Weekend Links
Once again too much time has passed, so here I am late on a Saturday with another tech-heavy edition of the links dump for your reading pleasure. But I need to get this update out because I’m taking a long weekend for myself (and the dog) while Jeff jaunts off on a boys ski trip and I have a very busy schedule avoiding everything responsible.
Let me know what you read or found online recently in the comments and share the wealth!
What a pathetic, sad, lonely little man.
Absolutely obsessed with fact that the “shadow" side of the latest breakthrough in AI technology encouraged a journalist reporting on it to leave his wife. 10/10, no notes. Jokes aside, it’s a good reminder for all those salivating for the technology to replace workers - or conversely those seeing the doom of replacement and are panicking - that this technology while impressive is still limited. The clue is in the first word of the name, artificial intelligence. It is fundamentally still based on human mimicry, not creativity in the original sense of the term. And as such, I agree with the journalist’s sense that while certainly impressive in important ways, it’s not yet ready for prime time. I can see the long term potential, but I can also see the short term risks much more clearly.
You’re not crazy, things are just crappier these days:
Silicon Valley is out of ideas.
This is interesting! I’m not vegan by a long stretch, but I do think a lot about consumer ethics around food, clothing, and other categories. For example, I don’t think that plastic-based alternatives to leather are necessarily better. Plastics and microplastics are a terrible ecological problem, where animal leather is biodegradeable - so which is more problematic, the threat to the animal or the threat to the environment? There aren’t easy answers to questions like this, so I don’t judge anyone’s choices too much as long as they are conscientious. More lately there are interesting bio alternatives to animal based materials on the rise so while I’m not positive on PETA overall, I think this exactly the kind of project they should promote and fund.
This week in Mormon news: I know I’m not exactly unbiased, but seems kinda low?
If you want to understand the economy part of the attention economy, this interview is excellent. (Or if you prefer, the reaction economy.)
As is this interview on what Big Tech culture has done to us all, and how one of its former cheerleaders became a disillusioned.
And lest I praise and share their content without critique, The New York Times should be absolutely ashamed of its recent publishing on trans issues, including the profile of J.K Rowling and its rejection of a letter from contributors protesting its editorial judgement. As is all too often the case, The Onion nails the issue.
A reclamation of hysteria or something more problematic?
There is too much going on with the Dominion filing for a single link, so go read everything Media Matters is writing on the findings. They are not surprising, but they are shocking.
