Monthly archives: October, 2023

Heather Ford: Is the Web Eating Itself? LLMs versus verifiability

Ethan Zuckerman: “One of my favorite things in academia is that you can go a decade without seeing a friend and remain at least somewhat in touch with what they’re doing and thinking by reading their work. Dr. Heather Ford, Associate Professor of Communication at the University of Technology Sydney, where she leads the cluster …

Subjects: AI, Education, Internet, Knowledge Management

Israel and Hamas: Major Conflict After Surprise Attacks

CRS Insight – Israel and Hamas: Major Conflict After Surprise Attacks: “On October 7, 2023, Gaza Strip-based militants led by the Palestinian Sunni Islamist group Hamas (a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization, or FTO) engaged in a series of surprise attacks by land, sea, and air against Israel . The assault targeted Israeli military bases and …

Subjects: Congress, Defense, Government Documents

The growing energy footprint of artificial intelligence

Joule / Full text free to read: “Alex de Vries is a PhD candidate at the VU Amsterdam School of Business and Economics and the founder of Digiconomist, a research company dedicated to exposing the unintended consequences of digital trends. His research focuses on the environmental impact of emerging technologies and has played a major …

Subjects: AI, Climate Change, Energy, Environmental Law, Internet, Knowledge Management, Search Engines

Language Models, Plagiarism, and Legal Writing

Smith, Michael L., Language Models, Plagiarism, and Legal Writing (August 16, 2023). University of New Hampshire Law Review, Vol. 22, (Forthcoming), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4542723 “Language models like ChatGPT are the talk of the town in legal circles. Despite some high-profile stories of fake ChatGPT-generated citations, many practitioners argue that language models are the way …

Subjects: AI, Education, Knowledge Management, Legal Research

Six Months Ago NPR Left Twitter. The Effects Have Been Negligible

Nieman Reports: “A lot of people threaten to leave Twitter. Not many of them have actually done it. This was true even before Elon Musk’s purchase of the platform a year ago. But the parade of calamities since — cutting back on moderation, unplugging servers, reinstating banned accounts, replacing verified check marks with paid subscription …

Subjects: Internet, Knowledge Management, Social Media

WordPress.com blogs can now be followed on Mastodon and other federated platforms

TechCrunch:”Earlier this year, WordPress.com owner Automattic acquired a plug-in that allowed WordPress blogs to be followed in the fediverse — the decentralized social networks that include the Twitter rival Mastodon and others. As a result, it launched version 1.0.0 of the plug-in, allowing WordPress blogs to be followed on Mastodon and other fediverse apps. At …

Subjects: Internet, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Social Media

The U.S. Climate Vulnerability Index

“Pulling in 184 sets of data to rank more than 70,000 U.S. Census tracts, the U.S. Climate Vulnerability Index helps you see which communities face the greatest challenges from the impacts of a changing climate. This tool shows what is driving the challenges, so policymakers and communities themselves can take action to build climate resilience …

Subjects: Climate Change, Environmental Law

An AntiMonopoly Approach to Governing Artificial Intelligence

An AntiMonopoly Approach to Governing Artificial Intelligence, Tejas Narechania & Ganesh Sitaraman. Vanderbilt Technology Accelerator for Political Economy & Regulation.. “Since OpenAI released ChatGPT in the fall of 2022, debates over regulating artificial intelligence (AI) among policymakers, technologists, and scholars have intensified. But for all the interest in regulating AI, there has been little discussion …

Subjects: AI, Congress, Defense, Economy, Financial System, Knowledge Management, Legal Research, Legislation

Disability Discrimination in the Digital Realm

Krupiy, Tetyana and Scheinin, Martin, Disability Discrimination in the Digital Realm: How the ICRPD Applies to Artificial Intelligence Decision-Making Processes and Helps in Determining the State of International Human Rights Law (August 7, 2023). Human Rights Law Review, 2023, 23, 1–27, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4544007 “Scholars have identified challenges to protecting individuals from discrimination in …

Subjects: AI, Civil Liberties, Government Documents, Legal Research

How to limit graphic social media images from the Israel-Hamas war

Washington Post [read free]: “You might be seeing violent, abhorrent videos in your social media feeds from Israel and Gaza. Those images have included the apparent killing of Israeli hostages, dead bodies and other cruelties. Those online videos can feed a hunger for information for people in Israel and Gaza in the absence of official …

Subjects: AI, Health Care, Internet, Knowledge Management, Search Engines

Half of Americans can’t install solar panels. Here’s how they can plug into the sun

Washington Post [read free] – “Half of Americans can’t install solar panels. Here’s how they can plug into the sun…If you live in a state with a robust community solar market, subscribing is easy. Marketplaces like EnergySage aggregate projects signing up new subscribers. I typed in a Zip code in St. Paul, Minn., a hotbed …

Subjects: Climate Change, Environmental Law

Google announces new generative AI search capabilities for doctors

CNBC: Google Cloud on Monday announced new artificial intelligence-powered search capabilities that will help clinicians quickly access information from different data sources. It can be challenging for doctors and nurses to find information since it’s often stored across multiple systems and formats, so Google’s new tool brings it all to one place. The new features …

Subjects: AI, Health Care