Out of the loop

I've seen people posting tweets from public figures talking about alligators, seen other people joking about alligators. It appears to me that the issue is political, not environmental, but I don't fully get the picture.

What's going on?

Saw people talking in comments at several places now, expressing animosity towards them to say the least, always presented as something that everyone seems to know about.

I'm finding it hard to find concise info on what's been going on in/around Iran. Can anyone throw a brief timeline of events for me? Pretty pretty please?

Edi: thanks for all the comments and answers, appreciate it!

Why are we doing them? What did I miss?

Why are so many companies updating their privacy policy lately, I noticed many companies including reddit and some games I play updating their privacy policies? Why is that, is it just a coincidence or something big happened?

For instance: https://lemmy.ca/comment/16835886

I'm not very active on Mastodon, but saw this post - browsing the bluesky hashtag for a bit afterwards did not really give me much info. I can definitely imagine enshittification happening there, but what is causing the current drama in particular?

Disclaimer: I'm not American, I don't live in the US

JD Vance didn't exist in my life before he became vice president. Now, I am aware that I also don't know anything about most vicepresidents in the world. But I've seen a lot of people who are also USA outsiders making comments about him as if implying something else, as if relying on facts everyone ought to know. I get the feeling most people have already heard about him from before and I'm late to the party.

So, what do I need to know, other than his political affiliations? Yes, we all know who the president is and that says a lot, but, is Vance notorious for anything else?

Its been a while but I always wondered why the us decided to Lift the ban?

I don't understand why everyone is saying that they feel lonely from this face tracking model.

Is it because of the wide range of facial expressions the model makes or something else?

I know the fun answers (and choose to believe them a little), but what was the real (cover) story?

Haven't used Twitch in awhile and was surprised when trying to follow a channel only to see a phone verification prompt.

I've seen a couple posts in the top in the last 6 hours feed, and it seems like people are really up in arms about this functional programming stuff. Not really sure what it even is.

It looks like it's people writing bad programming or something? Like a lot of extra stuff that is not necessary?

EDIT: sorry everyone, I'm not a programmer and I don't know to much other than a little java and python. I guess I should have posted this in Explain Like I'm Five.

He expressed that a shutdown will favor Trump and Musk, so sounds reasonable?

With PewDiePie switching to Linux, I've seen more and more post with him and they often get locked.

What moral failings did he commit, and has he done anything to make up for them?

I almost hate to ask this since it's come up so much already, but what's with the Dragon Rider drama? Like what's going on

We have new members because of people fleeing, I'm seeing communities being archived, and just generally more than the regular Reddit being Reddit.

Has the end come in some way?

Seriously, what’s the significance of the word? There are many teens in my neighborhood, as well as me having a teenage sister, who laugh hysterically at the word.

Some people will respond with “Wanna know what else is massive?” Is this a sex joke or something?

[I live in the US now but grew up where many people did not speak English so I may not understand jokes that well even if my parents are English speakers.]

Edit: Looks like it’s from someone called Ninja. https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/ninjas-massive-you-know-what-else-is-massive

I am a self proclaimed wiki-phile, I always donated when I could. It was kind of like going to the library without the fresh book smell.

I've heard Reddit is setting themselves up for another major fumble and that it relates to how much Spez is a fanboy of Elon Musk.

I can't find any details on the drama playing out though. Can someone explain the details of what's going on?

I would love to see Lemmy grow with another big "Rexxit" event, but I'm not seeing anything happening to cause one.

There's the whole TikTok thing, talk about EV cars, and now DeepSeek. I know I've heard my own stuff too, but I want to see what other people are hearing and seeing?