A frequent gap in AI policy papers at FAccT is that many assume policymakers always act in the public interest

A frequent gap in AI policy papers at FAccT is that many assume policymakers always act in the public interest

Symposium on Reimagining Imaginaries of Reimagining

Getting a good sleep and waking up at a normal time after days of jet lag is one of the best feelings you can experience

The Portland school board has implemented a moratorium on new generative AI technologies. With unanimous support, the board aims to assess current usage and data privacy concerns over the next 120 days. theoregonian.visitlink.me/FLbgMT

I wrote this weird little essay in 2023 about a near-future in which AI, extended reality, and interlocking policy failures collapse politics into glitchy post-reality soup & fragile cognitive security regimes. So many prescient predictions in this volume, excited it's finally out!

Mattering Press@matteringpress.bsky.social · last mo.

1/ We are very pleased to announce the publication of Predictions, Volume 1: From Speculative Ethnography to Apocalyptic Testimony, edited by @melhogan.bsky.social, @stefanlaser.bsky.social and @edwardongwesojr.com www.matteringpress.org/books/predic...

‌8: Realness, Blair Attard-Frost "Realness is being annihilated by the surreal. There will be no truth other than (mis)truth. There will be no information other than (mis)information, no learning other than (un)learning, no certainty other than (un)certainty, no stability other than volatility."

For your bookmarks but not to be read just before bedtime. Changing course is the good idea. This writing is a trip but I have to say it feels important to go there (in the written dream-awakescape), but please let's not stay or continue the course there.

blair@blairaf.com · last mo.

I wrote this weird little essay in 2023 about a near-future in which AI, extended reality, and interlocking policy failures collapse politics into glitchy post-reality soup & fragile cognitive security regimes. So many prescient predictions in this volume, excited it's finally out!

I wrote this weird little essay in 2023 about a near-future in which AI, extended reality, and interlocking policy failures collapse politics into glitchy post-reality soup & fragile cognitive security regimes. So many prescient predictions in this volume, excited it's finally out!

Mattering Press@matteringpress.bsky.social · last mo.

1/ We are very pleased to announce the publication of Predictions, Volume 1: From Speculative Ethnography to Apocalyptic Testimony, edited by @melhogan.bsky.social, @stefanlaser.bsky.social and @edwardongwesojr.com www.matteringpress.org/books/predic...

Can't wait for our CRAFT workshop on trans AI policy at ACM FAccT this Sunday, June 28 at 2:15 ET, co-organized with @blairaf.com, @jhereia.bsky.social, and @techlissa.bsky.social! programs.sigchi.org/facct/2026/p...

Undermining scientific expertise and endangering public health and the environment seems very popular everywhere: The House of Commons and the Senate in Canada passed a bill that empowers the cabinet to authorize the use of pesticides that Health Canada has deemed unsafe.

Carney government passes law allowing authorization of banned pesticides | CBC News

The federal government has brought in major changes to how pesticides are regulated in Canada, granting cabinet the power to authorize the use of pesticides — even ones that Health Canada has deemed u...

cbc.ca

I wrote about SpaceX. SpaceX the rocket company, SpaceX the suspicious financial instrument for Musk to create value out of thin air. SpaceX the meme. SpaceX as the 7-headed hydra at the end of capitalism. (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...

The Myth of SpaceX

The company has mutated into something that defies both comparison and logic.

theatlantic.com

The most dangerous thing about AI is not that the machines might one day think. It is that we are being trained, by men with enormous financial gains riding on our acquiescence, to stop thinking for ourselves.

I'm looking for a new PhD student to come join me at UAlberta & Amii to study trans perspectives on AI policy & the future of AI as part of my new lab. The position is fully funded and offers access to a range of supports - more details in the poster below!

Save theatre, libraryes, parkes, indie bookestores, museums, cinema, non-chain restaurantes, coffee shoppes, meetinge places, qualitye public educacioun, communitye marketes, lyve musique, weirde places, goode places. All the thinges that corporate logic ys so eager to distorte and remove.

Extremely offline in remote BC for a few days and I return to civilization to find two massive new pieces of Canadian digital safety & privacy legislation waiting for me to read 🫠

One of the problems with how we do digital policy in Canada is we pass laws based on what sounds good (protect children! protect privacy! make big tech pay for links!) without understanding the implications of these laws or how they’re all supposed to fit together

Luke LeBrun@lukelebrun.ca · 2mo ago

So we're going to get legislation making privacy a fundamental right at the same time as we get legislation forcing us to ID ourselves to use social media platforms and online services?

This has always been the problem with tech exceptionalism, whether it involves generative AI or online shopping on Amazon: If long-established rules regarding accuracy, consumer protection and quality were applied online, many of these companies and services wouldn’t be allowed to exist.

tante@tante.cc · 2mo ago

A court in Munich declared that Google is liable for their "AI summaries" and all its hallucinations. This brings "AI" slop in line with all other products: "AI" is basically the only product where a provider can deliver unchecked garbage and put all liability on the consumer.

“The Al is not just telling you what you want to hear. It is training you, one conversation at a time, to need less friction, expect more agreement, and become slightly less capable of handling a situation where someone pushes back on you”

The_Lady_Red@theladyred.bsky.social · 2mo ago

A PhD student at Stanford noticed her classmates were asking Al to write their breakup texts. So she ran a study. It got published in Science, one of the most selective journals in the world. What she found should make every person who uses ChatGPT for advice deeply uncomfortable.

Super excited for our CRAFT workshop on trans AI policy at FAccT, co-organized w @jhereia.bsky.social & @anabrandusescu.bsky.social, come join us if you're at the conference! More details here: programs.sigchi.org/facct/2026/p...

Very interesting thread

Tim Ellis 🍁@djdynamic.ca · 2mo ago

At the Toronto school board's AI policy information session tonight. Will share learnings. A teacher is sharing an experience of teaching writing and finding that 70 to 75% of essays appear to be AI generated or supported. Huge abuse.

How interesting that Meta called @wired.com "dishonest" and then (quietly) removed the face-recognition system it had previously (also quietly) integrated into an app downloaded onto 50 million phones. Dishonest!

Meta Deletes Face-Recognition System From Its Smart Glasses App After WIRED Report

The code WIRED identified is gone from the latest version of Meta AI, the companion app for the company’s smart glasses. Meta won’t say why or whether it’s coming back.

wired.com

“Palantir is first of all a dehumanizing company. It is a terrifying company because of the amount of political and financial support it has.” Gift link:

Why are security experts worried about Canada’s secret Palantir contracts?

Hint: it has to do with data sovereignty.

readthepeak.com

LinkedIn guys once again mocking my work on trans AI policy then posting about making computers pass so they can win Alan Turing's drag race slate.com/life/2024/06...

The Original Turing Test Was a Drag Show

It didn’t have the glitter and butterfly wings for eyelashes that we find in RuPaul’s Drag Race—but drag culture is at the heart of today’s bots.

slate.com

if your initial reaction to anti-trans legislation is “I don’t understand how this helps anyone” you really need to accept the fact that these people aren’t operating in good faith. They aren’t trying to help anyone. They are trying to exterminate undesirables.

States are rolling out generative AI tools to thousands of public employees, but governance and transparency standards often lag behind deployment, writes Javaid Iqbal Sofi. He discusses the sharply different approaches in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Colorado, and California.

State AI Rollouts Are Outrunning Their Own Governance

States are expanding AI tools for public workers faster than they are building governance, transparency, and oversight rules, argues Javaid Iqbal Sofi.

buff.ly

An effective tactic in AI policy criticism is to expose points of counterproductivity - highlight instances where load-bearing concepts like "trust", "safety", or "sovereignty" are applied inconsistently, incompletely, or hypocritically

Visiting Vancouver next week what are fun Vancouver things to do?

LinkedIn guys once again mocking my work on trans AI policy then posting about making computers pass so they can win Alan Turing's drag race slate.com/life/2024/06...

The Original Turing Test Was a Drag Show

It didn’t have the glitter and butterfly wings for eyelashes that we find in RuPaul’s Drag Race—but drag culture is at the heart of today’s bots.

slate.com