Michael Romano

Photo of the screen of a parking validation machine that says "please pay displayed amount: five dollars", and underneath that, "change is possible."

I appreciate the optimism of this parking validation machine

I used to have time for defeatism on this subject and then after 2 weeks of lockdown the canals of venice were clear enough to see fish and the dolphins were back in the Ganga so yeah, the climate doomerism also now feels like an op

6 New Sci-Fi & Fantasy Short Story Collections to Devour in 2025 These are the most exciting new sci-fi and fantasy collections of 2025, from bone gallows to praying mantis dating lives.

My latest Book Riot post is live, in which I spotlight 2025 SFF collections and anthologies! Featuring work written or edited by Gina Chung, @coreyfarrenkopf.bsky.social, @leemandelo.bsky.social, @premeemohamed.com, @nnedi.bsky.social, and @kristinaten.bsky.social!

bookriot.com/new-sff-coll...

Graph of CO2 concentrations for the past 800,000 years from the Antarctic ice cores, showing current CO2 levels of 430 ppm are far, far higher than any level over this period, which never exceeded 300 ppm. Also shown is the emergence of Homo sapiens around 200,000 years ago -- so CO2 levels are higher than we've ever experienced.

You are here.
We've breached 430 ppm CO2.
#climatechange

Somehow, the future is both going to be a dystopian techno sci-fi hellscape AND we're gonna have coal and measles and robber barons and a permanent underclass.

Philip K. Dickens

California solar on canals initiative moves forward The California Solar Canal Initiative project aims to use information gained in a University of California, Merced study and begin to identify communities willing to generate electricity with solar…

California pilots a solar-over-canal system to combat drought. Project Nexus will cover canals with solar panels, generating clean energy while preventing water evaporation. The project showing potential for 13 GW of annual energy, while saving 50,000 acres of land. buff.ly/ZBokAil
#ShareGoodNewsToo

OpenStax | Free Textbooks Online with No Catch OpenStax offers free college textbooks for all types of students, making education accessible & affordable for everyone. Browse our list of available subjects!

OpenStax

openstax.org/details/book...

I made a thing! Hi friends! I am so excited to announce It’s Storytime with Wil Wheaton, my new podcast. Our first episode drops on March 26th. This idea emerged from my creative self […]

I am so excited to announce It's Storytime with Wil Wheaton, my new podcast. Our first episode drops on March 26th and is available wherever you get your podcasts.

Screenshot of ERA Explorer showing temperature, winds and warming stripes for Svalbard

Check out the new ERA explorer from @ecmwf.int

Snapshot from Svalbard - one of the fastest warming places on our planet.

Explore your own location and understand local climatologies and changes

era-explorer.climate.copernicus.eu

🧪⚒️🌏🌐🌊📈

Wired is dropping paywalls for FOIA-based reporting. Others should follow As the administration does its best to hide public records from the public, Wired magazine is stepping up to help stem the secrecy

They're called public records for a reason. Starting today, WIRED will *stop paywalling* articles that are primarily based on public records obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, becoming the first publication to partner with @freedom.press to offer this for our new coverage.

Pauli Murray.

My son reminded me:

"Just because you don't know your impact, doesn't mean your not having one."

It took 20 years for Pauli Murray to learn that it was their legal strategy that led to the end of segregation. Let that sink in.

Your effort matters more than you'll ever know.

Any time it rains you should be able to leave work early to go to the bookstore

A vintage photo from the National Archives shows smog hanging over the New York skyline

A vintage photo from the National Archives shows damaged oil drums piled high at an Exxon refinery.

A vintage photo from the National Archives shows cars driving down a road as smoke spews from factories in the distance and air pollution hangs over everything.

A vintage photo from the National Archives shows smog in Los Angeles taken from a high vantage point.

Just thinking about what the US looked like before the EPA existed

Illustration of an astronaut standing in a red and orange flower field, holding an old fashioned phone. The phone has a speech bubble that says, "you are not alone." Drawn by gdbeeart, 2025, paint tool sai

you are not alone.

‘Vague, confusing, and did nothing to improve my work’: how AI can undermine peer review Peer review ensures the findings of research are trustworthy. But what happens when it’s performed by an AI model?

"vague, confusing, and did nothing to improve my work" - the extremely widespread and uncritical use of software text generators as a replacement for real thought and engagement is corroding academia from the inside out

theconversation.com/vague-confus...

Google replaced useful human-generated links for AI-generated dad jokes. 🤡

Another world is possible and some people are living into it already.

This is a cartogram map of the United States depicting land use by different categories. The map distorts state shapes to represent proportional land usage. Key land use types include cow pasture/range (covering much of the central U.S.), private and federal timberland in the Pacific Northwest, corporate timberland in the Southeast, and urban housing/commercial areas in the Northeast. Other categories include agriculture (livestock feed, wheat exports, ethanol/biodiesel, cotton), protected lands (national parks, federal wilderness, state parks), and infrastructure (railroads, airports, highways). Additional specialized land uses include wildfires, golf courses, Christmas tree farms, and maple syrup production.

I think about this map a lot.

www.bloomberg.com/graphics/201...

Suspended Stone

😭 *cries in pro-rates 112 years later*

Ok, maybe AI is trash

Dutch pension fund ABP sells all Alphabet and Meta shares, CEO tells newspaper FD ABP, the Netherlands' largest pension fund, has sold its shares in tech companies Meta and Alphabet , its CEO told Dutch newspaper FD in an interview published on Monday.

💥The Netherlands' largest pension fund, has sold its shares in Tesla, Meta, and Alphabet (Google). The fund with US $569 billion equivolent in assets is "directing more money to companies and projects that help to improve society and the environment." #Divest

www.reuters.com/markets/euro...

‘Reading is part of my identity’: the woman taking on Goodreads owner Amazon Software engineer and developer Nadia Odunayo created the social media readers’ platform StoryGraph and its popularity has rocketed

Great alternative to Big Tech.

Do you forget to use alt-text when you post images? I'm forgetful, too. Fortunately, you can turn on reminders!

Settings -> Accesibility -> Require alt text.

Done! Easy accessibility.

‘The Interview’: Ed Yong Wants to Show You the Hidden Reality of the World The Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer talks about burnout from covering the pandemic and how bird-watching gave him a new sense of hope.

The most achingly beautiful explanation of what science is, from @edyong209.bsky.social: “the idea that much of the world is hidden from us, that we don’t perceive it and don’t understand it, and that it is worth understanding and it is necessary to understand.”

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/22/m...

How to Find Hope When You’re Feeling Cynical A new book explains the drawbacks of cynicism and how we can overcome it without being too naive.

”… cynicism—the idea that people tend to be selfish, greedy, and dishonest—is often more naive than we realize. Of course, bad things do happen, but cynical perceptions do not stack up to reality. Cynicism, he explains, is both personally harmful and damaging to society.” #mindset #hope

'My next home must be fireproof’: Why more Angelenos are looking to build 'SuperAdobes' There’s been a spike in interest in earthen architecture, particularly after a photo was shared on social media showing a a backyard structure that emerged from the Eaton fire intact.

“If everyone comes together at this moment, it could be an incredible opportunity to build these neighborhoods back with safe, fireproof housing that also works in harmony with nature…It could make Los Angeles a beacon for the country that would revolutionize housing to be safe from climate change.”

Public Library Ebook Service to Cull AI Slop After 404 Media Investigation Hoopla has emailed librarians saying it’s removing AI-generated books from the platform people use to borrow ebooks from public libraries.

“Librarians select, purchase, and lend materials in service to the public… Hoopla has broken this trust in favor of a profit-motivated, exploitative model that flies in the face of professional values… The misalignment of values between big vendors and libraries has never been clearer.”

Book bans impact public libraries & bookstores, but it’s school libraries where they are rampant ❤️‍🩹

Many kids are unable to make it to the public library. They can’t drive, often times the library isn’t in walking distance. It’s not that their grown-ups don’t want them to be library kids.

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