The Pope & The Puffer
+ I went on a podcast with Gemma Styles and I luv her ❤️🔥
Good moooorning my angels! I have just awoken from a dream I was having about Harry Styles (no wonder I found it IMPOSSIBLE to get out of bed this morning - who would want to wake up from that??) I also did the most un-Luce thing in the world yesterday - I got my nails done. My flatmate Flo always gives me shit about having gross nails (she’s kinda right 💀), so for her birthday she wanted me to get my nails done (I shouted her too, don’t worry.)
Anyway, they’re bright pink & sparkly, and as soon as I got home I slammed my fingers in the door nearly ruining them ˙ᵕ˙
PS, SUCCESSION STARTED LAST NIGHT - WHO’S WATCHING WITH ME???????
PPS, WHO’S WATCHING MAFS AUSTRALIA? (Don’t spoil bc I’m behind)
PPPS love u 𓆩♡𓆪 xxx
The Pope & The Puffer
Me + Gemma Styles, the crossover all the fans deserve
🗺Around the world🗺
Hong Kongers hold their first authorized protest in years, under strict rules
Protests against Benjamin Netanyahu break out
Elon Musk values Twitter at $20b now (down from $44b)
Today’s mundane poll: Do you think “breaking the seal” (when you’re out drinking and you pee ONCE and then you have to pee all night) is real?
The Pope & The Puffer
For a lil while now I’ve been wanting to explain the dangers of AI and misinformation in a way that doesn’t make me look like an Old Man Shaking Fist At Cloud - and thanks to Old Man Dressed Up As Cloud - I got it.
This photo of the Pope in a puffer trench went INCREDIBLY viral on Twitter the other day because people couldn’t believe the Pope was so DRIPPY. It racked up thousands of retweets and started conversations all over my timeline (but not a single one mentioned the possibility of this being AI generated for a loooong time…)
Then some good human did what I can only assume was about 10 minutes of research into WHERE the photo came from, and realised it was from R/Midjourney (a Reddit page all about AI art made with Midjourney.) It’s really funny to see people in the comments of that thread laughing at us normies from other parts of the web who believed it, and even FUNNIER to see how us normies reacted when we found out we’d been duped:
For obvious reasons this is also a lil freaky. This was a good and low-stakes example of how AI is going to change the way we see things, but you don’t even really have to use your imagination to picture the high-stakes and dangerous versions of this (we’ve already been seeing it with deepfake tech tbh.)
But I’m also interested in how this will change our thinking - will we all start questioning EVERYTHING we see, or not believing anything without proof? Proof and facts are good, but questioning everything can lead into conspiracy territory so that feels like something we should watch. For the record, I don’t have ANY answers (sorry) and tbh after seeing that TikTok hearing I don’t hold out much hope for regulation for tech like this… ever. Live laugh love! ✿ ★☆ ✰ ❀
Me + Gemma Styles, the crossover all the fans deserve
I can’t bring myself to listen to this podcast so you better listen and tell me that it’s really good 𓆩♡𓆪
🗺Around the world🗺
Hong Kong
Hong Kongers hold their first authorized protest in years, under strict rules (NPR)
Dozens of people on Sunday joined Hong Kong's first authorized protest since the lifting of major COVID-19 restrictions under unprecedentedly strict rules, including wearing a numbered badge around their necks.
For those who don’t remember, in 2020 Hong Kong passed strict new security laws making protesting/ speaking out against the government extremely dangerous. But now, for the first time since Covid restrictions were lifted, protesters are back - kinda. This protest was ‘police approved’ which protesters said was “super weird.”
But organizers had to comply with police requirements such as taking measures to ensure the number of participants would not exceed the expected turnout of 100 people and asking for proof of a "reasonable excuse" from protesters who wore masks during the event. At the height of the 2019 anti-government movement, Hong Kong's government invoked emergency powers to ban masks from public gatherings so it can identify protesters who officials accused of illegal acts.
Middle East
Israeli PM Netanyahu says he is ‘not ready to divide the nation in pieces’ after mass protests over judicial overhaul (The Guardian)
Israel is currently in ‘domestic turmoil’ over the government’s plans to change the way the judicial system works.
The protests intensified when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired the defence minister, Yoav Gallant (he had spoken out against Netanyahu's plans to overhaul the justice system.)
This is a big story that I’m not fully equipped to give you all the deets on, so let me lean heavily into some people much smarter than me.
Like the BBC (for a bit of background on the reforms):
The legal reforms at the centre of the crisis concern the power of the government versus the power of the courts to scrutinise and even overrule the government.
The government - and others - say reform is overdue, though the plans go much further than many people would like.
Under the government's plans:
The power of the Supreme Court to review or throw out laws would be weakened, with a simple majority of one in parliament able to overrule court decisions.
The government would have a decisive say over who becomes a judge, including in the Supreme Court, by increasing its representation on the committee which appoints them
Ministers would not be required to obey the advice of their legal advisers - guided by the attorney general - which they currently have to by law
The latest is that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “has delayed his government's controversial judicial reform plans until the next parliamentary session” which kinda only prolongs the issue - but you can get live updates here!
Tech
Elon Musk Values Twitter at $20 Billion
Losing it bc he bought it for $44b and is calling it an ‘inverse start up…’
Isn’t that just a ‘shut down???’
Elon Musk said Twitter is now worth about $20 billion, according to an email he sent the company’s employees on Friday, a significant drop from the $44 billion that he paid to buy the social network in October.
Today’s mundane poll:
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I too just woke up from a dream about Harry Styles and that being the first thing you wrote about really threw me off 😌🫣
luce!!! the pod!!!! im obsessed - halfway thru and have been counting the seconds until work is over to listen to the other half. so surreal to hear a crossover of my faves!!!