@gquaggiotto.bsky.social
58% of cities attempting to adopt ideas from elsewhere had not yet fully implemented them bloombergcities.jhu.edu/news/taking-...
Taking idea adoption in cities to the next level
Local governments have always borrowed ideas from each other, often through informal conversations between mayors or other public officials. What has begun to evolve in recent years is the infrastruct...
bloombergcities.jhu.edu
[Hmm] Using AI to build shared context for governing bloombergcities.jhu.edu/news/using-a...
Using AI to build shared context for governing
The most responsive city governments recognize that residents have knowledge, networks, and lived experiences essential to solving complex problems. But despite considerable progress in resident engag...
bloombergcities.jhu.edu
Why [data driven] positive deviance struggles with adoption by government? Great reflections from 5 years of practice dppd.medium.com/reviewing-th...
Reviewing the Data-Powered Positive Deviance Method: What we Found (Part 1)
By: Andreas Pawelke, Basma Albanna and Robin Nowok
dppd.medium.com
Selecting innovation funding mechanisms: a framework for policymakers www.nber.org/papers/w35549
Selecting Innovation Funding Mechanisms: A Framework for Policymakers
Founded in 1920, the NBER is a private, non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to conducting economic research and to disseminating research findings among academics, public policy makers, an...
nber.org
Why [data driven] positive deviance struggles with adoption by government? Great reflections from 5 years of practice dppd.medium.com/reviewing-th...
Reviewing the Data-Powered Positive Deviance Method: What we Found (Part 1)
By: Andreas Pawelke, Basma Albanna and Robin Nowok
dppd.medium.com
"For fifteen years, the answer to financial inclusion was more innovation" www.semafor.com/article/08/0...
View: A trust gap could unravel Nigeria’s financial inclusion wins
Nearly 33 million bank accounts sit dormant — a sign that access without confidence doesn’t hold.
semafor.com
"Sound waves built new relations of solidarity because they could not be confined within colonial borders" onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Sonic Cartographies of Internationalism
How does sound chart a different story of anticolonialism? Sound could perhaps draw out another map of space in history. Mirroring the form of sound waves, this article travels across borders, follow...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
“It takes considerable economic, social, and cultural capital simply to inhabit those spaces. … If we truly want inclusive AI communities, they cannot simply globalize Silicon Valley’s conversations.” restofworld.org/2026/global-...
The global grassroots gatherings trying to humanize the AI boom
Local tech groups in Kenya, India, and the U.S. are building communities and conversations around AI, but also face questions about privilege and reach.
restofworld.org
"It is among the first complete specimens I have seen of a federal agency regulating how a contractor uses AI to produce professional knowledge work itself, rather than governing AI systems sold to the government" www.ictworks.org/ustda-wrote-...
USTDA Wrote the AI RFP Clause that Government Should Copy - ICTworks
The most exciting federal AI language of 2026 is buried in a scoping services contract, and it has nothing to do with buying AI.
ictworks.org
One of my smartest friends pointed out that an important assumption in this post was already wrong. So I've added an update at the top.
Tom Loosemore @tomski.com · yesterdayI've written a long blog post about AI Agents and the need for those running services to prepare - technically, operationally, commercially, strategically, legally and in terms of policy. AI Agents could be a properly huge deal. There. I wrote it. loosemore.com/2026/08/04/k...
The challenge ahead is therefore not just to bring more African languages into AI, but to build the foundations that allow them to remain there, maintained by their speakers, accountable to their communities, and capable of evolving with them reamby.substack.com/p/michel-wen...
Michel WENEZOUI and the Infrastructure Nobody Notices
The African Innovators Series(TAIS): Tech, Data, and AI Changing the Game
reamby.substack.com
“Funding UBI on productivity gains that haven’t materialized yet means funding it on a bet, not a balance sheet” fastcompanyme.com/technology/t...
The AI dividend: Could the Gulf turn AI wealth into guaranteed income?
Experts say the policy could offer important protection against a potential AI dystopia, but converting AI wealth into a guaranteed income is far from straightforward.
fastcompanyme.com
For people living in camps, the price of transport into Maiduguri has turned into a metric of survival newlinesmag.com/reportage/th...
The ‘Zero’ People Who Died After USAID Was Dismantled
Both Elon Musk and Marco Rubio claim that no one has lost their life as a result of aid cuts. New Lines went to northeastern Nigeria to test that claim
newlinesmag.com
All Tomorrow’s Policies is a card deck that equips teams with methods to design both now-state and longer-term, more systemic policy solutions simultaneously www.publicpolicylab.org/resources/pu...
Public Service Design Kit: All Tomorrow's Policies | Public Policy Lab
All Tomorrow’s Policies is a methods deck that introduces how to design now-state policy solutions, while simultaneously developing and testing longer-term systems change.
publicpolicylab.org
"A map (and a research program) for the institutions a world of autonomous AI agents will need" www.agi-institutions.org
AGI Institutions — AGI Institutions
An interactive map of the new institutions needed for a world of autonomous AI agents — from dyadic agent contracts to global AI governance frameworks. Explore coordination mechanisms across scales: d...
agi-institutions.org
Plenty of [government] services quietly rely on people giving up. Agents don't give up www.linkedin.com/pulse/know-y...
Know Your AI Agent: Why you should act now, to avoid playing catch-up later
Back in March, I was beaten by the bins. I'd spent a happy few evenings (and a great many tokens) trying to build a simple web app: share any UK address, find out which bins to put out, and when.
linkedin.com
"The practical effect, nonetheless, was to freeze the colonial map. Stability was purchased at an exorbitant price: 54 dysfunctional rump states" rpublc.com/story/2026/0...
The (Mis)Invention of Central Africa
For more than 60 years, African governments have treated colonial borders as untouchable. But as conflict, economic fragmentation and shifting global power expo
rpublc.com
"I was just in a trough, drowning in uncertainty," says Walaa Volidis. "But deep inside, I made a decision: it will not be the end, no matter how hard it gets. I'll keep fighting for my dreams." www.bbc.com/news/article...
'Digital lifeline' - Gaza tech workers give glimpse of possible future
Thousands of young people in Gaza are pursuing roles in the digital economy as the territory's wider recovery stalls.
bbc.com
Disused mines often fill with water via rainwater accumulation and groundwater seepage — water that can then be used to heat or cool nearby homes www.sixthtone.com/news/1018850
A Chinese Coal City Finds New Use for Old Mines: Cooling Homes
The pioneering low-carbon technique, which routes water from accumulated rainfall and groundwater in abandoned mines to residential areas, has previously been used in the area to heat homes during win...
sixthtone.com
"For fifteen years, the answer to financial inclusion was more innovation" www.semafor.com/article/08/0...
View: A trust gap could unravel Nigeria’s financial inclusion wins
Nearly 33 million bank accounts sit dormant — a sign that access without confidence doesn’t hold.
semafor.com
"Sound waves built new relations of solidarity because they could not be confined within colonial borders" onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Sonic Cartographies of Internationalism
How does sound chart a different story of anticolonialism? Sound could perhaps draw out another map of space in history. Mirroring the form of sound waves, this article travels across borders, follow...
onlinelibrary.wiley.com
[Hmmmm] This is a strange but real option: Right now, the people best placed to actually facilitate a global deliberation on AI may not be elected leaders and heads of governments, but the heads of the companies building this technology www.noemamag.com/how-to-give-...
How To Give Everyday People A Say In AI Governance | NOEMA
Tech leaders keep saying “we” must decide AI’s future. Here’s an actual plan to include the public.
noemamag.com
“It takes considerable economic, social, and cultural capital simply to inhabit those spaces. … If we truly want inclusive AI communities, they cannot simply globalize Silicon Valley’s conversations.” restofworld.org/2026/global-...
The global grassroots gatherings trying to humanize the AI boom
Local tech groups in Kenya, India, and the U.S. are building communities and conversations around AI, but also face questions about privilege and reach.
restofworld.org
[Oh boy] "Developing countries should leave it to the rich world to agonize over whether AI will one day doom humanity" www.worldbank.org/en/publicati...
WDR 2026: The Promise of Artificial Intelligence
The World Development Report 2026 explores how artificial intelligence is reshaping development as a general‑purpose technology.
worldbank.org
"The larger ambition is to become a “Mondragón of Music: a constellation of community-owned ventures that form the foundation of an alternative economy owned by artists and workers" www.thenews.coop/subvert-co-o...
Subvert co-operative: A future ‘Mondragón of music’?
A co-operatively owned music platform has launched this year – with over 20,000 members and a vision to become a ‘Mondragon of music’
thenews.coop
The question is not whether an AI system can produce grammatically acceptable Swahili, but whether it reasons in Swahili, or merely wears it reamby.substack.com/p/kelvin-rom...
Kelvin Roman on Why Context Belongs at the Foundation of AI
The African Innovators Series(TAIS): Tech, Data, and AI Changing the Game
reamby.substack.com
When creating Japan's map of members of parliament, I started by consulting ChatGPT & Claude: "I want to create something like this; is it possible?"... AI didn't make me an engineer. But it has given people who previously had no choice the first step note.com/kokkai_map/n...
【登壇全文】誰が来ても、誰が去っても、時計は同じ速さで進んでいる——国会議員マップに込めた考え｜国会議員マップ【公式】
デジタル民主主義サミット2026でお話ししたこと 先日、デジタル民主主義サミット2026に登壇し、国会議員マップを作った経緯や、私がこのサイトを通じて実現したいことについて、お話しする機会をいただきました。 私は普段、建設会社を経営しながら、工事現場で仕事をしています。 政治の専門家ではありません。 プログラミングの専門家でもありません。 人前で話すことにも慣れていないので、当日はかなり...
note.com
Citizens are more likely to participate again when they feel that the government has learned and changed. That's why I'm not aiming for a Listening City; I'm aiming for a Learning City. note.com/mmiya/n/nb48...
No African executive sat at the negotiating table. No African government was consulted. Yet one of the largest technology transactions of the decade will reshape the digital economy of cities from Lagos to Nairobi, Cairo to Casablanca african.business/2026/08/inno...
Who owns Africa's last mile? - African Business
Uber's $14.8bn acquisition of Delivery Hero was negotiated in San Francisco and Berlin. But its biggest consequences may unfold in Lagos, Nairobi, Cairo and Casablanca.
african.business
