Профиль

As the UN Secy General says, the Euro wildfires are just an opening act to the El Nino bearing down on planet earth. It's time for smart politicians to stop climate hushing and start getting ahead of the heat. open.substack.com/pub/billmcki...

High Heat, High DramaEurope is starting to provide some answers about the next step in the climate fightopen.substack.com

All 150 people who are included in this Starter Pack are invited to join a new DM Group on BlueSky about climate change. The main aim of this group is to share links to articles about climate change and to coordinate our global fight against climate change deniers.

This is heartbreakingly beautiful www.theguardian.com/australia-ne...

Notes from a nursing home: ‘Our books told of who we were. The story of us. Then the movers came and asked what should go’Pencil marks in the margins of books gathered over a lifetime was proof of a life lived. So when it came time for Andrew McKean to move into aged care, leaving his books behind made the self thinnerwww.theguardian.com

‘More than just objects’: Australian book sellers raise alarm over ‘horrific’ destruction of rare titles to feed AI

‘More than just objects’: Australian book sellers raise alarm over ‘horrific’ destruction of rare titles to feed AISecondhand booksellers believe they may have been caught up in the AI supply chain that sees old books scanned then destroyedwww.theguardian.com

Android seriously needs a "paste link without tracking information" button. It'll never happen though - that would hurt Google too much.

It is much simpler: We know what we emitted since we know how much fossil fuel has been burned. And that’s twice as much as has accumulated in the atmosphere. So nature hasn’t been a source but a sink: oceans and forests took up half. And that’s also observed fact. www.climate.gov/news-feature...

How do we know the build-up of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is caused by humans?Fossil fuels are the only source of carbon dioxide large enough to raise atmospheric carbon dioxide amounts so high so quickly.www.climate.gov

An unusually strong heat dome will scorch much of the western United States this weekend, bringing the hottest temperatures so far this year to tens of millions from southern California to Western Canada. www.ctvnews.ca/climate-and-...

A record-challenging heat dome is about to bake the West with the summer’s hottest temperatures so farAn unusually strong heat dome will scorch much of the western United States this weekend, bringing the hottest temperatures so far this year to tens of millions from California to Canada.www.ctvnews.ca

I'm going back to in-class exams this semester, which are harder to schedule, less intellectually rigorous, slower to grade, harder to secure, more prone to error, harder to provide disability acommodations for, and use up a lot more paper than online exams. AI makes everything worse.

These businesses aren't just wasting billions - they're replacing skilled workers with defective chatbots. As I've written before, AI is the asbestos we're shoveling into the walls of our technological society. 79/

Cortex *is* the underling, except that unlike a human underling, Cortex *never* back-sasses you about your foolish questions. 65/

Speaking of fake AI… I was an engr at AWS. On my Day1 orientation in Seattle (Jan 20, 2020) we were encouraged to check out the futuristic unstaffed "AI-based" Amazon Go shop. "Walk in, pick up snacks, walk out, account billed." Turns out it was basically just "humans in India viewing cameras." 😑

So, Amazon’s ‘AI-powered’ cashier-free shops use a lot of … humans. Here’s why that shouldn’t surprise you | James BridleThis is how these bosses get rich: by hiding underpaid, unrecognised human work behind the trappings of technology, says the writer and artist James Bridlewww.theguardian.com

With the state of the industry dominated by froth, lies and mutual destruction pacts, it's no wonder that companies are deploying "totally gameable metrics such as 'money spent on AI'" as a means of evaluating employees and divisions. 54/

Without fail, this resulted in the once lukewarm execs insisting they be allowed to purchase Cortex *immediately*. Prospects who'd been unmoved by a pitch for new tech that would result in *millions* in savings were *hypnotized* by demos of a product described as *unsuitable and unreliable*. 47/

As Suresh says, if you're in business with a liar, you might be able to reason with them in private - but you can't reason with a true believer. The true believers are in charge. 38/

A person worked for a division that "pivoted" to re-engineer its software to create interfaces that support AI agents. When it became apparent that only *ten users* had touched this expensive new technology, they "pivoted" again to support "agentic workflows." 21/

Suresh has a good track record of writing trenchant, frank criticism of AI. You may know him from his 2024 essay, "I Will Fucking Piledrive You If You Mention AI Again": ludic.mataroa.blog/blog/i-will-... 11/

Suresh reports on his experience talking with hundreds of executives (and, more importantly, their subordinates) about what (if anything) AI is doing for business in an essay entitled "AI Mania Is Eviscerating Global Decisionmaking": hermit-tech.com/blog/ai-mani... 11/

AI Mania Is Eviscerating Global DecisionmakingThe reality of how much damage AI mania is doing to our ability to run institutions effectively.hermit-tech.com

I’m sorry, they made that apology & retraction *without* having previously agreed with JKR’s lawyers that it would end the threat of legal action? Is anyone competent in charge at Amnesty???

I'm going to say that whoever is in charge of @amnestyuk.bsky.social should be fired. This isn't just a complete abandonment of what Amnesty is supposed to stand for, but it's utter incompetence, too.