We just released a *big* working paper on Voice AI and Authenticity as part of the ARC CoE for Automated Decision-Making and Society @admscentre.org.au It surveys the history of the tech, emerging issues, and what can be done Check it out at Australian Policy Online here: apo.org.au/node/331920

Shout-out to fellow Angelfire homesteaders

It's great that there's a new season of Foundation, the best space opera/sci fi epic ever, and I admit I'm inattentive* but why has the current Cleon (Day edition) turned into The Dude? Guy's wandering around in a bathrobe, taking spliffs off shrooms, and generally DGAF *post-viral brainfogged

Job for a professional HASS research infrastructure person! Program Manager, Australian Internet Observatory rmit.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/RMIT_Careers...?

I wish you joy at all times.

I don't *care* if it's terrible it has Suranne Jones

It is really funny (sad, infuriating) to watch companies start to slowlyyyyy back away from the AGI. www.wired.com/story/charac...

I am getting 3 review requests a DAY. This whole academic publishing thing isn't going to end well.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

It seems to me that a lot of the AI discourse glides right over the key word “model.” If we had better public literacy around what models are and do we might be in a better position. (Please don’t @ me with the Box quote.)

Good stuff! If what's important about the humanities is critical thinking, scholarship and all that stuff, let's use that to work out and through this moment. Can the cheap slogans

Finally, something true. Usefulness would be a better place to start!

This is Percy. He's experiencing his first rainfall. Wants to know if you're seeing what he's seeing. 12/10 (TT: percy.boy.jackson)

Me, on the telly, restraining my intense feelings of irritation

This whole day on the radio was so wholesome, and much needed given everything

London is full of gimmicks & porno films.

In a stunning moment of self-delusion, the Wall Street Journal headline writers admitted that they don't know how LLM chatbots work.

Talk about The Wire, Sopranos, Game of Thrones all you want, but the greatest US television program ever made is Sesame Street. It's not even close. 50+ years of treating kids across class, ethnicity, religion not as mini-consumers...but as citizens with a stake in this world.

The gleeful doxing of someone cheating in public is bad even if they are a CEO and even if they are a Coldplay fan. It's bad because this kind of thing is happening to random people on TikTok for such crimes as "sitting silently on a plane" or "being attractive" www.404media.co/the-astronom...

After all these reports of authors adding language instructions for LLM reviews in their papers I wanted to check this myself and I downloaded the .tex source from one of these papers. Here is an example. (I will not share the identity of the paper)

Where to even begin with this

Akai ads (1980s)

I was very proud to chair the committee for this award. It was a tough job given the quality of the nominees, but we were very confident in our choice of winner. Congratulations to the inimitable Lilie Choimuliaraki: "Wronged" could not be more timely, more necessary, more humane.

Congratulations to PhD candidate, @jiarut.bsky.social, for her two new articles in June! 🎉 The first is a solo authored paper, "Broadcasting your virtual self: Exploring the authenticity construction and subjectivity of VTubers in China" journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Congratulations to post doc research fellow @ashwinnag.bsky.social, PhD candidate Shir Weinbrand, and DMRC alum @tjthomson.bsky.social for their new publication in The Conversation! theconversation.com/ai-overviews...

Google’s new SynthID tool claims to detect AI-generated content—but only if it’s made with Google’s own models. Researchers @tjthomson.bsky.social @jeanburgess.bsky.social @busedoyu.bsky.social explain how it works & whether watermarking can meet the challenge of #GenAI authenticity bit.ly/43Lj2jB

Thanks to the ubiquity of automated female voices, people are becoming “habituated to speaking louder to a female voice than is necessary" and to "a female response that doesn’t convey annoyance or irritation or even confusion but simply accepts all with equanimity.” www.nytimes.com/2025/05/05/t...

I gather from UK peeps they are showing some kind of epic #TOTP retrospective on the telly?

I think you mean Orwellianesque

Fine. More semicolons for the rest of us.

Immaculately dressed, intensely self-contained woman next to me on the plane has barely moved in 2 hours other than to write a to-do list with excruciating precision in a pristine notepad, now twisting her wedding ring as she reads "The Let Them Theory" (dubious self help book). I hope she makes it

YouTube turns 20. From a video sharing platform to a TV app. YouTube has transformed how we watch, learn, and share. @jeanburgess.bsky.social reflects on its rise from humble beginnings to global media giant on ABC Radio #YouTube20 admscentre.org/4iTOK3J

My actual GOD

Similar story in Australia

Good morning from Australia where we are fortunate to have compulsory preferential voting and relatively stable democratic institutions (s/o to the AEC!). We also now have a govt with a moral mandate for "courage and kindness", in the words of Penny Wong. More power to that: let's see it!

Delighted to announce that my PhD thesis "Misinformation Claims in Australian News: Lies, Fakes, and Scare Campaigns" is now available on QUT E-Prints at doi.org/10.5204/thes.... Big moment 🥹 massive, unspeakably huge thanks to my family, my supervisors, and my thoughtful and engaged interviewees.

There are so many wonderful things in the world!

The Association of Internet Researchers (@aoir.bsky.social) has released its Risky Research Guide, an essential resource for internet researchers (and risky researchers who use the internet), students and managers In These Times. Congrats @alicetiara.bsky.social and team aoir.org/riskyresearc...

pedro pascal in famous works of art: thread

Thanks to @jeanburgess.bsky.social and @kkasianenko.bsky.social along with @leoflores.bsky.social and the many wonderful bot creators, scholars, activists, and journalists for their invaluable archiving efforts in establishing, documenting, and preserving the legacy of these community creations

Remember when social media was sometimes good, thanks to users and what they built? We do! Please check out this 'minor history' of Twttr and its community-created bots from @domcarlon.bsky.social @kkasianenko.bsky.social & me, out now in Convergence journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

New piece out with the @admscentre.org.au Ad Observatory team: what political ads are Australians seeing online? We map the ads of #auspol2025. @internetobservatory.org.au @gisellenewton.bsky.social @markandrejevic.bsky.social @kateeuph.bsky.social theconversation.com/what-politic...

Finally some good news! Valerie the Daschund has been rescued by conservationists after more than 500 days lost on Kangaroo Island

Something to remind you It's a world worth saving

Hey, check out our new research project on Australian TikTok culture and the ways in which you can help below

Great resources (& dreamy patterns) in the replies

Today we walked in the forest

The comments (from the Brits), so good

Yesterday I prepared a colourful feast and ate it outside with friends. All sunshine and flavour for Easter Saturday (additional food porn in alt text) 🍽