🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on '“The library is a safe place.” – WIL WHEATON dot NET'

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I’ve felt a lot of appreciation for Wil Wheaton recently, but for him to come to Kentucky to praise our libraries and speak against dumb laws passed by our legislature makes me just love the guy. link to ‘“The library is a safe place.” – WIL WHEATON dot NET’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Kentucky governor vetoes sweeping GOP transgender measure | Lexington Herald Leader'

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Good for Andy. One thing I personally appreciate about Governor Beshear is that he so often invokes his faith as a Democrat. Granted, it’s probably a calculated decision in such a red state, and I’m still uncomfortable with how faith and politics are intertwined in the U.S., but it shows that faith doesn’t have to be queerphobic. link to ‘Kentucky governor vetoes sweeping GOP transgender measure | Lexington Herald Leader’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Biblical Literalists Don’t Exist - YouTube'

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Great point made by someone whose voice I’ve grown to appreciate over the past several months. link to ‘Biblical Literalists Don’t Exist - YouTube’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter’s $42,000-per-Month API Prices Out Nearly Everyone | WIRED'

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RIP my Twitter research. Glad I have other irons in the fire… link to ‘Twitter’s $42,000-per-Month API Prices Out Nearly Everyone | WIRED’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Musk apologizes for mocking and firing Twitter exec with muscular dystrophy | Ars Technica'

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Twitter just gets worse and worse. What a joke. link to ‘Musk apologizes for mocking and firing Twitter exec with muscular dystrophy | Ars Technica’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'ChatGPT Is So Bad at Essays That Professors Can Spot It Instantly'

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Lots of helpful stuff in here. link to ‘ChatGPT Is So Bad at Essays That Professors Can Spot It Instantly’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Paizo bans AI-generated content to support ‘human professionals’ - The Verge'

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Very interesting! I know some critics will describe this as a morally panicked response, but I disagree. I think it’s smart to ask how AI will affect human creators and for companies/communities like Paizo to take principled stances. link to ‘Paizo bans AI-generated content to support ‘human professionals’ - The Verge’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Musk Is Reportedly Building 'Based AI' Because ChatGPT Is Too Woke'

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This is dumb and worrying. The CEO of Gab has been promising to develop “based AI,” but he’s a bit player. Musk has the resources and influence to make this a bigger problem. link to ‘Elon Musk Is Reportedly Building ‘Based AI’ Because ChatGPT Is Too Woke’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'OpenAI Is Now Everything It Promised Not to Be: Corporate, Closed-Source, and For-Profit'

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I don’t know enough about OpenAI to evaluate these concerns, but I think these questions are important. The power of AI means that the companies that control them are also in a position of power, and it’s important that we treat them critically. That said, while I do think making LLM code open source is probably better in the aggregate, it isn’t without concerning drawbacks: The minute it was released under an open license, I’m sure Gab’s Andrew Torba would be considering how to make a homebrew version that can’t be content moderated.

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Sometimes Open Systems Beat Those Who Try To Lock Them Up: Spotify’s Podcast Colonization Flops | Techdirt'

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Happy to hear podcasts aren’t working out for Spotify, because I was always upset about Spotify trying to wall off this garden. link to ‘Sometimes Open Systems Beat Those Who Try To Lock Them Up: Spotify’s Podcast Colonization Flops | Techdirt’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'with love and respect to Senator John Fetterman and his family – WIL WHEATON dot NET'

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I read this when Wil first published it, but I thought of it again today with even more gratitude—for both Wil and Senator Fetterman. I’ve been wondering recently whether I should refrain from making particular commitments or pursuits because of my own struggles with mental health, and knowing that there’s someone with depression serving in the U.S. Senate is giving me hope. link to ‘with love and respect to Senator John Fetterman and his family – WIL WHEATON dot NET’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'As conservatives criticize ‘woke AI,’ here are ChatGPT’s rules for answering culture war queries - The Verge'

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Content moderation is hard, and moderating AI content definitely seems harder to me. However, so long as OpenAI has control over ChatGPT (and benefits from others’ use of it), I do think it has a responsibility to shape what it can produce. That said, there remains a deeper, legitimate question about how much influence a single company should have over LLM output. link to ‘As conservatives criticize ‘woke AI,’ here are ChatGPT’s rules for answering culture war queries - The Verge’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Musk created a special system for showing you all his tweets first - The Verge'

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This is just so petty. I don’t know how his leadership at Twitter is defensible anymore. link to ‘Elon Musk created a special system for showing you all his tweets first - The Verge’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Voice Actors Push Back Against Their Voices Being Used by AI'

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Interesting and important read. link to ‘Voice Actors Push Back Against Their Voices Being Used by AI’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Everything is hackable. That’s not always a bad thing.'

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Interesting reflection here. link to ‘Everything is hackable. That’s not always a bad thing.’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Elon Musk’s reach on Twitter is dropping — he just fired a top engineer over it - The Verge'

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Every time I think this acquisition can’t get dumber, it does. link to ‘Elon Musk’s reach on Twitter is dropping — he just fired a top engineer over it - The Verge’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The End of Grading | WIRED'

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Somewhat meandering read, but I think there are interesting implications for both teaching and research. link to ‘The End of Grading | WIRED’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter's new data access rules will make research harder : NPR'

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Some good coverage of the consequences of API restrictions for researchers—though I think we still need clarification from Twitter about whether the academic dev status is being handled separately from primary dev status. link to ‘Twitter’s new data access rules will make research harder : NPR’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Lazy Reporters Claiming Fediverse Is ‘Slumping,’ Despite Massive Increase In Usage | Techdirt'

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I’d seen some of the headlines Masnick is critiquing here, but I hadn’t read the articles. I appreciate this critique and overview. link to ‘Lazy Reporters Claiming Fediverse Is ‘Slumping,’ Despite Massive Increase In Usage | Techdirt’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'ChatGPT is a data privacy nightmare, and we ought to be concerned | Ars Technica'

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Important points in here. link to ‘ChatGPT is a data privacy nightmare, and we ought to be concerned | Ars Technica’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Disinformation Researchers Raise Alarms About A.I. Chatbots - The New York Times'

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Important to keep an eye on this. link to ‘Disinformation Researchers Raise Alarms About A.I. Chatbots - The New York Times’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Conservatives Are Obsessed With Getting ChatGPT to Say the N-Word'

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Of all the dumb responses to perfectly legitimate content moderation, this is perhaps the dumbest. link to ‘Conservatives Are Obsessed With Getting ChatGPT to Say the N-Word’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'OpenAI Wants To Help You Figure Out If Text Was Written By OpenAI; But What Happens When It’s Wrong? | Techdirt'

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Just because some worries about ChatGPT are, indeed, moral panics doesn’t mean that there aren’t legtimate criticisms of the technology—including from an educational perspective. I happen to agree with Masnick that schools ultimately need to roll with the punches here, but given how much we already expect of our schools and teachers, it’s reasonable to resent being punched in the first place. Masnick’s point about the error rate for detecting AI-generated text is an important one, though: I don’t think plagiarism-detecting surveillance is at all the right response.

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Twitter to remove free API access in latest money making quest - The Verge'

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I presume this decisuon also cuts off academics; this is going to have a huge impact on research, and not in a good way. I’m glad I’ve pivoted to other platforms, but this is still infuriating. link to ‘Twitter to remove free API access in latest money making quest - The Verge’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'The audacious rescue plan that might have saved space shuttle Columbia | Ars Technica'

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Fascinating read. I can’t believe it’s been 20 years… I remember learning the news at a Boy Scout activity. link to ‘The audacious rescue plan that might have saved space shuttle Columbia | Ars Technica’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Florida Teachers Are Emptying Classroom Libraries to Avoid Going to Jail'

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What a dumb world we live in. link to ‘Florida Teachers Are Emptying Classroom Libraries to Avoid Going to Jail’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on '4chan users embrace AI voice clone tool to generate celebrity hatespeech - The Verge'

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Why… why don’t we better anticipate better misuses like this? Are technological “progress” and market opportunities more important than these side effects? link to ‘4chan users embrace AI voice clone tool to generate celebrity hatespeech - The Verge’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Inside a US Neo-Nazi Homeschool Network With Thousands of Members'

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Well, this is horrifying. Another example of a news article I wish weren’t relevant to my research. link to ‘Inside a US Neo-Nazi Homeschool Network With Thousands of Members’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'People Can’t Stop ‘Spotify Snooping’ on Friends, Exes and Crushes - WSJ'

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This is dumb and gross, and another reason I’ll never use Spotify. link to ‘People Can’t Stop ‘Spotify Snooping’ on Friends, Exes and Crushes - WSJ’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Les Jones releases 'Burger,' an homage to /mocking of America | Boing Boing'

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Franchement, c’est parfait. link to ‘Les Jones releases “Burger,” an homage to /mocking of America | Boing Boing’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Instagram Has a White Nationalist ‘Groyper’ Problem'

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I wish this weren’t as relevant as it is to my work on Mormon Twitter, but here we are. link to ‘Instagram Has a White Nationalist ‘Groyper’ Problem’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'In The End, Trump Will Screw Over Anyone: Including His ‘Own’ Social Media Company | Techdirt'

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Welp, all the more reason to leave birdsite behind. link to ‘In The End, Trump Will Screw Over Anyone: Including His ‘Own’ Social Media Company | Techdirt’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'ChatGPT Is Passing the Tests Required for Medical Licenses and Business Degrees'

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Headline overstates things a bit, and I’m on team “change the assessments,” but it’s still worth asking if AI developers are appropriately anticipating the disruptions these tools are causing. link to ‘ChatGPT Is Passing the Tests Required for Medical Licenses and Business Degrees’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Madison Square Garden's facial recognition policy ignites debate over the tech : NPR'

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Glad this story is still getting attention, because it so neatly demonstrates why facial recognition is scary. We shouldn’t tolerate this level of surveillance—by private or public actors. link to ‘Madison Square Garden’s facial recognition policy ignites debate over the tech : NPR’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'OpenAI Used Kenyan Workers on Less Than $2 Per Hour: Exclusive | Time'

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Looks like the job of AI training is as awful as the job of content moderation. link to ‘OpenAI Used Kenyan Workers on Less Than $2 Per Hour: Exclusive | Time’

🔗 linkblog: my thoughts on 'Discord acquires Gas, the popular app for teens to compliment each other - The Verge'

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A couple of months ago, I spoke to Education Week about the Gas app. I thought it had an exploitative business model then, and its being acquired does nothing to calm that fear. link to ‘Discord acquires Gas, the popular app for teens to compliment each other - The Verge’