Sean Garrett

maybe the best lyrical output in a single song ever.

The NBA season ended on Sunday and believe it or not, that marks two entire seasons in which I've been running the Shams account. I have put a goofy amount of effort into that account for the sake of trying to make NBA Bluesky a thing - and I take the fact that the NBA now posts on Bluesky as a source of pride because I like to think I played a tiny role in that. I'm saying this because I want you to believe me when I say that I want Bluesky to succeed a lot and only criticize it out of love. I think Twitter is broken and I believe a better community can form here, and you know what, the NBA community here actually IS really good. But here's the thing: Bluesky must must MUST address the scale to which horrible Resistance accounts have been allowed to invade every waking corner of this app, because it's choking the life out of it and will eradicate whatever chance this place has of truly taking off if it's not fixed SOON.

I am very discouraged by how poorly Bluesky has dealt with this situation, because the aforementioned Resistance accounts (I'm using "Resistance" as a catch-all) have been draining the vibes on here for months and little seems to have been done about them. These accounts are rude, they're obnoxious, they're homophobic, they spam people like crazy, they drown the app in slop, and they react confrontationally to everything they see that isn't just about Trump - including sports. It's turned Bluesky into the only app I've ever been on where random users will actually come at you if you post about sports sometimes. It's hard to stress how bad that is for this place's sports prospects. Sports Twitter is never, ever, ever gonna meaningfully migrate over here if this place develops a reputation as Killjoy Land where angry Facebook refugees and scolds will legitimately confront you if you post about sports.

I believe the people running this app have consistently taken the easy way out when it comes to managing its user base - choosing to sit back and do little to nothing time and again as rude users who are poisonous for the community feel empowered to dictate the terms of engagement on it. Add that with the fact that the Discover feed is totally broken (search "Discover feed" on here and you will exclusively see people complaining about it) and is allowing this app's population of insufferable dweebs to find posts about sports/games/music/etc. that they consistently react to with hostility and you have an environment that is not just murky for sports but diametrically opposed to it. This place should be welcoming for sports ppl, but it can't really be that if the devs here never take a meaningful stand against the users who are manipulating the platform in a way that's ruining everyone else's time.

If there's one thing I could say to the people running Bluesky, it would be this: you can either be an app with a fun, chill, healthy environment in which thriving sub communities for things like sports can take hold, or you can be an app that 70-year-old grampas log into to scream at random people in between following grifter accounts that are pretending to be an underground cabal of park rangers, but you can't be both. Taking the path of least resistance will only result in malcontents strengthening their grip on this place. Just because most of the thinkpieces about Bluesky are bullshit doesn't mean the user experience hasn't also plummeted for a lot of people over the last year and will continue to plummet unless you find the initiative to wrestle control of this place away from ppl who are toxic. I still believe the sports community can become huge, but only if this app gives it a chance to be and right now it's unfortunately not.

Since the NBA season ended last night, here's my self indulgent take on where Sports Bluesky is atm. The TLDR is that crappy Resistance accounts are working like antibodies to flush casual sports ppl off this platform and the devs should address this if they actually want sports to take off here.

Rare case when the story is worse than the (bad) post which is worse than the (bad) headline.

This

I need you all to see the hype video that this person made to sell their 1994 Geo Metro

YouTube video by rrraaagggeeee The Fools - Psycho Chicken (1980)

No reason.

youtu.be/UnBlst3T7bY?...

all 6 mobiles on track

spectacular

The Good, The Bad, and The Unknown of AI with Kevin Roose Attention Shift · Episode

If there is anything that I’ve learned from BlueSky is that people here are optimistic about AI and love hearing @kevinroose.com’s takes on it. So what better way to announce my new podcast with @allisonbraley1.bsky.social than share an inaugural episode with Kevin. open.spotify.com/episode/1a5p...

Bluesky was foreshadowed by Strindberg and Helium: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw8c...

When the news gets overwhelming, I look through my dad’s collection of old newspapers. Zoom in and see everything happening on one day in June 1917.

I’ve reached the Mogwai phase. Send help.

National club volleyball tournaments are when all the dad species can come together. The Dad Bros. The Tattoo Dads. The Sprinter Van Dads. The Vouri Dads. The Oakley Dads. It’s a beautiful thing.

YouTube video by Club Jub Jub Late Night with Conan O'Brien - "Ginger, no!"

youtu.be/HGpI72vIeJ8?...

Seriously curious: Who is in the pro-tariff lobby? Could you get 100 people to show up for pro-tariff rally who genuinely cared?

NO KINGS is extremely effective because it’s simple, an extremely widely held belief, and gets right to the core of Trump’s assault without having to use words lots of people don’t understand

No More Kings Pavement · Schoolhouse Rock! Rocks · Song · 1996

“No More Kings”, Pavement (School House Rock cover)

open.spotify.com/track/5f6nPM...

Gift link.

The actual story of the shackled people being deported without even being told where they were being taken — maybe to countries where they’d face torture or death — while their terrified children cried.😢

The White House posted that pic with “ASMR” tag.

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/18/w...

You and I think about this all the time. And, he doesn’t.

SF Giants subreddit post about banning X links because Nazi symbolism, hate speech and other issues.

Banning X links is happening in many corners of Reddit, but this is notable because the SF Giants fanbase was a strong early mover onto early days Twitter.

Got an email yesterday congratulating me for being on LinkedIn for 21 years. That was nice, but, even better, the LI algorithm finally gets me now...

Hydroclimate volatility on a warming Earth Nature Reviews Earth & Environment - Rapid transitions between extreme wet and extreme dry conditions — ‘hydroclimate whiplash’ — have marked environmental and societal...

This exact temporal sequence of events, as observed in southern California in 2024, is something we use as a prototypical example of practical consequences of wet-to-dry "hydroclimate whiplash" events--which we show are increasing due to #ClimateChange. www.nature.com/artic...

Building Brands From Within: The Power of Authentic Storytelling with Brian O'Shaughnessy SUM Disruptors Podcast · Episode

Listening to @brianosh.bsky.social on storytelling and the importance of being actual, real humans in comms was just what I needed this morning. An encyclopedic / self-reflective convo on changes in media and PR with @mackmckelvey.bsky.social and Heidi Keele open.spotify.com/episode/63vV...

I've been using Facebook since 2006 and Instagram since 2010, and this is what Threads thinks I care about.

YouTube video by indy1234567891011 Run Lola, Run (Lola Rennt) - The Simpsons [HD] [SUBTITLES]

Ladies and gentlemen, it's the wee....

... it's an amazing Simpsons/Run Lola Run discovery. www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzhR...

Stay strong

YouTube video by m0ggieboy Mark E Smith reads the football results

My version of "ladies and gentleman, the weekend"...

Mark E Smith (of The Fall) reads football scores....

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBUi...

Tom Friedman's Waymo driver gave him a heads up...

YouTube video by Noah Glass Twitter 101 or twttr 101

Got to get @bizstone.bsky.social to do a Bluesky 'How To' so the simulation will be complete. www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGnM...

bsky.app/profile/sean...