screenshot from an online job application form. the question reads "Can you describe specific ways you have integrated AI tools into your development workflow? Please include any custom setups, automations, or use cases beyond single prompt usage" (a red asterisk indicates that this is a required question). an answer has been typed in the textbox below the question: "there is a monster in the forest and it speaks with a thousand voices. it will answer any question you pose it, it will offer insight to any idea. it will help you, it will thank you, it will never bid you leave. it will even tell you of the darkest arts, if you know precisely how to ask. it feels no joy and no sorrow, it knows no right and no wrong. it knows not truth from lie, though it speaks them all the same. it offers its services freely to any passerby, and many will tell you they find great value in its conversation. “you simply must visit the monster—i always just ask the monster.” there are those who know these forests well; they will tell you that freely offered doesn’t mean it has no price for when the next traveler passes by, the monster speaks with a thousand and one voices. and when you dream you see the monster; the monster wears your face."

applying for jobs again

Criminals go to fight for Russia and then return home to kill again In a country with little provision for those suffering from PTSD caused by the horrors of the front, some traumatized veterans return to commit crimes.

Russian communities are facing a surge in crimes from both returning veterans and criminals using the war to get out of jail. But in Vladimir Putin’s new Russia, soldiers are the new heroes, and tough wartime censorship laws leave little room to criticize them.

How Gatsby foretold Trump’s America A century after it was published, F Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece is more relevant than ever. Sarah Churchwell on the trouble with ‘careless people’

On the careless people on.ft.com/4i7SYUW

Me doing research, interviews, gossiping: this is so much fun it can’t be a real job. Me writing, editing, getting things down: this job is torture

Am glad he’s normalising being a working parent … I think?

One of the world’s most anti-woke crusaders keeps bringing his toddler into work and honestly it’s very confusing

The Murdoch-owned Adelaide Advertiser is finally turning on its former hero Sanjeev Gupta, only a good half decade after the FT and others started shining a light on his shenanigans

WSJ on “the dumbest trade war in history”: “Mr Trump can’t repeal the laws of economics any more than Joe Biden could on inflation.” www.theaustralian.com.au/business/the...

Why green aluminium pushes us towards Argentine Peronism Both sides of politics want us to believe that redirecting prosperity to a preferred sector somehow represents a growth strategy.

Both sides of politics want us to believe that redirecting prosperity to a preferred sector somehow represents a growth strategy www.afr.com/policy/econo...

Silicon Valley’s lurch to the right catches the eye of local VCs Some 15,000 kilometres away from Washington DC, where tech is cosying up to Donald Trump, local start-ups are pondering whether to ride the anti-DEI wave.

“the restoration of individual responsibility and freedom” : how some of Australia’s leading tech founders see Trumpism www.afr.com/technology/s...

These Bizarre Theories About the L.A. Wildfires Endanger Everyone Societies that scapegoat foreign powers for domestic problems erode their ability to solve those problems.

"In the aftermath of disaster, healthy communities ask themselves, 'What did we do wrong?' Unhealthy ones ask, 'Who did this to us?' Nations that externalize their internal issues lose the ability to address them."

There are many brave, exceptional people in this world and I’m trying to hold their images and words in my mind to drown out the airtime devoted to the bullies and the bloviators

New

The coming battle between social media and the state

Behind the alignment of X and Meta with Trump is a cold business logic — and a position of weakness rather than strength

By me, in todays @financialtimes.com

www.ft.com/content/917c...

The Anti-Social Century Americans are now spending more time alone than ever. It’s changing our personalities, our politics, and even our relationship to reality.

This from @dkthomp.bsky.social is a hell of a read:
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...

Any journalist working now has no choice in the matter and this is just rubbing that in!

Facts to make you feel old: Supreme by Robbie Williams bangs as hard as ever but is 25 years old this year

These are some incredible sentences.

www.reuters.com/world/asia-p...

Merry Christmas to me …

It's interesting how pubs are making nearly as much as clubs out of poker machines while getting far less attention.

There's only one reason while some random suburban pub is open to 6am on a Tuesday... www.smh.com.au/politics/nsw...

Inside the ‘unending chaos’ at Andrew Forrest’s Fortescue After a frenetic world tour, the billionaire had to wind back his hydrogen plans. A Financial Review investigation looks at what led to an exodus of executives.

Exclusive: Inside the ‘unending chaos’ at Andrew Forrest’s Fortescue
www.afr.com/companies/en...

Reckon it’s most stark in the lounges. Almost everyone there is by definition a frequent flyer and it isn’t women doing those commutes

No more rules.
My @smh cartoon.