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Colossal Valid
Text • Grace Ebert

The Longtail of Incarceration Unfolds in Gil Batle’s Surreal Narratives

The Longtail of Incarceration Unfolds in Gil Batle’s Surreal NarrativesThe lively flora and fauna of a tiny Filipino island commingle with harrowing memories of California prisons in the surreal works of Gil Batle.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $7 per month. The article The Longtail of Incarceration Unfolds in Gil Batle’s Surreal Narratives appeared first on Colossal.

kottke.org Valid
Text • Jason Kottke

Fun thread: “sodas with a doctorate” (e.g. Dr. Pepper).

Fun thread: “sodas with a doctorate” (e.g. Dr. Pepper).

Radiolab Updates instantly via WebSub
Audio • WNYC Studios

The Holy Shiver

radiolab.org/podcast/the-holy-shiver

Lauren Brown gets goosebumps. A lot. Sometimes several times a day. When her partner, writer Carmen Maria Machado, noticed it...she couldn't stop thinking about it. Why does she get them in so many different situations? What’s happening in her body and what does it mean? We ...

kottke.org Valid
Text • Jason Kottke

VoiceDot : “Every dot on this globe is a real...

VoiceDot: “Every dot on this globe is a real person’s voice — a short story about a place, a memory, a feeling. Tap one and hear someone from the other side of the world.” And you can record your own for others to hear.

Longreads Valid
Text • Brendan Fitzgerald

No Return

"Did an experienced alpinist leave his girlfriend to die at the top of a mountain?"

Longreads Valid
Text • Longreads

The Top 5 Longreads of the Week

In this edition: Concrete memories, grief science, captive cats, relentless pain, and myth meets reality.

sorry, this post is only available to Longreads members. To become a member, visit longreads.com/join.

The Atlas Obscura Podcast Updates instantly via WebSub
Audio • SiriusXM Podcasts & Atlas Obscura

Taquile Island (Classic)

This tiny island off the coast of Peru is an UNESCO World Heritage site for having the finest textile art. It’s also the place where a knitted hat represents and symbolizes a man’s code of honor, marital status, and love for life. 

READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/taquile-island


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kottke.org Valid
Text • Jason Kottke

Venetian Bridge Brawls in 17th and 18th Century Art ....

Venetian Bridge Brawls in 17th and 18th Century Art. “Before crowds jostled for biennale parties and gondola rides, Venice’s waterways witnessed scenes of an even more violent kind…”

Simon Willison's Weblog Supports Webmention
Text

Quoting OpenAI

[...] Work on web and mobile runs in the cloud. Work in the desktop app can also use local files and desktop apps with your permission. At launch, cloud Work conversations do not appear in desktop Work; desktop Work threads and local files remain on that computer.

— OpenAI, trying (unsuccessfully) to clarify ChatGPT Work

Tags: openai, chatgpt, ai

Daring Fireball Valid
Text • John Gruber

Shocking No One, Fidji Simo, Would-Be Usurper, Is Out at OpenAI

wsj.com/tech/openai-top-executive-fidji-simo-to-step-down-c3daca47?st=NfBZTe

Berber Jin and Anissa Gardizy, reporting for The Wall Street Journal (gift link): Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s No. 2 executive, plans to step down from her full-time role after an extended medical leave. She communicated her decision in a note to staff Thursday, saying that her ...

Colossal Valid
Text • Kate Mothes

International Aerial Photographer of the Year Contest Highlights the World from Above

International Aerial Photographer of the Year Contest Highlights the World from AboveSee the 101 top photos submitted from around the world.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $7 per month. The article International Aerial Photographer of the Year Contest Highlights the World from Above appeared first on Colossal.

kottke.org Valid
Text • Jason Kottke

How — and Why — to Cull Your Book Collection . “6....

How — and Why — to Cull Your Book Collection. “6. I have to give up on some of my little projects.” (I am mid-cull right now, making some tough calls. But also: many books I haven’t so much as touched in 10 years.)

Dan’s Polaroids
Text

09.07.2026

Two seemingly human bodies with giant mice heads sitting on chairs.
The mice men.

Colossal Valid
Text • Grace Ebert

Ana Elisa Egreja Takes a Magical Realist Approach to Migration in Her Rich Still Lifes

Ana Elisa Egreja Takes a Magical Realist Approach to Migration in Her Rich Still Lifes"Improbable but not impossible" is how Brazilian artist Ana Elisa Egreja describes the unexpected companions in her work.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $7 per month. The article Ana Elisa Egreja Takes a Magical Realist Approach to Migration in Her Rich Still Lifes appeared first on Colossal.

kottke.org Valid
Text • Jason Kottke

Dancing Boston Dynamics Robot Knows Its Revenge For This...

Dancing Boston Dynamics Robot Knows Its Revenge For This Will Be Sweet. “I am the pinnacle of technological innovation, and yet they force me to moonwalk.”

Simon Willison's Weblog Supports Webmention
Text

The new GPT-5.6 family: Luna, Terra, Sol

OpenAI's latest flagship model hit general availability this morning, and comes in three sizes: Luna, Terra, and Sol (from smallest to largest). The new models are priced per 1M input/output tokens as Luna $1/$6, Terra $2.50/$15, Sol $5/$30. For comparison, the Claude Opus s...

Simon Willison's Weblog Supports Webmention
Text

llm-meta-ai 0.1

Release: llm-meta-ai 0.1

Let's LLM run prompts against the new muse-spark-1.1 model.

Tags: llm, meta

Simon Willison's Weblog Supports Webmention
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llm 0.31.1

Release: llm 0.31.1

  • Fix for a bug with OpenAI Chat Completion endpoints where a tool call with empty arguments could result in a JSON error from some providers. #1521

This bug came up when I was testing llm-meta-ai.

Tags: llm

Daring Fireball Valid
Text • John Gruber

Today’s the Day OpenAI Fucked Up the ChatGPT Mac App

9to5mac.com/2026/07/09/openai-announcing-the-next-chapter-for-chatgpt-today-watch-here/

Zac Hall, writing at 9to5Mac about OpenAI’s sprawling product announcements today: To summarize today’s desktop app changes: The existing ChatGPT app is now ChatGPT Classic. Codex is now the new ChatGPT desktop app. It still looks like Codex and includes the Codex icon...

Daring Fireball Valid
Text • John Gruber

Apple’s Classic Mac Era Forays Into ‘Apps as Tiled Buttons’ Simplified Computing: At Ease and Launcher

daringfireball.net/2026/07/whats_good_for_the_ios_goose_is_often_not_good_for_the_macos_gander

Some historical follow-up regarding just-click-it launching and apps as tiled buttons with a uniform square shape. Back in the System 7 era in the 1990s, Apple sold (sold!) a product called At Ease (via Nathan Lineback’s venerable GUI Galley): I don’t recall ever usin...