We live in incredible times with such possibilities that is clear. Although its easily dismissed hearing how Tesla robotaxis being remotely driven, seeing Linkedin spying and fingerprinting job hunters and the absolute madding thoughts of Palantir CEO Alex Karp, translated for us lay people?
To quote Buckminster Fuller “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.“
You are seeing aspects of this with few people posting on social media, a new plan to bring plugin solar to the UK and the EFF leaving X because its just too much!
On being a glasshole?
Ian thinks: What’s it like to walk the streets and live your life with the Meta smartglasses? Well you don’t need to put down the money yourself because Ella has described in a lot of detail her experiences. I find the privacy recommendations at the end useful but will meta learn and act? Not likely…
AI is a insecurity wonderland
Ian thinks: When are we going to take the well established practice of the separations of concerns seriously. It seems most people have forgotten, never run commands you don’t understand and certainly don’t provide access to sensitive data. This is why Google’s AI will never have explicit consent to my drives and data.
Imagine consumer technology had recall warnings?
Ian thinks: Its quite a serious question and In this podcast, about a Android streaming box, which is pretty much a Trojan horse. The question becomes a lot more serious, especially when thinking about national security and the endless IOT junk found and shipped from many shopping sites. Does your coffee cup really need to be connected and what is it up to on your network?
How can age verification actually work and be private?
Ian thinks: Age verification and stopping harms from young people is always in the news I found Proton’s summary of the alternatives quite useful for anyone being told this is a binary choice. The CEO’s blog is also worth reading too.
We have to talk about prediction markets
Ian thinks: At the start of April I gave a talk to European broadcasters about the future of social. At the very end I mentioned prediction markets, and the impact of a number of trends; being crypto, gamestop and economic reality of today. It was a surprise for many but a reality worth understanding. I was pleased to see Last week tonight’s John Oliver’s segment about the exact thing a week ago too.
Traditional Social media did it to themselves
Ian thinks: This report from OFCOM, highlights how less people are posting on traditional social media. There are many reasons for this but when I saw the report, it was a clear call back to the future of social report where we described people migrating to smaller private networks. Like it or not, companies like Meta did this to themselves with their emphasis on algorithms, enshitification and so much more.
Goodbye Sora and thank goodness
Ian thinks: Good reddens, it was a machine pumping out so much AI slop and misinformation. Of course we know the real reason of Sora closure; the huge costs to Open AI and there already over inflated stock price.
True stories affected by incentives
Ian thinks: We have all heard the stories about AI use, but I found this podcast with Oprah Winfrey and Tristan Harris, quite captivating and a clear reminder of the problem of incentives. This is also a big part of the newly released AI Doc, which I do recommend watching.
The Facebook museum?
Ian thinks: Does Facebook need its own museum, I wonder? But like the recently compiled geocities archive, there was moments of creativity and personal joy we all had. Is this worth celebrating and archiving, is another question?
Like this newsletter? Find the monthly archive here
