“When we use generative AI for work, there are two ever-present risks: hallucinations/confabulations and deskilling.” - Arvind Narayanan, AI Snakeoil

Like this definition talking about education and AI from the European AI Act - "including vocational schools, i.e.schools where students learn skills involving the use of their hand."

Britain has been paying a high price for Uncle Sam’s craziness. It’s time to turn to Europe | Simon Tisdall | Simon Tisdall In his final column, the Observer’s foreign affairs commentator says America under Trump is not the first time it has caused trouble for allies

A journalist writes his last post ….what he really thinks ..brilliant www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

“There is this terrible misconception that disabled people just take, but actually by taking from us, you prevent us from being able to give – we want to be able to participate in life equally the same as anyone else, and that includes going to work.” Disability campaigner Tanni Gray-Thompson

French scientist denied US entry after phone messages critical of Trump found France’s research minister said the scientist was traveling to Houston for a conference when his phone was searched

“I learned with concern that a French researcher” on assignment for the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) “who was traveling to a conference near Houston was denied entry to the United States before being expelled.” – France’s minister of higher education and research.

EU: don't put a green label on planes and ships! If it is up to the European Union, the newest planes and ships will be on their green list, the Taxonomy. In doing this, they are encouraging pension funds and banks to put our money into a polluting,...

Lobbyists have got the EU to classify aeroplanes and cruise ships as sustainable! Sign this petition telling MEPs to take them off it and focus on real climate solutions.
act.350.org/sign/EU-no-g...

In a meeting - we have 12 people and 6 AIs!

The dot com bubble burst 25 years ago. On March 10, 2000, the Nasdaq Composite index peaked at 5,048.62, more than double its value from just a year earlier. It went on to lose more than 75% of its value, wiping out $5 trillion in market capitalization. I wonder when the AI bubble will burst.

I’m not going to the Joint Address. I will be live posting and chatting with you all here instead. Then going on IG Live after.

👇🦋💪

Time saved and immense increase in production of the nation's wealth = hm sounds like a Labour Party politician talking about AI!

canva is the microsoft paint of the 2020s

According to MIT Technology Review "Software programming once was an almost entirely female profession. As recently as 1980, women held 70% of the programming jobs in Silicon Valley."

some america first beers spotted in denmark:

Bluesky, please raise your character count to at least that of Mastodon.

And please add an Edit button.

I love everything else about you, but those two are stopping me dead in my tracks.

(If you agree, please repost / pass along)

😑

#Bluesky #Interface @bsky.app

According toRemitly, YouTuber is the most searched career in England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, DJ tops the charts in Canada and Entrepreneur attracts the most interest in Senegal

Do you have a landline. I don't. And according to Adam Tooze in Chartbook "Within a single generation the landline has gone from complete dominance (95 percent of households) to an increasingly marginal position in telephony in the US. Less than a quarter of households still have a landline."

At kickoff meeting for the new Erasmus Plus AI Cookbook project on use of AI for migrants in Europe

We're getting the social media crisis wrong The bigger problem isn't disinformation. It's degraded democratic publics

"The technologies through which we see the public shape what we think the public is, and how we understand it." - @himself.bsky.social (Henry Farrell)

open.substack.com/pub/programm...

Whatever happened to in Information Super Hghway

Tech Bro Power Play: Zuckerberg vs. Global Tech Justice | TechPolicy.Press Tuesday's announcement signaled a new alliance between Silicon Valley and Washington against regulation and tech justice, write Tom Divon and Jonathan Corpus Ong.

Mark Zuckeberg’s announcement of sweeping changes to content moderation at Meta signaled a new alliance between Silicon Valley and Washington against global tech regulation, write Tom Divon and Jonathan Corpus Ong. The stakes are immense, especially in the Global South.

AI learns to distinguish between aromas of US and Scottish whiskies One algorithm identified the five strongest notes in each drink more accurately than any one of a panel of experts

🤖 AI & Whisky

This @theguardian.com article explores how AI is being used to distinguish between US & Scottish whiskies by analysing their molecular aromas.

The system outperformed expert panels, predicting flavour notes with 90% accuracy.

🔗 www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

#AI #SciComm 🧪

“AI could replace bloggers today if anyone really cared to try,” Dr. Ana Ibarra, a tech ethicist, wrote in WIRED Spain. “But who would build a machine to churn out verbose, shallow, and performatively opinionated commentary on AI’s impact? I assure you no one cares.”

Training up UK workers may not bring down net migration, Starmer warned Skilled overseas workers contribute 20 times more than UK-born adults, while some shortages may be due to pay and conditions, say advisers

The fact that migrants on work visas (*including* those on care visas and *including* the impact of dependants) make a substantial net fiscal contribution should not be surprise to anyone who understands how the system works...

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024...

In a small language like Danish, one of the big effects of AI, is the erosion of norms of writing. Normally e-mails from students would be 3-4 lines and to the point. Now I get half pages of flowery prose and formalities utterly alien to written Danish.

A photo of a newspaper piece by James Ball. Text: like hearing someone say they were wrong, or they changed their mind. Starmer's team should try this: pretend voters are people you know, in the room with you right now, and talk to them like that. If you wouldn't say it yourself, don't write it down. It might work miracles. Or as they would put it, the different approach to the execution of interlocutory functions might be expected to deliver positive synergies in the delivery of the government's strategic plan for its communications functions.

I laughed out loud at the last paragraph. Nice one, @jamesrball.com. 😅

<em>British Educational Research Journal</em> | BERA Journal | Wiley Online Library There is a longstanding imperative from both government and industry for a workforce with the skills needed to drive forward the scientific and technological advances that are considered so crucial t....

📊 Gender gap in UK STEM persists

A new #OpenAccee study uses 70 years of data to reveal little change in women's participation in STEM education or entry into high-status STEM jobs.

Ultimately, men still benefit more from STEM studies in the workforce.

🔗 doi.org/10.1002/berj...

🧪 🍎 #SciComm

SO excited to share Clio with the world (and on Bsky before Twitter)!

Clio generates insights on AI usage patterns, in a way that keeps user data private. It has unlocked, and will continue to unlock, an immense amount of understanding about the present and future of AI use.

(Blog linked below)

Hirples is a much better word

I’ve reported on homelessness for years and met many, many people who have found themselves in awful situations

Every single one of them had more decency and integrity than this privileged plutocrat