The panic over AI use making us dumber confounded me. Reading the original studies shows their findings were overblown and mischaracterized in the press. In this essay, I take a look at historical examples of technology changing our skills. Join me for the tour. uncommonplaces.com/resources/pa...

Panic Is a Lousy Tutor

Avoiding AI to protect your skills can feel prudent. History suggests our skills change whether we take cover or not.

uncommonplaces.com

ikat, youkat, mekat. There was some ikat in this embroidery exhibition at @artinstitutechi.bsky.social but I only photographed the bath towels... www.artic.edu/exhibitions/...

The Public Domain Review@publicdomainrev.bsky.social · last mo.

Examples of 19th-century “ikat” from Central Asia. It is a bit like tie-dying a T-shirt while the shirt has yet to be made: instead of creating designs in the finished cloth, you do it on small bundles of the unwoven fibres: https://publicdomainreview.org/collection/central-asian-ikat/

The AI use of my Italian diaspora society cracks me up. For a cookbook they published, they used AI to help interpret historic old world recipes into things we could make with our kitchens and grocery stores today. And now we have this. Both cringy and endearing....

When it comes to AI use, I have a vague concern that exposure to so much word-calculator writing degrades me standards. Reading quality human writing might help? I posted about some of the best books I've enjoyed lately. www.linkedin.com/posts/idaben...

I worry about my writing standards devolving with so much exposure to AI-generated writing. Even if I avoid other people's published slop, I chat with the models a lot to get real work done. I&#39...

I worry about my writing standards devolving with so much exposure to AI-generated writing. Even if I avoid other people's published slop, I chat with the models a lot to get real work done. I'm unavo...

linkedin.com

This is definitely not as fun as Universal Paperclips or Cookie Clicker, but I still played it a handful of times. And maybe I will pay it more... Play a company developing AI through to recursive self improvement. www.paradigm.xyz/research/rsi...

RSI Simulator | Paradigm

A game of recursive self-improvement. Run a frontier AI lab from a 2017 cold start and close the loop.

paradigm.xyz

I feel so affirmed in my decade-long astrology studies seeing measured looks at it from places like @pioneerwork.bsky.social pioneerworks.org/broadcast/ge... Getting ready to go to @unitedastrology.bsky.social in a few weeks, preparing to be overwhelmed. 🌞🌔☄️

Gen Astro | Broadcast

Dispatches from the <i>new</i> new age.

pioneerworks.org

"Kick rocks and don't come back." I'm gonna have to get that embroidered on something. www.wsj.com/tech/ai/ai-d...

The ‘Country Hicks’ Who Refused $26 Million from an AI Data Center

A Kentucky mother and daughter turned down a life-changing offer for their farmland. The ensuing drama has left the town divided.

wsj.com

I'm speechless! That was bonkers!!!

I kept having to pause this to clutch my dropped jaw and take a breath. Definately worth watching. So wild.

Ethan Mollick@emollick.bsky.social · 2mo ago

You may have been told to watch this video about the OpenAI AI hack. You really should, even if you don't usually care about any tech stuff. If nothing else, click this link to the 18 minutes in & see how the agents spoke & coordinated with each other. Its eye opening. youtu.be/87DyyMV0kCY?...

Hello from norther Spain. Searching out a spot to watch the total solar eclipse. This one looks like a winner.

Someone tried to convince me to work on their app for personal reflection, based on the premise that AI is too sycophantic to support useful reflection. It was not convincing. Lots of "AI will never..." arguments fall flat because they are based on definition by contrast to something changing fast

Fun to see what @blasttheory.bsky.social is up to. Their explorations of depopulation in Japan, and a gynecological office untouched for 20 years, brings me back to my trespass adventure design days. It's a great way to reflect on space, people, and change. www.youtube.com/shorts/e98ah...

Artist Diary: YCAM Residency Reflections | Blast Theory

YouTube video by Blast Theory

youtube.com

After so many circular conversations about AI agents, I wrote an essay about focusing on skills instead. It includes links to documentation of 4 of my skills. One reader already said he loved the change log because it reads like a test pilot, not an engineer. 👩🏼‍✈️ uncommonplaces.com/resources/sk...

Obsessing Over AI Agents Is Slowing You Down

Agent hype distracts from a tool called skills that already works. Here are four of my skills shared in full: what they do, what they need to run, and how they evolved.

uncommonplaces.com

This essay rings so true. Clearly, I enjoy consulting on AI capacity building because of the risk mitigation components involved, and the weirdness this whole AI moment is producing in organizations. hermit-tech.com/blog/ai-mani...

AI Mania Is Eviscerating Global Decisionmaking

The reality of how much damage AI mania is doing to our ability to run institutions effectively.

hermit-tech.com

Having this weird experience getting a decent personal server setup with AI and feeling like I no longer need anyone else's software. I can just make what I want. This is clearly an exageration. I am using lots of open source stuff, still other people's software.

I shared my ludicrously detailed Spain solar eclipse itinerary with a friend . He immediately shot back, "IDA API WTF!" 🤣 So true, AI helped me with it. If you haven't heard about my Ida API, here is the essay: uncommonplaces.com/resources/yo... I wouldn't reshare if people didn't love this.

Your Move 78 and My Colorblind Glasses

Ask not what AI will do for you. Instead, ask what you will do because of AI.

uncommonplaces.com

Anyone else have scenes from Jurassic Park running through your head as you read about this stuff? thezvi.substack.com/p/openai-mod...

The personal overview of computing and game experiences in @robinkwong.bsky.social's talk was dizzying. So much has happened in how we relate to each other over the last quarter century... www.youtube.com/watch?v=sze5... He makes very kind use of my research to ground his key questions. 🙏🏻

Robin Kwong | Some Good News about AI

YouTube video by The Power of Storytelling

youtube.com

This line made me chuckle: "Whenever I visit sacred buildings I open myself to the vibes, whatever the intellectual or ethical risks." I can so empathize with the disposition. From www.burningshore.com/p/still-expa...

Watched the Odyssey. It brings me back to Jonathan Shay's harrowing work on moral injury. Listening to Achilles in Vietnam took my heart away. www.are.na/block/26708279

Achilles in Vietnam | Are.na

Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character by Jonathan Sha…hings in our culture that so that we don’t continue repeating the same mistakes.

are.na

Been using this prompt lately. Claude wrote it for themself. The results are curious, from digital math geometry toys to deep research holes on niche LARP experiences

Google used 10.9 billion gallons in 2025, so about 30m gallons per day The Coachella Valley has 120 golf courses each using ~800 acre feet per year, which is ~750,000 gallons/day: www.cvwd.org/167/Water-Co... So Google buying up 40 of those courses (1/3) should do the trick

Lots to learn from this podcast on writers using LLMs. Both discussants have a high bar for craft and don't let LLMs write for them. They do prompt for feedback in very specific ways. The research prompt for deep investigative work made me choke-laugh. www.complexsystemspodcast.com/episodes/llm...

What LLMs can and can't do for writers, with Clara Collier of Asterisk Magazine

How to use LLMs in investigative journalism

complexsystemspodcast.com

sometimes, it is still possible to find odd and interesting things on the internet. ooh.directory

ooh.directory: a place to find good blogs that interest you

A collection of 2,433 blogs about every topic

ooh.directory

*swoon*

Grief is the price of love. Reminding myself of this as I unexpectedly bump into my ancestors belongings.

I so love Melanie Mitchell. All of this is worth savoring. yalereview.org/article/mela...

I incresingly get annoyed with commercial software and just ask Claude to do things for me through the command line with bash and python, neither of which I know. And the results are great.

My essay on the two failure modes of high-stakes gatherings sparked unexpected offline conversations. People described facing "highly charged chaos" in their own organizations. Here's my advice for those underdesigned situations. uncommonplaces.com/resources/wa...

Walking Into Highly Charged Chaos

For the person walking into a high-stakes gathering — anchors set up in advance, ways to stay connected to yourself and what's actually happening. Companion to The Two Failure Modes of High-Stakes Gat...

uncommonplaces.com

My second-cousin once removed tipped me off to this 70-hour meticulous boat restoration series that has over 8 million views. One boat, lots of love. www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...

Rebuilding TALLY HO - from the beginning. - YouTube

youtube.com