John Skiles Skinner

John Skiles Skinner

@skiles.blue

I work on @securedrop.org Former fed at 18F "deleted" by DOGE 🔗 https://skiles.blue/

31.4K followers979 following3.3K posts

John Skiles Skinner reposted

Cameron 🇺🇸🗽🦅
@cameroncorduroy.bsky.social

it's unbelievably infuriating how many times i have conversations (both online and IRL) where i talk about improving the IRS and people say "well couldn't we automate a lot of this stuff?" and then i have to explain to them that Republicans fired the entire AI and automation department

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Here's what I'm curious about: will LLM -driven discovery of severe flaws like this slow down as the supply of these outstanding vulns is exhausted? Or will it instead increase as LLMs automate the production of software and thus the production of new bugs? Is the future continued chaos like this?

Charlie Warzel@cwarzel.bsky.social

70 percent of the internet was vulnerable yesterday to very bad security flaws inside a coding language. Turns out, *one volunteer* is mostly responsible for maintaining that code & helping push updates. Yesterday Ondřej Surý saved the internet. So I called him up www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...

theatlantic.comThe Man Who Saved the Internet YesterdayOndřej Surý was a relatively anonymous volunteer working on PHP security. Then the internet exploded.
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I would guess that the discovery of these flaws will slow down, and maybe already is. But I can't share Surý's positive outlook here about the cause. We've already defunded CISA. I don't see that private corps will somehow syncronize to stop exploiting open source, leaving it under-resourced.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

America's scam fighters, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, were destroyed so that Elon Musk could add unregulated financial transactions to X

Tressie McMillan Cottom@tressiemcphd.bsky.social

I’m telling you that the extreme exposure to scams is a big part of the reason so many people are negative about our economic future.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

A new reason to run an ad blocker! As always, great work by @citizenlab.ca

WIRED@wired.com

Researchers at The Citizen Lab have for the first time released technical evidence of sophisticated mercenary spyware being distributed via online advertising.

buff.ly‘Nightmare Scenario’: Zero-Click Spyware Is Infecting Phones via Targeted AdsResearchers at The Citizen Lab have for the first time released technical evidence of sophisticated mercenary spyware being distributed via online advertising.

John Skiles Skinner reposted

Anil Dash
@anildash.com

Based on a browser funded with public money, and made the founders multimillionaires. One went on to cofound the biggest venture firm in the world and hired a man as a partner because he choked my unarmed neighbor to death. The people who *didn't* become millionaires are still making a free browser.

WebDesignMuseum@webdesignmuseum.org

On October 13, 1994, The Mosaic Communications Corporation launched, under the name Mosaic Netscape 0.9, the first one in a series of browsers, called Netscape Navigator.

John Skiles Skinner reposted

Chris Geidner
@chrisgeidner.bsky.social

I spoke a bit about Matthew Shepard over the weekend in person to some folks, but I didn't want to let the anniversary of his death — October 12, 1998 — pass by without giving a moment to him and his memory here.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I didn't know @chrisbackemeyer.bsky.social was a fellow fired federal worker! Running in my old home district in Nebraska. I'll be donating!

teabelly@teabelly.bsky.social

Meet the FWUCS!! Vote for Federal workers on election day!! www.commondreams.org/opinion/9-fe...

commondreams.orgMeet the 9 Former Federal Workers Running for Congress | Common DreamsAll Americans who want to continue living in a democratic society need to know about these candidates and support their campaigns.
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I guess it was hopeless after Columbia and other Ivy schools capitulated, but I had hoped Cornell would stand strong where the other schools failed. It was founded in 1865 with an explicit dedication to inclusion that was almost unparalleled in that era and for more than an century afterward.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I found out this dictator monument was destroyed by treasure hunters who thought it was full of stolen gold. Which is exactly what will happen to any Trump monument.

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John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

"The plan was the same plan Musk had executed two years earlier at Twitter: Make sweeping statements about the incompetence and dishonesty of the people working inside the place before you know much about them."

Alt18F@alt18f.bsky.social

"Find the blockers between us and what we want, Elon told his young followers. Find the blockers and eliminate them."

theguardian.com‘Elon is my prophet’: how Musk’s Doge team took a wrecking ball to WashingtonWhen the new ‘department of government efficiency’ sent young techies to disrupt federal agencies, not everyone complied. Here’s what happened when one worker fought to protect immigrant data
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I struggle to communicate effectively about the arcane (but important!) privacy laws that DOGE smashed, and about the people who care about those laws and who stood up against DOGE. Michael Lewis has communicated it very well here and I'm looking forward to picking up his book!

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

This is what government software can be again if we get the yahoo cowboy dudebros out

bryan newbold@bnewbold.net

ah damn, RIP Margaret Hamilton. she took safety-critical software engineering seriously, and got people to the moon and back. news.mit.edu/2026/margare...

John Skiles Skinner reposted

Vittoria Elliott
@telliotter.bsky.social

If you’re a government employee or tech worker and you want to talk, you can find me on Signal at Vittoria89.82

WIRED@wired.com

The National Design Studio (NDS) has been something of a successor agency to DOGE. A WIRED investigation finds some of its members are on loan from a nonprofit run by SpaceXAI’s general counsel.

wired.comA Mysterious Nonprofit Run by SpaceXAI’s Top Lawyer Is Paying the Salaries of Government WorkersThe National Design Studio has been something of a successor agency to DOGE. A WIRED investigation finds some of its members are on loan from a nonprofit run by SpaceXAI’s general counsel.
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Yet another reminder that the world's richest man and GOP's largest funder still controls federal computer systems

WIRED@wired.com

The National Design Studio (NDS) has been something of a successor agency to DOGE. A WIRED investigation finds some of its members are on loan from a nonprofit run by SpaceXAI’s general counsel.

wired.comA Mysterious Nonprofit Run by SpaceXAI’s Top Lawyer Is Paying the Salaries of Government WorkersThe National Design Studio has been something of a successor agency to DOGE. A WIRED investigation finds some of its members are on loan from a nonprofit run by SpaceXAI’s general counsel.
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I wonder if this commission's acquisition recommendations will be landing about the same time as Elon Musk's gutted version of Federal Acquisition Regulations

Paul Waldman@paulwaldman.bsky.social

Also, the DoD just put Anduril founder Palmer Luckey on "Project Meridian," its commission to determine the future of warfare, which may just involve buying lots of Anduril products, who knows. Luckey has made over 1,000 contributions to Republicans since 2017, 23 of which were for over $100K each.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

This is still happening. It's called the Revolutionary FAR Overhaul (RFO) now. bsky.app/profile/skil...

John Skiles Skinner@skiles.blue

Putting aside the farcical use of AI, this is a fundamental conflict of interest: Musk's people are rewriting the regulations that Musk's companies operate under www.wired.com/story/doge-c...

wired.comDOGE Put a College Student in Charge of Using AI to Rewrite RegulationsA DOGE operative has been tasked with using AI to propose rewrites to the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s regulations—an effort sources are told will roll out across government.
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

The cheering. Growing up in Nebraska I was taught a reflexive contempt for cities, but I'm still a little surprised by the barbarity of this.

Decoding Fox News@decodingfoxnews.bsky.social

In what looked like an unscripted moment during his speech in Nebraska Trump said it would be a small price to pay if Iran took out Los Angeles or San Diego before promising the crowd he would get gas prices down.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

The man who created the twisted disneyland of religion and sexual abuse that all of America now lives in has died, half-forgotten. I'm surprised to learn he was still alive.

Cheshire@thatsregrettab1.bsky.social

Where are they now? No, seriously.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

A European once asked me "will it take a Savita Halappanavar to finally get America to end it's abortion bans?" Wasn't sure how to explain that we already have many Savita Halappanavars

Barred and Boujee aka Madiba Dennie@audrelawdamercy.blacksky.app

For weeks, Tierra Walker and her family continued to ask medical providers about ending the pregnancy For weeks, medical providers continued to tell her, “Your baby is fine” Walker, however, was not ballsandstrikes.org/law-politics...

ballsandstrikes.orgTierra Walker’s Death Was Preventable. The Conservative Legal Movement Made It PredictableRepublican politicians have made Texas doctors increasingly afraid to provide lifesaving abortion care.

John Skiles Skinner reposted

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Replying to @skiles.blue

longstanding California kinkster / mystical flake culture captured by billionaires, twisted by their particular psychosexual needs bsky.app/profile/dome...

Alt Boo-reau of Lake-Monster Spook-tistics@domesticshoggoth.bsky.social

its fairly obvious that these spaces are being cultivated from the top down because “kinky tech nerd sex culture” is way more expansive than this scene is. They’ve cut out all the furries for Christ's sake, it’s unnatural.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Important context on rationalism as a religion ("sex cult") is that it is far from isolated. All of the TESCREAL bundle is studded with interlocking micro-religions. Silicon Valley is religiogenic, like the burned-over district of 19th century upstate New York.

Faine Greenwood@faineg.com

This is another great, approachable explainer on “the rationalist wackos who have managed to take over much of the AI industry, and who now have tons of money and political power.” www.iankduncan.com/personal/202...

iankduncan.comSex, AI, and the Apocalypse - Ian DuncanHow a community devoted to thinking clearly incubated salvation stories, abusive experiments, race science, and an affection for autocracy, and why that history matters now that its alumni are asking ...
View full thread
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

This is a super powerful machine for turning billionaires' interests into a vivacious social scene full of ambitious people, intoxicated by ideas and the smell of money.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Important context on rationalism as a religion ("sex cult") is that it is far from isolated. All of the TESCREAL bundle is studded with interlocking micro-religions. Silicon Valley is religiogenic, like the burned-over district of 19th century upstate New York.

Faine Greenwood@faineg.com

This is another great, approachable explainer on “the rationalist wackos who have managed to take over much of the AI industry, and who now have tons of money and political power.” www.iankduncan.com/personal/202...

iankduncan.comSex, AI, and the Apocalypse - Ian DuncanHow a community devoted to thinking clearly incubated salvation stories, abusive experiments, race science, and an affection for autocracy, and why that history matters now that its alumni are asking ...
View full thread
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

The SV micro-religions attract misfits — queer, neurodivergent, gifted, kids looking to break away from crazy religious parents — and offer them belonging and an apparent radical freedom of intellect, encouraging bold speculation about the future.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

But somehow that apparent freedom of thought and diversity of ideologies always returns to ideas that appeal to old rich tech men. "Seasteading" and "network states" (to escape taxes and regulation) "transhumanism" and "radical life extension" (assuaging their anxiety about impending mortality)

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Important context on rationalism as a religion ("sex cult") is that it is far from isolated. All of the TESCREAL bundle is studded with interlocking micro-religions. Silicon Valley is religiogenic, like the burned-over district of 19th century upstate New York.

Faine Greenwood@faineg.com

This is another great, approachable explainer on “the rationalist wackos who have managed to take over much of the AI industry, and who now have tons of money and political power.” www.iankduncan.com/personal/202...

iankduncan.comSex, AI, and the Apocalypse - Ian DuncanHow a community devoted to thinking clearly incubated salvation stories, abusive experiments, race science, and an affection for autocracy, and why that history matters now that its alumni are asking ...
John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Indeed Berkeley and the Bay Area have been fertile soil for new spiritual movements since the 1960s. The TESCREAL religions represent the partial capture of this fertility by tech billionaires.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Gossiping about Yudkowsky and Aella may be juicy but honestly they would be just random blowhards if they weren't funded by the usual sources of evil: Thiel, Musk, and various Christian-Right-coded weirdos

John Skiles Skinner reposted

It's ME(Jaime)
@exceedhergrasp1.bsky.social

We watched CDC staff be ousted or suddenly decide it was time for retirement; provisional employees were fired en masse last year, and in some cases, trainings have been frozen so no one new can fully engage. CDC has been a ghost ship this year. Thanks to Apoorva for her reporting on this.

Apoorva Mandavilli@apoorvanyt.bsky.social

I’ve been reporting on the CDC for years, and have written about many of its troubles over the past year. I was still shocked by the extent of the staff losses and political interference I found when reporting this one. www.nytimes.com/2026/09/26/h...

nytimes.com‘Zombified’ C.D.C., Hobbled by Cuts, Struggles to Fulfill Scientific Mission (Gift Article)The agency has lost its independence and nearly a third of its staff, as Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and associates have tightened control.

John Skiles Skinner reposted

Schooley
@schooley.bsky.social

Twitter not laughing at your jokes, buy Twitter. HBO owns streaming rights to an unflattering exposé, buy a piece of HBO. Government regulations threaten your businesses, buy the government. Elon Musk seems determined to be a case study in the problem with unfettered wealth.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

It's weird to me that "tattoos mean you will never get hired" is *still* a widespread belief. You can plainly see tattooed people with all sorts of jobs. As a hiring manager I've never given a moment's thought a candidate's tattoos.

ellie lockhart (she/they)@eleanor.lockhart.contact

this is roughly equivalent to "is it unprofessional to have tattoos or dyed hair" for Millenials companies that cared about that stuff in the 2000s didn't fail or anything, and they weren't being "discriminatory" in an actionable sense, but companies that didn't care got top talent

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

There's a whole encyclopedia to be written on the details of how this administration moved money away from brown people and into the insane preoccupations of a couple of rich dudes

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John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

The whole right-wing anti-government-worker movement, from the Oklahoma City Bombing to DOGE, has always been motivated by the fact that a lot of government workers are Black.

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

The racist conspiracy-thinking of a small number of rich men is also a unifying theme of all grants and programs the administration has cut, with USAID as the most obvious example. I hope when the history of all this gets written, this motivation is stated clearly.

John Skiles Skinner reposted

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Replying to @skiles.blue

Is there any question that the doctrine at work here is apartheid? We should clearly state that apartheid is now US policy.

Joe Flynn@chinajoeflynn.bsky.social

Hi folks. If you saw this, you know the administration plans to only accept white South Africans next year. Tomorrow is Congress's formal say before the determination is signed. Please check this brief thread on why I'd like you to speak out for the Afghan people still in limbo...

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Particularly wild because we have a widely understood word for Musk's particular brand of white supremacy — apartheid — which we are willing to talk about in the South African context but suddenly not when it comes to America

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John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

Is there any question that the doctrine at work here is apartheid? We should clearly state that apartheid is now US policy.

Joe Flynn@chinajoeflynn.bsky.social

Hi folks. If you saw this, you know the administration plans to only accept white South Africans next year. Tomorrow is Congress's formal say before the determination is signed. Please check this brief thread on why I'd like you to speak out for the Afghan people still in limbo...

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.blue

I also renewed my MMR vaccine this year. Theoretically a lifetime immunity but, why not? Measles is spreading. Taking inventory of my vaccination history and getting up to date this year was reassuring and liberating.

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