BA in French Teaching; PhD in Educational Technology; Associate Professor of ICT at University of Kentucky School of Information Science
Supported by digital methods, my research focuses on online social spaces, community practices within these spaces, and the influence of the platforms where they are found. My research is interdisciplinary, exploring spaces associated with teaching and learning, Mormonism, the far right, or even combinations of these themes.
My CV is available here.
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I sometimes write in French! To only see the French content (which is also available below, alongside English content), please click on [fr] in the site header.
🔗 linkblog: Musk’s Grok 4 launches one day after chatbot generated Hitler praise on X
Okay, really don’t want to spend any more time writing about Grok, but let’s talk about this passage:
“With respect to academic questions, Grok 4 is better than PhD level in every subject, no exceptions,” Musk claimed during the livestream. We’ve previously covered nebulous claims about “PhD-level” AI, finding them to be generally specious marketing talk.
To return to my thoughts on AI and epistemology, I don’t think having a PhD is (or should be) a benchmark for content knowledge.
🔗 linkblog: Trump Seeks to Cut Basic Scientific Research by Roughly One-Third, Report Shows
Reading this through an Ellulian lens is interesting. In the 1950s, he was expressing concern about the valuing of (applied) technique over (basic) science. In this article, though, it’s clear how often that basic science is still described and defended in applied/technical terms. pushing the boundaries of knowledge seems to only be valuable if it “sow[s] practical spinoffs and breakthroughs” or helps the U.S. in its geopolitical competition.
Gift link.
🔗 linkblog: Musk makes grand promises about Grok 4 in the wake of a Nazi chatbot meltdown
Yesterday, I wrote my thoughts on how Grok’s “Nazi meltdown” helps illustrate some of my concerns about AI and epistemology.
This coverage of Grok’s latest demo only reinforces that—Musk’s tinkering with the LLM to get the results he wants is at odds with his states naïve epistemology that an LLM can be “maximally truth-seeking,” as though there is a self-evident truth that an LLM can deliver in a straightforward way (that is, without all that mucking about behind the scenes).
on Grok, other LLMs, and epistemology
Yesterday, I blogged (en français) on Jacques Ellul’s emphasis on the need for a technology-responsive ethic that emphasizes (among other values) tension and conflict. Ellul explores this ethic—one of non-power—in a few different writings that feel like different drafts of the same thing, and so I’ve seen that emphasis come up a few times as I’ve tried reading his work. Every time, it surprises me a little bit. Why, in articulating an ethical framework, would you emphasize tension and conflict?
🔗 linkblog: Microsoft, OpenAI, and a US Teachers’ Union Are Hatching a Plan to ‘Bring AI into the Classroom’
It feels like it’s Big Tech’s world and schools are just living in it.
Jacques Ellul contre l'IA
Ça fait plusieurs mois que je m’intéresse aux écrits de Jacques Ellul comme base théorique pour comprendre les techniques et technologies de nos jours. En fait, j’ai déjà écrit en février au sujet de l’intelligence artificielle générative et combien l’œuvre d’Ellul semble utile pour les critiques de l’IA malgré le fait qu’Ellul a vécu et écrit bien avant l’ère de l’IA comme nous la connaissons aujourd’hui.
Je suis en train de lire son livre posthume Théologie et technique (bien lentement, il faut l’avouer—j’avais commencé le livre en mai avant de devoir recommencer il y a quelques jours), et je trouve qu’il y a plusieurs passages qui me semblent utile lors des débats actuels au sujet de l’IA générative.
🔗 linkblog: OpenAI and Microsoft Bankroll New A.I. Training for Teachers
Don’t know what to say here except that I don’t like any of this. Reminded of two arguments from Ellul:
First, that an effective ethics of technology considers systematic effects, not “good” uses vs. “bad” uses,
Second, that “because it exists” is not sufficient justification for adopting a technology.
Anyway, here’s the gift link.
🔗 linkblog: ‘Improved’ Grok criticizes Democrats and Hollywood’s ‘Jewish executives’
More on why we need to talk epistemology when we talk generative AI:
Musk tweaking his AI model to be more aligned with right-wing edgelords was inevitable, but there’s a broader point to be made: each AI model is a black box that supposedly gives objective answers but in reality is shaped by its owners. As more people look to AI to learn about the world, the people who control how it’s trained and how it responds will control our prevailing narratives.
🔗 linkblog: Google, de moteur de recherche à moteur de réponse
Voilà pourquoi il faut parler de la théorie de connaissance quand on parle de IA:
On est passé d’un moteur de recherche à un moteur de réponse. C’est-à-dire que les algorithmes proposent des versions rédigées à partir des données qu’ils auront collectées sur Internet, puis reformulées sans que vous ayez rendu visite aux sites contenant ces éléments de réponse à votre requête.
🔗 linkblog: Radio Télévision Suisse Pour développer l'industrie des puces, la Suisse finance la recherche plutôt que le secteur privé
Si on doit absolument investir au niveau national dans l’IA, je préfère cette approche (investir dans les recherches).
🔗 linkblog: Radio Télévision Suisse Le retour de Donald Trump relance le débat sur la souveraineté numérique
J’aimerais parler de ce sujet à mes étudiants. Même aux États-Unis, on doit nous demander de qui nous sommes dépendants dans notre vie numérique.
🔗 linkblog: From the Backlist: Bloggers Discuss the LDS Church Compensating Social Media Influencers — Exponent II Blog
Hadn’t heard about this, and it feels like an invitation for a new research project of some kind.
🔗 linkblog: Reddit turns 20, and it’s going big on AI
Reddit is a really interesting example of digital labor issues as they relate to both social media and AI. I wonder how things will go over the next few years.
🔗 linkblog: Radio Télévision Suisse A Neuchâtel aussi, les téléphones portables seront interdits à l'école obligatoire
Bon, je comprends ces soucis, mais je ne suis pas sûr que de telles interdictions soient la bonne réponse. Pourtant, vu que je suis plus ouvert à une interdiction de l’IA à l’école, il faut que je développe un peu plus ma philosophie ici.
📚 bookblog: The Sound of Mormonism: A Media History of Latter-day Saints (❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤)
I’m being a little hard on this book because it wasn’t quite was I was expecting. There’s a lot of good stuff in here despite not having some of what I was hoping to find. I do wonder if it would have been better as the original lecture it’s based on: You could hear some of the audio, and I think some of the fat could be trimmed from the manuscript.
🔗 linkblog: Teachers Are Not OK
Bookmarked this a while ago and am finally reading it. So infuriating.
🔗 linkblog: The Internet of Consent - Anil Dash
Lots of good observations in here, and I need to think through the implications for digital methods research.
🔗 linkblog: Funding Cuts Are a ‘Gut Punch’ for STEM Education Researchers
What’s happening at the NSF is a tragedy, and I’m upset about all of these cuts. That said, I’ve long been skeptical about how the NSF has been used to promote STEM education at the expense of other worthy (but less economically productive) causes in schools. If Trump’s petty—and often cruel—cuts are a warning sign about how government can distort research priorities, there’s a deeper issue lurking in the background that we also need to wrestle with.
🔗 linkblog: Researchers Scrape 2 Billion Discord Messages and Publish Them Online
I confess that I would have found this interesting in an earlier part of my career. Now, though, I’m reminded that I built that career on a methodological approach that’s uncomfortable close to surveillance, and I don’t love that.
🔗 linkblog: Duolingo CEO says AI is a better teacher than humans—but schools will exist ‘because you still need childcare’
I hate everything in this article.
🔗 linkblog: How Miami Schools Are Leading 100,000 Students Into the A.I. Future
There are some critical perspectives in this piece, but certainly not enough in my book. [gift link]
🔗 linkblog: American Schools Were Deeply Unprepared for ChatGPT, Public Records Show
Fascinating piece that underscores how often cheerleading voices are the only ones valued in edtech—and also how much education has been forced to respond to big tech companies simply releasing their products into the world wirhout input from those it will effect.
new publication: Jacques Ellul and educational technology
I’ve repeatedly referenced 20th century French technology scholar Jacques Ellul on my blog(s) since the beginning of the year. While my interest in Ellul’s work is also personal and political, I wrote back in February that one of the main reasons I’m reading a lot of Ellul right now is to add a stronger theoretical foundation to my scholarly work.
With that context in mind, I’m happy to share that my first Ellul-inspired article has just been published in the Journal of Computing and Higher Education!
🔗 linkblog: Oklahoma education standards say students must identify 2020 election 'discrepancies'
Ryan Walters continues to be shameful.
🔗 linkblog: UK launching social media campaign spotlighting NIH-funded research
NIH funding is an important part of my employer’s budget, so I think this kind of advocacy is important. However, it rubs me the wrong way that we’re speaking up publicly about potential funding cuts and being largely silent and “well, gotta follow the law” when our marginalized students are being targeted.
new publication: documenting a teacher group on far-right social media
I’m pleased to be able to finally share the publication in the British Journal of Educational Technology of an article that Dan Krutka and I have been working on for some time, which documents activity in a teachers’ group on a far-right social media platform (which we intentionally don’t identify within the paper). Here’s a link to a full-text, read-only version of the article, and here’s the abstract as a preview: