Did you know that the new European Omnibus threatens research based on data donations? We wrote an open letter highlighting the problematic amendment (see below). Please consider reading and signing it. If the amendment goes through, this might well be the end of data donation research...

We recently concluded a special article series, “Seeing the Digital Sphere: The Case for Public Platform Data,” in collaboration with the Knight-Georgetown Institute, in which experts explored why access to public platform data is critical. Here’s a snapshot: (1/9)

Die Grünen sind nur Bürgerrechtspartei, wenn sie nicht in der Regierung sind. www.swr.de/swraktuell/b...

@lkseiling.bsky.social & @markscott.bsky.social plea in @techpolicypress.bsky.social for a new data access regime emerging from a "generation of decentralized platforms that treat data transparency not as a regulatory burden but as a civic and scientific good" www.techpolicy.press/in-critical-...

The most transparent, de-gamified way to do social media would be a “more like this / less like this” interface that nobody else sees. The “like” is pointless here anyway, while sharing is everything.

"Many of the deals OpenAI has struck — with chipmakers, cloud computing companies and others — are strangely circular. OpenAI receives billions from tech companies before sending those billions back to the same companies to pay for computing power and other services." www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

two for one, nice 😎

"Gegen vier Uhr morgens drangen Be­am­t:in­nen in die Wohnung der syrischen Familie Seleman ein, führten die Geschwister Rouaa (24) und Ibrahim (28) ab und setzten sie in ein Flugzeug. Dabei sollten beide eine Ausbildung antreten. Der Flüchtlingsrat Schleswig-Holstein nennt das „Behördenwahnsinn“.

The key terms here are: 1) burdensome procedures 2)burdensome tools While the findings themselves are not public, let's take a closer look 🧵👇

I’ll be presenting this work at #CSCW2025 in Bergen on Tuesday at 2:30PM! We will be part of the session “Core Concepts in Privacy Research” (in the Bekken room) chaired by @emtseng.bsky.social ☺️

The parsing code and info on the schema based on Activity Streams 2.0 we suggested: gitlab.weizenbaum-institut.de/lukas.seilin... @lionw.bsky.social's latest paper on data donations: doi.org/10.12758/mda... (follow him for more to come soon!)

"Instagram head says company is not using your microphone to listen to you (with AI data, it won’t need to)" techcrunch.com/2025/10/01/i...

Für alle, die keine Zeit für ~36 Seiten und über 100 Fußnoten im Policy Paper haben, habe ich im Interview mit dem @weizenbauminstitut.bsky.social kurz erklärt worum es im #DSA geht, welche Rolle Forschungsdatenzugang (#DSA40) spielt und was schulterzuckende US-Plattformen damit zu tun haben ⬇️

👉 Just published: "Empowering People in Online Spaces: Democracy and Well-being in Digital Societies" - Book of Abstracts of the Weizenbaum Conference 2025. #WIConf25 ➡️ doi.org/10.34669/WI.... 🔗

Haven't read this paper yet, but something has been on my mind: because diffusion and LLMs were more "discovered" than "invented," the explanations given for how they work, even by folks in the industry building them, are assumptions. Those stories drive AI narratives, and they're usually wrong.

Today, we’re proud to share the Coalition’s new report: The State of Independent Technology Research: Power in Numbers It's an offering to our community and all researchers doing public interest work–a reflection of collective strength, solidarity and persistence in the face of adversity. (1/2)

We already have over 100 sign-ups but a few spots are still available for Day 1 of the Data Access Days on research access to platform data under the Digital Services Act (DSA) — happening on 25 September 2025. Join us in Berlin! 👉 dsa40collaboratory.eu/data-access-... #DSA40 #DigitalServicesAct

This newsletter does not focus on the ongoing sabre-rattling from across the Atlantic. Instead, we recap all the work we've been doing since the last issue and examples and opportunities for constructive collective engagement around the DSA. Read here: dsa40collaboratory.eu/newsletters/...

Register to the #DSA40 Data Access days today before we reach maximum capacity! Join us in Berlin, September 25 & 26 - to connect and collaborate around DSA-based data access! More info here: dsa40collaboratory.eu/data-access-...

Was passiert eigentlich, wenn wir uns alle einig werden, dass das, was gerade weltweit grassiert und demokratische Errungenschaften sowie große Teile der Menschheit bedroht, Faschismus ist? Geht dann der antifaschistische Kampf los? Oder ist er dann schon gewonnen?

War crimes as a form of marketing

The U.S. administration is going all in on its AI death cult. It's side-lining the environment and it's own citizens to scale the build out of an over-leveraged technology, while aggressively pushing their technology onto other countries trying to distribute collapse-risk.

Or as I put it in a talk last year: This is not tech adoption, it is penetration - decidedly masculine, neither consensual nor reflected and it leaves us and our planet injured, if not violated. f we don't resist, we're - most literally - fucked.

Newsletter: This is the Hater's Guide To The AI Bubble: genAI is nothing like Uber or Amazon Web Services, there are no profitable genAI companies, agents do not and cannot exist, there is no AI SaaS story, and everything rides - and dies - on selling GPUs. www.wheresyoured.at/the-haters-g...

„Wer beim Forschungsdatenzugang jetzt liefern muss” – @lkseiling.bsky.social, @dscheykopp.bsky.social, @claesdevreese.bsky.social & @ulrikeklinger.bsky.social heute im @tspbackground.bsky.social: 🔗 t1p.de/zf6pa ⬅️ #dsa @dsa40collaboratory.bsky.social

Meta just blew a hole in a EU plan to tame artificial intelligence models. Today, the technology giant was the first Big Tech company to come out saying it will not sign the EU's code of practice for general-purpose AI.

The discussions about big platforms are intense. The systemic risks are real. Now the #DSA Delegated Act is finally here to ensure data access for researchers. Time to put this system to work. W @lkseiling.bsky.social, we show how @techpolicypress.bsky.social www.techpolicy.press/time-to-deli...

Das Bundesinnenministerium von Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) plant ein Sonderregister für alle Menschen, die das Selbstbestimmungsgesetz in Anspruch genommen haben. Das ist nicht nur geschichtslos, sondern brandgefährlich

In this piece for Tech Policy Press, @dscheykopp.bsky.social , @ulrikeklinger.bsky.social, @claesdevreese.bsky.social and I argue that it's time for regulators, researchers, and platforms to fulfil their roles and standards set by the delegated act on data access.

Last week, the EU adopted rules on data access under the DSA. The Delegated Act clarifies key procedures, but questions remain around what data will be available, how it will be protected, and how requests will be prioritized, writes Jacob van de Kerkhof.

I've complied a legible overview of the differences between the draft and the adopted delegated act on data access. The rendered html is on our website, the source code and data on github. Hope it's helpful 🙏🏻 Let me know if you find any errors so I can correct the underlying data table!

Can X block data access for researchers? We went to court to find out👇🏽 Join DRI, Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte, and top experts on Thursday, July 10 at 15:00 CEST to unpack the first national court ruling on data access under Art. 40 (12) DSA. Save your spot 👉🏽 bit.ly/3Gitk34

@ec.europa.eu published the delegated act on data access yesterday. In this 🧵, we give a quick overview of key aspects for researchers to take note of. Find my personal top3 highlights in the comments below and stay tuned for a more in-depth analysis coming soon!

If you agree with our 5 requests to our universities, please sign 🖊️ the open letter and don’t forget to confirm your email! ☺️🙏 openletter.earth/open-letter-...

Jaw-dropping reporting by Haaretz www.haaretz.com/israel-news/...

Felix Gaisbauer presenting first insights into political content suggested too and seen by actual German users around the German election earlier this year. Debunking assumptions of asymmetrical algorithmic curation on #tiktok in recent years. #WIConf2025 @weizenbauminstitut.bsky.social

Returning from second visit as @weizenbauminstitut.bsky.social Fellow. What a privilege to spend time with @dscheykopp.bsky.social’s group and the inspiring and friendly WI community (including the Berlin ‘staffel run’) 🏃🏼‍♀️ 🇩🇪 Honoured to deliver the Weizenbaum conference #WIConf2025 keynote 🎙️

How or why does #political content spread on #TikTok? Is there a large supply by political actors, is there a high demand by users for political content or is that content preferred by the platform algorithms? Weizenbaum researcher Felix Gaisbauer takes the issue apart at #WIConf2025

Platforms need to be researched on the risks they pose to society, like our civic discourse or our mental health. But the relationships between researchers, platforms and regulators are complicated. @lkseiling.bsky.social presenting their work on the #DSA at #WIConf2025

new article in @europeanlawopen.bsky.social on the concept of systemic risks in the DSA. what does it mean that we think of all kinds of social issues linked to online platforms as 'risks' to be managed? find out this way: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

I don’t know who is ready to hear this but people don’t have to add value Like people should also be allowed to exist for free

It's not just the MCP stuff (that one is extremely badly built though) but so many other pieces of that stack and the models. "AI" as an "industry" has basically no regard for engineering. Which is why all the talk about "safety" is utter nonsense.

People feel more lonely, in part because so many of our relationships are mediated by social media. Instead of atoning for the harms of his platforms, Mark Zuckerberg has a new tech solution: he’s going to give us all a bunch of Meta-powered AI friends. It’s an even more dystopian future.

This essay on "AI and Internet Hygiene" by @katewagner.bsky.social really how AI is ruining the experience of using the internet (and knowing how to use it), while also crippling the social infrastructure of trust that makes the internet work. web.archive.org/web/20250121...

I also spoke with a former employee of 18F, the federal tech support agency gutted by DOGE. He discussed how DOGE used its "AI-first strategy" and the hype around genAI in Silicon Valley to help justify their job-killing program. *This* is the AI jobs crisis—not any far-off robot apocalypse.

"Researcher Access in the DSA: State of Play & Next Steps" Organised by @ivir-uva.bsky.social with @geurkink.bsky.social (moderator), @mathver.bsky.social, @lkseiling.bsky.social, @kirstypark.bsky.social, @pjleerssen.bsky.social More info: cpdp.be/18184 #CPDP.ai #CPDP2025 #TheWorldisWatching #DSA

Our #DSA40 Data Access Q&A is finally out! If you're still not sure what Art. 40 is about, we hope that our summary provides some clarity! Take a look - and let us know if we're missing something!

🐦🇩🇪 Ask my organisation how our X account has been going ever since we sued X before a Berlin court and won an interim order to have them release data ahead of German parliamentary elections (which X ofc ignored).

You all need to treat Harry Potter IP like we’re treating the Tesla brand.

the guy up on stage is even more robotic than copilot