danah boyd recently argued that social media (as we knew it) is mostly dead; what we have now is parasocial media: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/... I agree. Networked social media is disappearing, replaced by a new logic/structure of content creator, creator-centered community, & algorithm.

Where does the “it’s not x, it’s y” come from? It’s not only training data: LLMs are trained to use language to arrive at “answers.” Whatever we’re incentivizing and disincentivizing in our use of language when we resist “sounding like AI” has big implications for students, and for human thought.

Excellent new research from @cdt.org @mluria.bsky.social analyzes the dark patterns applicable to AI chatbots, including general-purpose systems (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude) and “companion” platforms (Replika, Character.AI): cdt.org/insights/dar...

🌟 NEW PREPRINT 🌟 After six months of following people using chatbots for socioemotional health & 1 year of participatory engagements, we're proud to release a longitudinal qualitative study on how people use general-purpose LLMs and what it demands of AI governance: arxiv.org/abs/2605.23787

"The field has glossed over the fact that our methods of evaluating these models are deeply unscientific and they are more driven by ideology and policy." Great interview with Rumman Chowdhury on AI governance: www.nosmallendeavor.com/rumman-chowd...

"Why is it so normal for law enforcement — those who are supposed to be keepers of law and order — to kill Americans? And why is the only question at the end of the day how much their victims deserved to die?" Read more from @sarahjeong.bsky.social: www.theverge.com/policy/86745...

"Boredom feels like a trap not because it is a static experience, but because it is an all-encompassing way of being; a fog that dissipates attention and dissolves meaning." I liked this essay on boredom (and where it leads us) from @emptysetmagazine.bsky.social www.emptysetmag.com/articles/ent...

A new brief from @brianjchen.bsky.social argues that this admin's AI strategy dumps "downside risks onto the American public while actively accelerating AI’s impact on workers, job quality, climate." Instead, we should "reclaim innovation as an essential public good." datasociety.net/library/the-...

This piece opens with an anecdote about Louise Glück laboring over lines of a poem she rewrites for years, reminding us that artistic ego, "the stubborn belief that we—despite our cosmic insignificance—can create something original" is a bulwark against the ease of genAI. lithub.com/against-gene...

Been working on this one for a while — it's a little bit of history of a key foundation of internet technology, and a little bit of an explainer about how people _actually_ invent things. This is the amazing (true!) story of how Markdown took over the world. www.anildash.com/2026/01/09/h...

Great toolkit from @ainowinstitute.bsky.social on how to stop and restrict data center development. It’s helpfully organized into local and state policy recommendations: ainowinstitute.org/publications...

New: we've obtained material explaining how an ICE surveillance system, called Webloc, works. Draw shape on a map, see all phones available there, follow them home. All without warrant “This is a very dangerous tool in the hands of an out-of-control agency.” www.404media.co/inside-ices-...

“Much of our storytelling today is individualized and limited in form—therapeutic, gamified…At other times, a prevailing mood of irony ridicules the very desire for narrative coherence.” Great @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social piece on the evolution of narrative forms: lareviewofbooks.org/article/when...

Great piece by @livgar.bsky.social and @briana-v.bsky.social on their @datasociety.bsky.social research into our relationships with AI chatbots. The "auto-intimacy" of chatbot interactions suggests we use tech "to curate the conditions under which we can be honest." datasociety.net/points/all-t...

Two years into Europe’s Digital Services Act, data access for researchers is on life support, write Mark Scott and LK Seiling. Yet an alternative future is possible—one built on openness, interoperability, and platforms that treat data access as a civic and scientific good.

Three German universities offering post-docs for researchers "who cannot conduct or continue their work in the USA appropriately because of actual political pressure. " www.uni-konstanz.de/zukunftskoll...

Hello. I wrote a nice long essay about AI and this very strange moment where we're constantly told we're living in the dawn of a strange new future but the only thing that's actually clear is that everyone feels pretty unmoored and uncertain. I hope you'll read it

@tamigraph.bsky.social and I get to some mythbusting today about data centers and the supposed future they bring. Long story short: 😬

“…what we are left with is a structure of feeling that is now a part of AI as an artifact, the aspirations pinned to its potentials, which are directing its adoption into spheres of intellectual inquiry where it may have little or even nothing to offer.” www.artforum.com/features/gen...

And while you’re at it - also read @bcmerchant.bsky.social's excellent AI Now report AI Generated Business, on how OpenAI has used narratives around AGI (front and center in this report) to inflate its business proposition: ainowinstitute.org/publications...

Amazing group of AI auditing scholars and practitioners at the AI Accountability Lab @aial.ie, led by @abeba.bsky.social ✨

NEW: 911 audio and EMS records from ICE detention centers reveal a surge in medical emergencies — including staff sexual assaults, suicide attempts, and head injuries. Records also show calls over severe pregnancy complications. Free to read: www.wired.com/story/ice-de... w/ @dell.bsky.social

While existing disability rights statutes do provide some legal recourse against AI-enabled discrimination, state-level regulation remains a vital avenue for harm mitigation. The proposed federal moratorium on state AI laws threatens those very protections, Ariana Aboulafia and Travis Hall write.

NEW: A protester was shot and killed at the Salt Lake City 'No Kings' march. A man is in police custody, booked on suspicion of murder—but not the one who fired the gun. From video, witnesses and interviews, @schotthappens.com and I tried to piece together what really happened Saturday. Our report-

Most reporting on AI examines worst-case systems deployed under the guise of efficiency. But what would a good faith effort at Ethical AI look like? For two years, we’ve been looking over the shoulder of a city trying to do things differently.

Federal data misuse is accelerating, but state and local governments can still act, argue Reem Suleiman, Esra’a Al Shafei, and Brian Hofer. “Before DHS, ICE, or others come knocking, governments should run, not walk! — through this triage checklist to protect the privacy of the most vulnerable.”

I'm biased, but this report is a must-read for anyone looking to understand the state of AI in 2025. It explains how AI is entrenching power for big tech and the oligarch class, speeding deregulation, dislodging human expertise and threatening workers—and how there's still time to refuse all that.

Today, as part of the @techpolicypress.bsky.social and @datasociety.bsky.social "Ideologies of Control: A Series on Tech Power and Democratic Crisis" series, @emilymbender.bsky.social and I write about the myth of AGI. www.techpolicy.press/the-myth-of-...

"Actual reform is done carefully...Instead, AI appears to be understood within this administration as a highly effective tool for consolidating power..." Great piece by Jake Metcalf & Meg Young introducing a @techpolicypress.bsky.social series on technofacism: www.techpolicy.press/tech-power-a...

I spent five weeks talking to federal workers about knowledge loss and brain drain across the federal government, and its implications, both right now and for decades to come. Their stories are frightening, but I think it's important to know what we're facing: www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

Happy to have a shared piece on trust in relationality in the new @datasociety.bsky.social Trust Issues Anthology! Read below 🪢

A new tool has scraped YouTube comments, lets harassers or anyone else search for a specific user, use AI to approximate where the person might be from based on their comments. Developer says it's for cops, but there are no checks. We signed up and used it www.404media.co/developer-bu...

Psst! Hey you! EFF is hiring a staff technologist and *you* should apply! www.paycomonline.net/v4/ats/web.p...

Listening to an author talk by @karenhao.bsky.social on her new book Empire of AI, hosted by @alltechishuman.bsky.social. Hao describes "quasi-religious" beliefs motivating doomer/boomer narratives around the "inevitability" of AGI that run parallel to narratives around the inevitability of empire.

When @kesearles.bsky.social and I began our research we thought we would be studying experts’ experiences w/ *online* harassment. But we quickly realized that was insufficient. Now we speak of tech-facilitated harassment & hybrid forms of harassment. A 🧵 about what we found and why it matters: 1/

This is really not good; www.techpolicy.press/us-house-pas...

SCOOP: DOGE used Meta's Llama 2 model to review emails from federal workers responding to the original "Fork in the Road" email. www.wired.com/story/doge-u...

“This primer maps what we currently know about generative AI’s role in scams, the communities most at risk, and the broader economic + cultural shifts that are making people more willing to take risks, more vulnerable to deception, and more likely to either perpetuate scams or fall victim to them.”

staging a show-and-tell about a fake genocide during a real genocide to the government that has done the most to seek justice for that real genocide is designed to break our brains. They know what they are doing. www.cnn.com/2025/05/21/w...

One of the world's biggest data center booms is quietly underway just outside of Reno. Some projects have been covered, but few outlets have recognized the full scope of the plans. The developments will require gigawatts of new electricity generation & could consume billions of gallons of water.

This FTC workshop about kids safety online features speakers and organizations that work diligently to harm marginalized youth, especially teens who identify as LGBTQIA+. This is not a serious workshop. Shocking, I know. www.ftc.gov/news-events/...

We’re among 100+ organizations calling on House leaders to reject a proposal that would stop states from regulating AI. This still-in-development technology should not be allowed to make unfettered life-or-death decisions about our lives, safety, and freedoms. edition.cnn.com/2025/05/19/t...

Here’s this week’s Better Offline. I’m joined by @karenhao.bsky.social to talk about her book Empire of AI, the confusing world of OpenAI, and the associated mind-poison of artificial general intelligence. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/b... Linktr.ee/betteroffline

Early Wednesday, at a markup hearing to consider legislative recommendations for budget reconciliation, House Energy & Commerce Committee Republicans advanced a ten-year moratorium on enforcing state legislation on artificial intelligence.

feels like a good time to issue one of my favorite respectful invitations: to support worker-run, reader-funded, billionaire free news

The deadline (May 30) is approaching for submissions to our workshop at the Aarhus Conference 2025! 👇

"For me, the answer now lies in refusal, the withdrawal of participation from systems that require dishonesty as the price of belonging." Today I am resigning from the National Science Board and the Library of Congress Scholars Council. I wrote about my decision in TIME. time.com/7285045/resi...