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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 1h

"Why would OpenAI and Microsoft spend $23 million to give 'free training' on how to use AI to teachers? Because they love teachers? No. Because they want to get their products into public schools in an attempt to cultivate the education market. ... To automate teachers, in other words."

Hamilton Nolan @hamiltonnolan.bsky.social · 21h

It takes no special technical expertise to know that
1) AI's main value proposition today is automating labor,
2) AI is going to supercharge economic inequality, and
3) If we do not get out in front of that policy-wise, we are fools.

www.hamiltonnolan.com/p/thinking-o...

Thinking of AI as a Social Problem

No need to know the unknowable. The knowable is bad enough.

www.hamiltonnolan.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 1d

Scholarslop: The Dangers of an Algorithmic Idea of the University - great piece by @berrydm.bsky.social

"academics will need to find new means to defend the university and contest the use of scholarslop before it is too late" stunlaw.blogspot.com/2025/10/the-...

Scholarslop: The Dangers of an Algorithmic Idea of the University

Understanding digital media, technology, theory, culture and society.

stunlaw.blogspot.com

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Reposted by Ben Williamson

Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 3d

This is so good from Cory Doctorow on all the tricks Amazon uses to get both consumers to pay more, and how businesses on the platform end up paying it 45-51 cents on every dollar.

Plus he rightly calls for regulatory change, not just individual consumer action
www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

Way past its prime: how did Amazon get so rubbish?

Sick of scrolling through junk results, AI-generated ads and links to lookalike products? The author and activist behind the term ‘enshittification’ explains what’s gone wrong with the internet – and ...

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Ben Williamson

Utopian Incrementalist @meliorist.bsky.social · 3d

Vibe literacy (pejorative) is absolutely what these companies are trying to sell. I used that exact phrase when telling my boss why I wanted to keep my students as far from LLM instruments as possible.

Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

I searched "vibe learning" for fun recently and found exactly what I expected and let out the kind of sound you'd expect from someone realizing the end of their time in this world was just minutes away basescripts.com/what-is-vibe...

What is Vibe Learning

Vibe Learning represents a revolutionary shift in how we approach education and skill acquisition, moving beyond traditional passive methods to an active, AI-partnered journey of discovery. Coined …

basescripts.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

At least Max Ventilla actually went and bought a pile of progressive education books instead of getting a chatgpt autosummary on demand techcrunch.com/2013/04/03/m...

Aardvark Co-Founder Max Ventilla Departs Google To Read A Lot Of Books On Education | TechCrunch

One of the early proponents of social search and part of Google’s social team has left the company, and he has a big reading list ahead of him. Max Ventilla, co-founder of early social search company ...

techcrunch.com

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Reposted by Ben Williamson

Matt Seybold @mattseybold.bsky.social · 3d

Listening to this for the first time since it came out, partially to review my own research on Vista Equity, now a seeming target of kleptocratic antitrust suit.

But, omg, @ajdouglas.bsky.social, Jared Loggins, @kgrotke.bsky.social Crystal Sanders, Jelani Favors, & @bakerdphd.bsky.social are 🔥🔥🔥.

Philanthrocapitalism U

Podcast Episode · The American Vandal · S11 E7 · 1h 34m

podcasts.apple.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

I searched "vibe learning" for fun recently and found exactly what I expected and let out the kind of sound you'd expect from someone realizing the end of their time in this world was just minutes away basescripts.com/what-is-vibe...

What is Vibe Learning

Vibe Learning represents a revolutionary shift in how we approach education and skill acquisition, moving beyond traditional passive methods to an active, AI-partnered journey of discovery. Coined …

basescripts.com

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Reposted by Ben Williamson

Morticia Frump-Addams (She/Her) @morticia-frump.bsky.social · 3d

Private equity companies are the bane of society.

Kathleen Bachynski @bachynski.bsky.social · 3d

“The first ethics panels, created in response to testing scandals in the 1960s and ’70s, were nonprofits based at universities and hospitals. But in recent years, private-equity investors have increasingly reshaped them as for-profit endeavors.” cc @profgoldberg.bsky.social

How Private Equity Oversees the Ethics of Drug Research

www.nytimes.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

Laziness *is* the new innovative forward-thinking of the future

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

Or if they're feeling especially lazy they could magic it up with NotebookLM for maximum efficiency and lack of care for education

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

Private equity in education turns things like academic work, student data, and administration into different things - objects that can be valued and generate returns as assets they own and control. Whether that's good for education is doubtful. PE is just after a slice of that $10t edu-pie.

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

Private equity is its own hype machine, mobilizing *massive* valuation claims:

"As education evolves into a $10 trillion global industry, private equity is positioning itself to play a transformative role in its future"

These amazing numbers animate PE efforts to capitalize on education 😱

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

But private equity is looking for efficiency above all else, which is why it loves edtech:

"Continued investment in technologies that can scale educational access and improve outcomes while reducing costs"

Reducing costs for whom? Not the institutions paying millions for PE-owned edtech platforms

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

So what does private equity look for from education?

"Greater emphasis on measurable educational outcomes as a driver of valuation and investment decisions"

Good grades, good performance metrics - what is measurable is good for valuation and investment, rather than what is valuable educationally

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

Private equity discourse about education is ramping up again:

"education has become a compelling asset class offering strong returns, long-term stability, and global scalability"

PE investors are desperate to turn education into financial assets with long-term ROI huntscanlon.com/private-equi...

Private Equity’s Resurgent Interest in Education: Key Trends for 2025 - Hunt Scanlon Media

Following a phase of cautious investment, private equity firms have rekindled their interest in the education sector in 2025, adopting focused strategies and prioritizing long-term value generation. E...

huntscanlon.com

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Reposted by Ben Williamson

Dare Obasanjo @carnage4life.bsky.social · 3d

AI is sucking all of the oxygen out of the room when it comes to VC funding. 53% of global funding (63% in the U.S.) now flows to AI startups, a record high.

Yet fewer companies are raising money, as giants like OpenAI and Anthropic dominate. The AI boom is concentrated in just a handful of players

AI Is Dominating 2025 VC Investing, Pulling in $192.7 Billion

Venture capitalists poured $192.7 billion into AI startups so far this year — setting new global records and putting 2025 on track to be the first year where more than half of total VC dollars went in...

www.bloomberg.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

"Hype is no longer fleeting noise. It has become institutionalised, calculable, and consequential."

Neat little essay on studying hype practices, devices, and techniques www.business-school.ed.ac.uk/about/news/h...

Hype is not noise: Why we need Hype Studies

In this article, Professor Neil Pollock, Chair in Innovation and Social Informatics at the University of Edinburgh Business School, and Professor Robin Williams, Director of the Institute for the Stud...

www.business-school.ed.ac.uk

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 3d

Such an excellent piece on private equity edtech investors building "a portfolio of companies that amass data and effectively track kids throughout their educational journeys" as a route to big returns.

Matt Seybold @mattseybold.bsky.social · 3d

This is the 2022 story poorly screenshotted above.

This Private Equity Firm Is Amassing Companies That Collect Data on America’s Children – The Markup

Vista Equity Partners has been buying up software used in schools. Parents want to know what the companies do with kids’ data

themarkup.org

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 4d

And from very far away, your work is remarkably helpful and inspiring - I now get students writing fiction pieces inspired by the Amazon and Other Fables collection you co-edited, and still love your essay on the dreadful Human Project placesjournal.org/article/data...

Databodies in Codespace

As the bioengineering of people and cities converges, where do we locate the public sphere?

placesjournal.org

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 4d

In the edtech space, venture capital in new startups has collapsed but the big money is flowing from private equity firms to incumbents like Canvas and Blackboard - data-hungry Big Edtech giants that are now swiftly integrating AI into the core infrastructures of higher education, like it or not.

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 4d

There is a whole micro-industry in edtech market valuation that aims to support investors to price their investments - and humongous figures like the $8t conjured up by big financial orgs surely help prop up edtech markets even when markets look bad www.holoniq.com/notes/edtech...

EdTech funding drops again in early 2025. Fewer deals, but bigger bets

$410M in Global EdTech VC funding with fewer deals, larger checks, and new regional momentum hint at where investment is heading next.

www.holoniq.com

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 4d

Anyone wondering why private equity firms remain interested in edtech - it's because of truly eye-popping speculative valuations like this:

"The global education market is expected to soar to $8trillion in value by 2030" www.privateequityinternational.com/private-equi...

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 4d

Pretty alarming how private equity plans for this kind of edtech can supercede academic autonomy, erode academic intellectual property rights, and and result in data exploitation, for sure. ICYI @jkom.bsky.social and I did a report on this last year www.ei-ie.org/en/item/2848...

Behind the platforms: Safeguarding intellectual property rights and academic freedom in Higher Education

Higher education (HE) faces a complex landscape of digital technology services, shaping educators’ labour and working conditions in new ways. Two particular issues are ownership of intellectual prope...

www.ei-ie.org

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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 4d

Canvas may not be going bankrupt but its parent company Instructure is still a private equity-owned outfit and it may not be all good... bsky.app/profile/matt...

Matt Seybold @mattseybold.bsky.social · Jul 24

Canvas just became one of the most powerful surveillance, IP theft, & data monetization tools in the world.

OpenAI bought a user-base locked in to long-term contracts.

But they can’t make us use their trashware.

Boycott. Luddify. Open source.

Don’t let them have your work or your students.

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Reposted by Ben Williamson

Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 4d

Using the device the way it was intended.

University of San Francisco warns of man in Meta glasses harassing students

The University of San Francisco has issued a safety advisory after reports that a man wearing Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses approached women with unwanted advances.

www.sfchronicle.com

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