Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 13m

Philology, bitches!

Sanho Tree @sanho.bsky.social · 9h

Holy crap. Trump will make the FCC crucify Jimmy Kimmel for this.

3 16

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 12h

Hello again! Thanks for your interest in assigning my article. I just got a nice, clean pdf copy of it. This link will take you directly to the pdf download: static1.squarespace.com/static/55577...

Otherwise, you can click the link from my webpage here: sonja-drimmer.squarespace.com/academicwrit...

1 2

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 13h

No substance. Just false homages to civil discourse from the Furrow Brows.

9

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 13h

I really like the idea of calling this particular class of tragic pundits Furrow Brows.

Karl Bode @karlbode.com · 15h

I'm never ever gonna forget all the furrowed browed corporatist Charlie Kirk hagiography and sportsball halftime memoriams for a race baiting brigading zealot

Stephen Soldz @ethicalpsycholo.bsky.social · 15h

Professor Flees to Europe After Turning Point USA Calls Him Antifa, Leading to Death Threats for Him and His Family
newrepublic.com/post/201448/...

1 18

Reposted by Sonja Drimmer

Timnit Gebru @timnitgebru.bsky.social · 15h

Back in the day people used to have a slide at the end of their presentations saying "and that's how the brain works" as an inside joke about Hinton since he was known to talk confidently out of his ass.

Now, the Nobel committee brought this upon us like they give the peace prize to genociders.

⚡️🌙 @dystopiabreaker.xyz · 3d

anyway, here is 2024 Nobel Prize in Physics winner Geoffrey Hinton discussing what we know about large AI models on 60 Minutes.

2 58 200

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 14h

And again. bsky.app/profile/sonj...

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · Jul 3

You know those global orgs that promote “sustainable” resource extraction & how those boards have 10 members, 8 of whom are execs from Exxon & whatnot & then 2 represent environmentalist groups? When a uni invites an AI-critical scholar to sit on their AI committee they’re the environmentalist rep.

3 13

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 14h

And again. bsky.app/profile/sonj...

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · Jun 2

And, this, folks, is why the entire concept of "ethical AI use" or "critical AI" in education is a scam.

The alibi is blown: teaching "critical AI" was always just a backdoor to outsourcing learning to AI. www.404media.co/teachers-are...

Post-grad educator
Last year, I taught a class as part of a doctoral program in responsible AI development and use. I don’t want to share too many specifics, but the course goal was for students to think critically about the adverse impacts of AI on people who are already marginalized and discriminated against.

When the final projects came in, my co-instructor and I were underwhelmed, to say the least. When I started digging into the projects, I realized that the students had used AI in some incredibly irresponsible ways—shallow, misleading, and inaccurate analysis of data, pointless and meaningless visualizations. The real kicker, though, was that we got two projects where the students had submitted a “podcast.” What they had done, apparently, was give their paper (which already had extremely flawed AI-based data analysis) to a gen AI tool and asked it to create an audio podcast. And the results were predictably awful. Full of random meaningless vocalizations at bizarre times, the “female” character was incredibly dumb and vapid (sounded like the “manic pixie dream girl” trope from those awful movies), and the “analysis” in the podcast exacerbated the problems that were already in the paper, so it was even more wrong than the paper itself.

1 1 16

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 14h

I will always have a post for this. bsky.app/profile/sonj...

Because capitalism is so expert at assimilating dissent (think about how radical movements become marketing campaigns) just teaching a course called "Critical Al" or
"Ethics, Al, & the Humanities" will be retailed as permissiveness, marketed by a university as promoting Al products.

1 9 34

Reposted by Sonja Drimmer

Roxanne Shirazi @roxanneshirazi.bsky.social · 1d

And the library infrastructure for print books continues to crumble. No more binderies, no more distributors. Getting pretty bleak!

Cyberpunk Librarian @cyberpunklibrarian.bsky.social · 1d

Baker & Taylor appears to be shutting down. A post on the r/libraries subreddit from an employee of B&T breaks the news and there appear to be other employees in the comments confirming the situation.

From the Libraries community on Reddit

Explore this post and more from the Libraries community

www.reddit.com

5 28 65

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

Indeed!

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

That’s very amusing. Coincidentally, on the phone with my mom yesterday who couldn’t remember “squirrel” and kept saying “ardilla,” but I’d forgotten “ardilla.” Brains…they’re bastards.

1

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

I kept losing the word I needed today in a fac meeting and wanting to say “amargura” before locating “bitterness” in the cavern of my brain.

1 1

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

I have been researching and writing about for enough years that I have now gone through all twelve steps of Feelings about these conversations. If you feel like it will be of use the article I published that’s pinned in my profile might move the needle with them?

1 6

Reposted by Sonja Drimmer

David M. Perry @lollardfish.bsky.social · 1d

I get an email about “ai advocate hackathon” every couple days. We are being offered a chance to train our replacements.*

*they can’t actually do the work
**but an admin thinks they can and then fire half of us to monitor the bots

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

There are so few people actually asking, “is this any good for what we do?” Instead people give lip service to “responsible use” while plowing ahead with punching “AI” into everything. This isn’t just about selling a product; it’s about co-opting humanities researchers to train “AI” models.

1 6 36

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

Pleased to shout out my comrade Annie Sollinger on this! bsky.app/profile/sonj...

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 8d

Yelling about AI...Home Edition! Any fellow UMassians who are around on October 8, come on out! We're gonna have a good time.

OCTOBER 8 SOUTH COLLEGE E480 12:30PM - 2PM
AGAINST AI:
PERSPECTIVES ON THE PROBLEMS OF
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
JOIN US FOR A BROWN BAG GATHERING WITH PRESENTATIONS BY
ANNIE SOLLINGER
VISUAL ARCHIVIST/ART LIBRARIAN W.E.B. DUBOIS LIBRARY
"AI REFUSAL IN THE LIBRARY"

SONJA DRIMMER
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF MEDIEVAL ART IN THE HISTORY OF ART AND ARCHITECTURE DEPARTMENT
"WHY CAN'T COMPUTER VISION SEE?"

AND INTRODUCTORY REMARKS BY
MEG VICKERY

4 8

Reposted by Sonja Drimmer

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

There are so few people actually asking, “is this any good for what we do?” Instead people give lip service to “responsible use” while plowing ahead with punching “AI” into everything. This isn’t just about selling a product; it’s about co-opting humanities researchers to train “AI” models.

2 17 80

Reposted by Sonja Drimmer

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

Here’s another example of how the tech industry is infiltrating cultural institutions, mining historical artifacts & historical expertise. The rhetoric here of “advantages & limitations” is common, but the conclusion is foregone that AI has a role in this sphere. portale.units.it/en/news/arti...

Artificial Intelligence in Cultural Institutions: a two-day conference in Gorizia on 6th and 7th October

portale.units.it

1 9 46

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

When I first started working at UMass, I decided that I needed to learn more about what it is, what it means to work for a public university in the 21st-century. Newfield's _Unmaking the Public University_ was my entry into critical university studies, & I have so much admiration for his work.

1 12

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

I wanted to excerpt something from this piece, grab a pull-quote to post. But, as always, Newfield demands to be read in full. Just read it.

www.publicbooks.org/academics-mu...

Academics Must Seize the Means of Knowledge Production - Public Books

Trumpism has canceled the knowledge society.

www.publicbooks.org

1 8 30

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

Overheard at the UMass bus stop: one undergrad interrupts another who’s reading. “I love that book!” Brief but energetic conversation about it ensues. Legitmately made my day.

2 3 100

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

We stan Gramsci in this house.

1

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

There are so few people actually asking, “is this any good for what we do?” Instead people give lip service to “responsible use” while plowing ahead with punching “AI” into everything. This isn’t just about selling a product; it’s about co-opting humanities researchers to train “AI” models.

2 17 80

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 1d

Here’s another example of how the tech industry is infiltrating cultural institutions, mining historical artifacts & historical expertise. The rhetoric here of “advantages & limitations” is common, but the conclusion is foregone that AI has a role in this sphere. portale.units.it/en/news/arti...

Artificial Intelligence in Cultural Institutions: a two-day conference in Gorizia on 6th and 7th October

portale.units.it

1 9 46

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 3d

Talbot just sees camping as an opportunity to be perfect in a new location.

A large fluffy labradoodle lying down on a camping chair at a campsite with his paws elegantly hanging over the front of the chair, while he turns his head to look at the right

1 50

Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 4d

Ed, don’t make me do this again.

6