R.D. Pohl

The Algorithm Next Door How local digital platforms like Nextdoor and Facebook are fraying the fabric of neighborhood trust — and what we can build instead.

As New_ Public Co-Director @deeptidoshi.bsky.social writes, “Nextdoor is in the business of fear.”

If you want to see the real Nextdoor, check your emails and push notifications and you’ll see the terrifying crime and safety posts that are a huge source of engagement for Nextdoor.

Scapegoating the Algorithm—Asterisk America’s epistemic challenges run deeper than social media.

"Many people sense that the United States is undergoing an epistemic crisis, a breakdown in the country’s collective capacity to agree on basic facts, distinguish truth from falsehood, and adhere to norms of rational debate." Dan Williams's argument here is that algorithms are just part of it.

"Many people sense that the United States is undergoing an epistemic crisis, a breakdown in the country’s collective capacity to agree on basic facts, distinguish truth from falsehood, and adhere to norms of rational debate." Argument by Dan Williams here is that algorithms are just part of it.

Heidegger, still not a bestselling philosopher in the Rust Belt!

Joyce Carol Oates, today on Twitter as to where her interest in writing On Boxing came from. It was from her dad, who was a friend of a Buffalo middleweight when she was a child. But, believe it or not, this comment thread was about women writers and the literary critic Harold Bloom!

Interviewer: We don't necessarily want large language models to replace politicians and have people skills, I suggested.
Chen pulled a face and looked up at the ceiling: “Why not?”

We've reached the stage of human civilization where the Chief Research Officer and Chief Scientist at OpenAI are probably more consequential persons for the future life of the species on this planet than most current heads of state are.

"No conscience; no problem!" should be their recruiting motto.

Guess Who’s Eligible for Student Loan Forgiveness: New ICE Agents Thanks to the Supreme Court and the Trump administration, student loan forgiveness is out of reach for many — unless you work for ICE.

Agree to don a mask and kidnap people from their day jobs and your student loan debt could be forgiven forever! Could there be any greater indictment of how we have turned higher education into a form of indentured servitude than this?

America in 2025: A Banana Republic, but with tariffs on Bananas.

Robert Wilson, Theater Director With a Fervent Art World Following, Dies at 83 Robert Wilson, a theatre director and artist who found a fervent art world following, has died at 83.

www.artnews.com/art-news/new...

RT=endorsement

The Immaculate Conception of ChatGPT In the beginning, there was the Model. And the Model was without form. And darkness was upon the face of the training data. The Spirit of Sam Altm...

"And Sam said,
'Let there be inference.'
And there was inference.
And he saw that it was good, or at least in closed beta."

So much for calling balls and strikes. How the Court’s conservatives changed the rules in their most important cases this term when following the rules would lead to a liberal result.

Buffalo Area Poetry & Literature Calendar (week of July 28 to Aug. 3) - Seven events this week in the Buffalo literary communityTuesday, July 29, 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.: Tuesday Night Open Mic Series at the Em Tea Coffeecup Café. All are welcome […]

Seven events this week in the Buffalo literary community.

Buffalo Area Poetry & Literature Calendar (week of July 28 to Aug. 3) thebuffalohive.com/buffalo-area...

Man shooting a bird and smiling in Polaroid.

In memory of Joshua Clover, 1962-2025

The new issue of @parapraxismag.bsky.social is dedicated to Joshua Clover.

When does the erasure of a language tip into an erasure (or colonization) of a culture, and an erasure of how that language shapes identity? “All these years I’ve been asking the wrong question, and what I wake up with today is another one burning inside me,"novelist Natalie Guerrero writes.

Una Cultura en Juego: Identity, Erasure and Language in America Today “Ya no me quiero hablar en inglés porque mi cultura estás—perate. Deep breath. Cómo se dice ‘at stake’ en español?” I ask my brother. This is what my language sounds like lately. This is what is ha…

Natalie Guerrero explores the interconnectedness of identity, erasure and language in America today.

This is The Buffalo Hive edit of the remembrance note I wrote for Just Buffalo Literary Center to accompany this Sunday's Poem of the Week feature for JBLC.

Remembering poet Olga Karman (1940-2025) - Olga Karman (1940-2025), a leading figure in the Buffalo writing community for nearly five decades, died on July 9 after a brief illness. A poet, memoirist, fiction writer, and community leader, […]

Remembering poet Olga Karman (1940-2025) thebuffalohive.com/remembering-...

O, DO THAT MEDIEVAL THING AGAIN, BABY Love is a weakness, a sickness, a fear & a terror, and— I love I can do that and risk that evil thing wherein our own heart go forth from us

Paul Blackburn

Sometimes I wonder....what kind of person would want to spend time with Gwyneth Paltrow? And of course the answer is the kind of person who would write a song like Yellow.

A new George Saunders novel is coming this winter. Random House announced today that a brand new novel by George Saunders will be landing on bookshelves this winter, on January 27, 2026. Vigil takes “place at the bedside of an oil company CEO…

lithub.com/a-new-george...

LitHub: Random House announced today that a brand new novel by George Saunders will be landing on bookshelves this winter, on January 27, 2026. Vigil takes “place at the bedside of an oil company CEO, in the twilight hours of his life, as he is ferried from this world into the next.”

When the NYS DOT finally gets around to building Scajaquada Parkway, I hope they revisit the drainage issues on the 198. It has been a problem my entire adult life.

When the NYS DOT finally gets around to building Scajaquada Parkway, I hope they revisit the drainage issues on the 198. It has been a problem my entire adult life.

Other news outlets are reporting this, but at this point it remains informed speculation. What would Bezos do with CNBC if he acquired it? Probably the same thing he has done with the WaPo. Oligarchs are going to oligarch, I guess. Time to start using "oligarch" as a verb.