Internet reacts with laughter to AI prompt theft complaints
Plus: USPS changes definition of "postmarked."
Happy New Year! đ
Here are the latest trending internet culture stories today:
The discourse about AI âprompt thievesâ is reaching ridiculous levels.
USPS quietly changed its definition of being âpostmarked,â which has many voting advocates sounding the alarm.
A look back at the year that wasâin memes.
To a great 2026,
â W.J.
âĄď¸ Today in Internet Culture
âMost ironic outrageâ: Ha, ha, AI bros are complaining about âprompt thievesâ
AI art communities are arguing over âprompt stealing,â with some users accusing others of copying and reposting the exact instructions used to generate images. Outside these spaces, critics say the outrage is steeped in irony, pointing out that generative AI itself is trained on massive amounts of artistsâ work, often without consent or compensation.
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âOf all the dirty tricksâ: USPS quietly changed what a postmark means. Voting advocates are alarmed
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) quietly changed what it means for mail to be âpostmarked,â a move that could make letters, ballots, and time-sensitive paperwork appear late, even if they were dropped off on time.
Under the new policy, the official postmark date may be applied days after mail enters the system, rather than the day itâs placed in a mailbox. Voting and healthcare advocates are sounding alarms, since the USPS itself is not.
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The 30 best memes of 2025
As 2025 comes to a close, people turn to the highlights of what made the year specialâŚor at least bearable. There were plenty of viral trends and memes that took over the internet this year, though some of them are more memorable than others.
From penguins paying tariffs to Le Poisson Steve and holy airball, here are the top memes that show what it was like to live through 2025.
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đŽ Everything we know about The Boys video game so far
đĽ Hot on the Dot
This was the most-read story on the Daily Dot yesterday:
⤠Erika Kirk memes are taking over social media following her theatrical Turning Point appearances
The prompt theft thing is peak irony but also kind of predictable. Once people invest time engineering prompts that actually work, they start treating them like IP even if the underlying model scraped millions of artists without asking. I spent hours trying to get consistent results for a project last year and honestly did feel annoyed when someone copy-pasted my exact phrasing and got better outputs. But then I remembered the whole thing runs on unconsented training data so like... maybe we're all just operating in a moral grey area here. The real question is wether this creates a new category of labor or if it's just gatekeeping with extra steps.