Rebecca Flook and me on the power behind gen AI tools. "The systems now being woven into education are shaped by a remarkably small group of people." wonkhe.com/blogs/the-ch... #jisc

The choices universities and colleges make about AI are political

Ahead of this week's Digifest, Michael Webb and Rebecca Flook confront the complex values systems behind general purpose AI technology

wonkhe.com

Digifest is almost here. I’ll be in conversation with Rebecca Flook and Lawrie Phipps on “The Power and the Principles: Who’s really shaping AI?” A timely discussion given everything happening in the world right now. Tuesday, 12:30 (Hall 8B) #jisc

A follow-up on Claude Cowork. Two weeks in, it's the most genuinely useful AI tool I've used so far. The browser automation actually works. mwebb.blog/2026/03/02/c...

Here’s my handout for the webinar I did a while back in AI’s environmental impacts & putting stats in context). docs.google.com/document/d/1... #AI #environment #DataCenters

AI’s Environmental Impact: Understanding the data and acting sustainably

AI’s Environmental Impact: Understanding the Data and Acting Sustainably Nicole Hennig (nicolehennig.com) Handout for Oct. 17 and Dec. 5 webinar, 2025 1. Individual use of generative AI is a drop i...

docs.google.com

A quick overview of a really good All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) meeting on AI horizon scanning: mwebb.blog/2026/01/26/a...

AI APPG Horizon Scanning

I’m on a train heading back from a crowded committee room in the House of Lords for an AI APPG (all-party parliamentary group) evidence session on horizon scanning. AI events always draw a cr…

mwebb.blog

Random thought but I wonder if social media bans for U-16 are the wrong approach and instead we should regulate toxic design patterns like the infinite scroll.

Another busy week with lots of travel. Good to be home with the kitty cats :-)

Should be an interesting day at the Federation of Awarding bodies conference - I'm on a panel looking at how AI can be used in assessment, with a focus on the assessor, rather than the student, which has perhaps been the focus of most conversations so far.

Maastricht University teaching staff: test your digital skills in 20–25 minutes with the Jisc Discovery Tool. Get a personalised report on online teaching, collaboration, media literacy, AI use and digital wellbeing — plus trusted resources. Voluntary & anonymous! maastricht-uni.potential.ly/signin

Pretty wet on this morning’s ride. This is a road.

This is interesting - when I try to get ChatGPT to give me song lyrics without searching it gives me a few lines and then errors. Does anyone know if it's always done this? Or is it a rapid response to the German court ruling?

Has anyone found a fix for the iPad iPadOS26 scrolling issue by any chance? The one where scrolling from anywhere apart from the edge of the screen stops working until you reboot?

iOS 26 has made my iPad mini 6th gen pretty much unusable. Slow, screen barely responds. Anyone found a fix?

My colleague Sue Attewell leads our stream of work looking at staff and student perceptions of AI. In a new blog post the focus is with a group of pre-sessional international students. nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/09/0...

Student Perceptions 2025: Insights from a Group of Pre-sessional International Students at the University of Manchester - Artificial intelligence

How do international students preparing to study in the UK view AI? Sue Attewell spoke with a group of pre-sessional students at Manchester, mostly from China, about their hopes, worries and everyday ...

nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org

In a perfect world, maybe we’d all be able to accept everyone’s authentic self and not judge people by how they communicate, including how they write and express themselves. But we don’t live in a perfect world, do we? #jisc #aied nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/07/0...

Opinion: how generative AI can help us address linguistic inequalities - Artificial intelligence

Within the theme of AI and social inclusion, Tom Moule discusses how generative AI can address linguistic inequality.

nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org

The US have released their AI action plan. We need to take notice as it has profound implications for academia. More here: #jisc #aied nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/07/2...

AI detection, assessment and learning to use electricity. If we rely on scales/traffic lights and ignore assessment redesign then the logical conclusion is we have to detect AI misuse. Tools aren't great at it, and nor are people. nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/06/2...

AI Detection, assessment and learning to use electricity - Artificial intelligence

This blog post is an update to two previous entries that focused on AI detection tools: ‘AI Detection: Latest Recommendations’ (September 2023) and ‘AI Writing Detectors – Concepts and Considerations’...

nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org

Have you heard of wooden data centres? nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/06/0...

Artificial intelligence and the environment: Looking ahead - Artificial intelligence

In our AI and the environment blog series, we’ve covered taking a responsible approach, provided an update on the current landscape, and looked at putting the numbers into perspective. In this final b...

nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org

How often does this lift break down that this signed is needed? Didn’t fill me with confidence!

How often does this lift break down that this signed is needed? Didn’t feel me with confidence!

Can image generation be more than a gimmick? We think so. We ran a pilot exploring imagine generation with 44 institution late last year, and we've now released our report blog post, which includes a nice gallery of images and their prompts: nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/05/1...

Guidance on AI Image Generation: learnings from our pilot - Artificial intelligence

Following Jisc's Image Generation pilot, this report provides guidance on how colleges and universities can use image generation effectively.

nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org

Two wins for the Jisc cyber team at last night's Security Excellence Awards! Winning both CISO and security team of the year, the judges remarked "exceptional leadership defending not just one organisation, but the entire academic sector, while building a security community."

A new blog post from my colleague Catherine Barker. Well worth reading, especially to see the striking fashion images that it can create and how they compare to those possible when we did our image generation pilots just a few months ago. nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org/wp/2025/04/0...

ChatGPT image generation: What’s changed and why it matters - Artificial intelligence

OpenAI have built their most advanced image generator yet into GPT-4o, which ‘excels at accurately rendering text, precisely following prompts, and leveraging 4o’s inherence knowledge base and chat co...

nationalcentreforai.jiscinvolve.org

Got round to trying Perplexity deep research. The name overhypes its ability but still a decent enough tool to help with some search activities.

It’s snowing in Birmingham this morning! Ok, just a tiny bit but still… #digifest25

So much in Sana Khareghani’s wonderful keynote on where we are with AI that I could only capture a fraction! #digifest #digifest25 from @jisc.bsky.social

Fantastic session sharing examples from our Learnwise pilot, with a message around both how useful it is and how quick to deploy. #digifest25

Standing room only in our Kaltura workshop around personalised learning and their AI Class Genie beta. #digifest25

Hall 3 is starting to take shape and there's a buzz in the air. Make sure you tag us in your posts if you're joining us at #Digifest25 so we can share our favourites 🧡

Who’s coming to Jisc Digifest next week? If you are come and add to our AI map!