Assistant Managing Editor for News, The New York Times. Postings in Berlin, Cairo, Moscow, Albany and Midtown. Tweets and retweets mean check it out.

New York City
Joined June 2009
Michael Slackman retweeted
The NYT confirms Haaretz's report that Benjamin Netanyahu was secretly warned before Oct. 7, 2023 by the Emirati president that Hamas planned a major attack, per 2 sources The warning was not shared with Israeli security chiefs, per 5 ex-officials nytimes.com/2026/09/25/world…
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Michael Slackman retweeted
MIT published a brutally honest report on what AI is doing to students. A committee of professors and students spent five months studying how AI changed learning on campus, and the findings read like a warning to every university on the planet. Study groups are disappearing. Office hours are emptying out. Problem sets and take-home exams no longer prove anything, because AI can produce credible solutions to almost any written assignment in the undergraduate curriculum. Students who lean on chatbots lose mastery and confidence, and some slip into what the report calls cognitive surrender, reaching for AI at the first hint of struggle. The numbers are rough. 46 percent of surveyed MIT undergrads use LLMs daily. 90 percent worry about their own overreliance. Undergrads who feel AI makes them replaceable now outnumber those who feel it makes them capable. The committee's answer surprised me. They refused to fight AI with surveillance. The report calls AI detectors unreliable, says lockdown browsers feel like spying, and warns that policing students builds a classroom atmosphere of mutual distrust. Instead, MIT wants to rebuild education around the things AI can't replace. That means oral exams, semester portfolios, in-person project work, and a required social component in every subject. The report even floats the idea of rethinking grades entirely, since without a GPA to optimize, much of the incentive to cheat with AI evaporates. The committee warns professors against replacing undergrad research assistants with AI agents just because they're cheaper, because a university exists to grow people, not output. The most famous tech school on earth admitted the machines broke its way of teaching. Its answer is more humans, not more software.
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Astronomers plan to use Roman’s data to probe the mysterious nature of dark matter…They also expect to find more than 100,000 new worlds beyond the solar system and complete the census of planets across the Milky Way. nytimes.com/2026/08/30/scien…
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Nine out of 10 Afghan children age 10 cannot read an age-appropriate piece of writing. Only one in four Afghan women is literate. Girls who want to continue their education sometimes face additional obstacles from their families. @ElianPeltier nytimes.com/2026/08/28/world…
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Michael Slackman retweeted
Ukraine halted an intense campaign of drone strikes on oil tankers using a critical Black Sea port after a request from JD Vance amid concern about further destabilizing energy markets, Ukrainian officials tell @ChristopherJM @malcolmmoore @ak_mack ft.com/content/725b4d15-bd8d…
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So @JCP_L power went out at 4 pm Monday. This electric company said power would be back at 8 pm, then midnight, then 2 am, then 4 am, then 6 am, then 8 am and now 10 am. The messages say thank you for your patience. Mine is wearing out Clear skies. Perfect weather. Incompetence
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Breaking News: Mohammed Hadi @hadimo, who was the principal deputy on the business desk of The New York Times, is now the News Director for The Times. Congratulations Mo. Lucky us. nytco.com/press/new-role-for…
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A statement from The New York Times on the Pentagon’s press pass policy:
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We're happy to announce that Jorge Arangure will be joining the News Desk as a senior editor. nytco.com/press/jorge-arangu…
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Great news: @williaqj is now a senior editor with the News Desk at @nytimes
We're thrilled to announce that Amber Williams is taking on a new role as a senior editor on the new News Desk. nytco.com/press/new-role-for…
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Michael Slackman retweeted
Goodbye sweet Flaco. I’m sure where you’re going there’ll be no poisoned rats to sicken you.
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Michael Slackman retweeted
It’s Thursday February 15, 2024. WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich was detained by the FSB Mar 29, 2023. 323 DAYS AGO. For the “crime” of practicing true journalism in Russia. Russia is a totalitarian regime and Putin is a corrupt dictator. FREE EVAN TODAY! #IStandWithEvan
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