Welcome back to the Abstract! You’ve probably been reading a lot about humans this week. Most of the news seems to revolve around humans. Fair enough, we do seem to get up a lot of hijinx. But now, we’re going to check in on what some other Earthlings have been doing with their time. Some…
This is Behind the Blog, where we share our behind-the-scenes thoughts about how a few of our top stories of the week came together. This week, we discuss getting fooled, the ‘one big story’ of the week, and Ghibli. SAM: I remembered earlier this week that it’s almost April Fools’ Day, because Joe showed us…
This article was produced in collaboration with Court Watch, an independent outlet that unearths overlooked court records. Subscribe to them here. The FBI managed to track down and freeze millions of dollars of cryptocurrency Caesars Entertainment sent to a group of hackers that held the casino’s computer systems ransom, according to a 404 Media and Court Watch…
In a video that fills me with wonder at being alive in 2025, someone in an inflatable Pikachu costume was seen loping down the street in Turkey alongside anti-Erdoğan protesters fleeing from the cops. Pikachu was spotted amongst anti-Erdoğan protesters fleeing from police in Antalya, Turkey last night. — Adam Schwarz (@adamjschwarz.bsky.social) 2025-03-27T14:36:22.725Z The protests—reportedly…
On Tuesday, OpenAI updated ChatGPT with new AI image generation capabilities that make it especially good at recreating specific visual styles. People trying the new feature immediately flooded social media with images in the style of Studio Ghibli and Japanese animation legend Hayao Miyazaki, who famously called artificial intelligence “an insult to life itself.” Miyazaki’s…
AOL.com is using AI to write captions for photos, which gave cutesy captions to photos of a man who allegedly tried to throw his wife off of a cliff in Hawaii and who has been charged with attempted murder. The article, “Top Doctor Allegedly Tried Pushing Wife Off Hawaii Beauty Spot in Wild Homicide Attempt,”…
One of the most basic tenets of cybersecurity is that you must “consider your threat model” when trying to keep your data and your communications safe, and then take appropriate steps to protect yourself. This means you need to consider who you are, what you are talking about, and who may want to know that…
You all already know the story about national security leaders, Signal, and The Atlantic by now. But to summarize in one sentence: a top U.S. official accidentally added the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic to a group chat on the secure messaging app Signal, and members of the group chat then discussed plans for striking Houthi…
This week we start with the bankruptcy of commercial DNA company 23andMe, and what it means for its users’ genetic data. Probably not good things! After the break, Joseph and Jason explain what ‘Dogequest’ is, and how people allegedly vandalizing Tesla locations have been caught. In the subscribers-only section, Emanuel tells us about some fake…
This article contains potentially disturbing graphics and descriptions that are nonetheless viral on Instagram and other major platforms. These are words I never thought I would type, and the people in my life who I have said them to have told me to immediately stop speaking. But here is how I would describe the type…