Flock provides the ALPRs here in Lexington, which makes this especially frustrating.

So, if employers save time from AI, and applicants save time from AI, where’s the net benefit? Or does it become a new burden for everyone?

Last few sentences of the article really make the point.

I have my own (complicated) thoughts to share on this later, but more than anyone else, I’ve wanted to hear from David Howlett (and, okay, Lach Mackay). Appreciate Jana’s coverage here.

Cory Doctorow is one of my favorite authors, and I’ve also (mostly) appreciated the work of Humble Bundle over the past decade. When I learned this weekend that there’s an ongoing bundle of Doctorow’s fiction, I was ecstatic. The only thing that I was disappointed about is that I’ve already bought so many of these titles… however, that still wasn’t enough to stop me from buying all 18 items (it helps that while I own many of these already, most of the ones I own are in formats rather than epub, so now I’m a multimodal owner).

Bookmarking for future reference. Are the purported benefits of generative AI worth these (and other) costs?

Helpful reminder that it’s low-paid, underappreciated workers who contribute to AI as much as high-paid programmers and household-name executives.

This strikes me as illustrating the digital labor issues associated with generative AI. It’s someone else profiting off of one’s work.

Aw, geez, and I liked Automattic, too. I get that financing Tumblr is hard, but why this?

I feel like I say this whenever I talk about Doctorow, but I love that his fiction reads like an op-ed. While waiting for this book to come out, I’ve been slowly reading his co-authored book Chokepoint Capitalism, and I feel like The Bezzle is all his (and Rebecca’s) critiques about large and greedy companies wrapped up in a fun, action-driven narrative. Here’s the thing about me: I’m an academic, and I respect facts, reason, and citations.

Dammit, I literally just started following Motherboard again.

I enjoyed Nolan’s movie so much that I thought I ought to eventually read the book—yet, I couldn’t imagine that it could live up to the film adaptation (especially after hearing the audiobook narrator’s awful attempts at any language other than English). Yet, this ended up being amazing—perhaps better than the movie. Funnily enough, I felt that the best parts weren’t about the man himself. Rather, his life provides fascinating insight into the existential horrors of nuclear weapons, the authoritarian impulses of McCarthy-era conservatism, and lots more besides.

About a week ago, I felt like I was going through an audio drought—I wasn’t listening to any audiobooks, my podcast consumption has continued to go down in recent months, and I just wasn’t listening to anything while doing the dishes or whatever. This wasn’t necessarily a problem (it’s been good in terms of mindfulness, for example), but it had gone on long enough that I decided that I wanted something to listen to.

Darkly hilarious.

There are few phrases grosser than “monetizing our user base.”

This made me laugh out loud while reheating my leftovers for lunch.

Look, even academics cite the wrong papers sometimes, but if the researchers you cite to support your crime bill don’t actually support your crime bill, that should be a warning…

Musk’s pettiness knows no bounds.

We live in a dumb timeline. Why are we turning TVs into surveillance machines?

Look, I’ve never been really into Reddit, but I’m still really disappointed in the company. This sucks.

I’ve never voted for Michael Adams, but I appreciate his being a voice of reason within his own party.

I recently started following The Onion again, and it’s already paying off.

C’mon, Reddit.

On peut pleurer la mort de quelqu’un sans oublier ses problèmes. Je ne savais pas tout cela, et j’avoue que je vois Navalny différemment maintenant. C’est toujours quelqu’un qui a mené une lutte importante, mais on ne peut pas ignorer ces propos non plus.

Very interesting case.

Depressing but important read.

Look, it’s hard to oppose legislation that purports to be “for the kids,” but with the EFF, Mike Masnick, and other voices I respect still firmly against this, I’ll be calling my reps—and encouraging others to do the same.

Russia is in the wrong in this conflict, but that also means that Russians are among those being wronged.

You know, instead of assuming that we must grow AI data centers and asking how we should power them, we could look at the costs in terms of power and ask whether we should grow AI data centers.

Heck yes.

Hmm. Unsurprising but all the more frustrating for it.

Fascinating read on web crawlers and robots.txt

Good article on some dumb fearmongering.

Masnick’s perspectives on free speech are always helpful.

Domain name infrastructure plays a bigger role than we might think.

I bought this book with a gift card and to thumb my nose at an obnoxious visiting authority at a Latter-day Saint stake conference from over four years ago. This guy spent the Saturday evening session of the conference complaining about young adults who supported gay marriage and parents who pushed back against school discipline instead of giving their kids a whuppin’ (his words, not mine) and then still had the gall to talk about how great Mormonism is because it doesn’t believe in a fire and brimstone angry God.