A warning sign with a picture of Walter Benjamin that says: “Are you sure you want to post Al art? You can read this essay to help you make a better choice: Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”

Don’t make me tap the sign again.

I'll keep throwing my five cents in. The distinction between STEM and humanities is useless. And it's weird when someone approaches one without approaching the other.

And. Much of prestige academia is just flushing down public money for APC in for-profit journals. We should stop venerating that.

The U.S. has successfully convinced its people that “the humanities are frivolous and STEM is Important and Real” is basically a law of nature: this is absolute nonsense that we should stop putting up with.

There is a genuine sadness to this era of tech. This IS the Rot Economy, and what you get when growth is all that matters. Every person defending LLMs is ultimately defending growth itself. It’s not about technology and hasn’t been for a long time. It’s about more things to sell and develop for.

Actors and artists pack Stanford hearing to demand new AI transparency law SAG-AFTRA and other groups say the measure offers basic transparency for performers whose work is being scraped without consent.

Still so excited for everyone who showed up to this yesterday! It was stunning to see a sea of creatives overwhelm that tiny hearing. We had an overflow room of artists and the line for 30 second public commentary literally had to be cut off!

You made a huge difference
yesterday.

Thank you!

AI: The New Aesthetics of Fascism It's embarrassing, destructive, and looks like shit: AI-generated art is the perfect aesthetic form for the far right.

These are images intentionally made with plagiarism software by the US Department of Labor. No artist was paid to create this propaganda. Does it look familiar? Do you see what’s happening?

I urge you to read this prescient article that came out in February:

newsocialist.org.uk/transmission...

crying about whales in the club

Digital illustration of six people of different ages, ethnicities, genders, and abilities. There’s text that reads, “it is exhausting being neurodivergent in a neurotypical world”

uh... this is an understatement this week…

Graph showing AI adoption rate by firm size. Firms with 250 or more employees began dropping in June. So did a number of categories below that too.

Happy to report the AI adoption rate for large firms is going in the right direction — that is, down down down 📉 (according to US Census data)

Artists are losing work, wages, and hope as bosses and clients embrace AI Visual artists, illustrators and graphic designers share their stories about how AI is being used to lower wages, degrade work and even replace it altogether, in this installment of AI Killed My Job.

Whenever someone questions market impacts of GenAi, show them this article.

Make them read each heart breaking story.

People’s livelihoods are being negatively impacted, by a tech that relied on the work of those same people to function at capacity.

The whole thing makes me sick.

It’s a relatable movie with catchy songs!

When you feel yourself becoming complacent or surrendering to hopelessness or apathy, remember that everything that exists today exists because someone(s) dreamt it up and decided to put in the work to make it a reality. We can create new ways of doing things, new ways of being, new worlds.

And the sequel is even better!

Apparently a lot of you need to hear this, but bugs aren't jerks, they're not evil, they're not vindictive, mean or anything else. They're simply bugs, trying to live and will defend their nests and lives when necessary. They don't give enough shit about you to be a jerk to you in particular.

Folks, US banning any kind of AI regulation happening in the states is about to be voted on soon!! CALL your Senators ASAP!!

Zach gave us a great break down bellow so check out his thread and lets do it! It’s GO TIME!

So much marine life! I remember being mesmerized by a giant octopus in an aquarium before.

Glad you had lots of fun! Aquariums are really cool!

It’s beautiful!

Them: Autism is way overdiagnosed and everyone's saying they're autistic now because it's "in" 😒

Me: No. People are finally discovering their very real MISSED diagnoses because better information about autism is being shared in accessible ways.

🧵: my entire existence has centered around making sense of my experience as a highly sensitive person. I perceive everything as highly saturated and thus have a strong appreciation for nuance, the imperceptible spaces in-between that most don’t even notice. It’s a double edged life tho.

It’s wonderful to receive recognition!

I wonder how it feels like to touch them?

Congratulations!

Opening panel of me with my mouth wrapped up tight in some bandage that I cant remove. Narration: "Since I was a kid, I have found it hard to express negative feelings openly to other people. I believe this is partly due to autism, but not because I have any trouble identifying or articulating my feelings." I sit at a party amongst lots of talking people, feeling sad but not saying anything. "Whenever I'm sad, I know exactly how I'm feeling." A contrasting image shows me sat on my bed alone in a dark room. "And yet, I almost always feel the need to express that sadness alone." A 7 yo me tugs at my mums sleeve, expressing upset. "This wasn't the case when I was a kid. My parents never discouraged me from talking about my feelings." A series of images showing younger me getting upset and stressed out in various situations- overwhelmed at a kids party because we were having dinner at the wrong time. Going to concerts and finding the sound too painful. Getting scared of the hair drier my mum insisted I use, even though it made me feel like I was choking and was too loud. "But, as an autistic child, I remember being distressed a lot. And I was undiagmosed. I couldn't explain what was wrong. Sensory overload wasn't a word I knew about. The only thing I knew was that I was stressed and couldn't escape the stress."

A series of images of kid-me crying, my parents are trying different ways to make me feel better, but nothing's working. "But this led, over time, to increasingly distressed parents- who had tried many ways to help me feel less 'worried'. But found nothing had worked, and they just didnt know what to do." The last panel shows a parent finally snapping at me with "Why can't you just calm down?!" A long panel with kid-me in the lowest corner, looking determined. "I have a very specific memory from when I was seven. I thought to myself: 'I'm making everyone upset when I get upset. I can't react this way any more.' Two contrasting images next to each other- kid me is crying in one panel, and then feeling shaky and sick from suppression of the crying in the next. "So I started to surpress what were clearly meltdowns, and any stressful feelings I got after sensory overload, into something else." An image of me sat in the dark in my bed, shaking with adrenaline. "After long days at school, or loud parties, or days out to new places, surpressed stress would break out at night in 'panic attacks' that lasted for hours. I would quietly keep them to myself."

An image of 14 yo me crying because I was freaked out at the idea of going to cinema without my family. "I still had visible meltdowns occasionally. But as I got older, they became something I was embarassed by, along with all the other things I struggled with that others didn't." 13 yo me sat on the floor thinking 'whats wrong with me?' "I still didn't know anyone who was as 'sensitive' as me, and I felt ashamed and confused." An image of me looking happy and making a rainbow with my hands. "Over time, this led to me being closed off, in the most optimistic and personable way possible." An image of me standing with confidence and happiness, but I have a contrasting shadow beside me that's full of distressed sqiggly lines. I'm thinking lots of bad thoughts: 'no one else can help you when you feel this way. These feelings are something only you experience, so you need to deal with them yourself. You can handle all negative feelings by yourself. You don't have to bother other people with how you're feeling. How do you explain how you feel to others exactly??' "Over time, keeping everything to myself became second nature, it became the normal thing to do."

An image of me speaking nervously to a diagnostician. "During my autism diagnosis, I was forced to talk about myself. And forced to see that the things I find hard are genuinely harder for me than for many people." Image of me struggling to get any feelings out. "It made me think about all the times I hadn't been able to truly explain my experiences as a kid, and how I gave up on explaining. Now it's time to be heard, with this new language I have been given." An image of me looking peaceful as I try to unravel the fabric that was wrapped around my mouth. "This is a long process for me. The way in which I don't share myself is deeply intergrated into my behaviour. I need to learn to stop saying 'yes' to things that hurt my body and mind. I have to stop framing my feelings in the form of a joke. I shouldn't be saying 'sorry' after getting upset. Little by little though, it is getting easier to express my feelings. It's the brave thing to do and the right thing!"

Here is a comic I made a couple of years ago for #autismacceptancemonth about Autism and Trauma.
Although the impact is long lasting, it took a very long time to untangle and understand. I've met alot of ppl since posting this who have had a similar experience, and I'm glad we're not alone in that.

I absolutely do regret being supportive to some people who turned out to be terrible. The world would be a better place if I just was mean to them from the start.

They’re really quirky critters! And everywhere too.

The hand picks up Mia again and puts her on the ‘very autistic’ end of the linear spectrum. It says: “Whoa, you’re more autistic than I thought. Since you’re very autistic, actually I don;t think you should be allowed to go out with friends, okay?” Mia says with sadness: “...and then, if you’re seen as being ‘severely autistic’, it can lead people to labelling you as not being capable of doing anything at all.”

Mia smiles and points to a ROUND spectrum, with varying colours that are also all sorts of tones and shades. Around the edge of this spectrum is different areas of human experience: language, motor skills, sensory, executive function, perception. Mia: The truth is though, the autism spectrum can look something more like this. There are some AREAS where we have more struggles than a neurotypical person...and then some where we are no different at all. Mia points to her own round spectrum, with little x’s marking where she struggles. She says: “We don’t all have the exact same struggles, s each autostic person’s points on a spectrum are in different places.” Another panel shows Mia looking overwhelmed, and so some of the x’s on her spectrum have moved to different areas. She says: “This can be affected by circumstances, too. Like how I’m good at talking, but when I go somewhere noisy, I find that I can’t talk at all.”

Mia stands next to a different autistic person with x’s on different points of their own circle. Mia: “You can see then how another autistic person might be very happy in noisy spaces, but not be skilled in talking in general. It’s easy to see with this spectrum, how not every autistic person has savant skills or how someone who is non-verbal can hold a perfect conversation with you, they just use AAC or sign language instead of speech. It shows how not every autistic person acts the same way, and that like everyone else, we have a variety of strengths and weaknesses.”

Mia is wearing headphones whilst sensory lightning bolts try to attack her, she has a helpless expression. She says: “Sometimes, when someone is autistic and wants to tell someone else this, it’s so they can get some understanding and respect for the things they’re unable to do…” Another panel showing Mia looking happy and writing in a notebook. She says: “...But, they also tell other people they’re autistic so that they can cooperate with those around them- so that they can be the best in the things they can do!”

Breaking autism down into simplistic 'mild' and 'severe' labels, both misunderstands how we define/diagnose autism, *and* creates problems that makes it harder for autistic people to be supported when they need it and to thrive when they can!

Mia waves to the reader: “Hi! I’m Mia, and I’m autistic! It means sometimes I find talking nad language difficult, even though I’m really good at writing my own songs. But sometimes neurotypical people aren’t so good at this kinda stuff either. And it means they can make some misconceptions about me. That’s why I want to explain what ‘autism spectrum’ actually means.”

Mia points to a line that is going from light to dark pink. On one end of the line is the words: ‘Not Autistic’, on the other end ‘Very Autistic’. “Sometimes when people think of the word ‘autism spectrum’ they think of something like this. A very linear looking ‘spectrum’ which suggests that people range from being ‘a little autistic’ to ‘very autistic’. Mia looks uncertain as she points to a drawing of herself where half of her is filled up with autism and the other half isn’t. “...Huh. I just don;t get it. If I’m just ‘a little autistic’, which part of me would that be? My feet? My eyes? I don’t think that’s how autism works!”

A big hand is holding Mia and trying to put her somewhere along this autism line. Mia says: “The problem with thinking of the spectrum in this way is that an autistic person becomes linear, too.” The hand says to Mia: “You’re only a little autistic, Mia.” Mia says back: “uuuh, c-could you elaborate please?” The hand replies: “you’re able to explain yourself pretty well and you act mostly NORMAL. You’re not SEVERELY autistic.” The hand pushes Mia towards a bunch of intense and scary looking words that are all muddled together. The words read: ‘new situations, smart tight clothing, too much noise, lack of routine, don’t stim, be more organised, don;t fidget, loadsa conversations all at once’ Mia says: “But you see, when someone thinks you’re only a ‘little autistic’, this can happen.” The hand says: “Mia, you can handle all these situations just fine, since you’re not THAT autistic”.

Mia starts to panic as she’s faced with all those scary noisy words. Some judgemental speech bubbles talk around her: “How can you be tired? Everyone does this every day, you’re just being lazy.” “Wow you’re being so overdramatic! Get over it!”

Happy #autismacceptancemonth !
Here's an old (like 10 years now lol) comic that explains the Autism Spectrum- still much needed, as I continue to see people- and most recently a book read out on bbc radio 4- think you're either 'mildly' or 'severely' autistic. Please give it a read 💖

They look so cozy!