Tootfinder

Worth repeating: Claims of "AI" democratizing anything (coding, creative endeavors, etc) are always BS. The thing locking out people from doing that is not having the time/resources.
You want to democratize coding/art/creativity? Give people paid time off to do it and access to infrastructure. Easy.

The main recourse for challenging #racial #profiling
is through the
"Federal Tort Claims Act",
which allows people to sue the federal government
for harm caused by federal employees,
said Thomas A Saenz,
the president and general counsel at
the "Mexican American L…

An analysis of 5,290 AI research papers at NeurIPS: 141, or ~3%, had US-China AI lab collaboration, up from 134 in 2024; Llama featured in 106 Chinese papers (Will Knight/Wired)
https://www.wired.com/story/us-china-collaboration-neurips-papers/

The US and China Are Collaborating More Closely on AI Than You Think
WIRED analyzed more than 5,000 papers from NeurIPS using OpenAI’s Codex to understand the areas where the US and China actually work together on AI research.

achieving highly localized star peace with a beautiful recording of the cosmic tones research trio in utrecht last fall. https://soundcloud.com/leguesswho/the-cosmic-tones-research-trio

Huge amounts of nanoplastics discovered in tap and bottled water https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/03/huge-amounts-of-nanoplastics-discovered-in-tap-and-bottled-water/

Huge amounts of nanoplastics discovered in tap and bottled water
The amount of nanoplastics in drinking water in the U.S. has been wildly underestimated. That’s according to a new study that found the amount of plastic in both tap and bottled water was 10-100 times higher than previous estimates. For the new study, researchers used more advanced methodology and found more plastic. “It is like […]

☃️ How fire-loving fungi learned to eat charcoal
#fungus

How fire-loving fungi learned to eat charcoal
Wildfire causes most living things to flee or die, but some fungi thrive afterward, even feasting on charred remains. New University of California, Riverside research finds the secret to post-fire flourishing hidden in their genes. The study is among the first to investigate how fungi that are barely detectable in the soil before a fire are able to proliferate wildly once an area has burned.

Q&A with YouTuber J.J. McCullough, who started his channel in 2015 and has 1M subscribers, on research, earning enough for a middle-class lifestyle, and more (Hanaa' Tameez/Nieman Lab)
https://www.niemanlab.org/2026/01/does-…

“Does this channel have more juice in it?” YouTuber J.J. McCullough on a “sustainable” life as a news creator
"I respect mainstream media a great deal. I think they're doing better work than a lot of new media people do. No one has really risen to dethrone them in terms of news-gathering."

Behind the #TNC26 branding concept: Part 2
It's a design that celebrates the spirit of Finland and our wonderful host, CSC, who are welcoming the global #Research & #Education networking community…

“I don’t think Jesus would ever ignore people being hurt,
-- especially by the federal government,”
said 17-year Ben Luhmann at the wheel, to a reporter in the back seat.
Sam, his 16-year old brother was pounding an energy drink with one hand,
scrolled through a lengthy list of group chats with the other,
scouring for reports of ICE and other federal immigration agents in their area.
Mornings like this have been typical in recent weeks for the Luhmann fam…

How one conservative Christian family is pushing back against ICE
A coalition of activists, everyday citizens and people of faith — including theologically conservative Christians — who have pooled resources and learned new technologies to mount an effort they say is designed to protect immigrants in their neighborhoods and around Chicago.

Germany is facing calls to withdraw its billions of euros’ worth of gold from US vaults,
spurred on by the shift in transatlantic relations and the unpredictability of Donald Trump.
Germany holds the world’s second biggest national gold reserves after the US,
of which approximately €164bn (£122bn) worth
– 1,236 tonnes
– is stored in New York.
Emanuel Mönch,
a leading economist and former head of research at Germany’s federal bank, the Bundesbank,