Bobby Allyn

U.S. has a quarter fewer immigration judges than it did a year ago. Here's why The continued drain of personnel from the already strained immigration court system has contributed to depleted staff morale, mounting case backlogs — and floundering due process.

Immigration courts by the #’s:
- 25% less judges
- 400 less legal assistants + clerks
- 12 courts lost over half their judges, two have no full time IJs
- supervisors spread across several locations

We break down a clear picture of what is happening across the country:

www.npr.org/2026/02/23/g...

but when there’s a high-profile trial in California it’s a funny thing right, because networks are scrambling to book guests when reporters are least available (in court reporting!) so filling that void are usually shameless self promoters with a ring light at the ready

This did not happen. The judge issued a general warning about not recording with smart glasses, but she didn’t “upbraid” or call out Meta’s legal team

Bookers: Getting nuances like this right is why talking to reporters who actually witnessed something, not professional pontificators, is important

the tail that wags the dog that caught the car

A fake ICE tip line reveals neighbors reporting neighbors A Nashville comedian’s deportation hotline, set up as a joke, has gone viral among viewers who say it shows the “banality of evil personified” in the U.S. immigration crackdown.

New: A comedian set up a fake ICE tip line as a joke. Then 100 calls flooded in: neighbors ratting on neighbors, a teacher reporting a kindergartener. Fans say the viral TikToks revealed deportation's "banality of evil." Conservatives say he should be in prison wapo.st/4kM4qbF

The Problems With Prediction Markets

Went on WAMU’s 1A to talk about the unhinged state of prediction markets and whether the casino-ification of every aspect of modern life will ever stop (spoiler: probably not) open.spotify.com/episode/6Vql...

The story of Section 230 goes back to an AOL troll. Now the law may be undone A fight between a Seattle man and AOL in the 1990s led to what has been called "the most important internet law ruling ever." Decades later, the Supreme Court is weighing if Section 230 still fits.

with the 30th anniversary of Section 230, here's a profile i did of the Seattle man whose quixotic campaign against AOL in the 90s over a tasteless Oklahoma City bombing phone prank became the tech industry legal immunity precedent everyone still can't stop fighting over

www.npr.org/2021/05/11/9...

How Epstein and Maxwell used an elite Midwest arts school to prey on girls Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell lavished money on the Interlochen Center for the Arts to gain access, documents show — even funding an on-campus lodge they stayed in. In the process, two teenage...

In the 90s, Epstein and Maxwell used to visit an elite Michigan boarding school and would walk around with a cute little Yorkie "to help break the ice" before Epstein would "dangle the prospect of financial support for their education"

www.npr.org/2026/02/19/n...

There are different estimates among Meta trial attendees about exactly how massive a poster was that a team of lawyers held up in front of Zuckerberg as he sat on the witness stand showing hundreds of selfies taken by the plaintiff. Her lawyer Mark Lanier clarifies it was a 35-foot-long poster.

Zuckerberg grilled about Meta's strategy to target 'teens' and 'tweens' The billionaire tech mogul's testimony was part of a landmark social media addiction trial in Los Angeles. The jury's verdict in the case could shape how some 1,600 other pending cases from families a...

Zuckerberg’s big day in court, where he faced questions like: "People who join Facebook at 11 years old? I thought y'all didn't have any of those?"

www.npr.org/2026/02/18/n...

Another random back-and-forth from today's testimony:

Plaintiff lawyer Mark Lanier: “Are you familiar with the term doom-scrolling?”

Zuckerberg: “Roughly”

(Reporters aren’t allowed to transit during the proceeding, so impossible to post about it live, only on court breaks)

From the witness stand, Mark Zuckerberg was asked about media training and how Meta comms staff are asking him to portray himself, to be more “human” and “relatable” and less “fake,” “corporate,” and “cheesy.” Zuckerberg adds: “I think I’m known to actually be pretty bad at this.”

and while prediction market traders are on the hunt for alpha, in the markets with the most liquidity, like major sports events, traders are now up against high-frequency arbitrage bots executing contracts in a fraction of a second. almost like…the stock market! except without the whole SEC thing

The degree to which MAGA world is embracing prediction markets because Polymarket called the election early for Trump should not be overlooked.

The social value question of prediction markets is an important one. Until this admin, the CFTC wouldn't allow futures contracts that were "contrary to the public interest," and would block all that are "readily susceptible to manipulation." But that's all being bulldozed today.

retail traders colocating for physical edge in prediction-market bets, now i've seen it all

Seeking an edge is an old trading tactic. Very old. It reminded one finance professor of people in the 1600s who would glimpse with a telescope the size of boats docking ashore to secure competitive intel about commodity imports !

Others are sharing tips on buying terrestrial TV antennas to get a millisecond advantage on “mention markets,” when traders stream live events and bet money on someone saying a word or phrase. One trader complained on Discord: “Antenna chads mog us so hard”

Another trader inspected the HTML code of Travis Scott’s website and found an embargoed release on single sales. He used this edge to out-maneuver other traders on Kalshi betting on Billboard 100 charts

After Charlie Puth was spotted in SF, one trader flew from Ohio to Santa Clara with a parabolic bird mic and a stopwatch to record rehearsals of the Super Bowl national anthem. Bettors were taking wagers on Polymarket over how long the national anthem would last. He nailed it and made many thousands

TV antennas and Super Bowl rehearsals: How prediction market traders seek an edge As prediction markets boom, competition is heating up. So traders go the extra mile for a fraction-of-a-second advantage or to sleuth out information nobody else has. It can lead to a huge payday.

Prediction market traders are “seeking alpha” by buying TV antennas for a millisecond of speed, timing the Super Bowl national anthem rehearsal in person and uncovering not-yet-public press releases hiding in the HTML of websites. Anything for an edge!
www.npr.org/2026/02/17/n...

Meta Plans to Add Facial Recognition Technology to Its Smart Glasses

In 2021, I reported on an internal meeting at Facebook about discussions to put facial recognition on new smartglasses. One of their execs complained about the coverage and said the co would have a "very public discussion" about the tech.

They never did. And now: www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/t...

Homeland Security Wants Social Media Sites to Expose Anti-ICE Accounts

New story up on the Homeland Security Department’s new tactic: flood social media companies with subpoenas to unmask anonymous accounts that criticize ICE or monitor the movements of ICE agents.

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/t...

During the social media addiction trial today in LA, a lawyer for Meta pressed psychiatrist Anna Lembke on the witness stand about what apps besides Instagram can hook people.

“Can people become addicted to Netflix? Can someone get addicted to outtakes of American Idol?”

Meta Plans to Add Facial Recognition Technology to Its Smart Glasses

Meta's plan for launching glasses that people can use to secretly identify strangers on the street is to do it "during a dynamic political environment" when people who care about why that's bad are "focused on other concerns."

www.nytimes.com/2026/02/13/t...

Israel accuses two of using military secrets to place Polymarket bets The Tel Aviv indictment is the first publicly known instance of people being accused of leveraging military secrets to place bets on the popular prediction market.

The Tel Aviv indictment is the first publicly known instance of people being accused of leveraging military secrets to place bets on the popular prediction market. n.pr/4kvG3yW

Israel accuses two of using military secrets to place Polymarket bets The Tel Aviv indictment is the first publicly known instance of people being accused of leveraging military secrets to place bets on the popular prediction market.

“Such bets can put your own military at greater risk because you are signaling to your enemies what may happen, and that puts your own troops in danger"

www.npr.org/2026/02/12/n...

What happens when you can bet on everything? - WHYY Today, we pull back the curtain on prediction markets: who’s using them, how they make money, and the real risks and rewards beneath the hype. We also ask a bigger question: why does it feel like bett...

You could talk for hours about the bizarre ways prediction markets could go wrong. Enjoyed exploring that on @whyy.org
along with @bobbyallyn.bsky.social:

whyy.org/episodes/pol...

Apple News is an enormous driver of traffic for many publishers that have seen link referrals crater with the rise of AI Overviews/LLMs. If Apple News responds to this by promoting a fever swamp of far-right partisan outlets, many news sites are gonna get utterly walloped