New Tech, Same Story
For many years, I wrote a blog called Tweetage Wasteland: Confessions of an Internet Superhero. (I like to regularly change my brand name and focus to reduce the chance of any long-term financial success.) My motivation was to bridge the gulf between how people in the tech industry talked about their products in public and how they worried about them in private. That story hasn’t changed much, but it bears occasional re-upping because of the importance of you getting a grip on what’s happening that is as strong as the one you have on your phone right now. So, as Meta faces a landmark trial in which it is accused of encouraging growth over child safety, it’s worth noting the time Mark Zuckerberg explained, “I don’t generally want my kids to be sitting in front of a TV or computer for a long period of time.” His philosophy is hardly unique among those selling the wares designed to ensure everyone else’s kids are sitting in front of them for long periods of time. “‘We didn’t give our kids cellphones until they were 14,’ Microsoft’s co-founder Bill Gates said. When Sundar Pichai’s son was 11, the Google chief noted he ‘still doesn’t have a phone,’ adding that ‘our television is not easily accessible.’ Apple’s Tim Cook said he would not let his nephew on a social network.” NYT (Gift Article): Silicon Valley Executives Are Tech Fans. Just Not for Their Own Kids. “By now, it’s a cultural cliché. In ‘The Audacity,’ Jonathan Glatzer’s new AMC series, a girl at a Silicon Valley party is surprised that a boy has a smartphone. ‘Arms dealers don’t give their kids land mines,’ she explains.”
+ The way tech execs feel about privacy (black) mirrors the way they feel about tech use in general. While you’re encouraged to share everything, they make contractors who work on their houses sign NDAs. That’s why, several years ago, I wrote that, The Only Privacy Policy That Matters Is Your Own. Tech execs don’t share. And they’re right not to. “They are right not to want to toss the floor planks that represent their last hint of personal privacy into the social media wood chipper. They are right in their unwillingness to give in to the seeming inevitability of the internet sharing machine. Do you really think it’s a coincidence that most of the buttons you press on the web are labeled with the word submit?”
+ The story is not new. But the technology environment in which it exists is rapidly evolving, as is the effort to put even more of it in front of your kids. A.I.-Themed High School Is Put on Hold After Parental Backlash. And from The Verge (Gift Article): Meta glasses are a workplace menace. “Public-facing workers are being filmed, harassed, and creeped out by AI-powered smart glasses.” The best way to protect yourself is probably to do what tech executives do, not what they sell.
Superhighway Robbery
There’s a lot of negative buzz around data centers and AI growth, but not nearly enough to put a dent in the value of the nuts and bolts required to build out the future. Thieves are aware of this reality, and they’re not waiting for something to fall off a truck. ‘The Worst I’ve Ever Seen’: Cargo Thefts Have Turned Violent in Pursuit of AI Hardware. “Experts allege that two recent incidents in California show the extreme lengths that criminal organizations are willing to go to steal servers and other gear meant for data centers.”
+ Not everyone wants in on the action. WSJ (Gift Article): The ‘Country Hicks’ Who Refused $26 Million from an AI Data Center.
The World According to Harp
“Sen. Jon Ossoff didn’t even use her full name. But everybody in Washington knew who he was talking about. At a recent campaign event, the Georgia Democrat argued that President Trump would rather ‘travel with Natalie’ on Air Force One than do the hard work that comes with being commander in chief.” And thus, we’ve been thrust into focusing on a key Trump aide (maybe the most key one) known as the ‘human printer’ because she always has a portable printer she uses to print out positive news (or quack internet theories), which she hands to the president. We’ve all sort of avoided this story, not because of its lack of newsworthiness, but because it’s just too weirdly disturbing, even in 2026. Whether we like it or not, it’s time to harp on Natalie. WSJ (Gift Article): How Trump’s Ever-Present Executive Assistant Became the Talk of Washington.
+ NYT (Gift Article): ‘With All My Heart, Natalie.’ Trump’s Most Devoted Aide Emerges. It’s a fool’s errand to attempt to explain such devotion. The Harp wants what the Harp wants…
Success Breeds Succession
Miss watching Succession? You can always follow the real-life Saga of the Buss Family Circus. After only a year of being sold, the Lakers are being sold again. Maybe. And there is intrigue on all sides of the transaction. “Like two teams trading intentional fouls at the bitter end of a big basketball game, Jeanie Buss and her brothers and sisters have been going back and forth against one another for years, using various weapons to get their way or make a point: human resources, the media, the power of persuasion, that tag-along provision that, if triggered, would strip Jeanie of the NBA Board of Governors seat she expected to keep holding for years. And now, the law.”
Extra, Extra
This is 40: “The national debt surpassed a record $40 trillion on Wednesday, a staggering milestone as defense costs, social programs like Social Security and Medicare and interest on the burgeoning deficit make up an enormous share of federal spending.” You might not be worried about that debt load, but the bond market is. And the bond market has a way of making its worries your worries. NPR: The bond market is signaling trouble ahead. This is why you should pay attention.
+ Big Bet: “A handful of billionaires and companies are driving corporate spending in U.S. midterm elections this year, and they aren’t the usual power brokers who have sat atop the political food chain in Washington in previous decades.” The new kingmakers: Crypto, AI and betting firms fuel record spending on the 2026 midterms. In the great food chain of separating you from your money, crypto and betting are intertwined. And neither is slowing down. People are now gambling on the Little League World Series.
+ Steam Punks: “Washington’s misadventure was not an aberration so much as the ultimate expression of the inherent vice of its Middle East strategy.” Foreign Affairs: The End of the American Middle East. Trump’s strategy, to the extent there was one, has been bad. The tactics also haven’t worked. And the same people who masterminded them are trying to rewire the military. WSJ (Gift Article): New Drone Unit to Be Phased Out as Hegseth’s Army Pick Makes His Mark. And, Trump’s steam obsession risks crippling the U.S. carrier fleet.
+ Self-Destruction Epidemic: More U.S. Parents Opting Children Out of Vaccine Requirements. “In Utah, which has some of the most relaxed laws around school vaccine requirements, nearly 13 percent of kindergartners had a religious or personal exemption for at least one routine shot. The state is also in the midst of a monthslong measles outbreak that has infected more than 700 people. New York, which stopped allowing parents to opt out for religious reasons in 2019, reported no non-medical exemptions.”
+ Swall Fall: FBI searches former Rep. Eric Swalwell’s home, seizes his electronic devices. (But these days, we don’t know whether this search is for legitimate reasons or political ones.)
+ Sea No Evil: North Korea fires barrage of missiles toward the sea after dismissing overture from Trump.
+ The ABCs of 0s and 1s: Another era-defining headline: UC Berkeley professor admits to using AI to edit op-ed on students’ math skills. “Stankova admitted she had used AI software to ‘help edit the piece’ but that the article was “the result of several hundred person-hours of intensive human work, of which about 80 hours are my own.'” (Several hundred person-hours for one op-ed? To a humanities major, that math doesn’t add up.)
Bottom of the News
“For decades the familiar advertisements offering multiple albums for a penny or a dollar appeared in magazines, newspapers, and television. Families across the country built large collections through the mail-order system, and the company’s negative-option billing practices became a widely discussed feature of the membership model.” After 71 Years, Columbia House Closes for Good: The Mail-Order Giant That Defined a Generation Is Gone. (The generation that spent a penny for several albums eventually learned to discount that even further by just stealing music on Napster.)
