A recent Auditor General's report shows that #Ontario gov't employees are routinely ignoring (inadequate) #safety and #privacy rules regarding #AI use, a situation made more difficult by our reliance on American providers, argues @jmmcgrath.bsky.social www.tvo.org/article/anal... #policy

The #Ontario gov't is planning to privatize municipal #water facilities, which are likely to increase private profits and public health risks, while decreasing accountability, argues Meera Karunananthan theconversation.com/new-ontario-... #cities

While debate about public grocery stores focuses on profitability, #food security could be enhanced by considering it as public infrastructure, suggesting other regulatory and community-led approaches, explain Jenelle Regnier-Davies, Pauline D Cripps & Sara Edge theconversation.com/canada-has-a...

The art of prompting generative #AI requires capturing the "vibe" of scenes, recalling how novelists responded to the advent of photography, with less visual description and more atmosphere, suggesting #AI will not eliminate #writing but change it, argues Lei Yu theconversation.com/how-ai-promp...

Communication about #AI data centres tends to frame benefits in terms of the "digital sublime" and energy & water risks as merely technical issues, distorting public debate about them, argues Sibo Chen theconversation.com/canadas-ai-s... #energy #sustainability

Immigrants to Canada may face unfair hiring from #AI, when they already face underemployment and overqualification more than most Canadians, a situation that needs policy attention, argue Hari KC & Rupa Banerjee theconversation.com/are-algorith... #work #fairness #immigration

Recent oil price rises expose dependence of #cities on ICE #cars, and suggest that #mobility can be boosted by encouraging uptake of electric cars, #bikes, #transit, and walkability, plus updating zoning rules, argues @cgreysongaito.bsky.social theconversation.com/oil-price-sh...

The @albertateachers.bsky.social holds that students should learn #AI literacy in school but should not be exposed to #AI that simulates care due to the health and #privacy risks involved, explains Soroush Sabbaghan theconversation.com/should-ai-ch... #education

Does flirtation with an #AI count as infidelity to a human partner? It depends somewhat on who you ask, but many ppl take it as a kind of withdrawal or betrayal, explain David Lafortune, Ellfie Chen & Valerie Lapointe theconversation.com/if-you-flirt... #relationships

Employers are increasingly turning to tracking software in the workplace, but more data does not guarantee more understanding or better quality, and may decrease #trust among employees, explain Nick Turner & Justin Weinhardt theconversation.com/tracking-you... #work #surveillance

Ideas of the Technocracy movement of the 1930s, such as use of technology to address social concerns (e.g.,Musk's yen to colonize Mars), enjoy renewed interest today, though they stop short of support for a managed economy, explains @historydafydd.bsky.social theconversation.com/a-1930s-move...

Abundant Intelligences represents indigenous perspectives on #AI, developed in pods by different peoples around the world, seeking ways for the technology to work in keeping with their values, explains @byaseale.bsky.social www.guelphtoday.com/local-news/t...

"Stardust Solutions" is a private company proposing to cool the Earth using clouds of tiny particles of amorphous silica, raising questions of efficacy and whether management of the climate should be a private enterprise www.economist.com/science-and-... #geoengineering

#AI generated music and "slopaganda" help fuel the Alberta separatist movement and promote its anti-immigration, white nationalist themes, argue Jamie Meyers-Riczu & James Deaville theconversation.com/how-ai-gener... #politics

The Ontario Auditor General concluded that #AI scribes are too inaccurate for use in medical offices, but @drgorfinkel.bsky.social begs to differ: issues can be addressed and the scribes save doctors screen time they can spend with patients www.thestar.com/opinion/cont... #medicine

One way to prevent collapse of beneficial currents in the North Atlantic might be to dam the Bering Strait (you read that correctly), though that doesn't mean the project is advisable, explains @sarahashemi.bsky.social www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/c... #geoengineering

A recent Auditor General's report shows that Ontario civil servants are using #AI in ways that may compromise citizen's #privacy, though responses to this issue aren't as straightforward as you might guess, argues @jmmcgrath.bsky.social www.tvo.org/article/anal...

#AI can help ppl by productive but also can also dull critical thinking, though #AI "breaks" and other methods can mitigate this problem (before it's too late!) www.economist.com/business/202...

Ppl have a natural tendency to undervalue investments in the present with future payoffs, explaining interest in #AI companions, which bring immediate payoffs that may be less than those of human relationships, which pay off in the longer run, argues Rahul Ravi theconversation.com/from-ai-comp...

If this network of #YouTube channels promoting #AI generated "slopaganda" is to be believed, Albertans can't wait to become the 51st state, though the material seems to originate outside of #Canada, explains @alexboyd.bsky.social www.thestar.com/news/investi... #politics

This isn't a one-off, it's a pattern! #AI generated text proliferates expressions like This-isn't-X, it's-Y beyond all necessity and simply obfuscates whatever point is being made, argues Joshua Gonzales theconversation.com/slanguage-wh... #chatbots

Ppl fall for their #AI companions, but the emotional safety those provide could also keep users from developing the emotional resources fostered in relationships with other real but imperfect human beings, explains Sarah Laing www.thestar.com/life/relatio...

Premier Ford of #Ontario is against a surveillance-pricing ban on groceries, though the gov't has banned ticket scalping, leaving consumers to scratch their heads on the gov't's affordability policy, explains @jmmcgrath.bsky.social www.tvo.org/article/anal... #food

Low-quality, high-volume #AI generated political commentary is proliferating, especially in conservative #socialmedia in the US, no doubt in time for midterm elections, though its unclear who is producing it, explains Tiffany Hsu www.nytimes.com/2026/04/17/b... #politics

#Ontario allows some #plastic waste to be incinerated, at a plant in Buffalo, rather than recycled, creating confusion about the gov't's #recycling policy, explains Patty Winsa www.thestar.com/business/is-... #sustainability

#Deepfake nudes have become a crisis especially in schools where (usually) girls are harassed with them, and where supports and consequences remain uncertain, explains @mattburgess1.bsky.social www.wired.com/story/deepfa... #AI

The "extended-range electric vehicle" is an #EV with a gas-powered charger, which may assuage Americans' range anxiety but alleviates few of the issues with either full #EV or conventional vehicles, argues @andrewmoseman.bsky.social www.theatlantic.com/technology/2... #design #cars

Students can now have agentic #AI complete entire online courses for them, and instructors can get #AI to do all their marking, raising the specter that humans will be shut out of #education altogether, explains Lila Shroff www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...

#FacialRecognition is now being employed at such a scale that even seemingly small error rates have big implications for #fairness, particularly in law enforcement, explains @lucaslaursen.bsky.social spectrum.ieee.org/facial-recog... #AI

The ENIAC, the first general-puropse electronic computer, was first turned on 80 years ago, and helped set off the age of digital computing, explains San Murugesan spectrum.ieee.org/eniac-80-iee...

Providers design #chabots to be sycophantic, which prompts users to over-trust them and risking harm to their well-being down the line, a repetition of under-regulation of #SocialMedia previously, argues @schneier.com www.schneier.com/blog/archive... #AI #trust

Team Mirai is a new political party in Japan determined to use #AI to boost public engagement in #politics and involvement in policy setting, explain Nathan Sanders & @schneier.com www.techpolicy.press/japans-team-... #democracy

Meta's #AI glasses record lots of private encounters and beam them away for review by labelers: “You think that if [people] knew about the extent of the data collection, no one would dare to use the glasses," explain Naipanoi Lepapa et al. www.svd.se/a/K8nrV4/met... #privacy

"Federated unlearning" could help distributed #AI systems comply with #privacy laws but also opens up #cybersecurity backdoors that could undermine system integrity, explain Abbas Yazdinejad & @annfitzgerald.bsky.social theconversation.com/does-federat...

New research: #Chatbots readily resort to nuclear threats in game scenarios, and mostly respond with escalation, although all-out nuclear attacks were rarely approved, a "sobering" result, explains @indescribable.bsky.social www.kcl.ac.uk/news/artific... #AI #war #military

A bio-inspired process that turns waste #plastic into useful acetic acid could help reduce plastic #pollution in the environment, argues Yimin Wu theconversation.com/how-we-turne... #sustainability

The term "misinformation" online should be reserved for materials that are very likely to be lies on the evidence, rather than just more likely than not, or the term loses its significance for practical purposes, argues Mu Zhu theconversation.com/truth-or-mis... #AI #deepfakes #misinformation

All @uwaterloo.ca members are invited to our next Movie Night: Dark Waters—A tenacious attorney uncovers a dark secret that connects a growing number of unexplained deaths to pollutants from one of the world's largest corporations. Thursday at 6:30pm in DC 1304! @engsoc.bsky.social

High school student Mia Heller has invented an interesting device for filtering #microplastics from household drinking water, explains Ramsha Waseem www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/t... #design

#TokenMaxxing and token anxiety result as employers begin to rate coder productivity by how many #AI tokens a person uses, even regardless of output quality, explains @kevinroose.com www.nytimes.com/2026/03/20/t... #unintendedconsequences

A missive from the White House calls for states to forgo much #regulation of #AI, apart from some protections for children & energy costs, so the US can win the AI arms race, explains @nytceciliakang.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2026/03/20/u...

Growcer is a Canadian system for using shipping-style containers to grow veggies locally in remote communities, supporting local nutrition and #FoodSecurity, explains @spaikin.bsky.social www.tvo.org/article/anal... #food

#SpaceX 's proposal to launch 1m satellites overlooks their impact on the appearance of the night sky, effects of launches on the atmosphere, and de-orbit risks, and is being with far too much haste, argue Samantha Lawler, Aaron Boley & Hanno Rein theconversation.com/a-million-ne... #progress

With car thefts escalating into home invasions and underwhelming police reponse, residents of Lawrence Park, #Toronto, are considering their own "virtual gated community," explains Raju Mudhar www.thestar.com/news/gta/the... #AI #security

At $700k, Rolls Royce's first electric car, the Spectre, rides like a cloud and oozes luxury, showing the marque has succeeded in adapting the new tech to their brand, explains Gabriel Gélinas www.thestar.com/life/autos/d... #cars #design #style

Ppl use #AI agents to perform lots of personal assistant type tasks, with results that can be impressive or disconcerting, suggesting they cannot be wholly trusted just yet, explains @cademetz.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2026/03/19/t... #trust #design

Withdrawal of the novel "Shy Girl" shows that the publishing industry lacks clarity in its #genAI policies and is unprepared to screen submissions effectively, explains Alexandra Alter www.nytimes.com/2026/03/19/b... #writing #AI

Publication of the novel "Shy Girl" has been discontinued over allegations that #genAI was heavily involved in its writing, a claim the author disputes, illustrating challenges publishers face with the authenticity of work, explains Alexandra Alter www.nytimes.com/2026/03/19/b... #AI #writing

#OpenAI 's response to the Tumbler Ridge shooting shows the need for gov't in the loop: #regulation that protects the well being and #privacy of users w/o reliance on opaque & voluntary corporate standards, argues Jean-Christophe Bélisle-Pipon theconversation.com/openais-safe... #AI #policy

A video of Netayahu struck some as a #deepfake with the wrong number of fingers, prompting rumors of his death, to which he responded with a new video showing his hands, a sign of how #AI is sowing doubts online, explain @stuartathompson.bsky.social & Tiffany Hsu www.nytimes.com/2026/03/17/t...