Sameer Vasta

I wrote about AI art and why I philosophically refuse to use generative AI regardless of its potential utility, but it's actually about mortality and authoritarianism and book clubs and Bowling Alone. (I resisted an extended metaphor about curling, you're welcome / I'm sorry.)

Once you see RTO as one part of an anti-labor movement, it makes other things clear: in-office attendance requirements are designed to force tech workers to remain in expensive cities. Because a tech salary + a rural mortgage = a whole lot of power to say no.

The ever awesome @jameskingsley.ca made the shirt! I have it in four different colors. :)

More info here: www.jameskingsley.ca

Best bifana I’ve ever had was at a place called Rocinha in Porto. Your dance card is probably pretty full, but it’s worth a stop if you have some time and stomach space.

Easy trap to use on your local Canadian conservative

1. Ask if they support the TRC 94 Calls To Action (unless they're going full mask-off they'll probably say a careful yes)

2. Ask if they support defunding the CBC (they will almost certainly say yes)

3. Ask what the 84th call to action is

Does anyone care is almost never the right question. People care. The issue is that people don't know what to do.

the post office is a public service. it doesn’t need to make money. public transit doesn’t need to make money. the library doesn’t need to make money. some things exist for the public good and we desperately need lawmakers to stop thinking about them in terms of capitalism. these are not businesses.

Last weekend of September and it was still warm enough to make sandcastles on the beach and swim in Lake Erie. Enjoying these last vestiges of summer.

Summer may officially be over now, but there’s no way you can convince me that it’s still not chili dog season.

How Wikipedia Can Save the Internet With Advertising | TechPolicy.Press Robin Berjon explores how principled advertising on Wikipedia could fund a democratic digital future.

Want an internet aligned with the public interest? @robin.berjon.com does too. And he has one idea on how to do it: build an advertising ecosystem with Wikimedia at its center in order "tip the balance in favor of an open, democratic digital sphere" ...

"Balderdash!" you may scoff. But read ...

Good luck navigating the hills! It’s worth it — a magical city. Have fun!

As someone waiting for an important medical delivery shipped through Canada Post I will say that Canada Post is more than just inefficiency and junk mail. It's a vital connection backbone for our country and diminishing its service harms us all.

Through her creative platform, Saint Heron, Solange has launched The Saint Heron Library, a digital archive dedicated to making rare and out-of-print works by Black authors, poets, and artists accessible to all.

🔗 library.saintheron.com

"Canada Post is on track to lose money" Hum. Duh. It cost less than a toonie to send a letter across Canada.

"Canada Post is a service and not a business" was common knowledge until late stage capitalism brain rotted most people into think if it ain't making money for shareholders, it's failing.

The really innovative thing Canada Post could do would be a postal bank that takes on the challenger banks (EQ, Wealthsimple, etc). Just today WS announced they're cutting the 1% cashback on their prepaid Mastercard. A similar zero cost alternative could compete for customers on things like this.

Canada nation built (and built and built and built) until the 1970s, then began the great dismantling. I'd pin it to Mulroney era when rails were ripped out across country & Chretien/Harris pulling out of housing funding/backstopping. Canada Post stuff is just another dismantling moment.

Reminder that my most recent book is about the corporate control of Canada and how it's hollowing out public services, like Canada Post. I write about Crown corporations, their purposes and democracy in our economy. I'm available for interviews! Even though you'll pick a white guy professor instead!

it's 2007. you're scrolling your favorite rss feeds in google reader. the internet ad market has led to a boom in mid-sized blogs that can employ tens of writers and editors in a relatively niche subject. you don't know it, but this is the last time journalism will be any good.

Nobody Wants to Be a Foodie How “foodie” went from badge of honor to cringey term to pejorative smear and all the way back again.

Here it is, my last piece for @eater.bsky.social: my treatise on the last 20 years of food culture, and how food turned into fandom. I really hope you read it. www.eater.com/food-culture...

Most of the people I spoke to at the library today all mentioned that they don’t mind the longer wait for holds; they don’t like the extra steps to get the hold they want. (Personally, I don’t mind either way, but there was a vociferous contingent at the library today that was pretty against this.)

Works for me too, but from most people I’ve talked to at the library today (mostly senior citizens and parents with young kids) they all worry they’ll forget to un-suspend the hold and it’s more steps for them to get the book they want.

I am shocked and surprised by this unexpected finding that in no way aligns with everything we know about the tech industry, the medical profession, or how power works.

Using LLMs in this context essentially guarantees that existing biases are maintained and reflected consistently. There’s no longer a way to seek out a “good doctor” if they’re all flattened into using the same poisoned data sets. There is no argument in favor of the ethics of any of this.

"if you dont use smart glasses with an always-on AI assistant youre going to fall behind intellectually" i cannot express how little i am concerned about being shown up by people who have paid money to have a simpering computer lie into their ear at all times

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

We really are living in a wild time.

💜

A Way We Were - Anil Dash A blog about making culture. Since 1999.

I wrote up a little bit more about how Prince took some inspiration from Redford & Streisand in "The Way We Were", and then how that led to a fun conversation with him about intellectual property. (There's a little gift for you at the bottom of this post, too.) www.anildash.com/2025/09/17/a...

Thanks for sharing that recording at the end!

Fruit crisp - Flashing Palely in the Margins Sameer Vasta is an epistolarian, anthropologist, urban explorer, and over-user of the discretionary comma.

“I eat, and thoroughly enjoy, dessert now. It is an indulgence that reminds me that every day is worth celebrating in some small way.” www.inthemargins.ca/fruit-crisp