Dr. Damien P. Williams, Magus

Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Data Science, UNCC
PhD in Science, Technology, and Society from Virginia Tech for research in Algorithms, Disability Studies, Marginalized Lived Experience, Values, Machine Consciousness, Pop Culture, and Magic
Master of Science in STS
Master of Arts in Philosophy & Religious Studies.
He/Him

Public Key

npub1afyla3fq5vqwz4zfx0sufrw3m6wq9g0el9lqdm3wh8g4y8uvl6wqlyk0mr

NIP-05 Address

Wolven_at_ourislandgeorgia.net@mostr.pub

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsw5j07c5s2xq8p23yn8cwy3hgaa8qz58uljlsxachtn52jr7x0a8qpz4mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujumt0wd68ytnsw43qekhq0p

Publishing to

relay.mostr.pub

Author Public Key

npub1afyla3fq5vqwz4zfx0sufrw3m6wq9g0el9lqdm3wh8g4y8uvl6wqlyk0mr

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Last Notes

2024-06-19 20:08:53

Fourth Juneteenth in a pandemic in a consistently downward-spiraling capitalist hellscape, so here's The Halluci Nation and
Saul Williams with "The Virus"
youtu.be/4_5VAKdHMek

2024-06-18 17:03:08

Still not really back, but since tomorrow's Juneteenth, here's a reminder that a bunch of my writings on the intersections of race and other structures of marginalization with technology and society are available for free, either on my website, or elsewhere:
https://afutureworththinkingabout.com/?page_id=5038#Publications

2024-06-16 21:37:12

Yeah no, I'm out. Some of y'all need to get your houses in order, and a LOT of y'all need to look in a mirror or otherwise take a moment of deep introspective reflection before you address other people.

2024-06-16 21:29:54

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@npub1gm8…5h8r I'm sorry, are you saying that the number of my followers should somehow lessen my experience of virulent hate, and my desire to be exposed to it?

2024-06-16 20:45:13

Me: Been having a lot of Latourian thought crop up in my sphere this weekend. Well. Even more than usual.
*checks something*
…Oh, his birthday is this coming Saturday.

2024-06-16 19:54:56

"Do Artifacts Have Politics?"
https://faculty.cc.gatech.edu/~beki/cs4001/Winner.pdf
Well…
"Challenging the Use of Algorithm-driven Decision-making in Benefits Determinations Affecting People with Disabilities"
https://cdt.org/insights/report-challenging-the-use-of-algorithm-driven-decision-making-in-benefits-determinations-affecting-people-with-disabilities/
Yes.

2024-06-16 18:32:41

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Since this has escaped containment, here's a note that "Cf." is an abbreviation that means "compare," also often used to mean "see also." So when I say 'Cf. "Bias Optimizers" … "On Bullshit Engines,"' i'm not just throwing out phrases. I'm directing you to compare what I said to two Specific things:
https://www.americanscientist.org/article/bias-optimizers
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DpM_TXq2ws

2024-06-16 16:51:37

Mastodon has features to limit discovery and visibility, but it really needs features that allow everyone to see your shit but only some people to reply.
And if you can't immediately understand a use-case for that, then you need to stop and think about why that is.

2024-06-16 16:48:56

Being a Black person staking out a realm of expertise or even just trying to exist and talk about things that interest you on the internet remains, as ever, super duper fun.
Wait, no, not fun. The other thing. *snaps fingers* "Fucking Exhausting!" Yeah. It's super fucking exhausting.

2024-06-16 06:05:14

Time for bed, i think, so here's Sascha and the crew with a reminder of what Nancy told you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MTHqK9lG_g

2024-06-16 05:55:35

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@npub1c2r…4aa7 Probably. A lot of people on the social medias don't read things very carefully.

2024-06-16 04:11:20

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And yes, the use of algorithms and machine learning to arrange search results based on profit motive has been a big problem for consensus knowledge for a long time, and everything here [https://ourislandgeorgia.net/@Wolven/112622292468046430], Safiya Noble and others long ago first wrote about as applying to said parameters of search.
And LLM integrations make it Worse.

2024-06-15 19:59:28

I think a lot about how latour felt when the anti-science rightwing crowd figured out how to weaponise their misreadings of social constructivism before progressives even started to get what he actually meant by it, and somedays I think we've learned absolutely nothing since the science wars.

2024-06-15 19:59:14

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Use generative "AI" to spitball, hypothesize, overcome the tyranny of the blank page? I mean if the environmental costs weren't astronomical and the training corpra weren't largely stolen, then yeah, sure.
Use it for facts? Knowledge? To fully *Replace* thought, feeling, and creativity? Absolutely not.

2024-06-15 19:30:04

First Sundar Pichai, now Tim Cook, both admitting that generative "AI," by dint of its very foundations (cf. "Bias Optimizers"), will not and cannot stop bullshitting (cf. "On Bullshit Engines").
Look at me. Listen to me: If someone is selling you a product they claim is smarter and better and faster than you, but it literally cannot be guaranteed to give you simple true facts about consensus reality when asked, then that product DOES NOT WORK and SHOULD NOT BE USED.
https://futurism.com/the-byte/tim-cook-admits-apple-ai-stop-lying

2024-06-15 18:56:49

I mean… do we *Know* saying "Depression! Depression! Depression!" out loud won't banish it like Beetlejuice? Has anyone Tried?

2024-06-15 05:28:58

If you're ever looking for a peer-reviewed, article-length piece to cite re: my arguments on why we need to center marginalized lived experiential knowledge in all technologies, but especially "AI," then my article “Disabling ‘AI:’ Biases and Values Embedded in ‘Artificial Intelligence’” is for you.

2024-06-14 21:52:47

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@npub1qtw…p5ly So just… don't have people who study the ethics and social implications of things involved? So… No change, except cutting out the trying? Cool.

2024-06-14 21:50:53

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@npub17l3…3z7p https://ourislandgeorgia.net/@Wolven/112615613350949228

2024-06-14 15:11:29

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https://ourislandgeorgia.net/system/media_attachments/files/112/615/606/788/204/898/original/e076a0a81dbd2dec.jpg

2024-06-14 15:08:23

So. Literally everything that i and many others who have thought and written truly carefully about the social implications of "AI" have said in the past decade pretty much amounts to "Do Not Do This Exact Kind of Thing; In Fact UNDO How Often You've Done This Exact Kind of Thing." And yet here we are.
The FUCKING NSA, openAI?! JFC y'all
https://www.theverge.com/2024/6/13/24178079/openai-board-paul-nakasone-nsa-safety

2024-06-08 17:20:24

Gonna be 42 next month and I just keep thinking about hitting what people call "midlife" in the middle of all … this. And to have grown to full adulthood through the changes this world has seen. Being an Oregon Trail Millennial is weird, and all I want for my birthday is a better world than this.

2024-06-08 14:51:58

Goodnight, Bill Anders, and thanks fot the perspective.

2024-06-08 00:49:49

Every single time I've been online this past week, there's been some significant number of interactions that are just shitty and wearying and outright fucking hostile for no goddamn reason and I know we're scared, and I know things are terrible, but get your shit together, fix your hearts, and work on helping.

2024-06-07 23:51:47

The Governor of New York is working to kill a plan that would help the NYC budget and increase revenue for city repairs, because NYPD essentially said "That's a Nice Civil Society You Got There; Be A Real Shame if Something… Happened To It."
https://nysfocus.com/2024/06/07/hochul-congestion-pricing-silence

2024-06-07 22:17:52

If you want a careful and nuanced examination of the politics and power dynamics of class, disability, and remote work, read this piece.
If you don't want a careful and nuanced examination of the politics and power dynamics of class, disability, and remote work, then you definitely need one, so read it.
https://www.yesmagazine.org/issue/access/2024/05/23/reworking-remote

2024-06-07 16:40:13

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To everyone who told me "Microsoft Won't Care?" Your cynicism doesn't get shit done. Doing the work gets shit done.
https://cyberplace.social/@GossiTheDog/112576234172896735

2024-06-07 16:18:55

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@npub1p3a…txdr Yes, now if only every government agency, doctors office, and university would just Stop Using This Thing That's Woven Throughout Their Workflows

2024-06-06 21:49:52

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Frankly, this piece technically from yesterday does a much better job of contextualizing the timeline and "discrepancies" in Alito's account of things:
https://www.npr.org/2024/06/05/nx-s1-4993790/a-neighbor-of-the-alitos-describes-her-unpleasant-encounter-with-martha-ann

2024-06-06 18:06:35

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A lot of people out here today seeminh to think that cynicism is a useful stand-in for raising an alarm; or, indeed, that alarm somehow requires surprise.
I don't need shock, i just want it to be known, clearly stated, often repeated, and then something actively Done about it.

2024-06-06 16:22:50

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@npub10wj…0axw yep, except this time he put his in print as a timeline of events, in a letter to congress, and signed his name to it, which… yikes.

2024-06-06 16:10:58

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Too many people don't know how to handle a situation where formerly foundational concepts like "facts" and "the rule of law" are flouted by some and embraced by others.
When it's your job to find cohesive, nuanced truth and someone calls that very concept "devisive" or "political," you Keep Doing Your Job.

2024-06-06 16:09:09

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A Supreme Court Justice seems to have outright lied to Congress, and that needs to be covered as such with due gravity by journalists, and acted upon by the body that was lied to.

2024-06-06 15:29:10

Oh. So Alito straight up lied about how this went down.
https://www.npr.org/2024/06/06/nx-s1-4992355/the-neighbor-at-the-center-of-the-justice-alito-flag-controversy-speaks-out

2024-06-06 05:25:03

No, I'm very very serious and need you to pay attention right now: If you've not already watching We Are Lady Parts, fix that immediately.
Immediately.

2024-06-05 19:24:36

Devery Jacobs and Elliot Page are mutual fans of each other, Happy Pride.
https://www.npr.org/2024/06/04/1197956549/its-been-a-minute-devery-jacobs-backspot-cheerleaderl

2024-06-05 16:09:10

…holy fucking shit, we are lady parts.

2024-06-05 05:18:02

Huh. Looks like the Edward Elgar Handbook on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence, containing my chapter "Disabling AI: Biases and Values Embedded in Artificial Intelligence," is going to be released the day after my birthday. Kind of had a feeling it might.
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/handbook-on-the-ethics-of-artificial-intelligence-david-j-gunkel/1144875259

2024-06-05 01:57:56

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If anyone wants a template to email their various orgs about this, here's a version of the letter I sent my CIO:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vTFWkZoyb0mJcP6aG-QahOudGlN3nPLFDEid0EU7zDeCx9QUrylyx1tWVYwqPzGFrVynDW136gcrfbg/pub

2024-06-04 22:42:10

Target's "Dr Cherry Vanilla" caffeinated seltzer tastes like the ghost of mr. pibb, which still makes it superior to actual mr pibb.

2024-06-04 20:06:17

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Also I got an email back from the Vice chancellor/CIO… but he also CC'd three OTHER vice chancellors.
So… Yeah. They're pretty seriously worried about this.
I suggested they use their positions to pressure both the university and microsoft into a better course of action. So we'll see.

2024-06-04 19:45:58

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*Does the Elliot Reid "I Told You So" Dance*
"This Hacker Tool Extracts All the Data Collected by Windows’ New Recall AI: Windows Recall takes a screenshot every five seconds. Cybersecurity researchers say the system is simple to abuse—and one ethical hacker has already built a tool to show how easy it really is."
https://www.wired.com/story/total-recall-windows-recall-ai/

2024-06-03 20:28:42

Welp, that's two instances of racism and ableism, in the last 45 seconds, so yeah, I'm out of here for the day.
If you don't think Mastodon has a serious culture problem, you need to rethink your shit.

2024-06-03 20:21:28

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@npub1gx5…teuu Go fuck yourself

2024-06-03 20:20:36

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@npub1lu4…vkqj If you're on a windows 11 machine capable of running the advanced copilot features, it'll be an issue for everything you do on that machine.

2024-06-03 20:07:52

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@npub1llj…vrlv It was certainly a surprise to me when it happened, yeah

2024-06-03 20:06:39

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@npub18c7…er9d EXACTLY. Like genuinely, what kinds of contextual frames do these people think the general public has???

2024-06-03 20:01:38

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IS2FG if one more off you says "just put linux on it," thus completely ignoring that a) not everyone has the ability to do that to a computer on which they work, b) it's not just about me, and c) not everyone has NOR SHOULD THEY HAVE TO HAVE the skillset to do a linux move, even if they have the inclination, I am going to LOSE it.

2024-06-03 19:56:45

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@npub1ecp…pr53 same

2024-06-03 19:56:19

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@npub1jpp…euxz More or less, yeah

2024-06-03 19:55:50

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@npub1mff…gqsr As currently configured and deployed, there's definitely a case to be made that it is, yes.

2024-06-03 19:47:46

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Sent a very angry, very detailed email to my University's Vice-Chancellor for IT/CIO; I mean what else can I fucking do about it right now?

2024-06-03 19:08:20

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Since I don't think some people are grasping how bad this is:
Bank Data;
Health Data;
Passwords;
Student Data;
Privileged Information (NDA's contracts, etc.)
Addresses
Unless a) your job has some version of windows that doesn't have these systems and tools in it, and b) work/life firewalls are PRISTINE, and I mean literally ZERO interconnections, even via email or calendars, the entire windows 11 OS has just become a threat surface.

2024-06-03 18:39:51

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@npub1van…zcx0 https://www.pcgamesn.com/windows-11/ai-app-watermark

2024-06-03 18:39:30

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@npub1van…zcx0 It will very specifically monitor your system in order to tell you it CAN'T run most of their new shit.

2024-06-03 18:19:20

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@npub1jvg…9f7v oh yeah, it's gonna be a NIGHTMARE.

2024-06-03 16:28:21

Actually, I'm angry AND disappointed.

2024-06-03 15:58:33

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@npub1mph…rhf7 Oh no, they've definitely been taking very clear aim at the current state of the UK

2024-06-03 15:46:47

$90 million dollars for CopCity while Atlanta is literally under a city-wide boil water advisory due to a water system that has been known to be failing and in need of complete overhaul **for at Least 30 years.**

2024-06-03 05:56:08

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(Sometimes I wanna put lockpicking in the "Technical Skills" section of my CV because I like it, I'm good at it, & I think of it as like a more practical version of being good at Rubix cubes, but there's almost no way a BUNCH of people don't get shitty ideas about a Black dude who likes to pick locks.)

2024-06-03 05:36:18

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(My unabridged CV is about 23 pages long, so)

2024-06-03 05:36:09

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@npub1933…jggw Yeah, all my word and pdf versions have them already (easy to do with headers), but it's taken me forever to set up this sidebar nav on my website

2024-06-03 00:26:53

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@npub1dsk…7eae oh yeah, no, I wouldn't've gone through the trouble for a non-linked list 😂

2024-06-03 00:16:53

Made a table of contents for my CV to make it easier to navigate. Yes, I do in fact hear myself.
https://afutureworththinkingabout.com/?page_id=5038
https://ourislandgeorgia.net/system/media_attachments/files/112/549/801/772/962/867/original/332a32632fda897a.png

2024-06-03 00:14:30

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@npub174c…ynjl It's a device architecture thing which I do not, may not, but very definitely did not have the wherewithal or desire to deal with.

2024-06-02 19:14:13

To understand the best versions Magneto and Professor X, imagine them in a bell hooks reading group that's led by Storm.

2024-06-02 17:35:06

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@npub1mue…jqpn Wow. For something that was as plain as the faces on those friend walls? Mm.

2024-06-02 02:26:37

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@npub1mqq…8v7l First for MSFT is to quietly disentangle the co-pilot feature from the main windows OS; once they do THAT you'll know they've figured out a way out that let's them save face and market reputation

2024-06-02 00:24:20

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@npub1p53…a6tq Again: "getting it right" == "strip it for parts and integrating said parts into other products in ways ranging from unnoticeable to innocuous to outright infuriating."

2024-06-02 00:09:12

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What'd I say? I TOLD you! I told you, and you FUCKING DOUBTED ME. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/01/technology/google-ai-overviews-rollback.html?smtyp=cur&smid=bsky-nytimes

2024-06-01 18:57:58

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Like… i wonder how long it's going to take for most people to get what's happening in "Dot and Bubble"

2024-06-01 18:57:50

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@npub1uj0…xdnk oh no, never that

2024-06-01 18:57:31

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@npub1xaw…qsme Sorry to hear it. "Boom," "73 Yards," and this week's "Dot And Bubble" have been up there with some of the very best episodes of Who

2024-06-01 18:35:27

This season of Doctor Who is 100% not fucking around

2024-06-01 15:58:52

Magneto Was Right.
…I mean "Happy Pride."

2024-05-31 18:36:16

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@npub1kdg…c5sf Oh this is an old repost, i meant to grab the one with the link to the online version
https://www.americanscientist.org/article/bias-optimizers

2024-05-31 18:29:46

"Bias Optimizers," by Damien Patrick Williams in American Scientist: https://www.americanscientist.org/article/bias-optimizers
(Preprint access https://afutureworththinkingabout.com/?attachment_id=5767)
https://ourislandgeorgia.net/system/media_attachments/files/112/537/115/414/090/478/original/d6c26bb2eaf19b1d.png

2024-05-31 07:13:46

So. Picked up my signed copy of Pattern Recognition was again presented the date of that time William Gibson saw my name on a post-it then looked me right in the eye and said "Beware apophenia," and let's just say it was a good thing i was already lying down.
20 years and 3.5 months.
Time is a relentless, tire-bodied demon.

2024-05-31 00:18:28

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@npub1r3f…nnhr might've been! Details remain unclear, uninvestigated, and oddly timed

2024-05-30 22:52:26

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Once again for no reason reminding people of that time jared kushner went to non-extradition Qatar for we-don't-know-why in the final days of the trump administration*.

2024-05-30 21:18:25

Former President Found Guilty On 34 Felony Counts

2024-05-30 20:26:53

As a reminder, if you're a journalist or podcast host looking to talk about historical frameworks and present-day and longterm implications of the things we call "AI," I've been told I give pretty good interview.
For examples, see:
https://afutureworththinkingabout.com/?page_id=5038#Press
https://afutureworththinkingabout.com/?page_id=5038#Podcasts
(NB: This is not the only thing I'll do interviews about, nor is anyone asking guaranteed a "yes;" I'm just putting this back out there.)

2024-05-30 15:18:44

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@npub1q2u…tv7q True; I mean, that's a pattern we've seen before too.

2024-05-30 05:36:07

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Oh hey, look what google removed.
But, as I've said before, "just don't talk about it" is not a viable strategy for the kinds of fucked up answers LLM/GPT-type "AI" is likely to give, because that strategy doesn't account for the structural reasons it gives those answers. Meaning it can't account for the question/topic you can't think of.
https://futurism.com/the-byte/google-bizarre-ai-answers

2024-05-29 22:30:39

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@npub16py…v40u It definitely isn't, but they also haven't seen this kind of concerted, all-corners backlash on their work in quite some time, so 🤷🏿‍♂️

2024-05-29 22:24:24

Quoted and referenced here on the structural, systemic biases in "AI," and the very real, life and death implications thereof. The rest of the article is pretty damn good too.
https://thewalrus.ca/ai-hype/

2024-05-29 16:36:32

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@npub1eav…4xw9 Yeah nah. Bye.

2024-05-29 06:29:48

Going to bed now, so here's Aldous Harding with "What If Birds Aren't Singing, They're Screaming"
https://aldousharding.bandcamp.com/track/what-if-birds

2024-05-28 21:15:16

Probably my biggest public professional L is back when Amazon, Facebook, Google, and IBM announced that they were going to be putting together an "AI" oversight board and I expressed mild hope that they might actually be more sincere about the socioethical implications of sociotechnical systems than they were about money.

2024-05-28 20:21:29

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@npub1eav…4xw9 The best apology is changed behaviour but that doesn't mean you shouldn't also utter "I apologize."

2024-05-28 17:13:10

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@npub15c8…fal0 he's doing interviews and being favourably mentioned and memed dunking on elon musk and talking about how long it will take for "AI" to be "as smart as cats" or w/e

2024-05-28 17:00:46

I gotta tell you, I'm not at all here for the Yann LeCun Redemption tour; dude shoved LLM/GPT shit into every corner of facebook/meta, got mad when people exposed its failure points, and then pivoted to being like "AI ain't that great," without ever acknowledging that he bears some responsibility for this landscape because he was, in fact, a hype merchant.

2024-05-27 16:40:52

A thing many of us need to get right with is that it's not so much "why isn't anyone talking about this?" as it is "why isn't this changing, when we can all see how horrible it is?"

2024-05-27 01:39:45

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@npub1tvk…egdw there are SO MANY COPS on that list. And then, at the bottom, Maya Wiley. Like… Come on, people

2024-05-25 22:48:49

It didn't have to come to this and it doesn't have to stay this way.

2024-05-25 19:14:23

Time to get off the internet for a while.

2024-05-25 19:14:00

A lot of y'all don't read.

2024-05-25 18:15:50

None of this inevitable and none of it has to stay this way.
Humans designed the "AI"/LLM/GPT systems, trained them, designed their interfaces, and then packaged them into everything they could get their grubby little human appendages on with no fucking opt-out (let alone opt-In) recourse all because those humans got the money-money-money FOMO brainworms and literally could not be arsed to envision a different, better way forward.
None of this inevitable; none of it has to stay this way.

2024-05-25 18:11:24

SO WHY DID YOU FUCKING LAUNCH IT, SUNDAR?!
(I know the answer, shut up)
https://futurism.com/the-byte/ceo-google-ai-hallucinations

2024-05-25 14:43:44

I genuinely long for the day someone puts the CEOs of google, meta, openAI, amazon, microsoft, and twitter at a table where they're forced to respond to and be held accountable by someone who actually knows what, how, and why the fuck these technologies can and can't do what they can and can't do.