All posts tagged: IRL

Anti-Vax Dating Apps Are Going IRL. People Are Mad as Hell About It

Anti-Vax Dating Apps Are Going IRL. People Are Mad as Hell About It

Published by skeptic

As a crowd of 60 anti-vaxxers squeezed into the upstairs dining area of Jonathan’s Grille in Nashville on a recent Monday night, a moment of pride washed over Scott Armstrong. Years ago, he had been let go from his job as a drug and alcohol counselor for refusing to get vaccinated. Now, unvaccinated people from all over the country were piling into the sports bar to meet others like them. There was a woman who flew in from New Jersey and another from Philadelphia. One group drove up from Florida. They were there to attend a mixer hosted by Unjected, an anti-vaccination dating app that, according to its website, is “built on creating health-conscious relationships.” It was the second stop on Unjected’s four-city “Summer of Love” tour meant for singles who oppose the Covid-19 vaccine. “We’re still some of the most persecuted people in society right now,” Armstrong, who now owns a video production company and helped organize the event, tells WIRED. “People still express this absolute hatred for us and for our beliefs in …

Clavicular Says He’s Quitting Drugs, Meaning He Can’t IRL Stream Anymore Because He’s Unable to Mog Sober

Clavicular Says He’s Quitting Drugs, Meaning He Can’t IRL Stream Anymore Because He’s Unable to Mog Sober

Published by José Betancourt

Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech Braden “Clavicular” Peters was rushed to the hospital earlier this week after suffering a suspected drug overdose. A video circulating on social media showed his entourage carrying the limp body of the 20-year-old so-called “looksmaxxing” influencer into a black vehicle. The hair-raising incident perfectly illustrated the dangers of encouraging young people to attempt to “maximize” their physical appearance through often risky and ill-advised practices, which range from treating facial acne to plastic surgery and “bonesmashing,” a bizarre phenomenon that involves striking one’s own face with a hammer. Peters has long boasted about injecting himself with a variety of substances, including testosterone, something he’s reportedly done since he was 14. He’s also known to consume a daily “stack” of other drugs and supplements, including Adderall, a prescription drug conventionally used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and even methamphetamines, a dangerous and addictive stimulant. The exact cause for his recent trip to the hospital remains unknown. The Miami Police …

Does Humanity Need an IRL Project Hail Mary?

Does Humanity Need an IRL Project Hail Mary?

Published by Jenni Sidey

Ryan Gosling saves the world, or rather, his character does, in the new sci-fi movie, Project Hail Mary. Audiences are showing up in force. The film opened to $141 million gross worldwide with a 95 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes. Critics are calling it the first great movie of 2026. I read Andy Weir’s novel and watched the film adapaption. Both are beautiful. The premise is simple: The sun is dying, Earth has one desperate shot, and a lone science teacher named Ryland Grace is humanity’s last hope. He’s the unlikely hero of Project Hail Mary. But what makes the story transcend typical sci-fi is not the science. It is Rocky, and his connection with Grace. Rocky is an alien from a completely different star system. It has different biology, senses…seemingly everything. Grace and Rocky cannot breathe the same air and initially cannot even communicate. They are as different as two intelligent beings could possibly be. And yet, they discover the neighbor in one another. They are able to become partners and then friends. Grace …

13 Best MagSafe Wallets (2026), Tested IRL

13 Best MagSafe Wallets (2026), Tested IRL

Published by skeptic

Other Good MagSafe Wallets Photograph: Jacob Roach ESR Geo Wallet Stand for $43: Apple’s Find My app lets you track your devices if they’re lost, and ESR’s Geo wallet has it built right into the wallet itself. This is the wallet I’ve been using for the past few weeks, and outside of the Find My capabilities, I love that it strikes a great balance between size and usability. ESR says it can hold up to three cards, but I’ve been using mine with four—three cards plus my ID—and I can get them all out easily. Although having a wallet with magnetic charging pins is weird—the Find My feature requires a battery that lasts three months—you can turn it off if you don’t care for it (but then, maybe just buy a different wallet). It does kind of suck that you need a proprietary charger to recharge your wallet. The magnets adhere well to the back of the phone, and you can pop the wallet open and use it as a kickstand. ESR even includes a …

I’m a Die-Hard Seahawks Fan. Here’s How It Felt to Watch the Super Bowl IRL

I’m a Die-Hard Seahawks Fan. Here’s How It Felt to Watch the Super Bowl IRL

Published by Jenni Sidey

There’s always a few instances in a lopsided football game where it gets kind of scary. In a blowout, the more artful elements of the sport give way to something much uglier and more upsetting on a human level. Football has more potential for carnage than any other major sport, and when the stakes are raised and adrenaline hits the danger zone, it can be giddy for some and terrifying for others. I think Drake Maye was a little terrified on Sunday. In his first Super Bowl appearance, the 23-year-old showed a greenness we hadn’t seen at all throughout his sophomore season, a campaign that saw him finish second in MVP voting and lead his team to the brink of a championship. It was a tough day at the office for Maye in pretty much every respect, but what was he really supposed to do against Seattle’s swarming, generationally talented defense? The Dark Side, as the fearsome unit is known, provided the toughest test of Maye’s career thus far, and it drove the final dagger …

Can Woke 2 Go IRL? Even Thomas Chatterton Williams Thinks It’s Possible

Can Woke 2 Go IRL? Even Thomas Chatterton Williams Thinks It’s Possible

Published by Sam Flores

Ever since, the public conversation about “cancel culture” and the effects of social media on our lives has changed profoundly. In 2022, Elon Musk bought Twitter, eventually turning it into X, a site where white supremacists, race scientists, and out-and-out Nazis enjoy chopping it up. Williams found this development particularly disturbing. “Questions are back in play that I really would have thought were completely settled, even in 2020,” Williams says. “People are getting tens of thousands of likes for tweeting that all immigration must stop.” Eventually we’ll know for sure if a repeat of Williams’s journey—a rejection of Woke 1, a negative experience of Trump 2, and a tentative embrace of Woke 2—is happening across the nation. It might be our only hope. In the meantime, there will be memes about Pride flags and “libbing out” and the nobility of resistance moms. (The right has a new pejorative term for the latter, which Woke 2–types may well appropriate for themselves: AWFUL, which stands for “Affluent White Female Urban Liberal.”). Táíwò, the Georgetown professor, has his …

AI-Powered Dating Is All Hype. IRL Cruising Is the Future

AI-Powered Dating Is All Hype. IRL Cruising Is the Future

Published by skeptic

I am, admittedly, a big flirt. I love everything about the exchange of getting to know another person. The playful banter. The rush of dopamine. The sexual subtlety and subtext of everything not said. Flirting, to me, remains one of the last human endeavors where people are intentionally trying to find common ground. It’s pure possibility, absolute magnetism. It’s also an art that can’t be faked, or—despite Silicon Valley’s best attempts—perfected by AI. That, of course, didn’t stop Big Dating from going all in on virtual intimacy this year, during which the focus shifted from endless swipes to AI-powered matchmaking. As the narrative around dating fatigue reached new heights, the trend toward sincere connection was an overdue correction by an industry that, across the last decade, built itself on ruthless scale, maniacal ambition, and profit incentives, only to realize that the answer was right in front of them all along: You win by investing in people. The integration of AI tools wasn’t simply about keeping up with the Joneses or leaning into new innovations (though …