US to Demand Five Years of Social Media History From Foreign Travelers Under New Proposal

I’m sure the tourism industry is going to absolutely love that move. Might want to go ahead and delete that hysterical meme right now

The Dogs of Today Are Undergoing a Mysterious Brain Expansion, Study Suggests

The dogs are getting smarter. That just means we’re a few generations away from them subjugating all of us because we clearly don’t know what we’re doing

More Stories Below, but first some new content in the News Sidequest Podcast Universe…

Auditory Anthology

SCI-FI SHORT STORIES - NARRATED BY DARREN MARLAR & PRODUCED BY KEITH CONRAD

The Veldt by Ray Bradbury - When George and Lydia Hadley realize their children’s expensive, automated nursery… which projects any mental landscape with vivid reality… has been stuck on a terrifying, lion-filled African veldt, they find their attempt to shut down the machine may lead to a deadly confrontation with the technology that has replaced them as parents.

The Veldt by Ray Bradbury Keith Conrad / Darren Marlar Episode

Listen on Apple | Listen on Spotify | Listen on Amazon | RSS Feed

Become a paid subscriber to listen to all of our episodes completely ad-free! You’ll also get access to a deeper dive on the stories we share and the authors!

Also Worth A Look…

• Time magazine names ‘Architects of AI’ as its person of the year for 2025 - As a former Time Magazine Person of the Year myself, that was a pretty lame choice

• Disney Invests $1B in OpenAI, Licenses Characters for AI Videos - What are you going to force Mickey Mouse to do on Sora?

• ‘Jaws’ Auction: Two Long-Lost Props Set to Hit Block After 50-Year Disappearance - You’re gonna need a bigger display shelf

• Librarians Are Tired of Being Accused of Hiding Secret Books That Were Made Up by AI - No matter what ChatGPT tells you, my autobiography is not at the library. It doesn’t exist. No one would read that. Also, my story The Last Four Years is only available here on Substack.

• Singing with Other People Improves Health More Than Singing Alone - Ok that’s great and all, but it also means you have to be around other human beings. Who wants that?

• Oscar Mayer opens applications to drive the Wienermobile - Gig alert

• Donald Trump Reminds the Entire World He Has No Idea What 6G Means - Maybe we should try electing people who aren’t in their 80’s. Crazy thought

• Prisoner Dubbed ‘Escape King’ Breaks Out of Prison for the 4th Time in 16 Years - Maybe instead of putting his brain to use coming up with ways to break out of prison, he could try to come up with a legit way of making money so he doesn’t end up in prison to begin with

• NASA Loses Contact with Its Maven Spacecraft Orbiting Mars for the Past Decade - I, for one, welcome our new Martian overlords

• Uranus and Neptune May Be Rocky Worlds Not Ice Giants, New Research Shows - They’re learning new thing about Uranus all the time