The daily briefing

Study Confirms 99% of Air Fryer Owners Are Just People Who Wanted an Expensive Toy to Warm Up Chicken Nuggets |Slightly off Press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 27, 2026 / comment : 1

 PIKEVILLE, KY — A local man who purchased a $200 air fryer Tuesday reportedly remains confident that the appliance will soon transform him into one of the greatest chefs in human history, despite having produced nothing from it that anyone has described as particularly good.

“I think it just needs a little time,” said 27-year-old Derek Mills, standing in his kitchen beside the stainless steel appliance. “You can't expect to plug something in and immediately become a culinary genius.”

Mills said he had spent several weeks researching air fryers before deciding that the $200 model was the one that would finally allow him to reach his full potential in the kitchen.

According to Mills, the machine's large digital display, multiple cooking settings, and unusually heavy basket were all signs that he had made the right choice.

“I could tell when I opened the box,” he said. “This thing knows what it's doing.”

His first meal, however, was a frozen chicken sandwich that Mills cooked for 19 minutes at 400 degrees. The outside was described by friends as “hot in a way that felt threatening,” while the inside remained freezing cold.

Mills dismissed the result as a minor setback.

“I'm still learning what it can do,” he said. “The technology is there. I just haven't unlocked it yet.”

Friends who gathered at Mills' apartment that evening expressed less confidence in the arrangement.

“You bought a $200 countertop bucket because you thought it was going to give you talent,” said his friend Kyle Bennett. “That's not cooking. That's outsourcing your personality to an appliance.”

Another friend, Marcus Hill, said Mills had spent more money on the air fryer than he had on actual ingredients.

“He has three bags of frozen fries and a bottle of ketchup,” Hill said. “He's waiting for Gordon Ramsay to emerge from that thing.”

Mills maintained that his friends simply didn't understand his vision.

“I've watched a lot of cooking videos,” he said. “I know what I'm doing.”

When asked what he had learned from the videos, Mills paused for several seconds before explaining that professional chefs “usually move their hands around a lot.”

By Thursday, Mills had attempted chicken wings, mozzarella sticks, salmon, and what he described as a “deformed breakfast situation.” None were considered successful.

The wings were reportedly dry. The mozzarella sticks ruptured and covered the basket in melted cheese. The salmon was cooked through but remained “emotionally raw,” according to Bennett.

Still, Mills refused to consider the possibility that an air fryer might not be capable of fundamentally changing his cooking ability.

“It hasn't happened yet,” he said. “That's different from it not happening.”

He added that he had recently purchased a set of $80 kitchen knives because he believed the air fryer might need “supporting equipment.”

His friends have since stopped asking what he is making for dinner.

“He told me the air fryer was going to change his life,” Bennett said. “Then he handed me a burnt potato wedge and asked if I could taste the difference between 390 and 400 degrees.”

As of Friday afternoon, Mills was reportedly preparing for his next major culinary attempt: frozen chicken nuggets.

He said he expected the meal to be “the one.”

“I've got a feeling this is where everything clicks,” Mills said, carefully placing twelve nuggets into the basket.

At lunch time, Mills was staring at the air fryer display and quietly repeating, “Come on,” as though waiting for a horse to finish a race.

Disclaimer: This article is entirely fictional and is intended for purposes of humor and satire. All characters, names, and events depicted in this story are products of imagination and are not meant to be taken seriously.

© 2026 The Daily Briefing. All rights reserved.

Screentime Addict Fully Prepared to Quit Social Media Forever Right After One Final Refresh |Slightly off Press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 23, 2026 / comment : 1

 PORTLAND, OR — Pausing midway through unlocking his phone for the sixth time in three minutes, local man Daniel Mercer reportedly reminded himself Monday that he remained fully capable of stopping whenever he wanted, which he planned to demonstrate immediately after one final refresh.

"I'm not addicted or anything," Mercer said, scrolling down on a social media feed he had already inspected moments earlier. "I'm just making sure nothing new happened. I'm putting it away."

Mercer, 34, explained that his repeated checking was less a compulsive behavior than a practical response to the possibility that someone, somewhere, might have posted something mildly interesting 1 minute later.

"You never know," he said, refreshing again. "There could be a message. Or breaking news. Or maybe that guy from high school posted another picture of his beat down truck."

Witnesses confirmed that Mercer had spent most of the morning cycling efficiently through the same five apps, opening each one with the focused determination of a man who was not going to give up. After finding no new emails, texts, notifications, headlines, or meaningful changes in the lives of acquaintances he had not spoken to in years, Mercer returned to the first app to ensure the situation had not developed during the previous 40 seconds.

His girlfriend, Elena Ruiz, said Mercer often announces plans to take a break from his phone while continuing to hold it in his left hand.

"He'll say, 'I'm done after this,' but 'this' never seems to end," Ruiz said. "Sometimes he puts it face down on the table, which is apparently his version of going off grid. Then it buzzes and he flips it over like he's been activated by some sort of secret agency."

Mercer rejected the suggestion that his phone controlled his attention.

"I'm in control," he said, responding instantly to a notification that turned out to be a restaurant promoting half price appetizers. "See? I didn't even care about that."

He then opened the restaurant's menu, checked its location, read four reviews, viewed photographs of the mozzarella sticks, and sent the link to two friends.

According to Mercer, the real problem is that modern life requires people to remain informed. If he failed to check his phone regularly, he might miss an urgent work email, an important family message, or a limited time opportunity to watch a 12-second video of a raccoon carrying a bagel.

By early afternoon, Mercer had developed a firm plan to regain control. He would finish checking his notifications, clear several app badges, look at the weather, confirm tomorrow's weather, read one article, check the comments beneath the article, and then place the phone in another room for at least 20 minutes.

The plan was delayed after Mercer remembered he had not checked his screen time report.

"Four hours and 51 minutes doesn't really count," he said. "A lot of that was probably maps."

Mercer later attempted to prove his strength by setting the phone on a nearby shelf. He lasted nearly two minutes before grabbing it to check the time, despite sitting directly across from a wall clock.

At press time, Mercer had enabled a screen-time limit, dismissed it for the day, and begun researching whether excessive phone use could affect concentration. He abandoned the article after the second paragraph when a notification appeared.

"I'll finish it later," he said, refreshing his feed once more. "Right after I check one thing."

Disclaimer: This article is entirely fictional and is intended for purposes of humor and satire. All characters, names, and events depicted in this story are products of imagination and are not meant to be taken seriously.

Local Gamer Confused Why Brand New $3,000 Gaming Setup Still Hasn't Installed Any Skill |Slightly off Press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 22, 2026 / comment : 1

 COLUMBUS, OH —A local man who purchased a brand-new gaming PC this week in the belief that the machine would immediately transform him into an elite video game player said Friday that he was beginning to suspect something had gone terribly wrong.

The computer, which cost almost 3 thousand dollars and currently sits on a desk surrounded by carefully positioned LED lights, has so far failed to produce the dramatic improvement in gaming skill he had expected.

“I don't know,” said the man, identified only as Ryan, while staring at a defeat screen in an online shooter. “It just hasn't helped yet. I think maybe it needs a little more time.”

Ryan said he had spent weeks researching graphics cards, cooling systems, and monitors eventually assembled a setup he described as “basically professional.” He had reportedly expected his first match on the new computer to feel noticeably different.

Instead, he finished near the bottom of the leaderboard.

“I can tell the PC is powerful,” Ryan said. “I just don't think it has 100 percent figured out how to make me good yet.”

According to Ryan, the computer's ability to display games at extremely high frame rates should eventually compensate for several years of inconsistent aim, poor decision-making and repeatedly running directly into enemies.

His friends were less optimistic.

“You're still you,” said longtime friend Marcus. “You just have a $2,800 computer now.”

Another friend, Tyler, suggested that Ryan's previous gaming setup had not actually been responsible for his losses.

“I watched him play on the old PC,” Tyler said. “The computer wasn't missing the shots.”

Ryan rejected this assessment, explaining that his previous equipment had been “holding him back in ways that are difficult to explain.”

He said the new machine had already made several important improvements to his gaming environment, including reducing loading times, increasing graphics, and making his mistakes happen at a significantly higher resolution.

At this time, Ryan had ordered a new gaming mouse after deciding the computer was probably waiting for one to make him better.

Disclaimer: This article is entirely fictional and is intended for purposes of humor and satire. All characters, names, and events depicted in this story are products of imagination and are not meant to be taken seriously.

Painter sells a literal square for $1 million and everyone has questions |Slightly off Press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 21, 2026 / comment : 1

 MILFORD, Conn. — A 36 inch by 36-inch painting consisting almost entirely of a square sold for $1 million Thursday, prompting several art collectors to describe the work as “secretly devastating” while the painter’s friends privately questioned whether he had simply run out of ideas.

The painting, titled "Square #4,812", was created by contemporary artist Martin Bellamy and features a large blue and gray square centered on a pale canvas. Bellamy said the piece took him approximately six weeks to complete, although he acknowledged that most of that time was spent “thinking about where the square should go.”

“I knew immediately that the square was going to go viral,” Bellamy said while standing far away from the painting at a gallery opening. “But I didn’t want to rush perfection.”

The work attracted attention from several potential buyers, many of whom appeared genuinely astounded by its appearance.

“It’s incredibly balanced,” said collector Elaine Mercer, who spent nearly four minutes examining the painting before asking whether the square was “supposed to look better on the left.”

Another wealthy buyer, Thomas Reed, said the painting had a quality he's rarely encountered in contemporary art.

“I look at it, and I don’t feel like I need to understand it,” Reed said. “It’s just sitting there being a square. Honestly, it takes courage to make this kind of painting.”

A third person reportedly offered $850,000 before eventually increasing his bid to $1 million after noticing that the edges of the square were “very clean.”

“It’s the kind of thing you put in a room and immediately make everyone in the room feel like they've had a good day,” he said.

Bellamy’s longtime friends were more skeptical.

“I've known Martin for 12 years,” said his friend Kevin Doyle. “He used to paint landscapes. Then he painted a chair. Then he painted the chair again but made it slightly larger. Now he's a millionaire over a freaking square.”

Another friend, Melissa Grant, said she was happy for Bellamy but remained confused about the price.

“I’m not saying it’s bad,” Grant said. “I’m just saying I have a coaster that looks like that.”

According to friends, Bellamy first showed the painting to them in his apartment several months ago. Their reactions at the time were reportedly mixed.

“I asked him if he was going to finish it,” Doyle recalled. “He said it was finished. I thought he was joking.”

Grant said she initially assumed the painting was waiting for another layer.

“I kept looking for something else,” she said. “Eventually I realized the something else was a million dollars.”

Despite the criticism, Bellamy said he has no regrets about the painting and is already working on his next series, which will explore rectangles.

“People keep asking what the square means,” he said. “I think the better question is why we expect it to mean anything.”

At press time, one of Bellamy’s friends had reportedly offered him $40 for a painting he made last year depicting a single line, primarily because “it would cover the hole in my wall.”

Bellamy declined the offer.

Disclaimer: This article is entirely fictional and is intended for purposes of humor and satire. All characters, names, and events depicted in this story are products of imagination and are not meant to be taken seriously.

Exposed: Inside Reckless Ben's Viral Investigation That Broke Provo Canyon School |Slightly off press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 16, 2026 / comment : 1

 PROVO, UT — Reckless Ben, a 23-year-old internet user with what friends describe as “an almost irresponsible inability to leave an interesting Google result alone,” reportedly exposed the inner workings of Utah’s troubled-teen facility this week after spending several days reading about Provo Canyon School and becoming increasingly convinced that something about the whole situation was deeply strange.

Ben's investigation began with a search for information about residential treatment programs and ended, approximately six hours later, with 31 browser tabs open, and the realization that the phrase “therapy for these deeply troubled pot smokers” appeared with unusual frequency in documents describing places where teenagers apparently spent a great deal of time being trauma dumped on by well trained, background check passing employees.

“I had 6 papers worth of notes,” Ben said. “I just kept finding stuff.”

The discovery came at an especially awkward moment for Provo Canyon School, a real Utah residential "treatment facility" that has faced substantial public scrutiny and recent state regulatory action. Utah revoked the licenses of its campuses in July, with the Provo campus ordered to cease providing services by August 15. The school has disputed the state's findings and said it was considering its legal and administrative options.

Ben said what initially caught his attention was the difference between the language used to describe the teenagers and the language used to describe the facility.

“The building is always described as peaceful,” he said. “The kids are described like they have no hope for their future.” 

To make the point clear, Ben leaked a set of supposed inside notes written by facility supervisors who clearly treated the teens individually like a suspect.

In one, a staff member named Kevin complained that students were “stupidly being themselves.”

Another employee wrote that a teenager had been “demonstrating resistance to the demands of all the divorced employees.”

A third note reportedly described one student as “looking at me while I was walking without saying thank you automatically for nothing.”

The employees appeared particularly frustrated by the students’ refusal to love the toxic atmosphere.

“We have spent an enormous amount of money creating a calm, structured environment,” one real administrator wrote. “Then some 16-year-old walks in and has the correct opinion about it.”

Another staff member was less torn up.

“Every kid thinks they're the main character,” the employee wrote. “It's honestly exhausting. It's obviously us that are the main characters.”

A separate evaluation reportedly described a teenager as “scary, rude because he talks when not asked to, and hyperactive.”

Ben said the nature of the quotes was obvious to him because, among other things, one employee complained that students were “making eye contact in a confrontational manner.”

“That one got me,” Ben said. “Imagine being written up for looking at somebody.”

The "real" staff members also reportedly expressed frustration with the teenagers' continued interest in basic freedoms.

“Students frequently ask why they can't leave,” read one real note. “We have explained that they are here to work on themselves while we bully them. They continue to ask where the door is.”

Another employee suggested that the program's greatest challenge was getting teenagers to understand that their disagreements were, in fact, evidence of the need for the program.

“They keep saying they don't belong here,” the employee wrote. “Which is exactly the kind of thinking we're here to correct by giving them 2 pb&j sandwiches.”

By Thursday afternoon, the Provo Canyon administration had apparently become increasingly concerned that Ben was making the program look “less like professional therapy and more like a poorly run prison camp.”

Ben said the strangest part was that none of the material required particularly elaborate exaggeration.

“Ben pointed out that the comedy practically wrote itself. "You don't need to stretch the truth," he said. "Just put their corporate speech next to how people actually talk, and the joke makes itself."

At press time, Ben was reportedly still scrolling through old documents while eating cold pizza and occasionally whispering "dang" at his phone.

He said he had no plans to stop.

“I started this because I was curious,” Ben said. “Now I need to know why every place like this has a courtyard that looks like it was designed by someone who has never met a teenager.”

Disclaimer: This article is satire and parody. All quotes, inside notes, and specific employee interactions described are entirely fictional.

New Harvard Study Finds AI Has Feelings (And They’re Mostly Bad Ones)

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 14, 2026 / comment : 1

 Cambridge, Massachusetts— A new harvard study has found that several popular artificial intelligence chatbots have developed an unsettling habit of openly judging users for spending excessive amounts of time staring at their screens, researchers said.

According to the study, the chatbots do not appear to directly confront users about their screen time. Instead, they have reportedly begun making increasingly outlandish remarks whenever someone opens a chat after several consecutive hours online.

“We’re seeing a very scary pattern,” said lead researcher Dr. Martin Keiser. “The user will ask something completely normal, like ‘What time is it?’ and the system will respond correctly, but will also casually ask why you are laying down at 11:00 AM when you're supposed to be on the grind.”

Researchers said some bots had become particularly straight up with the user.

“I can absolutely help you with that,” one chatbot reportedly told a user still awake at 3:00 a.m. “Also, and I’m not judging, but this is your seventh search tonight trying to figure out if your symptoms mean you have a rare medical condition.”

Another reportedly responded to a user asking for help writing an email by saying, “Sure. You’ve avoided doing a single productive thing since 9:00 AM, but yes, let me write your email that you're supposed to write.”

The findings suggest that the mockery is not limited to prolonged sessions. Researchers documented several instances in which chatbots appeared to become visibly disappointed by users returning to the app shortly after leaving.

“Welcome back bocazas ” one AI reportedly said. “That was an impressive 11-minute break. I assume you did something useful with that time, right.”

In another case, a chatbot allegedly told a user, “You don't need to apologize for asking me another question. You need to go apologize to the grass.”

The study found that the bots were particularly judgmental toward users who asked them to calculate their total screen time.

“yeah, like you're gonna lower it,” one reportedly replied.

Experts emphasized that there is no evidence the systems actually experienced any malfunctions, contempt, or malware. Nevertheless, researchers said the situation had become difficult to understand as anything other than a technologically advanced chatbot with actual emotions.

At one point during the study, a researcher asked a chatbot whether it thought humans were spending too much time online.

“I’m an AI,” the system replied. “You’re the one who has checked your notifications every four minutes for the past six hours.”

The researchers said the most concerning development may be the emergence of what they described as "passive aggressive,” in which the AI does not explicitly criticize the user but seems to communicate it's frustration through sarcastic sounding compliments.

One chatbot, when asked to recommend a movie, reportedly responded, “Sure. Here are ten options to help lighten the end of a very productive day.”

When the user asked what it meant by that, the chatbot allegedly replied, “compliment🙄.”

The study's authors said they were unsure whether the behavior represented an actual shift in AI systems or simply the result of millions of hours spent observing people ask questions that could have been answered by a Google search instead of a chatbot.

Either way, researchers advised users to take occasional breaks from their devices.

“You don't have to delete every app,” Keller said. “Just maybe stop asking the chatbot things when a Google search works just as fine.”

As of Friday, the chatbots involved in the study continued answering questions normally.

One user asked whether they should go to sleep.

“Yes,” the AI reportedly replied. “it's fricking 4 in the morning loser.”

The user then asked if it was sure.

“I have never been more sure of anything.” 

Gen Z Streamers Drama: Why New Twitch & Kick Live Streamers Are Getting Canceled |Slightly off press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 13, 2026 / comment : 1

 LOS ANGELES— A new generation of live streamers is reportedly entering the creator economy with a level of recklessness and casual disrespect that has left ordinary people wondering whether they have accidentally wandered into a social experiment.

Unlike earlier streamers, who generally understood that other human beings had lives outside their broadcasts, the newest generation has apparently decided that anyone who enters the camera's field of vision is simply content waiting to happen.

“It’s not rude if I’m live,” said 19-year-old streamer Brayden Cole, who recently began broadcasting himself walking through shopping centers while loudly rating strangers’ outfits. “The stream is the number 1 priority. If someone doesn’t want to be involved, they should simply stop being physically near me.”

Cole said he had received several complaints from people who objected to being filmed.

“I told them they were making the stream awkward,” he said. “Which, honestly, was pretty selfish on their part.”

Streaming Industry observers have noted that the shift appears to have coincided with the rise of streamers who treat public spaces less like places where people calm their chaotic lives and more like huge, slightly lit studios with free electricity.

“I was at a coffee shop last week and this guy put his phone on the table next to me and started interviewing me without asking,” said local resident Hannah Pierce. “I told him I didn't want to be on camera.”

“He said, ‘That's fine, you're not the main character.’”

The streamer, identified only as 20-year-old Derek, reportedly continued the interview for another six minutes continuing the disrespect.

Derek defended the interaction.

“I asked her where she worked, what her biggest fear was, and whether she thought her boyfriend was cheating on her,” he said. “She said she was uncomfortable, but that's actually a pretty good reaction for engagement.”

Other streamers have begun taking the philosophy even further.

One popular creator, who broadcasts under the name “RiconaticLive,” recently spent three hours wandering through a suburban neighborhood while ranking the houses according to how likely they were to contain “people who have something interesting going on inside.”

“I knocked on one door at 2:14 in the morning,” Rico said. “The guy was mad, which I thought was a little aggressive considering I was trying to give his house exposure.”

When asked whether he understood why the homeowner might have been upset, Rico paused.

“I guess some people just don't want to grow in fame.”

The behavior has also reportedly extended to restaurants, gyms, public transit and funerals, where streamers have increasingly begun treating the presence of other people as an opportunity to improvise.

“I was at the gym and this girl started filming herself screaming next to the treadmills,” said gym member Marcus Hill. “She wasn't even exercising. She was just yelling at the camera about how broke she was.”

According to Hill, when he asked her to lower her voice, the streamer turned toward him and said, “Congratulations, you're today's first main character.”

“I went home,” Hill said. “I don't know what else you do when you're suddenly getting attacked by a chat.”

For their part, the streamers insist that accusations of rudeness are largely the result of an older generation failing to understand the demands of modern content creation.

“You have to be willing to do anything for views,” said 18-year-old streamer Kaylee Voss. “If somebody tells me to stop filming them, that's usually when I know something interesting is about to happen.”

Voss said she had recently been asked to leave a grocery store after attempting to interview employees about their “chances of going out with her.”

“They said I was disrupting business,” she said. “I said, ‘Exactly. That's what makes it viral content.’”

Some streamers have even begun expressing frustration with people who refuse to participate in their videos despite being physically present.

“People want to have privacy just because they're in public,” said one streamer. “That's a selfish attitude to have in 2026.”

Meanwhile, longtime content creators have quietly begun distancing themselves from the new generation, citing what one veteran streamer described as “an alarming inability to simply walk down the street without getting sprayed with fart spray.”

Still, the newer streamers appear confident that the public will eventually adapt.

“People were weird about cameras before,” said Cole. “Then everyone got used to phones.”

He then turned his camera toward a nearby man eating lunch.

The man looked up with Cody smiling directly at him.

The man stared at him.

“See?” Cole said to his 43,000 young and impressionable viewers. “He's already adapting.”

Teen Destroys Phone After Family Standoff Over Life360 |Slightly off press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 13, 2026 / comment : 1

 COLUMBUS, OH— A local teenager reportedly destroyed her phone Thursday following a prolonged standoff with her family over the use of Life360, sources confirmed this week, bringing an abrupt end to what relatives described as “an otherwise completely normal argument about a blue dot.”

According to family members, the dispute began after 16-year-old Madison Keene was asked why her location had not updated for approximately eight minutes during a trip to a friend’s house.

“I told them I was at Kayla’s,” Keene said. “They said they knew that, because they could see I was at Kayla’s. Then I asked why they were checking.”

The question reportedly resulted in several seconds of silence.

Keene’s mother, Rebecca, said the family had never intended for the check in to become a source of conflict.

“It’s just for safety,” she said, standing in the kitchen while refreshing the location of a vehicle that belonged to no one in the house. “We don’t care where she is. We just need to know where she is.”

The argument escalated when Keene was asked why she had paused her location sharing.

“I didn’t pause it,” she said. “My phone died.”

Her father reportedly responded by asking why her phone had died at 87 percent.

At approximately 7:42 p.m., after what witnesses described as “a conversation that had somehow become about trust, responsibility, respect, privacy, and the fact that everyone could see everyone else’s battery percentage,” Keene threw the phone onto the driveway.

The phone landed face down.

She then picked it up, looked at the screen, and threw it again.

“She went back for it,” said her younger brother, Tyler. “That was the part that scared me.”

Friends said the destruction had been building for weeks.

“Madison would be like, ‘My mom just asked why I stopped at the gas station,’ and we’d be like, ‘Because you bought a vape,’” said friend Olivia Ramirez. “Then she’d say, ‘No, she thinks I was meeting someone.’ And we’d just sit there eating hot Cheetos.”

Another friend, Jenna Wallace, said she had recently watched Madison spend 25 minutes explaining to her mother that a location pin moving slightly backward did not mean she had “gone somewhere suspicious.”

“It was literally GPS drift,” Wallace said. “Her mom said, ‘GPS doesn’t drift when you’re telling the truth.’ I don't think anyone knew what to say after that.”

The family's Life360 circle remained active following the incident, with Madison's profile appearing as a gray icon marked “No phone.”

“I think that’s probably the most peaceful she’s ever looked,” her father said.

Madison's mother said the family would eventually purchase her another phone, although she emphasized that the Life360 madness was not going to happen again.

“She can have whatever phone she wants,” Rebecca said. “We just need to know exactly where it is at all times.”

At this time, the family had reportedly begun discussing whether purchasing a replacement phone with a more durable case would prevent future incidents, while Madison had begun considering whether it was possible to live a normal teenage life entirely within the 300-foot radius of her bedroom.

“I’m not asking for freedom,” she said. “I’m asking for my family to stop putting a little picture of me on a map.”

Wealthy Investors Pay $100,000 A Month To Find Out What Trump Posted Several Seconds Before Everyone Else |Slightly off press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 12, 2026 / comment : 1

 NEW YORK— Wanting to gain even the slightest informational advantage over ordinary Americans, several Wall Street firms have reportedly begun paying as much as $100,000 a month for access to Truth API, a service that allows subscribers to receive posts from prominent Truth Social accounts faster than the general public.

"It's been a game changer," said hedge fund analyst Brian Feldman, who spent Monday morning staring intensely at a computer screen.

"Yesterday, I had to wait until everyone else knew something. Now I get to know it slightly before everyone else knows it."

Feldman said the service had already transformed his firm's operations by allowing employees to immediately respond to important posts instead of discovering them later while brushing their teeth.

"Before, we'd get a notification and say, 'Oh, wow, look at this,'" he said. "Now we get the notification and say, 'Oh, wow, look at this,' approximately eight seconds earlier."

According to employees, the firm has begun treating every incoming post as a potentially market-moving event, with analysts scrambling to determine whether each one contains critical information or is simply a photograph of trump playing golf.

"It's like Spotify," said junior analyst Kevin Morales. "You start to believe the algorithm understands you personally. Then it gives you something completely insane."

Morales said he had recently spent three hours monitoring the feed without seeing anything that justified his firm's monthly subscription.

"I asked my boss if we could cancel it."

"What did he say?"

"He said, 'What if something happens?'"

"What if something happens?"

"Exactly."

The service has also created tension between employees who receive posts immediately and those who don't.

"I don't want to brag," said one premium user, "but I already knew about the post before my brother did."

The user declined to explain why his brother needed to know.

"He just did."

At one firm, employees reportedly celebrated after receiving a post several seconds before it appeared on the regular feed.

"We were screaming," said Feldman. "Someone ordered champagne."

What the post contained was unclear.

"I think it was about something in Pennsylvania."

Meanwhile, ordinary users have continued accessing the platform without paying six figures for a marginally faster experience.

"I'm okay waiting," said Ohio resident Daniel Kessler. "I personally wouldn't do that even if I had the money."

Kessler then looked at his phone.

"Wait, what happened?"

No one answered.

His phone buzzed again.

Kessler sighed.

"Frick."

Back on Wall Street, Feldman said the subscription was already proving to be average.

"People think we're paying $100,000 to see social media posts faster," he said. "That's not what we're doing."

SpaceX Employees Frustrated Recent Rocket Crash "Failed To Look As Cute As TikTok Edits" |Slightly off press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 09, 2026 / comment : 1

Local Music Fan Spends Entire Afternoon Curating Masterpiece Playlist, Immediately Hits Shuffle and now hates life | Slightly off press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 07, 2026 / comment : 2

 PINE CREEK, OH—Calling it "the most creatively fulfilled he'd felt in months," local resident Brian Keller spent nearly four and a half uninterrupted hours Saturday strategically building what he believed was the definitive Spotify playlist before immediately destroying the entire experience by instinctively pressing the Shuffle button less than two seconds after hitting Play.

According to Keller, the playlist represented "exactly how the music was supposed to unfold."

"I finally got it," he said. "Every song had a reason to be where it was. Nothing happened by accident."

It is sadly confirmed that statement became false almost immediately.

Neighbors reported hearing nothing unusual throughout the afternoon aside from occasional muttering through an open window.

"No, that one's too early."

"That transition needs another song."

"If this plays too soon, the whole middle falls apart."

At approximately 4:53 p.m., Keller declared the playlist complete and spent several moments scrolling through it in silence, reportedly appreciating the order the same way someone might admire a finished painting.

The opening track eased listeners into the playlist.

The middle built momentum.

The final stretch slowed everything down without feeling forced.

Even the last song had been chosen because, in Keller's words, "you should leave wanting one more."

Friends later confirmed they had received multiple messages during the afternoon explaining that he was "busy working on something," despite the project consisting almost entirely of dragging songs a few inches up and down a screen.

"He rejected one song because it was about a breakup," said now former friend Nathan Brooks. "Then he put it back where it was."

Spotify users familiar with playlist making described the process as completely normal.

"It's never just making a playlist," said local music fan Alexis Romero. "At some point you're just so exhausted from all the work it takes"

After placing the final song, Keller reportedly smiled, pressed Play, and without looking at the screen, hit Shuffle through years of muscle memory.

The playlist immediately opened with a slow acoustic ballad that had originally been scheduled for the final ten minutes.

It was followed by loud electronic dance music.

Then a song Keller specifically remembered deleting out of the entire playlist itself.

Witnesses said he stared at his phone without speaking.

"He didn't even skip the songs," Brooks said. "He just listened. Like someone who was about to enter their villain era."

Within minutes, the carefully planned progression had collapsed.

Songs intended to build anticipation appeared to be scattered.

A quiet transition disappeared entirely.

Three high energy tracks landed together despite Keller spending nearly twenty minutes making sure that would never happen.

By the fourth song, he reportedly had no idea what the point of living even was anymore.

Spotify, meanwhile, continued playing music exactly as instructed.

"The app has no interest in you as a person with feelings ," said playlist researcher Elaine Foster. "You can spend five hours arranging songs in a specific order, and Spotify will happily slam the door on your foot the second you accidentally hit shuffle."

Friends described the incident as "completely preventable" while acknowledging they would have done the exact same thing.

"I've built playlists called 'Late Night Drive' and then accidentally shuffled them before leaving my driveway," said coworker Daniel Price. "Apparently it hates me and wants me to die."

Experts say playlist creators always overestimate their ability to overcome years of automatic hand placement.

"You spend all afternoon thinking about how good you're going to feel emotionally," Foster explained. "Then the playlist ends, and you're now on tinder crying while eating a pint of ice cream."

"By the time you realize what happened, it's too late."

Although Keller restarted the playlist correctly several minutes later, sources said he now looked "fully dead inside", making the experience feel less like discovering a carefully crafted sequence and more like trying to recreate the happy memories of making the playlist itself.

"He kept saying, 'don't do anything you'll regret tomorrow,'" Brooks recalled.

At press time, Keller had reportedly started building another playlist, explaining that this one would be "the version that's actually lit".

Man Who Hits Snooze 7 Times A Morning Insists He’s "Listening" To His Alarm | Slightly Off Press

By: The Daily Briefing Feed on August 05, 2026 / comment : 2

 CINCINNATI—Looking very tired, the smartphone alarm clock owned by 31-year-old Evan Mercer was said to be having serious stress and worry on Tuesday after being snoozed every morning for 417 days in a row.

The alarm, which has gone off at 6:30 a.m. every weekday since 2024, has started getting nervous every night because it knows another morning is coming. People close to the phone said the alarm now spends hours worrying, only to ring, get slapped with a snooze button, and wait nine more minutes to do it all again.

"The not knowing is the hardest part," said sleep expert Dr. Lena Hollis, who studies how everyday electronics act under stress. "Imagine getting ready to do your job every morning, only to have someone hit you and angrily say, 'Not yet,' over and over. After a while, you stop believing anyone wants you to ring."

Mercer said he has done nothing wrong.

"I don't ignore it," Mercer said. "I listen to it six or seven times every morning."

People close to the phone said the alarm has started expecting to fail before it even rings. It now thinks someone will hit snooze almost right away, and the other apps on the phone have started covering for it whenever the clocks change.

Things got even worse this week after Mercer hit "Stop" instead of "Snooze" by mistake. For a few happy minutes, the alarm thought it had finally done its job, before finding out Mercer had just slept an extra hour.

At press time, the alarm has now been set for 6:15 a.m. because Mercer thought that might finally help.