I'm a citizen of Lexington, Kentucky, the United States, the world, and the digital sphere. Politically, I care about equality (and changing structures to support it), elections (that is, making them more fair and representative), and electronics (or, rather, their impact on society).
I am a believing agnostic in Community of Christ with a (mostly) cherished past as a (mostly) literalist Mormon.
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🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The job applicants shut out by AI: ‘The interviewer sounded like Siri’'
- kudos: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? link to “The job applicants shut out by AI: ‘The interviewer sounded like Siri’”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Tech Billionaire Tries to Ease Fears of Hawaii Takeover by Donating $150 Million to Hospitals'
- kudos:Last few sentences of the article really make the point. link to “Tech Billionaire Tries to Ease Fears of Hawaii Takeover by Donating $150 Million to Hospitals”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Kirtland Temple purchased by LDS church for $192.5 million'
- kudos: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. link to “Kirtland Temple purchased by LDS church for $192.5 million”
📚 spreading the word about the Cory Doctorow Humble Bundle 📚
- kudos: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).
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'AI’s craving for data is matched only by a runaway thirst for water and energy | John Naughton'
- kudos:Bookmarking for future reference. Are the purported benefits of generative AI worth these (and other) costs? link to “AI’s craving for data is matched only by a runaway thirst for water and energy | John Naughton”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Amazon Turkers Who Train AI Say They’re Locked Out of Their Work and Money'
- kudos:Helpful reminder that it’s low-paid, underappreciated workers who contribute to AI as much as high-paid programmers and household-name executives. link to “Amazon Turkers Who Train AI Say They’re Locked Out of Their Work and Money”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Fanfiction Community Rocked By Etsy Sellers Turning Their Work Into Bound Books'
- kudos:This strikes me as illustrating the digital labor issues associated with generative AI. It’s someone else profiting off of one’s work. link to “Fanfiction Community Rocked By Etsy Sellers Turning Their Work Into Bound Books”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Tumblr and Wordpress to Sell Users’ Data to Train AI Tools'
- kudos:Aw, geez, and I liked Automattic, too. I get that financing Tumblr is hard, but why this? link to “Tumblr and Wordpress to Sell Users’ Data to Train AI Tools”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for The Bezzle (A Martin Hench Novel), by Cory Doctorow
- kudos: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.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Pluralistic: Vice surrenders (24 Feb 2024) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow'
- kudos:Dammit, I literally just started following Motherboard again. link to “Pluralistic: Vice surrenders (24 Feb 2024) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer, by Kai Bird and Martin J. Shermin
- kudos:I enjoyed Nolan’s movie so much that I thought I ought to eventually read the book—yet, I couldn’t imagine that it coule 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.
scripture's authority comes from shared story rather than history
- kudos: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.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Christians Explain How Jesus Would Handle The Border Crisis'
- kudos:Darkly hilarious. link to “Christians Explain How Jesus Would Handle The Border Crisis”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Reddit: 'We Are in the Early Stages of Monetizing Our User Base''
- kudos:There are few phrases grosser than “monetizing our user base.” link to “Reddit: ‘We Are in the Early Stages of Monetizing Our User Base’”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Blue Origin Builds $8 Billion Barrel For Jeff Bezos To Ride Over Niagara Falls'
- kudos:This made me laugh out loud while reheating my leftovers for lunch. link to “Blue Origin Builds $8 Billion Barrel For Jeff Bezos To Ride Over Niagara Falls”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Criminologists cited in support of Safer Kentucky Act wonder why'
- kudos: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… link to “Criminologists cited in support of Safer Kentucky Act wonder why”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Only Started Buying Up Twitter Shares After Twitter Refused To Ban Plane Tracking Account'
- kudos:Musk’s pettiness knows no bounds. link to “Elon Only Started Buying Up Twitter Shares After Twitter Refused To Ban Plane Tracking Account”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Walmart buying TV-brand Vizio for its ad-fueling customer data'
- kudos:We live in a dumb timeline. Why are we turning TVs into surveillance machines? link to “Walmart buying TV-brand Vizio for its ad-fueling customer data”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Reddit Signs $60 Million Deal to Scrape Your Online Community for AI Parts: Report'
- kudos:Look, I’ve never been really into Reddit, but I’m still really disappointed in the company. This sucks. link to “Reddit Signs $60 Million Deal to Scrape Your Online Community for AI Parts: Report”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Despite ‘mass fraud’ claims, data shows few Kentuckians use student IDs to vote'
- kudos:I’ve never voted for Michael Adams, but I appreciate his being a voice of reason within his own party. link to “Despite ‘mass fraud’ claims, data shows few Kentuckians use student IDs to vote”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Christian Man Persecuted Simply For Driving 90 Miles Per Hour In School Zone'
- kudos:I recently started following The Onion again, and it’s already paying off. link to “Christian Man Persecuted Simply For Driving 90 Miles Per Hour In School Zone”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Reddit sells training data to unnamed AI company ahead of IPO'
- kudos:C’mon, Reddit. link to “Reddit sells training data to unnamed AI company ahead of IPO”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Mort d'Alexeï Navalny : propos racistes, nationalisme et positions conservatrices… L'autre visage de l'opposant russe'
- kudos: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. link to “Mort d’Alexeï Navalny : propos racistes, nationalisme et positions conservatrices… L’autre visage de l’opposant russe”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Air Canada must honor refund policy invented by airline’s chatbot'
- kudos:Very interesting case. link to “Air Canada must honor refund policy invented by airline’s chatbot”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'How the Kansas City shooting proves the 'good guy with a gun' idea is a fallacy'
- kudos:Depressing but important read. link to “How the Kansas City shooting proves the “good guy with a gun” idea is a fallacy”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Don’t Fall for the Latest Changes to the Dangerous Kids Online Safety Act '
- kudos: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. link to “Don’t Fall for the Latest Changes to the Dangerous Kids Online Safety Act “
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Russia Hides Its War Toll. We Pieced Together the Clues.'
- kudos:Russia is in the wrong in this conflict, but that also means that Russians are among those being wronged. link to “Russia Hides Its War Toll. We Pieced Together the Clues.”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Future data centres may have built-in nuclear reactors'
- kudos: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. link to “Future data centres may have built-in nuclear reactors”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Backdoors that let cops decrypt messages violate human rights, EU court says'
- kudos:Heck yes. link to “Backdoors that let cops decrypt messages violate human rights, EU court says”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Microsoft and OpenAI say hackers are using ChatGPT to improve cyberattacks'
- kudos:Hmm. Unsurprising but all the more frustrating for it. link to “Microsoft and OpenAI say hackers are using ChatGPT to improve cyberattacks”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The rise and fall of robots.txt'
- kudos:Fascinating read on web crawlers and robots.txt link to “The rise and fall of robots.txt”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Sell lab-grown meat in Tennessee, pay a $1 million fine'
- kudos:Good article on some dumb fearmongering. link to “Sell lab-grown meat in Tennessee, pay a $1 million fine”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Bill Ackman: Nazis On ExTwitter Are Just The Price Of Free Speech; But Marxist Theory Or Anti-Israel Claims On Campus Are Beyond The Pale'
- kudos:Masnick’s perspectives on free speech are always helpful. link to “Bill Ackman: Nazis On ExTwitter Are Just The Price Of Free Speech; But Marxist Theory Or Anti-Israel Claims On Campus Are Beyond The Pale”
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The ‘queer.af’ Mastodon instance disappeared because of the Taliban'
- kudos:Domain name infrastructure plays a bigger role than we might think. link to “The ‘queer.af’ Mastodon instance disappeared because of the Taliban”
📚 bookblog: ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ for Accidental Saints: Finding God in All the Wrong People, by Nadia Bolz-Weber
- kudos: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.
🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Hungary's president resigns over a pardon to a man convicted in a child sexual abuse case'
- kudos:Wondering how long it will be until implicit praise of her family values gets taken down from the LDS and BYU websites. link to “Hungary’s president resigns over a pardon to a man convicted in a child sexual abuse case”