There’s a video going viral this week of the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles with a wildfire raging behind it, letters glowing in the blaze. It’s a powerful scene, up there with the burning McDonald’s sign in imagery that’s come out of this week’s devastating fires spreading across LA. 

I've seen several people sharing this same video with shades of shock and heartbreak. But it’s AI-generated. When it was posted, according to a Community Note on one of the posts, a look at the Hollywood sign livestreams showed the sign was fine; as of writing, the feeds are down, but Hollywoodsign.org, a website that runs a live webcam pointed at the sign, told fact-checking site Snopes "Griffith Park is temporarily closed as a safety precaution, but the Sign itself is not affected and is secure — and the cameras will slowly but surely come back up." 

Another viral image of the Hollywood sign burning is also AI: 

Then there’s X poster Kevin Dalton’s image, which he later admitted was made with X’s Grok generative AI tool “for now,” showing what I can only assume he imagines as “antifa” in all black descending on a burned-out neighborhood to loot it. “The remains of Pacific Palisades will get picked clean tonight,” he wrote. (Dalton’s been making AI paint him little fantasy pictures of Trump firing California governor Gavin Newsom, so this is a big week for him.)  

People are also obsessively generating Grok images of Newsom fiddling in front of fires or saving goldfish (???). 

The very real footage and images coming out of Southern California this week are so surreal they’re hard to believe, with entire miles of iconic coastline, whole neighborhoods, and massive swaths of the Pacific Palisades and LA’s east side turned to ash (and still burning as of writing).  

Interestingly, a lot of this week’s news cycle has turned to blaming AI and its energy usage as contributing to climate change. But others are not wasting an opportunity for boosterism. In a stunning show of credulity, British-owned digital newspaper The Express ran a story with the headline “Five dead in LA fires as residents think AI tech could have prevented disaster” based on a quote from one evacuating 24 year old they found who took the opportunity in front of a reporter to breathlessly shill for AI, as an AI industry worker himself. “[Los Angeles’] fire and police departments don’t invest in technology [sic] hopefully more people build AI robotics solutions for monitoring or help. Instead a lot of people in ai are building military solutions. Aka putting a gun on top of a robot dog,” Chevy Chase Canyon resident William Lee told The Express. “Robotics operated fire response systems. It costs $6-18k for AI humanoid robots. LAFD salary is approx $100k/yr… 3,500 firefighters. We can slowly integrate robotics to put less lives at risk, but also for assistance."

That guy was so close to saying something prescient it’s painful: Robot dogs are a stupid waste of taxpayer money, and not a hypothetical one, as LA approved $278,000 for a surveillance robot dog toy for the LAPD in 2023. But the Los Angeles Fire Department’s budget was cut by nearly $17.6 million this fiscal year, while giving even more money to the police department’s already massive budget: the LAPD received a $2.14 billion budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year, representing an 8.1% increase. 

“Humanoid robots” as an absurd proposition aside, I don’t want to write off all forms of new technology as useless in natural disasters. Machine learning and machine vision technology seem to show promise in helping detect, track, or prevent wildfires: Last week, University of California San Diego’s ALERTCalifornia camera network alerted fire officials of an anomaly spotted on video, and firefighters were reportedly able to contain the blaze to less than a quarter acre. But companies taking investment to “solve” wildfires are also profiting off of a crisis that’s only getting worse, with no promise that their solutions will improve the situation. 

Overwhelmingly, AI is being crammed down the public’s throats as a tool for generating some of the dumbest bullshit imaginable. That includes misinformation like we’ve seen with these fires, but also bottomless ugliness, laughably terrible bots, sexual abuse and violence. And it’s sold to us as both our inevitable savior and the next world-ending existential crisis by people with billions earned on the theft of human creativity, and billions more yet to gain. 

AI might help solve tough problems related to climate change and things like wildfires, water scarcity, and energy consumption. But in the meantime, data centers are projected to guzzle  6.6 billion cubic meters of water by 2027, in service of churning out sloppy, morbid fantasies about tragedies within tragedies.

• Disney Cruise Line's sixth ship, Disney Treasure, set sail in late 2024.
• Its most luxurious Tomorrow Tower Suite has a private elevator, four bedrooms, and a spiral staircase.
• The suite starts at about $57,440 for a family of four.

If you're a Disney cruise fan with a genie, consider using one of your three wishes on a stay in Disney Treasure's Tomorrow Tower Suite.

Otherwise, expect to pay more than $57,000 for the luxury marine penthouse.

Disney Cruise Line's newest ship, Disney Treasure, set sail in December 2024, marking the sixth vessel to join the entertainment powerhouse's fleet. Don't expect the company to slow down — its popular cruise arm plans to double its fleet over the next six years.

It's no wonder fans of the brand have been indulging in its floating theme parks. Treasure is filled with amenities referencing Disney films and rides.

If you fondly remember the Jungle Cruise ride, grab a drink at the themed Skipper Society lounge. If you're a "Zootopia" fan, grab an ice-cream cone from Jumbeaux's Sweets.

If you love Walt Disney World's Epcot, consider booking Disney Treasure's Tomorrow Tower Suite.

The two-story suite's unconventional art, metal accents, and glittering stained glass are callbacks to Epcot. It's also about 1,970 square feet, making it Disney Treasure's largest and most luxurious cabin.

With luxury comes a hefty price tag.

The ship is spending its inaugural year operating weeklong Caribbean cruises from Port Canaveral, Florida.

The suite starts at about $57,440 for a family of four (about $22,625 per adult and $5,660 per child), as per a sailing in late November.

To compare, inside cabins on the same voyage start at $7,330.

The price for the high-end Tomorrow Tower is relatively steep. Yet, it's already been booked for several of Disney Treasure's coming voyages.

The luxe accommodation is perched in the ship's funnel — off of a private elevator, no less.

The front door opens to a cozy living space with a lounge, dining table, and bar, all bathed in light from the adjacent two-story floor-to-ceiling window that overlooks the ship's top deck.

Use the motorized sheer or blackout curtains for more privacy. Or, enjoy the sun with a pick-me-up from the coffee maker or a soda from the stocked bar.

Keep a chilled bottle in the bar's wine cooler and snacks in the pantry's refrigerator.

No need to hand-clean any post-grazing dishes — the expansive pantry also has a dishwasher.

Take the spiral staircase to the upstairs bedrooms.

The penthouse can sleep up to eight people with its two primary bedrooms (both with walk-in closets), a children's room with bunk beds, and a library with a queen mattress.

Expect a sumptuous slumber courtesy of the down duvets, 1,000-thread-count Frette cotton linens, and pillows of your choice, courtesy of the "pillow menu."

The living room and bedrooms all have their own TVs and bathrooms.

The primary bedrooms' restrooms are especially luxurious, outfitted with dual sinks, bathtubs, and rain showers.

No need to share — visitors can use the downstairs guest bathroom.

Guests also receive perks exclusive to those vacationing in the ship's Concierge-level cabins.

This includes a team to help book nursery or spa services and a private lounge with a pool and two hot tubs.

Ultra-luxury, one-of-a-kind suites have become popular picks in new floating resorts.

Similar to the Tomorrow Tower Suite, several of Royal Caribbean's new mega-ships have a distinctive two-story family suite with amenities like a slide, air hockey table, and butler-like Royal Genie.

The aptly named Ultimate Family Townhouse on the cruise line's one-year-old Icon of the Seas had been reserved for most of 2024 — for an average cost of $100,000 a week.

• China could destroy or neutralize US and allied airpower in a war with fewer shots than the other way around, a new report argues.
• China has prioritized hardening and expanding its airfields in the region at a faster rate than the US and its allies.
• The report's authors argue the US needs to prioritize defense, hardening airbases, and evolving its force.

In a war, China could suppress or destroy critical American airpower in the Indo-Pacific region with far fewer shots than it would take the US and its allies to do the same to Beijing's air forces, a new research report argues.

The report's authors note that China has been working faster than the US to harden its airbases and diversify its combat aircraft in the region, creating an imbalance in China's favor. American airfields are vulnerable to attack in a conflict, such as a fight over Taiwan.

A new Hudson Institute analysis from researchers Thomas Shugart and Timothy Walton highlights the serious threat facing US installations in the Pacific and echoes Department of Defense concerns about growing China's arsenal of missiles and those of US lawmakers about inadequate defenses.

In the report, Shugart and Walton write that China "has made major investments to defend, expand, and fortify" its airfields and more than doubled its hardened aircraft shelters and unhardened individual aircraft shelters over the past decade. China has also added to its taxiways and ramp areas. All of these efforts effectively give the Chinese military more places to protect and launch combat aircraft in a potential fight.

US efforts have been modest by comparison. And its military airfield capacity, including that of allies in the region, is roughly one-third of China's; without South Korea, that drops to one-quarter, and without the Philippines, it falls to just 15 percent.

The Air Force has been looking at dispersion and atypical runways as part of its Agile Combat Employment efforts, but there is still a notable shortfall that could be exploited.

This imbalance means it would take China far fewer missiles or airstrikes to neutralize US and allied airfields than it would the other way around, Shugart and Walton write. A preemptive strike, surprise being important in Chinese military doctrine, could catch the US and its allies off guard and give China an edge in air operations.

"Strategically, this destabilizing asymmetry risks incentivizing the PRC to exercise a first-mover advantage," the report says. "China could initiate a conflict if it sees an opportunity to nullify adversary airpower on the ramp."

Shugart wrote in 2017 that this is a real possibility, "particularly if China perceives that its attempts at deterrence of a major US intervention — say in a cross-strait Taiwan crisis or in a brewing dispute over the Senkaku Islands — have failed."

China has not been shy about its investments in being able to pull off such a strike, either. Beijing has invested heavily in its rocket force, with the Pentagon's annual report on Chinese military power documenting staggering growth in the number of stockpiled missiles and launchers, including the weapons it would need to hit US installations in the region. Satellite images have also documented mock American military assets, such as aircraft carriers, widely seen as missile targets.

For the conflicts and airpower operations in the Middle East, the US military enjoyed the ability to deploy to forward airfields uncontested, but the threat environment is different in the Pacific. A war with China would be very different.

But despite the significant concerns both within the Pentagon and Washington about vulnerabilities in US airbases, "the US military has devoted relatively little attention to countering these threats compared to its focus on developing modern aircraft," Shugart and Walton write. Older and newer aircraft differ in the air but are equally vulnerable on the ground.

The Ukraine war and ongoing fights in the Middle East have demonstrated that airfields are high-priority targets.

In order to counter the threat China poses, the Hudson report argues the US should invest further in active defenses for its air operations, harden its airfields to maintain resilience, and accelerate its efforts to field aircraft and unmanned systems that can operate from short or damaged runways or don't require runaways altogether, efforts fitting with ACE operations.

"Executing an effective campaign to enhance the resilience of US airfield operations will require informed decisions to prioritize projects — and sustained funding," Shugart and Walton write. "What is clear, however, is that US airfields do face the threat of attack, and the current DoD approach of largely ignoring this fact invites PRC aggression and risks losing a war." 

• California fires have led people to turn to apps, subreddits, and social media accounts for real-time updates.
• The Watch Duty wildfire maps app said it added over 1 million new users in recent days.
• Residents are also using security apps to check in on their homes and discuss updates in forums.

As California fires spread across the Los Angeles region, residents are turning to online resources and smartphone app communities to track the blazes and find up-to-date information on their impact.

Along with the Watch Duty wildfire maps app, people are using security apps like Google Nest and Ring to check footage of their homes and communicate in forums.

Others are sharing resources and information in subreddits and on social media platforms.

Watch Duty

Watch Duty describes itself as a wildfire mapping and alert app "powered by real people giving you real-time information vetted by trained professionals, not robots." There's also a web-based version.

Adam Wood, a 45-year-old film producer, director, and editor, living in North Hollywood, helped his friend evacuate from Pasadena and said he used the app to track the fires. He told BI it helped him assess whether his friend's area was likely to have been impacted, although they don't know if his house is still standing.

The app, which is free to use with the option to pay $25 for a yearly membership that unlocks some additional features, was developed by a nonprofit company in 2022 and isn't affiliated with a government agency. It focuses on providing real-time information about fires from sources including retired firefighters, dispatchers, and first responders.

"Our reporters undergo extensive training as well as background checks before joining our elite team," the company said on its website, adding that they "diligently radio scanners and collaborate around the clock to bring you up-to-the-minute life-saving information."

Social media

In addition to people posting stories, photos, and videos about their experiences with the wildfire, specific accounts are also being used to inform people about up-to-date information.

Facebook users are active in groups like Calfire Updates, which has over 300,000 members. The group dedicates posts to firefighters, shares information about damage, and discusses the fires. Other groups, like California Wildfires Information ALERT, post evacuation notices and resources for those who have fled impacted areas.

Local police, fire departments, and emergency services have been sharing information on their dedicated social media pages, such as the Los Angeles Fire Department account on X or the City of Pasadena account on Facebook.

Security cameras and apps

Security app users have shared experiences of watching their homes being burned down from the app's camera footage.

Zibby Owens, a writer, shared to social media on Wednesday footage from her Google Nest camera of parts of her Palisades property in flames.

Some have also used the "Neighbors" forum on the Amazon-owned Ring app to share information about the fires.

"Fire close to Mandeville Canyon (photo from 9:50PM), seems to be going rapidly toward South," one user posted last night with a photo.

The app has also released information about the wildfires and dedicated a tab to resources for impacted residents called "California Wildfire Information." The page includes shelter locations, where to find food in LA County, what to pack, and wildfire smoke tips. It also links over a dozen resources including media updates, Airbnb temporary housing details, and a list of school closures.

The Ring Neighbors team also released a statement in the app about the wildfires with links to help those impacted, including organizations like The American Red Cross, the California Community Fund, and California Fire Relief.

Local community forums on Reddit

People are also turning to community subreddits like r/PacificPalisades and r/Pasadena to share updates and discuss wildfire damage. Some posts have offered practical tips for evacuees, such as suggestions to film the contents of their homes before leaving for insurance purposes if they have time to do so.

One user named OnerKram17, has dedicated two days to monitoring police and fire scanners, providing frequent updates in the r/PacificPalisades subreddit in between what they said was a few hours of sleep.

Others have taken on similar roles, posting about power lines that are blocking off crossings or potentially false alarms for fires.

Apple’s best-selling Mac, the MacBook Air, is getting upgraded soon—possibly as the first Apple product launch of 2025. Here are four new features coming to the M4 MacBook Air when it arrives.

Benjamin and Chance talk about the current ongoing controversies with Apple Intelligence notification summaries and the reaction to the settlement of the Siri privacy lawsuit, and how Apple is managing the negative PR. LG announces a new 6K display, but does it actually exist? And Benjamin is thrilled to hear that Apple News+ Puzzles may finally be coming to the UK.

And in Happy Hour Plus, we appreciate the seamless integration of iPhone, AirPods and Watch in the current cold winter months. Subscribe at 9to5mac.com/join.

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