AI showing signs of self-preservation and humans should be ready to pull plug, says pioneer

Per "internal documents written between 2023 and 2025 and viewed by The Washington Post... Instagram staffers considered the mandate to boost teen metrics their top goal last year," including "boosting their messaging activity... to set up an early pipeline for lifelong use of Meta’s platforms."

Merriam-Webster’s human editors have chosen ‘slop’ as the 2025 Word of the Year.

Trump's latest attempt to thwart state AI rules will probably also fail, as federal agencies like the DOJ and FTC cannot encroach on lawful state regulations without a clear delegation from Congress, Olivier Sylvain argues on @techpolicypress.bsky.social:

Thousands of inauthentic accounts were found to be spreading lies online about Taylor Swift and Blake Lively.

The world we are living in…

Das ist wirklich historisch. Das Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz warnt vor ausländischer Einflussnahme durch … die USA.

Kremlin hails Trump’s national security strategy as aligned with Russia’s vision www.theguardian.com/world/2025/d...

Zeitenwende… fueled by loss of trust in the US. www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...

Oh … the pettiness

What about Europe? It is mentioned quite a bit, with one primary focus: European identity and the alleged elites and minority governments that restrict core liberties and democratic processes. This is extremely close to JD Vance’s Munich speech.

The headline, the main takeaway from a European viewpoint is this: The transatlantic relationship as we know it is over. Yes, we kinda knew this. But this is now official US White House policy. Not a sppech, not a statement. The West as it used to be no longer exists.

"Emerging research indicates that content poking at two main emotions — anger and anxiety — gets more customer engagement than other approaches, according to Wendy Moe, a professor at University of Maryland who studies social media marketing."

Fascinating, since it shows how creative LLM use circumvented restrictions on platform access providing evidence for the impact of algorithmic ranking systems…

New study finds that down-ranking hostile political content in people’s social media feeds decreases political polarization. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Compilations of 15 second Sora videos posted on accounts like this are already doing big numbers, along with Sora generated rage bait. Legislation should require AI detection tools to be an integral part of the posting process, and tag likely AI generated posts and lower their algorithmic ranking.

Interesting… VPN use is also disclosed.

This transparency feature could actually do a lot for information integrity…

The EU Summit set important impulses on the path to EU Sovereignty. Many concepts of our article made it into the mainstream debates… It is definitely worth a read :)

Nine-month-old AI company you've never heard of that revealed its first product last month wants to be valued as much as Ford

You can oversee the bloody dismemberment of a Washington Post journalist with a bone saw, and the president of the United States will smile, shake your hand and threaten to pull the license of a news outlet whose reporter asks you a question about it. www.washingtonpost.com/world/2025/1...

3,5 Milliarden User: Gesamtes #WhatsApp-Verzeichnis #abgeschnorchelt "Wiener Forscher haben alle WhatsApp-Nummern abgerufen. Die 3,5 Milliarden Profile sind der größte Datenabfluss der Geschichte – und übler, als man meinen würde." www.heise.de/news/3-5-Mil...

In den letzten 4 Wochen insgesamt 3 mal passiert. Wahltag in den Niederlanden, globaler AWS Ausfall for 2 Wochen, cloudflare Ausfall vor einigen Tagen… Monopole sind nicht resilient…

"Former workers and local campaigners told Rest of World that most of the positions are in security and cleaning."

"Voter anger over the cost of living is hurtling forward into next year's midterm elections, when pivotal contests will be decided by communities that are home to fast-rising electric bills or fights over who's footing the bill to power Big Tech's energy-hungry data centers."

Meta's fraud problem: The social media giant projected 10% of its 2024 revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods, documents seen by @Reuters show reut.rs/4qJTpdH

Die eine Hälfte der AfD fährt nach Washington, die andere nach Moskau, aber alle verfolgen dasselbe Ziel. www.t-online.de/nachrichten/...

Australia has so much electricity from solar power that it is going to start offering free electricity to everyone for at least three hours during the day as the wholesale price of power goes negative electrek.co/2025/11/04/a...

Former FTC chair Lina Khan was just named to NYC Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani's transition team—just one sign that his new administration will take tech matters seriously, writes Rebecca Williams. She offers a tech agenda for the new mayor to advance his campaign goals:

This really hasn’t gotten enough attention this week. @wired.com #ICE www.wired.com/story/fbi-wa...

The European Commission just announced that, under the new DSA rules, researchers will gain access to data from large online platforms. Here's Daphne Keller's take on what the rules have said thus far and what it means for platform accountability research in Europe.

Such a nice setting to talk about impact in think tanking. Also loved seeing Wiebke again..

A survey of 16K+ creators in eight countries: 86% use creative GenAI tools, 60% use multiple, 48% use them for ideation, and 52% for creating video and more (Adobe Newsroom) Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

Grokipedia is not a 'Wikipedia Competitor.' It is the antithesis of Wikipedia in every possible way, and it is not going to work: www.404media.co/grokipedia-i...

"How Microsoft has managed to avoid disclosing such basic details is baffling. The company in its financial reports identifies OpenAI as an equity-method investment. That means OpenAI, by definition, is a related party of Microsoft under the accounting rules."

In unserem Beitrag für @internationalepolitik.de beschreiben @kzenner.bsky.social &ich einen 🇪🇺 Weg der digitalen Souveränität - eine wertebasierte Alternative, die sich bewusst vom 🇺🇸 Techno-Kapitalismus & 🇨🇳 Digital-Autoritarismus abgrenzt. internationalepolitik.de/de/europas-d...

We are publishing an "Ideas for Europe" series from leading experts on how Europe can turn its sovereignty ambitions into action. In this piece, MEP @alexandrageese.bsky.social asks: Does Europe lack control over the digital infrastructure it depends on? www.techpolicy.press/europe-cant-...

The Chinese Communist Party’s new five-year plan emphasizes self-sufficiency and advanced manufacturing as a rivalry with America looms large www.wsj.com/world/china-...

French lawmakers have voted in favor of a fivefold increase on the taxation of tech giants in France amid ongoing negotiations on the country’s 2026 budget.

News Analysis: After President Trump's phone call with President Vladimir Putin of Russia, Trump appeared to express doubts about supplying Ukraine with more powerful weapons.

An amateur satellite tracker stumbled across the signal which is coming from Starshield satellites in a "hidden" part of the radio spectrum. n.pr/3WGaS8X

My Trade Secrets column today. Trump's been thrashing round with his tariffs for nearly nine months now but the global economy's doing....not too badly? I look at why, and also note there's a much bigger threat from the AI bubble and the US's renewed addiction to fossil fuels.

The Economist with good reporting on the case - with some reflections from my side. www.economist.com/business/202...

By capturing our social and economic infrastructure, tech companies have made it difficult for us to take up the question, ”Is this what’s best for us?” The time has come to insist that it is, writes Emily Tucker.

Really great work by my @cfr.org colleague Matthew C. Waxman on the legality of Trump's "counterterrorism" drone strikes near #Venezuela, finding that the White House "hasn't persuasively made the legal case that cartels are waging a war against the U.S." www.cfr.org/expert-brief...

Gerade gestern darüber geredet wie Vertrauen weg von political establishment hin zu Individuen hin migriert und jetzt dieser Artikel… 🚀

If anyone needs me I will be in the museum, lying down next to the bog bodies.