Joey Hess: the local weather

Snow coming. I’m tuned into the local 24 hour slop weather stream. AI
generated, narrated, up to the minute radar and forecast graphics. People
popping up on the live weather map with questions “snow soon?” (They pay
for the privilege.) LLM generating reply that riffs on their name. Tuned to
keep the urgency up, something is always happening somewhere, scanners are
pulling the police reports, live webcam description models add
verisimilitude to the description of the morning commute. Weather is
happening.

In the subtext, climate change is happening. Weather is a growth industry.
The guy up in Kentucky coal country who put this thing together is building
an empire. He started as just another local news greenscreener. Dropped out
and went twitch weather stream. Hyping up tornado days and dicy snow
forecasts. Nowcasting, hyper individualized, interacting with chat.
Now he’s automated it all. On big days when he’s getting real views,
the bot breaks into his live streams, gives him a break.

Only a few thousand watching this morning yet. Perfect 2026 grade slop.
Details never quite right, but close enough to keep on in the background
all day. Nobody expects a perfect forecast after all, and it’s fed from the
National Weather Center discussion too. We still fund those guys? Why
bother when a bot can do it?

He knows why he’s big in these states, these rural areas. Understands
the target audience. Airbrushed AI aesthetics are ok with them, receive no
pushback. Flying more under the radar coastally, but weather is big there
and getting bigger. The local weather will come for us all.

(Not fiction FYI.)