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Kristen Thomasen

@kristenthomasen.bsky.social

1.1K followers 350 following 240 posts

Law things, robots, space, privacy || habitual misAInthrope || feministing || #HamOnt kid in Windsor || she/her || (Profile pic from community art-making project in #YQG graffiti alley)

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · May 23

ICYMI: We Robot 2025 has a new permanent online home @windsorlaw.bsky.social, along with 2 exciting updates:

🤖 Video links are now included for each of our panels. Revisit or check out the conversation if you couldn't join us in person.

🤖 And (see next post) 1/3

www.uwindsor.ca/law/3450/wer...

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 1d

Right up there with deleting Orwell’s 1984 off of everyone’s kindle 🏆

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Ed Zitron @edzitron.com · 1d

Cool :)

Techmeme @techmeme.com · 1d

JPMorgan Chase reports that $1.2T of debt is now tied to AI-related companies, making it the largest segment in the investment-grade market (Caleb Mutua/Bloomberg)

Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

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Hamilton Nolan @hamiltonnolan.bsky.social · 1d

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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Lex McMenamin (they/them) @leximcmenamin.com · 2d

Greta Thunberg, deported to Greece, says the targeting of the Sumud Flotilla is "not the story" @teenvogue.com — instead, she says:

"Israel once again violated international humanitarian law by preventing aid from getting into Gaza while people are being starved.”

Greta Thunberg On Her Detention: I'm "Not The Story" — It's Israel Violating International Humanitarian Law

“I could talk for a very, very long time about our mistreatment and abuses in our imprisonment. Trust me. But that is not the story.”

www.teenvogue.com

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 2d

and beyond consent, much like colonial/imperial expansion, publics will be conscripted into training and testing the systems for ever wider use 🤮

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Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 2d

Others have drawn these links already, but: colonialism, rape culture, and AI /big tech are intertwined. It all comes down to a deliberate unwillingness to respect consent. Whether land, sex/bodies, or data—if those driven by white supremacist patriarchy want it, doesn't matter if someone says no.

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 2d

The consultation is structured to a pre-determined outcome: yes, more AI. Very much agree with @anabrandusescu.bsky.social 👇🏻

(I‘m also offended by how much effort so many stakeholders put into trying to make the AIDA process better only to be ignored again. As Ana says, it’s no way to build trust)

Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 6d

I wrote a short essay about refusing to participate in Canada's public consultation on AI.

On refusal and reaching the limits to engage

This is an essay about the importance of refusal. As a researcher, I hardly write anymore this way, but I thought I should, in this moment, where the need to document our descent into fascism is cr…

www.anabrandusescu.com

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 3d

Something is sparking in gen A, I hope it can materialize to its best potential.

Reposted by Kristen Thomasen

Jesse Hawken @jessehawken.bsky.social · 3d

Queen

KOJAMF🤘🖤🤘 @kojamf.bsky.social · 3d

Dr. Jane Goodall filmed an interview with Netflix in March 2025 that she understood would only be released after her death.

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 3d

i would read the thought piece on the through line between western society’s lack of urgency/denial around climate catastrophe, genocide, fascism, and Italian Brainrot as a philosophical aesthetic.

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 3d

“Absurdism is the philosophical theory that the universe is irrational and meaningless. It states that trying to find meaning leads people into conflict with a seemingly meaningless world.” (Wikipedia)

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 3d

My kid explained 6-7 to me: it means nothing. It just means 6 7 (🤷🏼‍♀️). It’s just a vibe. Like life. What does life mean?

This kid is Gen-A, and the A is for Absurdism.

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Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 3d

I think often about the Amazon engineer who wrote in an open letter to the company that Ring was “incompatible” with a free society.

Analysis | Amazon’s Ring plans to scan everyone’s face at the door

For the first time, the company is putting facial recognition into its home security doorbells and video cameras.

www.washingtonpost.com

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Dr. Johnathan Flowers, Blade Wielding Bisexual (Lordean arc) @shengokai.blacksky.app · 3d

Putting aside the question of AI personhood, a slur requires a history of dehumanization.

In order to fuction, the slur has to call into being that history of dehumanization for its injurious force. There is no such history for LLMs, regardless of claims otherwise.

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 7d

No one ever suspects the butterfly.

Willow @rockshrimp.bsky.social · 7d

what's the stupidest/randomest Simpsons quote that lives in your head rent free? Mine is the urge to say "you said go to bread" every time I am about to head to bed.

Reposted by Kristen Thomasen

Haymarket Books @haymarketbooks.org · 8d

We made a reading list for you.

Abolish the Border, Abolish the Police Reading List

In solidarity with all those standing up for our communities against the brutality of immigrant detention and police repression, we offer an extensive reading list about border and police ab...

www.haymarketbooks.org

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 8d

The momcologist in me is having trouble holding back my full nsfw opinion.

But this administration does not give a f*** about helping kids with cancer.

Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 8d

Hear ye, man who has spent 9 months kidnapping kids with cancer and throwing them in detention centres or deporting them away from their care teams, while cancelling funding to real cancer research, will now cure childhood cancer with the ~*~secret power of A.I.~*~

Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 8d

Guess that’s sorted then.

Trump pledges to conquer childhood cancer using artificial intelligence

With children surrounding Trump's desk in the Oval Office, the president inked the order on Tuesday.

turnto10.com

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The Walrus @thewalrus.ca · 8d

For Eva Jewell, the public and political indifference to the dignity of Indigenous women, girls, and gender-diverse people is rooted in a specific problem: Canadian exceptionalism that touts progressive feminist politics except if you’re Indigenous. thewalrus.ca/trc-gender/

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Authors Alliance @authorsalliance.bsky.social · 8d

Yesterday we filed an amicus brief in Reuters v. ROSS Intelligence. Though the suit is different in many ways from other AI lawsuits, this one is significant because it is the first time a US Circuit Court will have the opportunity to directly address the applicability of fair use to AI training.

Authors Alliance Files Amicus Brief in Thomson Reuters v. Ross

Yesterday Authors Alliance filed an amicus brief in Thomson Reuters v. ROSS Intelligence, the long-running lawsuit between Thomson Reuters, owner of Westlaw (a legal research platform) and ROSS Int…

www.authorsalliance.org

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Canadian Dimension @canadiandimension.bsky.social · 8d

Reconciliation isn’t about token gestures, museum visits, or diversity training, writes @pampalmater.com. True reconciliation means respecting Indigenous peoples’ right to say 'No'—to development on their lands, to discriminatory laws, and to ongoing abuse.

True test of reconciliation: Respect the Indigenous right to say No

The right to say no is the core of any future relationship with the Canadian state and its citizens. It’s a basic right — one which is grounded in our sovereignty as individuals and Nations to decide ...

canadiandimension.com

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Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 8d

“Full AI.” All male AI. Very muscular male AI.

404 Media @404media.co · 8d

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth called America’s Generals to Quantico to meet for an unknown reason.

America’s top civilian military leader calling the generals home all at once is strange. It’s the kind of move that often presages something like a major war.

www.404media.co/in-unhinged-...

In Unhinged Speech, Pete Hegseth Says He's Tired of ‘Fat Troops,’ Says Military Needs to Go Full AI

The Secretary of War lectured America’s generals on fitness standards, bears, and warriors for an hour.

www.404media.co

Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 8d

*”throw" blame at

Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 8d

All these excuses, but please do not blame your assistant when you could blame at the AI boosters who oversell their products.

Sam Cole @samleecole.bsky.social · 8d

lawyers caught using AI have used every excuse in the book short of their dog ate their filings www.404media.co/18-lawyers-c...

18 Lawyers Caught Using AI Explain Why They Did It

Lawyers blame IT, family emergencies, their own poor judgment, their assistants, illness, and more.

www.404media.co

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Dr. Amanda Wyatt Visconti @literaturegeek.bsky.social · 12d

. @courtniewolfgang.bsky.social's "WTF is the Radical Indoctrination EO?: Supporting and Affirming Queer and Trans Students and Their Teachers" shows how zines empower rapid writing+sharing info as realtime crisis response (here, same day as the Exec Order/EO) zinebakery.com/redistro/sup... +

Photo of a pink risograph-printed zine by Courtnie Wolfgang titled "Supporting and affirming queer and trans students and their teachers: WTF is the radical indoctrination EO?". Museum label beneath says: "WTF is the radical indoctrination EO? shows how zines empower rapid writing and sharing of information as realtime responses to crises. Wolfgang wrote and published this zine on the same day (February 3, 2025) the Executive Order (EO) of the title was published; that EO was a presidential proclamation violating LGBTQIA+ student, parent, and educator rights and censoring cultural heritage and memory.
Wolfgang penned an accessible, concise explainer of how an EO is not law, why it shouldn't be treated as such, and what violence the EO does to children and everyone in the U.S.
While she also created a beautiful, color riso print version of the zine, to more rapidly and accessibly share its content Wolfgang also made a digital, black-and-white version; shared it on social media for free printing and sharing; and collaborated with me to host the digital files on my Zine Bakery website (ZineBakery.com/redistro).
Courtnie Wolfgang, WTF is the Radical Indoctrination EO?:
Supporting and Affirming Queer and Trans Students and Their Teachers (Cocomade, 2025).
On loan from Amanda Wyatt Visconti"

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