Cloudflare has a new feature—available to free users as well—that uses AI to generate random pages to feed to AI web crawlers:

Instead of simply blocking bots, Cloudflare’s new system lures them into a “maze” of realistic-looking but irrelevant pages, wasting the crawler’s computing resources. The approach is a notable shift from the standard block-and-defend strategy used by most website protection services. Cloudflare says blocking bots sometimes backfires because it alerts the crawler’s operators that they’ve been detected.

“When we detect unauthorized crawling, rather than blocking the request, we will link to a series of AI-generated pages that are convincing enough to entice a crawler to traverse them,” writes Cloudflare. “But while real looking, this content is not actually the content of the site we are protecting, so the crawler wastes time and resources.”

The company says the content served to bots is deliberately irrelevant to the website being crawled, but it is carefully sourced or generated using real scientific facts—­such as neutral information about biology, physics, or mathematics—­to avoid spreading misinformation (whether this approach effectively prevents misinformation, however, remains unproven).

It’s basically an AI-generated honeypot. And AI scraping is a growing problem:

The scale of AI crawling on the web appears substantial, according to Cloudflare’s data that lines up with anecdotal reports we’ve heard from sources. The company says that AI crawlers generate more than 50 billion requests to their network daily, amounting to nearly 1 percent of all web traffic they process. Many of these crawlers collect website data to train large language models without permission from site owners….

Presumably the crawlers will now have to up both their scraping stealth and their ability to filter out AI-generated content like this. Which means the honeypots will have to get better at detecting scrapers and more stealthy in their fake content. This arms race is likely to go back and forth, wasting a lot of energy in the process.

If there’s one thing I’d hoped people had learned going into the next four years of Donald Trump as president, it’s that spending lots of time online posting about what people in power are saying and doing is not going to accomplish anything. If anything, it’s exactly what they want.

Trump’s second presidential term has arrived amidst a new golden age for internet grifters, propagandists, and bad-faith hucksters of all stripes. The contours of this era of untruth have been flashing like neon signs for the past decade, constantly enticing us to engage with its impenetrable nonsense. Whether it’s gaslighting everyone who saw Elon Musk give two Nazi salutes during the inauguration or blaming the Los Angeles wildfires on the racist dog whistle of “DEI,” lies and absurdities now regularly flood our senses, having long outpaced the media’s capacity to filter them.

Many of my journalist colleagues have attempted to beat back the tide under banners like “fighting disinformation” and “accountability.” While these efforts are admirable, the past few years have changed my own internal calculus. Thinkers like Jean-Paul Sartre and Hannah Arendt warned us that the point of this deluge is not to persuade, but to overwhelm and paralyze our capacity to act. More recently, researchers have found that the viral outrage disseminated on social media in response to these ridiculous claims actually reduces the effectiveness of collective action. The result is a media environment that keeps us in a state of debilitating fear and anger, endlessly reacting to our oppressors instead of organizing against them. 

To that end, the age of corporate social media has been a roaring success.

“The reality is you are oxygenating the things these people are saying even as you purport to debunk them,” Katherine Cross, a sociologist and author of Log Off: Why Posting and Politics (Almost) Never Mix, told 404 Media. “Whether it’s [New York Times columnist] Ross Douthat providing a sane-washing gloss on Trump’s mania or people on social media vehemently disagreeing and dunking on it, they’re legitimizing it as part of the discourse.”

Cross’ book contains a meticulous catalog of social media sins which many people who follow and care about current events are probably guilty of—myself very much included. She documents how tech platforms encourage us, through their design affordances, to post and seethe and doomscroll into the void, always reacting and never acting.

But perhaps the greatest of these sins is convincing ourselves that posting is a form of political activism, when it is at best a coping mechanism—an individualist solution to problems that can only be solved by collective action. This, says Cross, is the primary way tech platforms atomize and alienate us, creating “a solipsism that says you are the main protagonist in a sea of NPCs.”

“Everything on social media is designed to make you think like that,” said Cross. “It’s all about you—your feed, your network, your friends.”

In the days since the inauguration, I’ve watched people on Bluesky and Instagram fall into these same old traps. My timeline is full of reactive hot takes and gotchas by people who still seem to think they can quote-dunk their way out of fascism—or who know they can’t, but simply can’t resist taking the bait. The media is more than willing to work up their appetites. Legacy news outlets cynically chase clicks (and ad dollars) by disseminating whatever sensational nonsense those in power are spewing. 

"For most people, social media gives you this sense that unless you care about everything, you care about nothing. You must try to swallow the world while it’s on fire"

This in turn fuels yet another round of online outrage, edgy takes, and screenshots exposing the “hypocrisy” of people who never cared about being seen as hypocrites, because that’s not the point. Even violent fantasies about putting billionaires to the guillotine are rendered inept in these online spaces—just another pressure release valve to harmlessly dissipate our rage instead of compelling ourselves to organize and act.

This is the opposite of what media, social or otherwise, is supposed to do. Of course it’s important to stay informed, and journalists can still provide the valuable information we need to take action. But this process has been short-circuited by tech platforms and a media environment built around seeking reaction for its own sake. Many Twitter refugees made a good choice in migrating from Musk’s X to Bluesky, carving out a new online space that is inhospitable to bigoted debate bros and time-wasting trolls. But in their enemies’ absence, many of these Left-leaning posters have just reverted to dunking on each other, preferring the catharsis of sectarian conflict over the hard work of organizing. 

Under this status quo, everything becomes a myopic contest of who can best exploit peoples’ anxieties to command their attention and energy. If we don’t learn how to extract ourselves from this loop, none of the information we gain will manifest as tangible action—and the people in charge prefer it that way.

It’s no surprise that tech billionaires like Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg have rushed to kiss the ring of the twice-ascendent Trump. The marriage of big tech and Trumpworld should make clear that Silicon Valley and authoritarians share the same goal: to crush dissent by keeping their would-be opponents spinning on an endless hamster wheel of reactive anger. And just like in the classic 1983 thriller WarGames, the only winning move is not to play.

That can be a tough pill to swallow when the internet is our main window into the world, and that world seems to be rapidly falling apart. We gaze into our phone-portals, paralyzed by the trance of the doomscroll, reacting and swiping from one news article and hot take to another. Authoritarians issue frightening proclamations that may or may not be legally enforceable, seizing our attention and energy and ensuring that the process will repeat, ad infinitum.

So what is the alternative? If we log off, what exactly are we supposed to do instead? How are we supposed to get information without constantly raising our antennae into the noxious cumulonimbus cloud of social media?

It isn’t quite as simple as “touch grass,” but it also sort of is.

Trusted information networks have existed since long before the internet and mass media. These networks are in every town and city, and at their core are real relationships between neighbors—not their online, parasocial simulacra. 

Here in New York City, in the week since the inauguration, I’ve seen large groups mobilize to defend migrants from anticipated ICE raids and provide warm food and winter clothes for the unhoused after the city closed shelters and abandoned people in sub-freezing temperatures. Similar efforts are underway in Chicago, where ICE reportedly arrested more than 100 people,  and in other cities where ICE has planned or attempted raids, with volunteers assigned to keep watch over key locations where migrants are most vulnerable. 

A few weeks earlier, residents created ad-hoc mutual aid distros in Los Angeles to provide food and essentials for those displaced by the wildfires. The coordinated efforts gave Angelenos a lifeline during the crisis, cutting through the false claims spreading on social media about looting and out-of-state fire trucks being stopped for “emissions testing.” Many mutual aid groups in Los Angeles have not just been helping people affected by the fires but have also focused on distributing information about how to learn about and resist ICE raids in Los Angeles. It is no surprise that some of the largest and most coordinated protests in the early days of Trump’s term have happened in Los Angeles, where thousands of anti-ICE protesters shut down the 101 highway and several streets in downtown Los Angeles Sunday. 

Some of these efforts were coordinated online over Discord and secure messaging apps, but all of them arose from existing networks of neighbors and community organizers, some of whom have been organizing for decades.

“For most people, social media gives you this sense that unless you care about everything, you care about nothing. You must try to swallow the world while it’s on fire,” said Cross. “But we didn’t evolve to be able to absorb this much info. It makes you devalue the work you can do in your community.”

It’s not that social media is fundamentally evil or bereft of any good qualities. Some of my best post-Twitter moments have been spent goofing around with mutuals on Bluesky, or waxing romantic about the joys of human creativity and art-making in an increasingly AI-infested world. But when it comes to addressing the problems we face, no amount of posting or passive info consumption is going to substitute the hard, unsexy work of organizing.

It’s a lesson the Extremely Online Left still hasn’t fully learned, failing where its political enemies succeed. Reactionary right-wing groups like the homophobic and transphobic Moms for Liberty—which seeks to ban books from LGBTQ and BIPOC authors under the guise of “parental rights”—have claimed political victories by seizing power one public school board and small town at a time. Other reactionaries have similarly managed to take their pet grievances about diversity and wokeness to the national level by moving from online outrage to on-the-ground community organizing. 

You can d­iscourse and quote-dunk and fact-check until you’re blue in the face, but at a certain point, you have to stop and decide what truth you believe in. The internet has conditioned us to constantly seek new information, as if becoming a sponge of bad news will eventually yield the final piece of a puzzle. But there is also such a thing as having enough information. As the internet continues to enshittify, maybe what we really need is to start trusting each other and our own collective sense of what is true and good.

We don’t need any more irony-poisoned hot takes or cathartic, irreverent snark. We need to collectively decide what kind of world we actually do want, and what we’re willing to do to achieve it.

Janus Rose is New York City-based journalist, educator and artist whose work explores the impacts of A.I. and technology on activists and marginalized communities. Previously a senior editor at VICE, she has been published in digital and print outlets including e-Flux Journal, DAZED Magazine, The New Yorker, and Al Jazeera.

Hey, clowns!

Hope you’ve all had a good week, because I’m about to ruin it with today’s food experiment. That’s because it’s all about one of the most divisive (and delicious) condiments out there: mayonnaise.

Personally, I’m a big fan of mayo. I grew up eating Miracle Whip, because that’s what mom used for our sandwiches, but my life changed once I discovered actual mayonnaise. Because I think mayo is awesome. It’s thick, creamy, rich, makes any dry sandwich way better, and frankly, I’m not afraid to admit that it’s also a little bit gross.

That’s why I know there’s a lot of you out there who hate, and I mean, hate, mayonnaise. One person I know who absolutely can’t stand the stuff is my good friend Ariel, who has a newsletter called Rel’s Recs. (And I see you, commenter Max!) But before I continue, make sure you sign up for Ariel’s newsletter; she basically recommends useful and cool shit to you to make your life better.

Rel's Recs

An opinionated newsletter of unsolicited (but very good) recommendations.

By Ariel

Now that you’ve all signed up to read her stuff, just know that Ariel’s dislike of mayo actually goes past hate and goes straight to offending her. It’s to the point where whenever I mention mayo in any of my newsletters (including my newsletter about new-to-us Chicago restaurants Davida and I visit weekly), I can be guaranteed to get a reply from Ariel remarking about how everything looks good aside from anything with mayo in it.

So I did a lot of soul searching. I like mayo in things like frog salad, as an occasional condiment to things like Belgian-style fries, and in my nasty deviled Jesus eggs, but I really wanted to push its boundaries. Like, I pretty much only use mayo as-is, or as a binder in dishes. But how could I turn it into the main event? Would mayo be good for other things, like, say, dessert?!

When you think about it, mayo’s pretty creamy, and so are a lot of desserts, which is why my brain’s attention immediately focused on ice cream. Though there really isn’t any cream in mayo, it’s an emulsion of eggs and oil that ends up looking and feeling vaguely like a dairy product.

So why not try putting mayonnaise in my ice cream maker to see what happens? As I was working through this train of thought, I told Davida what I was thinking about, and she said carefully, while nodding, “There's eggs in frozen custard and people put olive oil on ice cream.”

See, it’s that kind of childlike logic that really fuels this newsletter.

Subscribe now

That’s why I whipped out my trusty Ninja Creami ice cream maker, an ice cream maker so beloved I haven’t used it in well over a year.

Don’t take that for me talking shit about it, by the way. This thing is actually pretty fun, and it makes good homemade ice cream using an interesting method. I’m just extremely lazy and prefer buying ice cream at the grocery store, because every now and then a pint of Ben and Jerry’s fits perfectly in my ice cream hole.

When it comes down to it, the Ninja Creami is basically a weird powerful culinary drill.

You put a fully-frozen pint of ice cream base in it (like, frozen solid), and it uses a shaving blade to grind down into it and turn it into ice cream, not unlike a Pacojet, which is a fancy ice cream maker you see in some high-end restaurant kitchens. Except those are like $5,000 and up, while a Ninja Creami is like $200 (full disclosure, I got my unit for testing for my day job back in 2021).

Also, The Ninja Creami is a good place to hide Harvey and Mr. Bee from the cats, but Pepper’s too big to fit and has to fend for herself out in the wilderness. Don’t worry, I wasn’t planning on turning them into ice cream, unless Pepper decides to press the power button.

For this experiment, I decided to use my usual standby mayo, which is Hellman’s.

Yes, yes, I know about Duke’s, which we’ve had in Chicago for a while now. Sometimes I switch it up, but Hellman’s is usually cheaper, plus I find it much more suitable for slathering all over handrails, doorknobs, and the deep crevasses of my body.

I started by simply transferring the contents of the Hellman’s jar to the special pint container you need to use for the Ninja Creami.

I have learned that mayonnaise makes some really interesting noises when you have to move it from one container to another. I did not know that one substance could make a kaleidoscope of crackling and squelching noises all at the same time.

I then stuck the pint of Hellman’s in the freezer to set up overnight and meditated deeply upon the fact that Hulk Hogan showed up on stage at the Republican National Convention earlier this year.

The next day, the mayonnaise had frozen into a solid icy mass within the pint container.

I’d show you a photo of it, but it looked exactly the same the next day. Once your ice cream base is frozen, you then insert it into yet another container to get started on the churning portion.

This is where the blade comes in — you snap it on top of the churning chamber (that’s my technical term for it), lock into place, and secure the entire thing into the Ninja Creami.

This entire system is weirdly complicated in a logical way, probably designed so that you can’t like, puree your hand or something. A hand sorbet sounds like something they’d serve at a whimsical three Michelin-starred restaurant, but I’m not so sure the emergency room doctors would find that so funny.

Not only is this thing capable of making ice cream, it also makes shit like gelato, milkshakes, and there’s even a very specific button for a smoothie bowl.

Also, are acai berries still the new black? What exactly is an acai berry? The world may never know. As much as I wanted to classify a frozen block of mayo as a smoothie bowl of sorts, I decided just to hit the “ice cream” function instead.

And yes, any device that has a literal drill installed in it is going to be pretty damn loud to the point where your cats will indeed be afraid of the racket.

Speaking of cats, our cats are fucking terrible. Davida and I were out grabbing a small amount of groceries the other day, and when we returned, we noticed a funny odor in the apartment. It turns out one of the little assclowns had tried climbing on the stove while we were gone and accidentally turned on a burner, filling the apartment with gas. Thank God I located the source of the smell.

Man, we were this close to showing up in the national news. I wonder what Hulk Hogan would have had to say about it.

A few noisy minutes later, and the churned frozen mayonnaise was out, ready to be revealed to the world (me, the gang, and you, Davida was at work).

Hmm. It looked exactly like…mayo.

I dipped into the frozen-then-drill-churned mayonnaise and noticed it had already mostly thawed back to its original consistency, though it was a little extra fluffy-looking and grainy.

I guess it wasn’t going to turn into a proper ice cream substitute, but you know, that’s okay. This is how science progresses. Failures turn into wins someday. Though in retrospect, I’m not sure how anyone wins if you convert mayo into a frozen treat.

Speaking of wins, I then decided to top the scoops of cold mayo with this questionable-looking “Unicorn” Magic Shell from Smuckers.

It’s white and viscous (stop), and has little colored beads in it, because everyone knows that this is what unicorn fluid (again, stop) looks like, right?

Then I finalized the whole thing with some whipped cream and added a maraschino cherry on top.

Ah yes, nothing like a mayonnaise sundae that didn’t quite set up. This is probably my finest moment. I’m 43, standing in the kitchen with some stuffed animals, about to dig into a ramekin full of thawing mayonnaise topped with unicorn Magic Shell, whipped cream, and a cherry, while my wife is still at work.

Well, I made this horrendous crap, I might as well try it.

So here’s the thing: I had already been queasy all day, and not in anticipation of this pig slop. I don’t think I’m officially sick, but I may have had something going on with my stomach, because I had already been somewhat nauseous since I’d woken up that morning. Also, the diarrhea might have been a red flag, but what do I know? I’m not an electrician.

I took a timid spoonful of the cold mayo sundae and found that the Magic Shell had in fact successfully set up, indicating to me that the mayo was still cold. I could smell the tangy-sour mayo before I reluctantly put it in my mouth, and when I did, I was not a happy camper.

Eating a spoonful of salty, tart, and coagulated egg and oil was bad enough, but the exterior texture of it had changed to some sort of slick consistency. And to make things worse, it turns out the unicorn Magic Shell is a culinary abomination and of itself. It’s “white cupcake” flavored, which means it tastes like waxy vanilla-flavored ChapStick. Humanity doesn’t deserve that shit. Okay, on second thought, maybe it does.

I discovered exactly what had happened to the mayo upon closer inspection.

The emulsion had started to break, as in the oil was beginning to weep out from the main mayonnaise mixture. It was as broken as my hopes and dreams for this experiment, and now here I was, having eaten some of it.

At least I have an experience that most people do not (though I somewhat regret this), and now I can warn you of the dangers of unicorn Magic Shell, which may actually be more important to know, because, gross.

Now if any one of you ever wonder what it’s like to put mayo in an ice cream maker, I’m your man with the answer. I have also answered previous questions such as “Can you brew a Papa John’s garlic cup in a Keurig machine?” and attempted to make popcorn shrimp in a popcorn maker one time, so I can add this to my pantheon of bottom-shelf food science experiments that would never make it to a TV show. But that’s what makes I, Dannis Ree, the greatest food writer in all of history.

Oh, and Ariel, I’m sorry I made you read all of this. I can’t wait to read your reply.

Okay, you know the drill, if you enjoyed today’s edition of Food is Stupid, please share it wherever you can, like Discord, Slack, Reddit, your Hinge dating profile, your own Substack newsletter, it’s all good:

Share

And of course, don’t forget to upgrade your subscription.

Subscribe now

Every other edition is for paid subscribers because it takes a lot of time and energy for me to run this thing; I hope you understand. Without you guys pitching in, I’d probably have to go sling pizza in my spare time again, but don’t worry, if you upgrade you get full access to the archives, plus all the exclusive locked stuff going forward.

A little housekeeping — I’m cooking at a charity pop-up next Thursday (which is unfortunately sold out), so I probably won’t have enough time to write an edition of the newsletter next week. Just a fair heads up. And of course, as always, I love you all, and I’ll hop back into your inboxes as soon as I can.