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AI Astroturfing is here

I've been working with Demos to turn the Verification, Deliberation, and Accountability (VDA) Framework into a report that lays out how it can be used to diagnose the state of democracy and build solutions around building the capacity for those functions in institutional and public spaces.

⁉️ How are polluting industries using digital tools to block climate action? I had a stab at an answer in Tactical Tech's latest publication "The RePlaybook" – a toolkit to decode disinfo challenge tech's divisive hold over climate comms, with contributions from 30+ authors in this space

And literally four days later from this story Open AI admits what we all know to he true. That when a model generates bullshit, that’s no flaw, that’s just how it works. www.computerworld.com/article/4059...

President Johnson, in a November 9, 1968 letter to the Smothers Brothers: “It is part of the price of leadership of this great and free nation to be the target of clever satirists . . . May we never grow so somber or self-important that we fail to appreciate the humor in our lives.”

@bellingcat.com CEO @eliothiggins.bsky.social discusses his thoughts on how democracy needs verification, deliberation, and accountability and how social media algorithms disrupt those elements. From the Democracy for Sale podcast. youtu.be/7si0HCTyr1Y

Amphetamine psychosis is probably a good comparison: a lot of people are susceptible, but most will never have a chance to find out. Except in our world suddenly meth is on shelves at 7-11, the media is flooded with hype for how productive it'll make you, and every new TV comes with a box.

"More professors in the United States have been fired for controversial views in the past week than any other week in all of American history." www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...

This seems like a big deal - free help to deal with harassment for journalists and researchers! From @righttobe.bsky.social, the awesome folks who do those bystander intervention trainings. Check it out!

When Musk denies that he did a big ol Nazi salute during the inauguration, remember this, from Jean-Paul Sartre, 1944.

Anybody keen to buy 25 footy fields above Sydney's Northern Beaches for a lazy $2m? Too late, you missed out! It's gone to a mystery buyer. #whatsthescam #auspol michaelwest.com.au/big-sydney-b...

MAKE POLLUTERS PAY

Remember, companies don’t make things anymore. They used to make things and money. Now they have so successfully excised the expensive part where they have to actually do something that they’re left with no way to Create Shareholder Value except rent-seeking. This+. That Premium.

look if we were killing the biosphere to animate more pictures of Wario with a dump truck butt i would consider that worthwhile. the problem is that AI has little utility outside of fat Wario ass pics

I don't know how to get across to people that you cannot stop these fires once they get going with 80+ mph winds behind them. it can't be done. this is not solvable.

after days of grifters and con men at CES we stumbled upon the booth for VLC. they were all dressed as wizards and told us, "we have nothing to sell, we just decided to show up". i told them I'd been using their software to pirate media for 15 years and they said "keep doing that"

As we witness these heartbreaking scenes from the fires in LA, an important reminder that incarcerated people make up over 30% of California’s forest firefighters.

Detailed in series of replies below: bsky.app/profile/anti...

I wrote about incarcerated firefighters for Bitch Magazine a decade ago, and while some of the facts have changed (including California's increased criminalization and 'enhanced sentencing'), a lot of this piece holds up. static1.squarespace.com/static/5b198...

This is the largest smart yard display I've seen in several years of CES's. Given the news today all I could think about was the batteries in these little drones detonating like baby IEDs as fire swept over the grass.

I think it’s time to bring my most viral tweet over from the bad place.

the progression of AIDS treatment in my lifetime, from how terrifying it was as a child in the 80s to stories like this 40-odd years later, is genuinely one of the human race’s most awe-inspiring scientific achievements. it was a nonnegotiable death sentence for SO LONG

Merry Concrete! Vertical concrete seawalls are "a brutalist solution of last century" (but good for seaside owners with infinity pools) "Dunes (revetments) build resilience" @marcusreubenstein.bsky.social #auspol #collaroy michaelwest.com.au/concrete-coa...

The Madison, Wisconsin school shooter was a radfem Columbine-worshipper who followed "radfem Hitler". Garrison Davis dug into her online presence and wrote this to explain what the hell all that means and why the right wants us to think she was transgender. shatterzone.substack.com/p/the-madiso...

Maternal mortality also increasing post Dobbs: www.whijournal.com/article/S104...

Me, a public health person, just sitting over here reflecting on the fact that the US has experienced a 7% increase in infant mortality post-Dobbs. Like, do you realize what that says about this society from an ethical perspective? That we made policy choices that caused this? #PHEthx

Oh. Wow.

Newsletter: Our digital lives are unregulated growth-hacked ecological disasters. The modern tech ecosystem's growth-at-all-costs mindset is actively harming billions of people, pushing them toward authoritarianism for profit. We must fight back. www.wheresyoured.at/never-forgive-them/

Private company buys a public good. A few years go by and the company decides the public good is no longer worthwhile; the public suffers as a result. This story arc is way too common in modern society. deadline.com/2024/12/max-...

This is a must-watch case about tech-enabled disinformation. I expect organizations like @bellingcat.com will be picking up more workload (and face increasing harassment) as new government administrations disband or potentially weaponize regulatory agencies. www.linkedin.com/posts/jagoli...

It’s a little known $20B+ submarine mess sitting atop the well-known $368B AUKUS sub debacle. Defence leadership incompetence means we’ll all be paying an ‘admiral’s ransom’ to desparately try to keep our 1990 Holden VN Commodore era Collins subs at sea. #auspol

Yes and this is the part I think a lot of liberals need to read: "You can’t have a politics of identity that is only about identity. If you do that, you draw sectarian lines, and you abandoned our interdependent ties"

Australia’s treatment of whistleblowers is downright dystopian. Heroes like Richard Boyle and David McBride face jail for exposing the truth, while billionaires and corporations dodge accountability. We need to do better. #auspol #RichardBoyle #DavidMcBride

“This week, the AI-powered summary falsely made it appear BBC News had published an article claiming Luigi Mangione […] had shot himself. He has not.”

Bellingcat's @koltai.bsky.social joins Anderson Cooper on tomorrow night's 60 Minutes to discuss the growing threat of non-consensual deepfake pornography:

"AI pimping" ... ... AI-generated influencers "stealing videos from real models and adult content creators, giving them AI-generated faces, and monetizing their bodies with links to dating sites, Patreon, OnlyFans competitors, and various AI apps" at @404media.co www.404media.co/email/6aac81...

If USPS goes private, the first thing a private company will do is get rid of last-mile service to areas that are not profitable to serve. This is a move that will absolutely fuck rural areas.

A lot of things suck in this lifetime, but I remember when the thought of this was incomprehensible. This is beautiful.

I see a lot of people talk about the environmental costs of AI. I don't see as much about the human exploitation behind it.

And, in what I am sure is a cancelable opinion in this part of the internet, the same goes with generative AI. even if you don’t want them to use it. ESPECIALLY if you don’t want them to use it. You gotta teach them what it is and how it works and when (not) to use it. “Just say no” doesn’t work.

remember the reason for the season

I’m super excited to announce I'm part of an amazing team (<3 @williambrady.bsky.social @killianmcloughlin.bsky.social @mjcrockett.bsky.social) that just published a paper in @science.org on the role of outrage in spread of misinformation Link here: science.org/doi/10.1126/... Summary in🧵🔽 1/

AI folks have now discovered “thinking”