Nate Ingraham

Politicizing tragedy is always out of bounds and a horrific desecration of the victim if it’s in service of trying to prevent future tragedy by taking obvious and proved remedies.

But it’s perfectly fine if it’s in service of demonizing an out-group for retaliation with literally zero .

Sure, the world is absolutely on fire, but the weather in Boston is CRISP and I'm wearing a flannel and generally feel rather cozy, so I'm going to try to enjoy that.

Also, fuck Mitch McConnell, Trump, ICE, and most of the corrupt and racist SCOTUS.

This is a disgusting money and attention grab loosely framed as journalism. Truly terrible stuff here.

This is perhaps the most upsetting thing I've read about AI so far, and that's saying a lot. Thanks for digging in to it for us.

This is fucking horrifying and I cannot believe that it is real, except that this is the world we live in.

In case you don't see what's going on in the preview for this story: "The former CNN host "interviewed" an AI avatar of one of the Parkland shooting victims."

It's as bad as you can imagine.

Reminder that in 2021, Senate Republicans filibustered a bill that would have banned partisan gerrymandering of congressional districts.

also i can't wait to play Ragebound!

Yeah, that I get! There are so many games from that era that I never finished but played over and over again anyway. Got to the final boss in Mega Man X so many times but couldn't put it away. In fact I can barely remember many games from that era I finished as a kid. Didn't stop me from loving them

I get this entirely. I spent a ridiculous amount of time trying to beat Sigrún in God of War, I've done both Last of Us on Grounded difficulty... occasionally I go nuts and decide to tackle what feels like an impossible challenge. And yet I still can't get anywhere on the original Donkey Kong!

I think what I'm ultimately saying is that I feel like NES / '80s games were often difficult because of the desire to keep people playing in an arcade, and that concept made its way home. Some people relish that, and that's great! But sometimes it feels not in service of a better game.

Makes me think about how Astro Bot and DK Bananza almost entirely do away with the concept of "lives." There's no reason to limit lives in those games, it's not part of the design concept and wouldn't make them better.

Yeah, there's just more types. That's interesting though because I feel like a lot of '80s game design is an extension of arcade game design from the time (so many of those games are ports to some degree) and thus they're designed to suck you dry of quarters....

But game design is so wildly different now that the comparison is almost meaningless? From your posts I know that you're not saying one should *only* play the way you're describing, but old games used difficulty so that people wouldn't mind playing them over and over again...

Will the UN finally broker a treaty to end plastic pollution? Negotiations for a global treaty to end plastic pollution are now in overtime, and UN member states are set to meet again in an attempt to reach a consensus.

Love this detailed report @cheymac.bsky.social put together on an ongoing attempt by the UK to agree on how to curb plastic pollution. I did not even know this was a thing. www.engadget.com/science/will...

iPadOS 26 preview: A long-awaited multi-tasking update pays off (so far) the iPadOS 26 pubilc beta is out, and it features the biggest multitasking update the iPad has ever received.

Second big story of the day is here: a deep dive into iPadOS 26. If you've been craving better multitasking, I think Apple is finally delivering on what you are looking for. It's quite a major update, even in beta form. www.engadget.com/mobile/table...

Donkey Kong Bananza review: Nintendo's latest 3D platformer is an instant classic A killer gaming mechanic, a delightful partner and a vibrant world make Donkey Kong Banaza

I've been in a bit of a gaming rut for a while. Fortunately, Donkey Kong Bananza absolutely slammed me out of that rut — I've been plowing through this game and loving everything about it, even though 3D platformer isn't my favorite genre. www.engadget.com/gaming/ninte...

The vibe from today's announcement

X CEO Linda Yaccarino is stepping down after two years One of Elon Musk's biggest cheerleaders and the head of X is moving on.

Lol, bye-bye Linda www.engadget.com/social-media...

The NYT Has a New Standard for What's Newsworthy: Whatever White Supremacists Are Pushing The paper laundered hacked documents from a race scientist into a hit piece on Zohran Mamdani, then silenced their own columnist for pointing out their source was a Nazi.

Today's newsletter: www.readtpa.com/p/the-nyt-ha...

It's so damn good.

PlayStation needs Neil Druckmann more than HBO does A tighter focus on making great games is the right thing now for Druckmann and Sony.

You'll be shocked to learn I had feelings about what Neil Druckmann's departure from HBO's The Last of Us means for both the show and Naughty Dog's future.

The timing is particularly interesting with Microsoft doing its best to single-handedly blow up major parts of the games industry yesterday.

ugh, i missed this one. not a huge shock but a shame nonetheless

Even before the Xbox layoffs, there was 'tension' at Halo Studios At least five employees at Halo Studios have been fired as part of company-wide layoffs at Microsoft on Wednesday, according to a developer with knowledge of the situation.

The Xbox / Microsoft layoff situation is wild and depressing. So many of these studios are doing good work and Microsoft's bottom line continues to grow but and getting cut because MAKE MORE? www.engadget.com/gaming/xbox/...

It's giving "i hate AI write this"

It's just embarrassingly bad!!

The Last of Us co-creator Neil Druckmann is stepping away from the show to focus on future games The co-creator of PlayStation's The Last of Us is stepping away from the HBO show to focus on games.

Hmm, big changes afoot for The Last of Us season 3. I still liked season 2 a lot, but also recognize that there were a lot of legitimate issues with the plotting and pacing. Just a difficult story to adapt to TV, so shaking things up isn't a huge surprise. www.engadget.com/entertainmen...

Jim Spanfeller is a fucking joke and I am glad that the fine folks at Kotaku no longer have to work under him.

Also, he's a shitty writer (assuming he didn't have AI write the bullshit missive that went out today).

Trump’s ‘Big, Beautiful Bill’ is a middle finger to US solar energy The 'Big, Beautiful Bill' will gut the domestic industry and hand solar power dominance to China.

Meanwhile, the bill that passed the Senate can fuck off in innumerable ways, one of which is what it may do the US solar energy market
www.engadget.com/general/trum...

I heard UPenn is now offering degrees in cowardice, kowtowing, and boot licking.

Penn Agrees to Limit Participation of Transgender Athletes

Lost in all of today's terrible news is that Penn is full of cowards.