Good morning. It’s Monday, June 15.
- Mark Arax chronicles California’s new age of plunder.
- Former San Francisco 49er is found dead at age 36.
- And farming heir is arrested for anti-Semitic threats.
Statewide
1.
California’s wealth was built on extraction — of gold, timber, water, oil, and more. The artificial intelligence boom now heralds “a new and more menacing age of plunder,” mining both our water and our minds, wrote Mark Arax, the celebrated chronicler of California.
“In Silicon Valley, lords of tech harness untold amounts of water and electricity to power more data-processing centers. The project of artificial intelligence feeds on human consciousness itself. Algorithms lay waste to our brains. Robots instruct our children how to expertly tie nooses to better hang themselves.” The Guardian
- An alternate view from the Atlantic’s Elias Wachtel: “The data-center panic is overblown.”
2.
In a follow-up to its Cesar Chavez investigation, the New York Times reported on Friday that many women inside the United Farm Workers union suffered under a culture of unchecked harassment, misogyny, and sexual assault. The article included new allegations against the UFW co-founder Dolores Huerta, who earlier revealed that she had been raped by Chavez. Interviews and union records suggest that a number of women complained that Huerta rebuffed complaints of sexism and even appeared to dismiss a purported rape claim.
3.
“They had all these little props to get a perfect Instagram moment.”
A few weeks ago, the story of a 7-year-old becoming the youngest to climb El Capitan ricocheted around the world. There were news headlines, television appearances, and sponsorship deals. But many in the climbing world grumbled. Missing from the coverage and the family’s social media posts was any mention of the six team members who actually led the climb, fixed lines, and hauled the bags. Climbing Magazine told “the true story behind the ‘El Cap kindergartener’ ascent.”
Northern California
4.
Aldon Smith, a former All-Pro for the San Francisco 49ers whose career was derailed by arrests and substance abuse, died on Saturday at the age of 36. The cause was not disclosed. Amir Shirazi, a friend, said he walked out of his Los Gatos home in the morning and found the former linebacker slumped over in the front passenger seat of his pickup. Shirazi was unable to revive him. He said Smith had been struggling financially, bouncing around friends’ homes and waiting for his NFL pension to kick in. S.F. Chronicle
5.
Oliver Tree, an electro-pop musician from Santa Cruz, was among six people who died when two helicopters collided over Rio de Janeiro on Sunday, officials said. It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the accident. Known for his bowl cut and theatrical music videos, Tree had been traveling through South America as part of a world tour. Asked once about his look, he told the Santa Cruz Sentinel, “I was making a statement with it. Everybody’s trying to look so beautiful and sexy nowadays. It was my way of rebelling against that.” Tree was 32. A.P. | L.A. Times
6.
UC Berkeley professor Hany Farid is the world’s leading deepfake expert. But even he now does not trust his own eyes. For years, Farid has fielded requests from governments, human rights organizations, journalists, and others to verify whether videos and images are real. It used to be fairly easy for him. “The technology is getting so good,” he said recently. “It takes me to a dark place.” He went on: “I don’t trust anything. … It’s over. Within a year or two, our whole visual system will be utterly useless.” N.Y. Times
7.
The idea of a trillion dollars is having a moment. OpenAI and Anthropic are both targeting valuations of around $1 trillion ahead of public stock offerings. After SpaceX’s market debut on Friday, its market capitalization soared above $2 trillion, while Musk himself became the world’s first trillionaire. But you have no idea what a trillion dollars is, wrote the Wall Street Journal. The publication created some mind-blowing visualizations to prove its point.
- The IPO boom is set to mint about 12,000 new multimillionaires, many of them in the Bay Area. Washington Post
8.
When Sundar Pichai, the Google CEO, took the stage to deliver the commencement address at Stanford on Sunday, scores of graduates stood up, chanted “free Palestine,” and marched out of the ceremony. The protest was aimed at a Google project providing technology services to Israel. Pichai’s remarks studiously avoided controversy, including the big landmine of the 2026 commencement season: artificial intelligence. He focused instead on broad life advice: be optimistic, work hard, and do what excited you. Mercury News | Gizmodo
Southern California
9.
Despite President Trump’s insistence that Spencer Pratt was robbed in the Los Angeles mayoral race, the candidate accepted his loss on Friday — sort of. In a three-minute video punctuated with insults for his campaign rivals — “commie animals,” “corrupt communists,” “dumb and dumber” — Pratt said the “campaign portion” of his efforts to “save” L.A. is ending. But he’s not done, he added: “I didn’t get into this for political power. I got in it to expose this corrupt machine and nothing has changed.” N.Y. Times | L.A. Times
- The latest fraud theory posits that people on Skid Row were paid to vote. The L.A. Times investigated and found no evidence to support it.
10.
Students in a sociology class at UCLA were required to “procure a mirror” and reflect their work desks on live video during an online test. In another class, students were told to keep their arms crossed during an oral video exam.
A cheating crisis is forcing professors to take extreme measures to police the use of artificial intelligence. For their part, students are taking their own measures to protect against false accusations, documenting drafts of their work and hiring academic AI-defense lawyers. It all amounts to a collapse of trust that is reshaping the American academy, the Los Angeles Times reported.
11.
David Hockney, the British artist who died last week, lived in Los Angeles long enough to dub himself “an English Los Angeleno.” His paintings of the city’s sparkling pools, palm trees, and manicured lawns have endured as defining symbols of America’s sunny West Coast. “The light there is 10 times brighter than anywhere else,” Hockney once said of the city. The New York Times and Another magazine revisited some of Hockney’s most memorable works.
12.
The heir to a Central Valley raisin giant was arrested in the Pacific Palisades after being accused of subjecting his Jewish neighbors to a monthlong campaign of anti-Semitic threats, reports said. Bruce Lion is the 64-year-old scion of Lion Raisins, which has been in the family for five generations. He has a lengthy criminal history, including charges of criminal threats, domestic violence, and vandalism. Before his arrest, a reporter found Lion at his home blasting Christian music for his neighbors to hear. “I want them to know they’re going to hell, and it makes me happy,” he said. California Post | KTLA
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