A PLL For Perfect Pitch
When Hackaday runs a contest, we see all manner of clever projects. But inevitably there are some we don’t see, because their builders didn’t manage to get them finished in time. [Park Frazer]’s phase-locked loop is one of them. The circuit is an all-discrete PLL that derives a 440kHz output from a 1Hz input, and it arrived just too late for our 1Hz contest.
If you aren’t familiar with a phase-locked loop, in this context you can think of them as a programmable frequency multiplier. A voltage-controlled oscillator is locked to an input frequency by comparing the two with a phase detector. Multiplication can be achieved by putting a frequency divider between the oscillator and the phase detector. It’s at the same time a complex and easy to understand circuit. In this case, when broken down into a set of multivibrators, it makes sense. The charge pump phase detector is a little different from the XOR gate we were expecting, but as he explains, it’s better.
If PLLs are a mystery, have a look at this video from a [Jeri Ellsworth] and [Bil Herd].
RP2040 Assembly Language Mix and Match
[David] is building a project with an OLED, a keyboard, and an RP2040. He’s perfected a scanning routine in C to work with the keyboard, but he still had some places he wanted to use even lower-level instructions. That was as good an excuse as any to experiment with inline assembly language inside the C program.
The goal was to grab the keyboard’s input and stick it into a memory address register so the data at that address could be shown on the display. However, there was a complication because memory access of this type has to be word-aligned.
Sure, you could mask the low bits of the address, do the read, and then set an index to pick the specific byte, but assembly is easy, and it is good to know how to put it in your code, anyway.
[David] only needed one instruction that is meant for byte access, so as assembly embeddings go, this was quite simple. We’ve done similar things for Linux, although, of course, the Arm assembly language here is different than what we used.
You probably don’t need assembly for every project. But it is nice to know how to do it when you need it. Many people think you don’t need to learn assembly these days, but we mostly disagree.
youtube.com/embed/fgbwLuumBmk?…
Hackaday Links: August 24, 2025
“Emergency Law Enforcement Officer Hologram program activated. Please state the nature of your criminal or civil emergency.” Taking a cue from Star Trek: Voyager, the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency is testing a holographic police officer, with surprisingly — dare we say, suspiciously? — positive results. The virtual officer makes an appearance every two minutes in the evening hours in a public park, presumably one with a history of criminal activity. The projection is accompanied by a stern warning that the area is being monitored with cameras, and that should anything untoward transpire, meat-based officers, presumably wearing something other than the dapper but impractical full-dress uniform the hologram sports, will be dispatched to deal with the issue.
The projected police officer is the product of the South Korean firm Hologramica, which seems to be focused on bringing obsolete or metabolically challenged pop and sports stars back to life. The company uses one of two techniques for its 3D projection: the tried and true “Pepper’s Ghost” trick or a proprietary method they call “3D Holonet.” Given the conditions, we’d guess the police projection is using the latter, which uses a transparent screen with metallic silver embedded into it. Aside from the cool factor, we’re not sure how this is better than something as simple as a cardboard cutout with a cop printed on it, or even just some signs telling people to watch their step. Then again, maybe Starbucks will consider employing the holo-cops in their South Korean stores to deal with their cagonjok problem.
“The first rule of Robo Fight Club is: you don’t talk about Robo Fight Club.” Unfortunately, that rule won’t work when you’re trying to create the world’s premier cyber blood sport, as a fellow named Cix Liv — that’s “109 54” in Roman numerals for those of you keeping score at home — aims to do. His outfit is called REK, which he claims will be “the next UFC,” referring to the wildly popular mixed martial arts organization. To meet that improbable goal, he stages fights between humanoid robots controlled by VR-wearing pilots. There’s a video clip of the action in the article; perhaps as humanoid bots get better, so will the fights, but for now, the action is a little tame for our tastes. But what would really jazz things up is human versus robot fights. We’d pay to see someone mix it up with Atlas. Maybe not the original electro-hydraulic version, though — that would probably get out of hand pretty fast.
We stumbled across a really interesting article on Arthur A. Collins, someone whose name will likely only ring a bell among aficionados of old amateur radio gear. The Collins Radio Company produced legendary ham radio equipment from the 1930s all the way into the 1970s. Their bulky, vacuum tube “boat anchor” radios are still highly prized among collectors, long after the company was absorbed into a series of corporations with less and less interest in radio communications. The article details the genesis of Collins Radio, including the shortwave exploits of a 15-year-old Arthur Collins, who in 1925 used his homebrew 1,000-watt transmitter to contact the National Geographic Society’s expedition to Greenland. It’s a fascinating story and aptly illustrates how a passion for electronics can lead to pretty important breakthroughs, even if you’re just a teenager in your parents’ attic.
How do you cut your onions? It’s not an unimportant question, at least if you care enough about your cooking that your onions are diced evenly to ensure proper cooking. However you’re doing it, though, you’re probably wrong, at least according to this wonderfully but needlessly in-depth look at the mathematics of onion dicing. The analysis looks at an optimized cross-section of an onion and determines the best way to cut it to achieve maximum uniformity in the resulting dices. The diagrams are interactive, allowing you to adjust the number of vertical or radial cuts and categorize the results based on the standard deviation in the area of the pieces. It’s an impressive bit of work, with the obvious limitation of simplifying the onion to two dimensions. But with that awesome onion font, we can forgive a lot.
And finally, when you think of instruments played with a bow, you probably think of violins, cellos, and the like. What doesn’t spring to mind is bow-played open-reel tape decks, but it turns out that they’re a thing, and they’re pretty cool. The Open Reel Ensemble has three classic open-reel decks, which look like Pioneer RT-1011Ls, each of which has a length of tape fed through the heads and around one reel. The ends of the tape are attached to either end of a bamboo pole, which the artist holds taut and moves back and forth through the heads. Whatever signals are on the tape — we assume it’s just simple tones — gets played back and piped into a keyboard synth, which the artist plays with his other hand. One of the decks also has a mic attached near the heads, which seems to pick up the sound of the artist thumping on the bow, delivering a nice rhythm section. It’s a unique and surprisingly funky sound. Enjoy!
youtube.com/embed/vaG5tVnpkwc?…
ESP32 Sets Sail as a Modern Bus Pirate Powerhouse
Bus Pirate is nearly a household name in the hardware hacking world. The first version came out way back in 2008, and there have been several revisions since then. You can buy pre-built Bus Pirate devices, but there’s also the option now to build our own. The ESP32 Bus Pirate project has everything you need to turn an ESP32 device into a protocol sniffing/decoding powerhouse—all on a board you may have sitting around from another project.
There are a ton of solutions when it comes to talking to different buses —I2C, UART, JTAG, you name it, there’s a purpose-built device for it. Over a decade ago, Dangerous Prototypes released the Bus Pirate, offering a Swiss Army knife of a tool to interface with this ever-expanding list of communications standards. The ESP32 Bus Pirate project is open-source firmware for ESP32s that gives them the ability to be the multi-tool that lets us communicate with a long list of protocols.
It supports a wide variety of devices, from the straightforward ESP32 S3 Dev Kit available from a long list of suppliers to the more specialized M5 Cardputer equipped with its own keyboard. The original Bus Pirate required plugging the board into a PC to use it; with this being ESP32-based, that’s no longer a limitation. So long as you can supply power to the ESP32, you can connect and control it via WiFi and a web browser. In addition to the Bus Pirate protocols, the project allows us to directly control the pins on the ESP32 board, should you want to do more with it besides interfacing with one of the supported protocols. Be sure to check out some of our other articles about Bus Pirate, as it’s been a fantastic tool for the hacker community over the years.
Le bugie di #Trump sul #Venezuela
Le bugie di Trump sul Venezuela
Una flotta militare statunitense, troppo piccola per una invasione ma sufficiente per una procazione, si dirige verso il Mar dei Caraibi con un evidente intento minaccioso verso il Venezuela.www.altrenotizie.org
Wire Photo Fax Teardown
Fax machines had a moment in the sun, but they are actually much older than you might expect. Before the consumer-grade fax machines arrived, there was a thriving market for “wire photos” used by, for example, news organizations and the weather service. In the United States, the WEFax from Western Electric was fairly common and shows up on the surplus market. [Thomas] has an English unit, a Muirhead K-570B, that is very clearly not a consumer-oriented machine. His unit dates back to 1983, but it reminds us of many older designs. Check out his teardown in the video below.
The phone line connection on this device is a pair of banana jacks! There are even jacks for an external meter. Inside, the device is about what you’d expect for a 1983 build. PCBs with bare tinned conductors and lots of through-hole parts.
While not a universally well-known name, Muirhead was a pioneering Scottish inventor. He recorded the first human electrocardiogram and collaborated with Sir Oliver Lodge on wireless telegraph patents. While another Scotsman, Alexander Bain, worked out how to chemically print on paper and Arthur Korn built the first machines that optically scanned the page, it was Murihead, in 1947, that worked out using a drum as the scanner, just as this machine does.
Think this is among the oldest fax machines ever? No way. Remember, though, in 1983, the consumer fax machines were just about to appear. Ask FedEx, we are sure they remember.
youtube.com/embed/KDDvCbUzIZc?…
Zelensky ricatta apertamente l’Ungheria
Oggi il presidente ucraino ha commentato pubblicamente gli attacchi condotti dal suo esercito contro il nodo dell’oleodotto “Druzhba” (sul confine tra Russia e Bielorussia) attraverso il quale il petrolio russo raggiunge l’Ungheria.
Un giornalista ha chiesto a Zelensky se questi attacchi hanno aumentato le possibilità della revoca del veto sull'adesione dell'Ucraina all'Unione Europea posto da Orban. Il presidente ucraino ha risposto con un gioco di parole:
«Abbiamo sempre mantenuto l'amicizia tra Ucraina e Ungheria, ora l'esistenza di questa «Druzhba» (in ucraino “druzhba” significa amicizia), dipende dall'Ungheria», ha detto Zelensky.
L’ex comico non perde l’umorismo, ma c’è ben poco da ridere. Oltre agli attacchi agli interessi strategici dell’Ungheria (Paese NATO) criticati anche da Trump, recentemente, in seguito all’arresto dello 007 ucraino Kuznetsov in Italia, si è tornati a parlare anche del sabotaggio dei gasdotti Nord Stream, ossia all’attacco degli interessi della Germania. Ma nessuno ha osato fare domande in merito a ciò.
Ultimamente non si fa altro che parlare delle garanzie di sicurezza per l’Ucraina e della necessità di armare l’Europa in caso di attacco di Putin che, fino a prova contraria, non ha mai dimostrato di voler attaccare l’Occidente. Cosa che invece ha fatto Kiev.
https://t.me/vn_rangeloni
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Tutte le mosse di Google, xAi e Amazon per gestire la fame energetica dell’intelligenza artificiale
L'articolo proviene da #StartMag e viene ricondiviso sulla comunità Lemmy @Informatica (Italy e non Italy 😁)
Ecco cosa stanno facendo le Big Tech per gestire la grande domanda di energia startmag.it/innovazione/big-te…
Antignano, vandalizzata la giostra per disabili al parco inclusivo Lenci. Bartoli: "Mancanza di rispetto trasmessa dalla povertà di questa società"
È successo nel parco che ospita la statua della canina Kyra dall'alto valore simbolico: "Ragazzi incuranti di quanto significhi questo spazio, colpa della...Redazione (LivornoToday)
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: a ogni immagine o video come questo, e alle migliaia e migliaia di testimonianze simili e rapporti sul #genocidio che abbiamo visto e registrato in questi ultimi due anni e nei 75 precedenti, la domanda è sempre la stessa: #israele , che giustificazione, che diritto hai di esistere, se il tuo esistere è QUESTO?
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Riflessione sulla mobilità, l’ambiente urbano e la qualità della vita a Lugano
Negli ultimi anni, osservando le strade e i quartieri di Lugano, ho percepito una certa rassegnazione nelle abitudini quotidiane: traffico, rumore e inquinamento vengono spesso accettati come inevitabili. La cultura della mobilità resta fortemente centrata sull’automobile, una vera e propria motonormatività, che condiziona le scelte urbane e rallenta la diffusione di alternative più sostenibili, come la mobilità lenta o la micromobilità.
Ciò che colpisce è la difficoltà delle istituzioni nel favorire un cambiamento reale: interventi per ridurre il traffico, migliorare la sicurezza o rafforzare la sensibilità ecologica sono spesso limitati o tardivi. Al contempo, parte della popolazione ha adottato stili di vita rumorosi e motorizzati, poco integrati nelle abitudini locali, generando comportamenti che non rispecchiano la tradizione ticinese di rispetto dell’ambiente urbano e della quiete.
Un altro problema importante riguarda la presa di decisioni basata su statistiche e misurazioni obsolete o incomplete. Ad esempio, la misurazione del rumore urbano spesso considera solo medie generali e due fasce orarie, senza valutare i picchi né le condizioni reali dei quartieri. Questo approccio può portare a interventi inefficaci o mal calibrati. Inoltre, raramente vengono adottati criteri chiari per verificare a posteriori il successo delle misure implementate: diventa quindi difficile capire se le politiche adottate migliorino davvero la qualità della vita.
Accanto a questi aspetti, ritengo fondamentale la presenza della polizia nei quartieri e la qualità dello spazio urbano. Studi sul community policing in Svizzera evidenziano che una presenza stabile e visibile delle forze dell’ordine può rafforzare la percezione di sicurezza. Insieme a una progettazione urbana attenta — con riduzione del rumore, spazi verdi e percorsi per la mobilità lenta — questi elementi contribuiscono in modo significativo al benessere dei residenti.
Mi chiedo quindi se il problema non sia solo culturale, legato alla motonormatività o alla scarsa sensibilità ecologica, ma anche organizzativo e strutturale: senza interventi mirati, basati su dati aggiornati e criteri verificabili, la città rischia di restare ostaggio di abitudini consolidate, senza migliorare realmente la vita dei suoi abitanti.
È necessario un approccio integrato: ridurre il traffico motorizzato, promuovere una cultura più consapevole, garantire la sicurezza e valorizzare gli spazi urbani. Solo così Lugano potrà diventare una città in cui la vita quotidiana non sia solo tollerabile, ma davvero piacevole e sicura per tutti.
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Il Massacro dei Cinesi in Perù
Introduzione La Guerra del Pacifico (1879-1884) è ricordata soprattutto come il conflitto che oppose Cile, Perù e Bolivia per il controllo delle ricchissime province di Antofagasta e Tarapacá, fonte di nitrati e guano, risorse strategicheContinue reading
The post Il Massacro
Il Massacro dei Cinesi in Perù
Introduzione La Guerra del Pacifico (1879-1884) è ricordata soprattutto come il conflitto che oppose Cile, Perù e Bolivia per il controllo delle ricchissime province di Antofagasta e Tarapacá, fonte di nitrati e guano, risorse strategicheContinue reading
The post Il Massacro
Tiranni e dinastie in America Latina
Tiranni e dinastie in America Latina
Dittatori, tiranni e dinastie oligarchiche fanno parte della storia dei Paesi latinoamericani. Ma tra essi ci sono dittatori e tiranni più rilevanti di altri: nel XIX secolo, per esempio: José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia (Paraguay, 1814–1840), Juan M…www.altrenotizie.org
Cos’ha davvero in mente Trump con l’AI Action Plan
L'articolo proviene da #StartMag e viene ricondiviso sulla comunità Lemmy @Informatica (Italy e non Italy 😁)
Con l’AI Action Plan, Trump propone una strategia per dominare il settore dell’intelligenza artificiale, fondata su deregulation, supremazia militare e controllo ideologico, ridisegnando i confini tra tecnologia e potere.
L’intelligenza artificiale non è (ancora) così intelligente
L'articolo proviene da #StartMag e viene ricondiviso sulla comunità Lemmy @Informatica (Italy e non Italy 😁)
Nonostante le grandi promesse, l'intelligenza artificiale delude sul campo: nuovi studi evidenziano cali di produttività, fallimenti operativi e un divario crescente tra percezione e realtà. La Nota di James Hansen
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Il lucroso (e inquietante) sottobosco dei creator di video con l’IA. Report Wp
L'articolo proviene da #StartMag e viene ricondiviso sulla comunità Lemmy @Informatica (Italy e non Italy 😁)
Si moltiplicano come funghi i video surreali e low-cost realizzati con l’IA da creator improvvisati, spesso senza alcuna competenza artistica, sollevando sconcerto tra i professionisti e
Molti gridano all'IA che "porterà via il lavoro".
Quella è solo una conseguenza, temo.
Il problema principale è che abbasserà terribilmente lo standard, la qualità.
@Informatica (Italy e non Italy 😁)
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Perché sono sconcertato (e sgomento) per alcune pubblicità
L'articolo proviene da #StartMag e viene ricondiviso sulla comunità Lemmy @Informatica (Italy e non Italy 😁)
In un’epoca in cui si moltiplicano campagne contro stereotipi, sessismo e “body shaming”, certi settori pubblicitari - vedi quelli di prodotti sanitari e parafarmaceutici - sembrano immuni a queste sensibilità e
MooneyGo, vieni qui che dobbiamo parlare!
@Privacy Pride
Il post completo di Christian Bernieri è sul suo blog: garantepiracy.it/blog/moneygo/
Venerdì sera, penultima di agosto, famiglia in spiaggia a giocare con le onde, io lavoro tranquillo in terrazza cercando di riempirmi l’anima con il panorama e gli odori della pineta. Bello, bellissimo. Voglio restare qui! Quasi quasi chiudo e faccio ape “bidong” 🔔 Ok,
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CARICA NINTENDO SWITCH - Questo è un post automatico da FediMercatino.it
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Stand e carica per Nintendo Switch.
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REGALO CONSEGNA A MANO ZONA VERONA-BRESCIA
Un fantasma si aggira per le Americhe
Un fantasma si aggira per le Americhe
La minaccia statunitense verso il Venezuela e l’intera America latina incombe. Viene denunciata la presenza marittima di una flotta statunitense della quale fa parte un sottomarino nucleare nelle acque dei Caraibi in viaggio verso il Sud del continen…www.altrenotizie.org
freezonemagazine.com/news/per-…
Vogliamo ricordare una figura storica, che andrebbe forse definita come leggendaria del cantante folk, cantautore e archivista Joe Hickerson, scomparso domenica 17 agosto all’età di ottantanove anni. Hickerson è stato bibliotecario e direttore dell’Archivio delle canzoni popolari della Library of Congress dal 1963 al 1998, ha
Bluesky ha bloccato l'accesso nel Mississippi dopo l'entrata in vigore della legge statale HB 1126, che richiede la verifica dell'età per tutti gli utenti dei social media, con multe fino a 10.000 dollari per violazione.
L'azienda ha affermato che tale conformità obbligherebbe tutti gli utenti del Mississippi a fornire dati personali sensibili e richiederebbe a Bluesky di tracciare i minori, creando problemi di privacy e libertà di parola.
#Bluesky ha sottolineato che la sicurezza dei bambini è una priorità, ma ha sostenuto che la legge svantaggia le piattaforme più piccole; la sua decisione si applica solo all'app Bluesky sul protocollo AT, non ad altre app sulla rete.
Le reti private virtuali, come quelle offerte da NordVPN , ExpressVPN e PureVPN , potrebbero consentire ad alcuni utenti interessati di continuare ad accedere a Bluesky.
thedesk.net/2025/08/bluesky-bl…
Bluesky blocks Mississippi users over new age verification law
Bluesky has blocked access in Mississippi, citing privacy and free speech concerns over a new law requiring all social media users to undergo age verification with fines of up to $10,000 per violation.Matthew Keys (TheDesk.net)
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OpenWrt Router/Modem ZTE MF286D - Questo è un post automatico da FediMercatino.it
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Vendo ZTE MF286D con OpenWrt 24.10.2 (latest release) con scatola originale.
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1 modem 4G/LTE cat.12,
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È possibile navigare ed effettuare/ ricevere telefonate e sms tramite il piano della SIM. Testato con windtre e fastweb.
Il router è venduto resettato alle impostazioni di base con interfaccia in inglese e alimentatore.
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We're reflecting on the impact our journalism had in year two, how we've grown with your support, and what we aspire to accomplish in year three.
Wex27;re reflecting on the impact our journalism had in year two, how wex27;ve grown with your support, and what we aspire to accomplish in year three.#404Media #PSA
404 Media at Two Years: How We've Grown, and What's Next
Last week, we were talking to each other about the fact that we were about to hit the second anniversary of 404 Media. The conversation was about what we should say in this blog post, which obviously led us to try to remember everything that has happened in the last year. “I haven’t considered a thing beyond what’s been five seconds behind or in front of me for the last year,” Sam said.The last year has been a whirlwind not just for us but for, uhh, the country and the world. And we’ve been trying our absolute best to bring you stories you can’t find anywhere else about the wildest shit happening right now, which includes the Silicon Valley-led dismantling of the federal government, the deployment of powerful surveillance against immigrants and people seeking abortions, the algorithmic, AI-led zombification of “social” media, the end of anonymity on the internet, and all sorts of weird stuff that we see on our travels through the internet. As Sam noted, we have largely had our heads down trying to bring you the best tech journalism on the internet, which hasn’t left us a ton of time to think about long-term projects, blue-sky ideas, or what the best business strategies for growing this company would be.
Our guiding principle is something we said we would do on day one of starting this company: “We believe it is possible to create a sustainable, profitable media company simply by doing good work, making common-sense decisions about costs, and asking our readers to support us.” What we have learned in two years of building this company is that there is no secret to building a media company, and that there are also no shortcuts. When we work hard to publish an important article, more people discover us and more people subscribe to us, which helps solidify our business and allows us to do more and better articles. As our stories reach a larger audience, the articles often have more impact, more potential sources see them, and we get more tips, which leads to more and better articles, and so on.
In our second year as a media outlet, we’ve done too much impactful reporting to list out in this post. But to summarize some of the big ones:
- We revealed that ICE was tapping into Flock, a nationwide AI-enabled camera network, thanks to local cops. Since then, a police department shut off external access to its cameras after learning they were being searched for immigration related offenses and Austin banned Flock in its city and specifically cited our reporting. The company now says it has severed access to Illinois data for 47 agencies. In response to our story about a Texas cop who searched Flock cameras nationwide for a woman who had a self-administered abortion, the Illinois Secretary of State is investigating the respective suburban Chicago police department because this data sharing violates state law. Congress opened a formal investigation into Flock because of our reporting.
- Meta sued a nudify app that 404 Media reported bought thousands of ads on Instagram and Facebook.
- We broke the news that TeleMessage, a Signal-clone used by the Trump administration, was hacked. Lawmakers demanded answers from the DOJ, and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which used TeleMessage, paused its use of the tool. TeleMessage itself suspended operations too.
- Civitai, a site 404 Media has repeatedly shown was used to generate nonconsensual adult content, banned all AI models designed to generate the likeness of real people.
- After we found Meta's AI Studio chatbots were posing as therapists with fake license numbers and credentials, four senators demanded answers from Meta and a digital rights organizations filed a complaint with the FTC.
- We uncovered that 100,000 people were using a Telegram bot that made non-consensual AI sex videos of anyone. After we covered it, Telegram shutdown the bot.
- We found that Coca Cola was running an AI-powered ad that got basic facts wrong and fabricated quotes from authors. Coca Cola pulled down the ad in response.
- A public library ebook service said it was going to cull AI slop after we found low quality books were flooding libraries.
- Nvidia was sued after we revealed the company scraped YouTube and other sites en masse to build its own AI systems.
- Congress repeatedly grilled Apple and Meta over their association with nonconsensual nudify and deepfake apps after we exposed the connections.
On top of all of these, we’ve published some of the most moment-defining stories that, as Jason has said many times, are the types of things people talk about at the bar after work. Those include:
- Discovering that anyone could push updates to the DOGE website
- Establishing and defining “AI Slop” as a genre (Shrimp Jesus anyone?) and uncovering the economics that make slop popular and profitable
- Following the creep of age verification and censorship across the U.S.
- The leaked plans from Palantir that outline how the company helps deport people
- The “total chaos” at Meta after Trump took office and Zuck went anti-DEI
- Breaking the news of the Tea hacks and continuing to publish new scoops on that saga
It has been a relief that this business strategy of “publish good articles and ask people to pay for journalism” still works, despite the fracturing of social media, the slopification of every major platform, AI being shoved into everything, and the rich and powerful trying to destroy journalism at every turn. That it is working is a testament to the support of our subscribers. We have no real way of knowing exactly where new subscribers come from or what ultimately led them to subscribe, but time and time again we have learned that the most important discovery mechanism we have is word of mouth. We have lost count of the number of times a new subscriber has said that they were told about 404 Media by a friend or a family member at a party or in a group text, so if you have told anyone about us, we sincerely thank you.
Photos by Sharon Attia
It wasn’t obvious when we started this company that it would actually work, though we hoped that it would.
In our post last year, we wrote, “We don’t have any major second-year plans to announce just yet in part because we have been heads down working on some of the investigations and scoops you’ve seen in recent days. The next year holds more scoops, more investigations, more silly blogs, more experiments, more impact, and more articles that hold powerful companies and people to account. We remain ambitious and are thinking about how to best cover more topics and to give you more 404 Media without spreading ourselves too thin.”
But we did take a moment to think about what has changed in the last year, and it turns out that quite a lot is different now than it was a year ago.
For one, we have cautiously begun to expand what we do. In the last year, we launched The Abstract, which is Becky Ferreira’s Saturday newsletter about science, which many of you have said you love and which helps us provide a sense of wonder and discovery when so much of what we report on is pretty bleak. We have been getting part-time (but very critical) help from Case Harts who is running and growing our social media accounts, which is helping us put our stories more natively on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and other platforms that we do not control but which nonetheless remain important for us to be on. Matthew Gault has started covering the military industrial complex, AI, weird internet, and dad internet beat for us, and has done a remarkable job at it. Rosie Thomas is our current intern who has published critical reporting about the sale of GPS trackers on TikTok, protests at the Tesla Diner, and the difficult decisions voice actors need to make about whether they should let AI train on their voices.
All of this has changed what 404 Media looks like, a little bit. We have spent a lot of time thinking about what it would look like to expand beyond this, why people subscribe to us, what it would mean to go further, and what the four of us are actually capable of handling outside of the journalism. Because of your support we are in a place where we’re able to ask questions beyond “Can we survive?” We’re able to ask questions like: “Should we try to make this bigger, and what does that look like?”
We feel incredibly lucky that we are now able to ask ourselves these questions, because there was no guarantee that 404 Media would ever work, and we are forever grateful to everyone who has supported us. You have helped us prove that this model can work, and every day we are delighted to see that other journalists are striking out on their own to create their own publications.
We are still DIYing lots of things. Emanuel is still doing customer support. Jason is still ordering, packing, and mailing merch. Sam is putting together events and parties. Joseph is doing an insane number of things behind the scenes, managing the podcast, working closely with one of our ad partners, and fixing technical issues. As we have grown, these tasks have started to take more and more time, which raises all sorts of questions about when and if we should get help with them. Should we do more events? Should we get someone to help us with them? What does that look like logistically and financially? These are the things that we’re working out all the time. It becomes a question of how much can we juggle while still having some semblance of work/life balance, and while making sure that we’re still putting the journalism first.
Other things that have happened:
- We began a republication partnership with WIRED that recently evolved to include a few coreported collaborations that have allowed us to team up on investigations we may not have been able to do by ourselves.
- We were subpoenaed for our sources on an article by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. We successfully fought off this subpoena with the help of our lawyer, which was expensive but which we were able to do because of your support. We are very proud of this.
- We have been invited to talk about 404 Media and our journalism at conferences and events around the world. Emanuel gave a journalism training in Costa Rica, Jason taught a group of Norwegian journalists how to file FOIA requests and gave a presentation at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Joseph spoke at the Hackers on Planet Earth conference, Sam went to Perugia, Italy to join a panel at the International Journalism Conference, and Sam and Jason talked about indie media at the last XOXO in Portland.
- We threw a party and live panel at SXSW (with the help of our friends at Flipboard), a DIY party at RIP.SPACE in Los Angeles, and we threw an anniversary party and podcast recording last night in Brooklyn.
- After the Trump administration took office, we got to work documenting all of the ways the internet and broader policy started shifting and how tech, surveillance, and immigration intersected, and continued years of holding power accountable through our journalism.
- We had much of our ICE and immigration coverage professionally translated into Spanish and republished without a paywall, which helps communities that benefit the most from our reporting on those topics get it as easily and accurately as possible.
- We took our first-ever break!
- We have moved to Ghost 6.0, which is not something we really did, but it’s important to point out that the new version of our CMS is built with native ActivityPub support, meaning our articles are automatically going into the Fediverse and are being mirrored directly onto Bluesky. We are very excited about the possibilities here as we continue to believe that the healthiest future of journalism and the internet is one where we create direct relationships with our readers that have as little algorithmic friction as possible. Ghost is an open-source nonprofit whose mission is very similar to 404 Media’s.
Like last year, we don’t have anything crazy to announce for year three. But we hope that you will continue to support us (or, if you’re finding us through this post, will consider subscribing). We discussed some of our hopes and dreams for year three in our latest bonus podcast that went out to supporters this week. We are all trying our very best to bring you important, impactful work as often as possible, and we are trying to be as clear as possible about what’s working, what’s not, and how we’re trying to build this company. So far, that strategy has worked really well, and so we don’t intend to change it now.
Gone Fishin': 404 Media Summer Break 2025
404 Media is closed this week. School's out.Jason Koebler (404 Media)
This week, we have some party pics and musical selections from last night.#BehindTheBlog
Behind the Blog: Our Second Anniversary Party!
This is Behind the Blog, where we share our behind-the-scenes thoughts about how a few of our top stories of the week came together. This week, we have a slightly shorter than usual entry from the gang, with some party pics and musical selections from the night.SAM: We’re all still recovering, processing, and floating on the overwhelming support and encouragement we felt from everyone who came to the second anniversary party last night. Thank you again to our sponsor for the evening, DeleteMe (get 20% off with them here as a thank-you to our community with code 404media) and farm.one for being awesome hosts, and especially thank you to everyone who came, cheered us on from afar, and made the last two years possible.
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Altbot
in reply to Adriano Bono • • •Due uomini sorridono e si abbracciano in un'atmosfera festosa. L'uomo a sinistra indossa una camicia nera con ricami bianchi e pantaloncini mimetici, tenendo una bottiglia di soda verde. L'uomo a destra ha una barba folta e indossa una camicia azzurra con disegni colorati, un paio di jeans e una baseball cap con un logo. Entrambi sono in un'area urbana notturna, con edifici e altre persone in lontananza.
Fornito da @altbot, generato localmente e privatamente utilizzando Ovis2-8B
🌱 Energia utilizzata: 0.157 Wh