Non-theist Christian and elder in Community of Christ. I have Mormon roots and aspirations to do better with justice and peacemaking—especially in the digital sphere but also in Lexington, Kentucky, the U.S., and the world more broadly.
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🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'CNET Defends Use of AI Blogger After Embarrassing 163-Word Correction: ‘Humans Make Mistakes, Too’'
- kudos:Here, as with autocorrect and citation managers, my personal opinion is that any human who knows enough to use the tool critically knows enough to do the job themself. Maybe slower, sure, but slower isn’t always bad. link to ‘CNET Defends Use of AI Blogger After Embarrassing 163-Word Correction: ‘Humans Make Mistakes, Too’’
'licensed, not sold, to you'
- kudos:As I’ve blogged about a couple of times recently, I’m currently reading R. Sikoryak’s Terms and Conditions, a graphic novel adaptation of the 2015 iTunes Terms and Conditions document, which no one ever reads. I was struck (if not surprised) by something stated explicitly in the document, which appears on p. 59 of Sikoryak’s volume: The software products made available through the Mac App Store and App Store (collectively, the “App Store Products”) are licensed, not sold, to you.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'How ‘radioactive data’ could help reveal malicious AIs - The Verge'
- kudos:Fascinating read on potential threats posed by AI—and potential solutions. link to ‘How ‘radioactive data’ could help reveal malicious AIs - The Verge’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Indigenous tech group asks Apache Foundation to change its name | Ars Technica'
- kudos:Ashamed to admit that until this week, I ’d never really thought about the origins of this name. This seems like a pretty straightforward argument, though, and I can’t think of any compelling reason not to change the name. link to ‘Indigenous tech group asks Apache Foundation to change its name | Ars Technica’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Public Library Budgets Are Being Slashed. Police Have More Cash Than Ever'
- kudos:Libraries are perhaps the most important public institution out there. We can’t afford to cut their budgets. link to ‘Public Library Budgets Are Being Slashed. Police Have More Cash Than Ever’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Mouse Jigglers, Fake PowerPoints: Workers Foil Bosses’ Surveillance Attempts - WSJ'
- kudos:Hey, look, workplace surveillance doesn’t work. link to ‘Mouse Jigglers, Fake PowerPoints: Workers Foil Bosses’ Surveillance Attempts - WSJ’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Iran to use facial recognition to identify women without hijabs | Ars Technica'
- kudos:I’m skeptical of many technologies, most of which I can concede have some real value. In contrast, I have a lot of trouble seeing any value in facial recognition that outweighs the obvious, large-scale harms that can come from it. link to ‘Iran to use facial recognition to identify women without hijabs | Ars Technica’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'As Elon Fires More Trust & Safety Staff, Twitter’s Moderation Efforts Fall Apart | Techdirt'
- kudos:Repeat after me: Content moderation is a good thing. link to ‘As Elon Fires More Trust & Safety Staff, Twitter’s Moderation Efforts Fall Apart | Techdirt’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Chokepoint Capitalism can break you free from big tech and big content - The Verge'
- kudos:It’s a long interview, so I didn’t read the whole thing, but what I did read made me want to read this book even more. I have a copy, I just need to open it up. link to ‘Chokepoint Capitalism can break you free from big tech and big content - The Verge’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Researchers Could Track the GPS Location of All of California’s New Digital License Plates'
- kudos:A good reminder that analog is often better. Digital often benefits others (including bad actors) more than ourselves. link to ‘Researchers Could Track the GPS Location of All of California’s New Digital License Plates’
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for Heike's Void, by Steven Peck
- kudos:What a weird, profound, and beautiful book. This is a very Mormon novel, and in all the best ways. It takes Mormonism seriously—even literally—but not uncritically. I’d wager that Peck has read Grant Hardy, and my favorite bit in an amazing book is a throwaway joke about farewell expressions in French in a way that only someone who knows and loves the Book of Mormon would do. More than all of that, it is a profound and optimistic (but never naïve) story about redemption knowing no bounds.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'ChatGPT is enabling script kiddies to write functional malware | Ars Technica'
- kudos:I’ve been making a real effort to be less pessimistic about ChatGPT, and I imagine this makes a better headline than actual threat, but this is still the sort of thing that makes me wonder about AI. What is missing from our world that ChatGPT fills? And is it worth these increased risks? link to ‘ChatGPT is enabling script kiddies to write functional malware | Ars Technica’
on Epiphany and insurrection
- kudos:I grew up in a faith tradition that—with the exception of major holidays like Christmas and Easter—didn’t follow the Christian liturgical calendar. So, shortly after I began attending Community of Christ regularly (and, given the circumstances, virtually) in 2020, I decided I was going to learn more all of the seasons and holidays that I wasn’t familiar with. A few months earlier, I’d heard an interview with the Swiss abbot Urban Federer on the Babel podcast by Radio Télévision Suisse.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'January 6 Report: 11 Details You May Have Missed | WIRED'
- kudos:Two years later, and we’re still learning just how bad this event was. Only two years later, and large parts of the country are ready to sweep it all under the rug. link to ‘January 6 Report: 11 Details You May Have Missed | WIRED’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on '531 | Cuppa Joe | Historic Sites Foundation | Divergent Paths of the Community of Christ: The Past One Hundred Years – Project Zion Podcast'
- kudos:Steve Shields does good work and has an interesting perspective on things. It’s fun to hear from him. link to ‘531 | Cuppa Joe | Historic Sites Foundation | Divergent Paths of the Community of Christ: The Past One Hundred Years – Project Zion Podcast’
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for A Short Stay in Hell, by Steven Peck
- kudos:I’ve read this short novella at least four times already, but I received a physical copy for Christmas and couldn’t help but give it another read. Despite being existentially horrifying, it’s one of my favorite books of all time. The protagonist is a Mormon man who dies and wakes up to his surprise in hell. This hell is specifically promised to be finite, but it’s a vast kind of finite: It’s a Borges-inspired library that consists of every possible book (as if written by monkeys on typewriters), and once you find the book that tells your life story, you get out of hell.
Disciples' Generous Response for 1 January 2023
- kudos:A member of my Community of Christ congregation recently asked if I would lead the Disciples’ Generous Response portion of tomorrow’s worship service (where donations and tithes are collected). I’ve done this for previous services, but more than any other way I’ve contributed to a Community of Christ service, this is the one that takes the most practice. In Latter-day Saint services, there’s never this kind of collection, and this was honestly one of the hardest things to get used to as I began regularly attending Community of Christ services.
on faith transition and letting go of LDS modesty worship
- kudos:I’ve mentioned before that I support the Salt Lake Tribune’s Mormon Land podcast on Patreon, one of the perks of which is that I get access to the Tribune’s Mormon coverage without having to subscribe to the whole paper (which would be a lot of money for someone who doesn’t care about Jazz coverage or Utah politics). Thanks to this Patreon perk, I read a lot of news about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and between that and over three decades that I spent as an active member of that church, you’d think that nothing would surprise me anymore.
- kudos:
I’ve been trying to put words to an idea in my head for a few weeks, and I think I finally have it: A secular Christmas is still definitely Christian in the same way that Homer Simpson is still definitely a white dude.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Musk asks in poll if he should step down as Twitter CEO, users vote yes : NPR'
- kudos:What a weird week it has been in Twitterland. link to ‘Musk asks in poll if he should step down as Twitter CEO, users vote yes : NPR’
- kudos:
Skipping my congregation’s candelight service today. Can’t go in person because of family sickness, and they’ve made it clear that they aren’t going to make huge efforts to make it Zoom accessible. Bummed to miss it, but playing Mario Party with kiddo instead is pretty fun.
- kudos:
I was really hoping to make something special of Advent this year, but the past three weeks have just kind of sucked, and I don’t know if the next one will be any better. I don’t know that I have a takeaway from this, except that maybe it’s okay to have a sucky Advent.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter abruptly bans all links to Instagram, Mastodon, and other competitors - The Verge'
- kudos:Just when you thought this couldn’t get any worse. Will be really interested to see if Dorsey gets banned. link to ‘Twitter abruptly bans all links to Instagram, Mastodon, and other competitors - The Verge’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Tries (Badly) To Defend The Banning Of Journalists As Twitter Starts Blocking Links & Mentions Of Mastodon | Techdirt'
- kudos:I’ve posted a bunch of articles about this already, but Masnick’s take is super helpful. link to ‘Elon Tries (Badly) To Defend The Banning Of Journalists As Twitter Starts Blocking Links & Mentions Of Mastodon | Techdirt’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Musk Is Taking Aim at Journalists. I’m One of Them.'
- kudos:Free speech is genuinely important, but it’s hard to take the ideal seriously when its advocates twist it to mean something specific and self-serving. link to ‘Elon Musk Is Taking Aim at Journalists. I’m One of Them.’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter is blocking links to Mastodon - The Verge'
- kudos:I’ve been trying to avoid dire predictions for Twitter since Musk took over, but this seems more and more like a turning point in the identity and reputation of the platform. link to ‘Twitter is blocking links to Mastodon - The Verge’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Musk starts banning critical journalists from Twitter - The Verge'
- kudos:I mean, I’m willing to wait a bit and see what Twitter and Musk have to say about this, but this sure doesn’t seem like the approach that a free speech absolutist would take. link to ‘Elon Musk starts banning critical journalists from Twitter - The Verge’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon’s Commitment To Free Speech Rapidly Replaced By His Commitment To Blatant Hypocrisy: Bans The JoinMastodon Account | Techdirt'
- kudos:Musk is getting pettier and more self-centered. link to ‘Elon’s Commitment To Free Speech Rapidly Replaced By His Commitment To Blatant Hypocrisy: Bans The JoinMastodon Account | Techdirt’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Experts Warn ChatGPT Could Democratize Cybercrime - Infosecurity Magazine'
- kudos:Well, this is terrifying. link to ‘Experts Warn ChatGPT Could Democratize Cybercrime - Infosecurity Magazine’
- kudos:
Streisand Effect must be real, because I’ve never cared this much about a single plane in my whole life.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon’s Promise Not To Ban Account Tracking His Jet Didn’t Last Very Long At All; Also Bans Guy’s Personal Account | Techdirt'
- kudos:How does such an already bad story get so much worse over the course of a single day? link to ‘Elon’s Promise Not To Ban Account Tracking His Jet Didn’t Last Very Long At All; Also Bans Guy’s Personal Account | Techdirt’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter Bans Elon Musk Flight Tracking Account After He Said It Wouldn’t, for Free Speech'
- kudos:Twitter left up other flight tracking accounts but took down Musk’s? link to ‘Twitter Bans Elon Musk Flight Tracking Account After He Said It Wouldn’t, for Free Speech’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter suspends @ElonJet after Musk promises not to ban it - The Verge'
- kudos:This is petty and concerning. link to ‘Twitter suspends @ElonJet after Musk promises not to ban it - The Verge’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter ditches Trust and Safety Council as Musk tweets fuel harassment | Ars Technica'
- kudos:I think this headline captures one of the worst parts of all of this: Musk isn’t just dismissing concerns about behavior, he’s fueling that behavior. link to ‘Twitter ditches Trust and Safety Council as Musk tweets fuel harassment | Ars Technica’
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Goodbye, Twitter - by Ken White - The Popehat Report'
- kudos:I haven’t been following Ken White as much as I used to, but this reminds me why I appreciate his perspective. This is someone who knows what free speech is and advocates for it, not someone who uses it as a buzzword justification for reprehensible behavior, à la Musk. link to ‘Goodbye, Twitter - by Ken White - The Popehat Report’