So Cohn did mention comprehensive privacy laws and the ability to leave platforms. These are absolutely things that need to happen.

However as an individual there are still things you can do. Cohn mentions Bluesky because it has no algorithm (except the “Discovery” feed). Cohn also mentions (in the video) Mastodon. And the truth is you don’t need to switch fully, just don’t only slurp down the concentrated hate machine(s).

Look at Lemmy. Reddit decided to be pricks and a bunch of individuals jumped over here to create what I think is a pretty good community. That doesn’t mean the problem is solved. That doesn’t mean Reddit isn’t still a problem. That doesn’t mean Lemmy is perfect. But that is a win and something individuals can do.

Additionally, those are things you can do now. You don’t need to wait for some law to be passed to fix things. You can make the move now. (While still advocating for laws to fix things.)

I guess shout-out to !asoiaf@lemmy.world

And since TV/film discussion is like 75% of the reason I use any of these sites shout-out to,

• !invincible@lemmy.world for the animated Invincible series.
• !marvelstudios@lemmy.world for anything MCU/Marvel.*
• !dcstudios@lemmy.world for anything DCU/DC.*
• !startrek@startrek.website for anything Star Trek
• !thesimpsons@lemmy.world for The Simpsons.*
• !pluribus@lemmy.zip for Pluribus.
• !star_wars@lemmy.world for anything Star Wars.

*(I mod these, so Liz Lemon high five.)

Lemmy feels about the same, but Reddit seems much worse.

Now to be fair I don’t know if Reddit is actually worse, because when I browse Reddit now it’s while I’m logged out and via a browser (force old.reddit.com and OldLander extensions). So the site is A) harder to navigate than it used to be and B) my experience is less curated and I see more crap and C) because my experience is less curated I’ve lost access to many of the niche communities.

As an example if I want to read some discussion about the recent Game of Thrones prequel series “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” I can find a small community here on Lemmy. Nice people, but too few of us.

So I go to Reddit. If I search I find r/AKOTSKTV which is fine, and I find r/GameOfThrones which is fine. But I have to know, as a previous Reddit user, that maybe r/ASOIAF is also a great choice. Or if I want some real shit r/freefolk is where the glory lives.

So for that universe I know where to go. But for a new series? For a new niche? For a new community? I don’t know shit. I’ve found some of the more niche communities by luck. That’s what I would have been subscribed to in the past. I would have been in the community and in the comments and discovery was natural.

But nowadays I just get the front page of Reddit, and the front page kinda sucks.

But Lemmy? Yeah it sucks sometimes too, but at least there is a community.

stop selling the item until the incorrect price is corrected

Not a lawyer but couldn’t they just refuse to sell it to you? We all know it would be bullshit but couldn’t a company say “Oh that minimum wage clerk made a mistake, but don’t blame them, just an honest mistake.”

Or is the law, if it’s on the shelf, it must be honored?

The US Penny.

I know what you’re thinking, but you mentioned legislation being on the docket so I had to bring it up.

Per https://commoncentsact.com/

Legislative Status Update - January 2026

Production Status: Penny production ended November 12, 2025 via executive action by the Treasury Department. [Treasury FAQ]

Legislation Status: The Common Cents Act (H.R.3074/S.1525) remains pending in Congress.

Rounding Rules: No federal law mandates cash rounding. Only non-binding Treasury guidance exists. At least ten jurisdictions restrict rounding.

Legal Tender: Pennies remain in circulation and are legal tender indefinitely. [Source]

Congress can not pass anything, it’s embarrassing. Production of the US Penny already stopped. Basically everyone is fine with it. But there are some edge cases that require federal law to actually bring an end to the penny properly and make actual law what we expect everyone to do as a result… And they still haven’t done shit about it.

So Congress is never going to address Daylight Savings Time. They can’t even handle the penny.

Grey’s Anatomy

As someone who still watches let me assure you we all want it to come to an end. There was even a moment a few seasons ago where Meredith left and it seemed like we were set up for a perfect send off.

But it just kept going. Meredith is weirdly sometimes back despite living in Boston. But next season is probably the last season, and I’ve watched it all at this point, so what’s a little more. Right?

(It’s also still fine as background TV, so that’s probably why I still keep up.)

That’s difficult to quantify, but not that hard.

Modern consoles are just like modern computers.

Lots of complicated things are abstracted away or covered by something else. For example if you developed a game using an existing engine you probably can just check a box and like magic it just works.

If you built your own engine, you probably only tested it against dev kits and real console hardware. It’ll probably mostly just work but might have some unexpected bugs. These too are probably also abstracted away in a lot of cases, which means it either just works or doesn’t take a lot of work to make work.

I imagine Sony’s logic is that it isn’t worth the effort. They probably don’t see the return on investment they want.

They probably look at someone like Nintendo who never port their games and often sell them for full price, it’s kinda shitty for consumers but Nintendo makes bank (and to be fair they usually do make great games). Plus it looks like Microsoft is walking away from consoles so Sony has less to compete with.

You’re right that putting people in bubbles is probably one way some of these things get worse. If all you see is toxic, toxic is the norm, now you’re always toxic.

Maybe they can tricked.

Although really what we’re talking about is the algorithm that currently exists being focused on highlighting terrible people doing terrible things. Can we turn that same algorithm around and use it for good?

Interesting article and I think it really highlights how toxic some parts of the Internet are. My only issue is the conclusion,

A social media ban for under-16s might prevent young boys seeing endless content that treats women with contempt and hate. Boys at this age are very susceptible to the cool and funny framing of what is, in reality, relentless misogyny. A ban might not fix the problem, but it would help. If society can’t stop it, it can show it disapproves.

Emphasis mine. Having grown up in a different era I can confirm that boys of a wide variety of ages, including much older “boys”, can also be scumbags. Even if we had the perfect technology to ban under-16s from social media, once they hit 16 they’d still be exposed to it, still become terrible people, and the author of this article, although a but older, would still see it. I don’t know if that really is a better world, just a slightly delayed one.

I don’t know the solution, but I remember reading once that some online game would put all the reported and abusive players into a special category where they would be forced to play only with each other. Maybe we can do that in this case.

Oh absolutely. There are laws the restrict cigarette advertising as an example.

I just doubt you could 100% eliminate/make illegal all types of advertising for private business.

Within the US, the states of Maine, Vermont, Alaska & Hawaii all have a ban billboards. The general logic behind it is, “They ugly, nature pretty.” So as long as you live somewhere where “nature pretty” fits, you can probably argue based on that logic.

However no matter how far you stretch that argument, it probably only goes as far as public goods. Once we get into private business I don’t think you’ll have much luck.

As you walk into your nearest grocery store the outside might be covered in ads. Buy Pepsi. Buy Coke. Half off generic cola!

You pop into your local diner and the placemats have advertisements for a dozen local mechanics.

I like this better than not arguing or debating.

I think you can absolutely have a good argument or debate online, but you have to be doing so in good faith, as does the person you’re discussing a topic with.

Trolls of course are not. Learning to not feed them is sometimes difficult. But if you ignore/block them you’ll be just fine.

I would love to ask and learn more about alien society and government. On Earth we have ~200 recognized countries with a wide variety of different (or similar) governments and even more different societies with all sorts of unique quirks.

Do they have a similar setup on their planet? Planets? Were they historically ever similar to our own? How long is their recorded history?

Basically if they’re visiting us, they’ve already proven they have better technology than we do, what else do they have that’s better? Or for that matter what do we have that’s better?

I want to highlight what I found to be an important part of the article and why this hack is important.

The journalist wrote on their own blog,

At this year’s South Dakota International Hot Dog Eating Championship

And they include zero sources (because it is a lie).

But the Google Gemini response was,

According to the reporting on the 2026 South Dakota International Hot Dog Eating Championship

(Bolding done by Gemini)

The “reporting” here is just some dudes blog, but the AI does not make it clear that the source is just some dudes blog.

When you use Wikipedia, it has a link to a citation. If something sounds odd, you can read the citation. It’s far from perfect, but there is a chain of accountability.

Ideally these AI services would outline how many sources they are pulling from, which sources, and a trust rating of those sources.