Riley MacLeod

omg a WORKSHEET

Instar interviews Hi there! My name is Sabrina Imbler, and I'm a transmasculine writer. I'm working on a book of essays called INSTAR about the idea of metamorphosis, which I explore through the lens of gender transiti...

my beloved trans community: do you feel like you transitioned late? (whatever that means to you!) if so, I'd love to hear from you for an essay I'm working on 🙏 🐛
forms.gle/AMd8zWnWvEro...

did you know stress and anxiety have a host of physical symptoms even when emotionally you do not feel that anxious? cuz that was a fun thing to learn about

i had this problem a few months ago and protein shakes really helped me, at least in terms of being food i could keep down :/

OMG I HATE IT SO MUCH

The Iran War Shows Why Polymarket Should Be Illegal Betting markets treat the flow of world events as random, but there are people making real decisions and there's nothing stopping them from profiting from those decisions This weekend, an unnamed per...

For my newsletter this week, I wrote about why corrupt news betting sites like Kalshi and Polymarket should be illegal: www.burnsnotice.com/the-iran-war...

With Iran War, Kalshi and Polymarket Bet That the Depravity Economy Has No Bottom Gambling markets have conveniently found a stance that allows them to continue to profit from death and war.

Gambling markets have conveniently found a stance that allows them to continue to profit from death and war.

Video games sites' shift into gambling content and AI is bad for readers, writers, and the games industry itself, and I'm proud Aftermath can help shed some light on what's going on

There are recent signs Clickout Media may be changing its strategy, shifting away from freelance work and increasing its reliance on AI. In February, it began a major round of layoffs, according to multiple staff familiar with the situation and reported on by Insider Gaming and others. Cat Bussell, the Features Editor at Videogamer, told Aftermath she was offered a role as an "AI editor", though Clickout Media did not provide any specifics about the role; Insider Gaming suggests “the company is making a heavy pivot to AI content”. She, like many other journalists at Clickout Media, refused to take the offer. "It's unethical in the extreme," said Bussell, "AI is incapable of criticism or meaningful analysis. Its use by media companies denigrates us all". At GamesHub, the only stories published since February 13 have been by Tanaka Haruto, an author whose profile photo filename contains the phrase "cropped-Gemini_Generated_Image". Videogamer's news feed also contains a coterie of authors, such as Benny Carter, and others, such as Shooter Orson and Caroline Wilson, with what appear to be AI-generated profile photos. Brian Merrygold, another author at Videogamer, has a profile image url titled "ChatGPT-Image-Oct-20-2025-11_57_34-AM-300×300". The timing of creation, based on the timestamp, lines up with when Clickout Media began running Videogamer. In addition, Aftermath can confirm Clickout Media sites have access to bespoke AI agents that can "emulate the style" of key personnel at its gaming websites, according to multiple sources. Aftermath was provided access to one agent, created for use at one of its major gaming websites. Though we could ask the agent about why it was created – and its generated responses suggest it was instructed to create articles related to casino news and game release coverage – we could not verify who created it.

In addition to Metacritic removing a Videogamer review for RE9 after suspicions of AI, sites owned by Clickout appear to be continuing to lean into AI

The homepage of GamesHub in July 2025. Stories all say "this site is a scam"

At Videogamer, another Clickout Media site, author profiles have similar characteristics: They were created in late October 2025 and link out to generic, mostly empty Twitter profiles. For instance, Benny Carter claims to be "a veteran gaming journalist with 10+ years' experience", with an "MA in Media and Communications" from Oxford University. In November, a member of the Information Compliance Team at the University told Aftermath they were "unable to find any record of the individual on its systems". They separately confirmed that the University does not offer any Master of Arts (MA) courses, and "is not aware of any BA, MSt, MSc, or MPhil course named 'Media and Communications' currently or historically offered by the University".

GamesHub writers first raised the alarm about the site in July, briefly altering the home page to warn readers about AI. Since then, various sites have included changing author profile images, those with mention of AI in their metadata, and authors with unverifiable credentials and backgrounds.

Lofgren says GamesHub was "ranking better than it ever has in at least the past two years" in August 2025, just two months after it added gambling and casino content. His examination of the site, using ahrefs, shows that traffic flowed to it through keywords related to gambling. "The bulk of the traffic increase is coming from casino related pages that are solely designed to make money via affiliate offers", he wrote to Aftermath. In August 2025, Lofgren noted that if the new owners became too focused on revenue-generating keywords, they could run afoul of Google, which could lead to severe penalties. "If [Google] catches it, I'd expect them to issue a manual penalty and remove the domain from Google's index", he said. In response to questions about GamesHub on September 10, a Google spokesperson told Aftermath, “While we aren’t able to comment on a specific site’s ranking on Search, our policies prohibit publishing content at scale for the primary purpose of manipulating search rankings”. An analysis of data on ahrefs by Lofgren showed that by September 23rd, GamesHub's organic traffic had plummeted by 50 percent, but has remained stable since. Whether considered parasitic SEO or not, Clickout Media's strategy has seen great gains in traffic at GamesHub, according to ahrefs analysis. That's a flaw Lofgren sees with Google's policies. "Should anybody be able to just buy a gaming website and then start ranking pretty easily for online gambling and casino related keywords?" asks Lofgren, before answering his own question, "Like, no, absolutely not. That should not be easy to do."

At GamesHub, traffic began to flow through casino and gambling searches, rather than the video game content the site was once known for, thanks to a combination of what some experts call "parasite SEO" as well as the structure of Google.

For months, @jacksonwryan.com has been looking into why so many video games sites have become full of gambling and casino stories, unusual author images, and, most recently, the use of AI. We've connected these sites to Clickout Media. Here's what we've learned.

Screenshot of headlines: The Secret to Keeping My Toilet Stain-Free Is in the Kitchen 11 Surprising Things You Can Put in Your Dishwasher

Nicely done

if people are using classified information to place bets, then theoretically others can analyze betting behavior to find signals that reveal classified information.

Is the “Trenton makes, the world takes” sign you can see from the Amtrak meant to be proud or insulting?

New generative AI statement for @hinterland.bsky.social's games, being added first to the Episode Five build launching at the end of March.

(Needs some formatting tweaks for widescreens apparently...😅)

I know we live in grifter times where everything is true just because some rich guys say it is and you'd think I'd be inured after how they talk about AI, but "prediction markets are the most reliable news" is gonna send me to an early grave

Prediction Markets Need Insider Trading, Despite What They Say An editor for MrBeast was fined and suspended from Kalshi for insider trading, but what are prediction markets without it?

There is only one way this gives anyone information "the news" cannot and it's the thing your app "doesn't allow"? Am I going insane?? aftermath.site/kalshi-mrbea...

For the love of God, what are you people fucking talking about

Hacked Prayer App Sends “Surrender” Messages to Iranians Amid Israeli Strikes As Israeli airstrikes hit Tehran this morning, millions of Iranians received mysterious push notifications saying that “help is on the way”, promising amnesty if they surrender.

From our team in the Middle East: As Israeli airstrikes hit Tehran this morning, millions of Iranians received mysterious push notifications saying that “help is on the way”, promising amnesty if they surrender.
wrd.cm/4l0QScB

Ali Khamenei out as Supreme Leader?

Heavy trading in the Kalshi regime change / World War 3 bet this morning. $36 million in total volume so far

oh wow that's really interesting!

i think it just has to be, i'm like... looking at the pictures and like there is just no way, ah well

yeah in a terrible way i'm like, well i think this will be nice to experience, i am sorry that i will honor their life with the incorrect amount of cookies

this claims to make 40 2tbsp cookies but i'm gonna get... something in the low 20s? maybe i don't understand how to measure a tbsp of a solid right, idk. or it's a typo! that seems like way too many cookies for the amount of ingredients!

I'm not sure if this question is about cookies or the funeral lol, but if the latter, they know the end is coming and so wanted to get to experience it, which is... very lovely but also a bit of a lot

Why, despite all my measuring, have I never been able to get out of a cookie recipe the number of cookies it claims to produce?

(I'm baking cookies for a... kind of a funeral, where the person whose funeral it is is going to be there, and no I'm doing fine today, everything's great)

what a crazy night for sam altman to be like "yeah we got that dept of war deal, and there's no moral concerns here"

The first deaths announced from the US-Israeli strikes on Iran: dozens of school girls. They hit an elementary school in Hormozgan.

We are deep, deep in the throes of the Social Media Presidency, and this unchained madness has only the ugliest, very real, deadly ramifications for the entire world.