Weekly Scroll: Big Sticks and Tiny Chefs

Plus! AI Law and Headline Of The Year

Welcome to the Weekly Scroll!

This week’s post is blessedly non-political. But if you can’t get enough politics, I wrote about what we can learn from the New York mayor’s race over at The Dispatch - check it out! I also have a member-exclusive episode of the New Liberal Podcast on the US/Israel/Iran situation.

Bill Maher loses a war with a Stick Account

There’s an account on Instagram called OfficialStickReviews that… reviews sticks. You ever find a really awesome stick and need to show your friends? Who doesn’t love a good stick? The account has more than three million followers and has built a whole community of stick enthusiasts. Dudes Rock is what I’m saying here.

Bill Maher, the talk show equivalent of a dirty sock that’s been stuck behind your couch for 12 years, somehow found this account and made fun of them for the crime of being righteous dudes who like sticks. The page reposted the clip, and the entire stick community declared war on Maher.

What did war look like? Mostly that they selected three of their best sticks, let a dog choose which one was best, and mailed the stick to Maher’s show. This was controversial, with some fans saying it was a ‘waste of a good stick’ to send one to Maher. But there’s a happy ending:

realtimers

A post shared by @realtimers

Bill brought the gift on air and was forced to admit that it was ‘a nice stick’. Because honestly, what kind of monster would deny the value of a good stick?

Do LLMs Violate Copyright?

There were two massive court cases this week on the legality of how our AI tools are trained, both of which will have significant implications for the future of the industry.