Paul Harland

Are the National Guard troops going to take on the windmills?

America was within two years of being destroyed by illegal immigrant transgender windmills.

Another way of saying it: would a Deepfakes4Good event yield much of worth to society?

Work that isn’t counted as work An interesting LinkedIn post from some colleagues musing on the “expectation of free service” has been stuck in my head for a few days now. In my university, we have a workload model wh…

When is work not work? What is the workiest work?

gavinbuckingham.wordpress.com/2025/10/07/w...

PSA: Get Your AI Money, Authors The Anthropic settlement has been preliminarily approved, which means people can join in to be a member in this class action suit.

Had a book published before mid-2021? Take 5 minutes to see if it's listed here and if so another 5 to enter info. And look up your grandma's book, the book of your friend, etc. and let them know

But, if you were the average employee, just how secure would you feel?

🚨 New assistant prof job posting at LSE with a focus on crime and criminal justice

jobs.lse.ac.uk/Vacancies/I/...

@milesbrundage.bsky.social's P.S.:
"(For the record, my current view is that AI remains massively underestimated, in terms of the total future economic value it will create, by almost all investors, but I don’t have strong views re: which specific investments are over/undervalued.)"

Miles continues:
"It’s not unrelated to the progress/diffusion thing, which affects the size of the pie to be captured.
But it seems like the bubble “position” has historically been associated with people who focused on the progress part specifically, so it’s worth distinguishing these things."

@milesbrundage.bsky.social:
"Seems to me the case for an AI bubble doesn’t hinge on AI progress + diffusion being slow or disappointing.
Seems to be partly a question of who captures the value from that.
Very unsure about the capture part personally, way moreso than the progress/diffusion parts."

Comment on X: "I tried [Bluesky] but it's a wasteland for housing convos. I think some people moved to LinkedIn - but it doesn't really work if you're not involved in that industry." Can anyone here help @lostinsw19.bsky.social get more conversations going?

It's not a whole lentil, it's a split one.

I'm using some of the time I have whilst on strike to work on an article for the Vegan Society on using animal products from rescue animals. There are lots of interesting ethical puzzles at stake.

Film is Fabulous are doing such vital work. They need support from people like us who care about preserving media, to help assess, transport, catalogue, store and acquire film collections.

Donate if you can afford it! 🙏 filmisfabulous.org.uk/the-film-is-... ⬇️

Chatbait Is Taking Over the Internet How chatbots keep you talking

Capitalism breeds innovation: why the innovation lately means always exploiting the user?

Have you had such a conversation with AI that you ended up wondering who actually asks questions here?

I look forward to it - am enjoying your writing.

One of the things I see argued is the value of "friction" in systems, i.e. whether removing all of it is a good idea in the name of efficiency. But the term is already mechanical.

Medicine Man, Performing His Mysteries over a Dying Man, 1832, by the American artist George Catlin, who specialized in portraits of Native Americans in the Old West. Featured in our essay “The Long, Forgotten Walk of David Ingram” — https://buff.ly/2QZcWIB

(It's where the old computers "freeing up time" work trope bites.)

* a millennium - Bluesky edit where is you when I need you? @davidgunkel.bsky.social

Chaplin inside huge cogs in Modern Times

If a job only wants the parts of you it can't automate yet, it's already seeing you as machine parts. But I'm sure the vision preceded the technology by millennia a two.

Gisèle Pelicot faces one of her rapists in court again Gisèle Pelicot's dominant stance was seen as a moment in France's MeToo movement but the enthusiasm appears to be wilting.

Gisèle Pelicot was treated like an object but somehow she's kept rejecting that we can see her other than as a person: www.bbc.com/news/article...

Boom times and total burnout: three days at Europe’s biggest pornography conference The crowd that gathers in Amsterdam is exuberant. Pornography use is more common than ever, so earnings for many here are through the roof. But there is trouble afoot, from AI to chronic illness …

I found www.theguardian.com/society/2025... by @ameliagentleman.bsky.social illuminating. It's a form of surveillance capitalism or attention economy, but it also sounds eerily like any industry where the value of humans is as money-making units. Automation often merely replays existing themes.

System errors!

I think Ted may be onto something.

Google's AI Co-Scientist Is Changing the Face of Scientific Research Google's AI co-scientist proves itself more than a novelty. In two studies, it generated exciting ideas that could have taken years of lab work to uncover.

Anyone who can ask the same question to Google's AI co-scientist? spectrum.ieee.org/ai-co-scient... "Is there any competition for a Neuralink Blindsight brain implant for the blind?"

What if it's Bogie?

To be honest, @mothinali.bsky.social is putting me off a bit, again.

Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove gives speech to IAA Education Secretary Michael Gove speaks at the Independent Academies Association.

Gove: "We should believe our society capable of ensuring many more than half our young people are capable of going to university." www.gov.uk/government/s... Seems to an aspiration, but a constant one.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politic... 'John Denham, the Universities Secretary... said: "... our target to see 50 per cent of young people benefiting from higher education"' (Gove seems to saying in article he's committed to more).