And we wonder why charlatans have such an easy time of it.

People Are ‘Marrying’ Chatbots. These Lawmakers Want to Stop Them
#AI #Tech
wired.com/story/people-are-mar…

Rare books about to be burned (sorry, I mean pulped) by Anthropic.

Picture by the Washington Post, found through this post: glammr.us/@overholt/1170087974…

#books #AI #techbros #tech

John Overholt

2026-07-30 11:55:59

From the website of the company that’s destroying books to feed them into the ravenous AI maw.

“A physical book is a delivery mechanism for information. Once that information has been extracted and encoded into an AI model, the delivery mechanism has served its purpose. What remains is paper, ink, and binding material. The book is not destroyed. Its value has migrated. The paper returns to the material cycle; the knowledge enters the intellectual one.” news.com.au/technology/online/…

#Meta faces biggest #court fight yet over #socialmedia’s impact on #children

Meta Platforms will face a coalition of state attorneys general in a California #FederalCourt trial beginning on Wednesday over claims it engineered #Facebook & #Instagram to be #addictive to children, a case that could expose the company to massive damages & force it to make sweeping changes ​to its platforms.

#law #tech #MentalHealth #business
reuters.com/business/meta-29-s…

NEW: General Dynamics opened a Texas factory to churn out artillery shells for Ukraine, but the machines kept breaking.

Robot arms smashed into things. Hunks of metal crashed to the floor. There was even a real-life dumpster fire.
propublica.org/article/general…

#News #Defense #Military #Ukraine #Government #Technology #Tech

General Dynamics Failed to Build Artillery Shells for the Army — ProPublica

General Dynamics opened a Texas factory to churn out artillery shells for Ukraine, but the machines kept breaking. Robot arms smashed into things. Hunks of metal crashed to the floor. There was even a real-life dumpster fire.

^{Jesse Coburn (ProPublica)}

As of August 3, more than 474 gigawatts worth of large-scale projects are waiting to connect to the #Texas grid, more than 5 times the grid's previous peak demand. Roughly 90% are AI data centers. texasobserver.org/who-pays-for…

#energy #tech #news

Who Pays for the High-Powered Grid that Data Centers Need?

Texas would make large AI hyperscalers pay for the wires that connect them. Whether they must also pay directly for the broader grid work needed to serve them is still an open question.

^{Mezabahnur Masum (The Texas Observer)}

"As the pioneering cybernetician Stafford Beer famously wrote, "the purpose of a system is what it does." If your bureaucracy is more concerned with fighting fraud than delivering service, then it isn't a service delivery system at all – it's a service denial system.

...how this ends – in a war of giant robots in which we are all collateral damage."
- @pluralistic

pluralistic.net/2026/08/10/dee…

#Government #Tech #Technology #AI #Cybernetics #Politics #Fraud #News #Press #US #USA #World

Meta’s latest AI model wants to live on your PC

Meta’s Muse Glimmer is a 30B model that can run on your laptop.

androidauthority.com/meta-muse…

#Tech #Technology #TechNews #AI #Gadgets #Software #Cybersecurity #Apple #Google #Microsoft #Startup #OpenSource #AndroidAuthority [Android Authority]

Meta’s Muse Glimmer brings agentic AI to your PC

Meta’s Muse Glimmer is a 30B AI model made to run locally on your PC.

^{Karandeep Singh Oberoi (Android Authority)}

Signal Login: the optional registration without a phone number will require a one-time payment.

This is intended to create an additional barrier against spam and abuse. The fees will also help support Signal’s mission 💙

Signal has not yet confirmed the price.

What do you think would be a fair price?

👉 aboutsignal.com/news/signal-lo…

#signal #signalapp #signalmessenger #aboutsignal #news #tech

Signal Login: optional registration without a phone number will require a one-time payment

The payment requirement for registration without a phone number is intended to serve as an additional barrier against spam and abuse. The fees will also help support Signal's mission.

^AboutSignal

Great summer read. Cory Doctorow completely dissects the hype behind #artificialintelligence .

#ai #tech #technology @pluralistic

Cory Doctorow: The people who tell you ‘AI is changing everything’ are lying

It has become impossible to tell managers mesmerized by artificial intelligence that the tools are not, in fact, helpful. So employees just play along with the fiction to keep their jobs, writes our tech columnist

thenerve.news/p/cory-doctorow-…

#news #tech #technology #AI #aislop #nvidia #AIPsychosis

Cory Doctorow: The people who tell you ‘AI is changing everything’ are lying

It has become impossible to tell managers mesmerised by artificial intelligence that the tools are not, in fact, helpful. So employees just play along with the fiction to keep their jobs, writes our tech columnist

^{The Nerve}

Just say no.

This new robot centaur designed to save lives is pure nightmare fuel.
#robots #tech
fastcompany.com/91582982/satyr…

RE: mstdn.social/@dalfen/117038237…

REMINDER

#Uber’s largest investor is #KSA, thanks to the “techbro of the desert”.

MBS not only had #JeffreyEpstein in his inner-circle, but killed a journalist & gave Trump’s SIL a $2 billion bribe to get nuclear w̶e̶a̶p̶o̶n̶s̶ #tech.

❝ The investment, part of Uber’s Series G fundraising round, is one of PIF’s single largest international transactions to date and the first since the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia announced Vision 2030…❞
pif.gov.sa/en/news-and-insight…

ˈdälfən™🐬 💥 🌊 (@dalfen@mstdn.social)

Attached: 4 images Boycott #Uber. In court filings, Uber's lawyers blamed sexual assault victims, suggesting that such things as what they were wearing, how much they drank, whether they had been unfaithful in relationships or whether they had chil…

^{ˈdälfən™🐬 💥 🌊 (Mastodon 🐘)}

AI is more likely than humans to form biases when hiring

The models were even more likely to stereotype people by demographic group than the human participants in the original study.

Because LLMs “really are eager to create generalizations from limited data”

#bias #discrimination #hiring #jobs #hr #artificialintelligence #ai #technology #tech

technologyreview.com/2026/07/2…

AI is more likely than humans to form biases when hiring

AI doesn’t just learn stereotypes from its training. It can cook up new ones, too.

^{Michelle Kim (MIT Technology Review)}

Uh-oh!

A debt-fuelled boom

"More than a million South Koreans are underwater as a result of the crash, and several hundred thousand have lost everything..."

"They borrowed to the hilt to take part in a frenzied splurge on technology stocks, particularly memory chip makers, in a market now experiencing a savage reversal."

"Nothing, not even the stellar earnings of the country's two biggest chip makers, has been able to stem the panic..."

Via: @SrRochardBunson

abc.net.au/news/2026-08-03/kor…

#Tech

Korean stock market crash threatening to upset tech boom

Balance is a fundamental principle of everyday life on the Korean peninsula, but the worst stock market crash in the nation's history threatens the livelihood of millions. 

^{Ian Verrender (ABC News)}

RE: cosocial.ca/@dyckron/117027856…

This sounds bad. 😬

"In the past five weeks, the market has collapsed, shedding almost 40 per cent, and threatening the livelihood of millions of South Koreans...

More than a million South Koreans are underwater as a result of the crash, and several hundred thousand have lost everything, and then some.

They borrowed to the hilt to take part in a frenzied splurge on technology stocks, particularly memory chip makers, in a market now experiencing a savage reversal.

Nothing, not even the stellar earnings of the country's two biggest chip makers, has been able to stem the panic, primarily because the debt that fuelled the stock market boom is now accentuating the crash."

#AI #Stocks #tech #technology #SouthKorea #economy #bubble

Many quotable bits here, but this one is bang on the money, by @pluralistic

"In other words, corporate leadership is starting from the premise that AI has (or will) radically change the business, and they're working backwards from that premise to find the evidence to support this article of faith."

pluralistic.net/2026/08/01/dar…

#AI #Tech #Code

If, like me, you love 1990s Web sites, back when the internet wasn't enshittified by Big Tech yet, have a look at Wiby, a Web 1.0 search engine.

Click on "Surprise me…" for random discoveries, often personal Web pages about obscure niche subjects, but sometimes you find a hidden gem…

wiby.org

#web #internet #online #RetroComputing #RetroTech #VintageComputing #retro #history #computing #IT #1990s #tech #technology #vintage #nostalgia #digital

Always read the footnotes:

"If I was somehow CEO at a hospital or civil engineering firm, I would not for a second think it's my place to start mandating specific procedures or building techniques w/out explicit agreement from the professionals on staff –how fucking clueless are the non-technicians who have attended a few talks & are now making mandates about how their extremely expensive professionals are doing their jobs?"
hermit-tech.com/blog/ai-mania-…

ht: @pluralistic

#AI #Tech #Business #News

RE: mamot.fr/@pluralistic/11702028…

"Employees who voiced honest, informed objections to AI in the workplace were passed over for promotions or targeted for layoffs.

This has created a situation in which *everyone* - "boards, executives, employees, vendors, consultants" - has a strong incentive to lie about how much AI is delivering for their companies."
- @pluralistic

#AI #Tech #Technology #ArtificialIntelligence #Business #Jobs #US #World

Most "Smart" TVs use Automatic Content Recognition (#ACR), essentially taking snapshots every 10+ms of what you watch and hear, then forwarding & selling that data to companies for ads, etc.

I now feel it's only a matter of time before this "feature" finds its way to our ever "smarter" PC monitors.

#LG with the help of #Windows is already installing adware when the right Device ID is detected.

arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/0…

☑️ To disable ACR on #TV:
zdnet.com/home-and-office/home…

#news #Tech #Technology

How to disable ACR on your TV (and why it makes such a big difference when you do)

Samsung, LG, and Sony TVs can pose data privacy risks - here's how to avoid one of the biggest.

^{Taylor Clemons (ZDNET)}

Substack wants no AI Nazis. Only real ones.

Substackers Say New AI Detection Tool Is a ‘Witch Hunt’
#AI #Substack #Tech #Writing

404media.co/substackers-say-ne…

Cloud giants wield influence in so many ways that we don’t even consider — including shaping and capturing research.

On #TechWontSaveUs, I spoke with Cecilia Rikap to discuss how major tech companies shape society and why we need to push back.

Listen to the full episode: techwontsave.us/episode/339_ho…

#tech #cloud #amazon #microsoft #google #meta #politics

This is the magnificent library Anthropic amassed, before destroying it because it gave them a legal copyright loophole.

#Anthropic #AI #Books #Culture #Tech #LLMs #Civilization

Anthropic spent billions of dollars to slice the spines off millions of books, including very rare ones.

AI companies are purchasing large quantities of used and rare books and scanning their contents to train LLMs. They then turn the originals to pulp.

The sum of human thought, digitized and shredded. Every book that gets scanned disappears from the physical world permanently.

Books that survived wars, fires, and centuries of handling are being shredded so an AI can learn to write a better marketing email.

#AI #Books #Culture #Civilization #Tech #LLMs

RE: mastodon.social/@nixCraft/1170…

Ha Ha!! This is a very good point! I am neither pro nor con on the subject of AI. I see it as the birth of a very new technology that has a lot of potential, but also has a lot of problems to be solved. I hope in ten years' time or even twenty years' time, I can look back and see progress on the environmental front, as well as the accuracy front.

#AI #GenerativeAI #Environment #Tech #Technology #Progress #Electricity #Energy #Future #Environmental

#GiftArticle

#Meta Got Everything It Wanted in a Secret #Louisiana #DataCenter Deal

A Times examination details how the Silicon Valley giant used private talks with local officials to start a project big enough to cover nearly six square miles.

#law #tech #regulations #electricity #energy #scam #Zuckerberg #ClimateChange
nytimes.com/2026/07/27/technol…

After The Economist’s interview with Elon Musk, will major media finally reassess how they cover the fascist billionaire?

As its editor-in-chief did the rounds saying she was “not a Musk hater,” he was on X calling her a traitor to the West and suggesting she be murdered. Please, have some dignity.

disconnect.blog/elon-musks-tir…

#tech #elonmusk #artificialintelligence #politics #media #journalism

Elon Musk’s tired schtick

Why does the media keep debasing itself for a man who despises them?

^{Paris Marx (Disconnect)}

Execs think that AI can magically fix all their org's problems: their data problem, their PDLC problem, their PMF problem.

But AI is not magic. It's just a technology — and like all novel technologies, incorporating it into your process only expands the number of things that can and will go wrong.

productpicnic.beehiiv.com/p/ai…

#AI #LLM #softwaredevelopment #tech

AI is not a substitute for knowing how to run software projects

Despite execs' best hopes for automating their own jobs, technology will always remain downstream of decision-making.

^{Pavel Samsonov (The Product Picnic)}

Physically accurate black hole you can put in your room…

blackhole.plav.in

#tech #science #astronomy #space #fun

The environmental cost of running LLMs keeps climbing, but a few inference providers are running on 100% clean energy out of the box:

- Regolo (regolo.ai/sustainable-ai/): EU-hosted GPU clusters running on wind and solar power, using zero-water cooling.
- GreenPT (greenpt.com/api): European OpenAI-compatible API powered 100% by renewables in ISO-certified datacenters.
- Riveon (riveon.io/): Swiss provider with Finnish GPU sites powered 100% by renewables, offering OpenAI-compatible endpoints.
- Upgreat (upgreat.ai/): Carbon-aware EU compute that schedules workloads around clean energy windows from on-site solar farms.

Good options if you want clean compute for open-weights inference without relying on carbon offsets.

#AI #GreenTech #OpenSource #Sustainability #MachineLearning #Tech

GreenPT API: one European AI API for developers

An OpenAI-compatible European AI API: chat, embeddings, reranking, OCR, speech-to-text, scraping, and web search. EU-hosted, renewable-powered, privacy-first. One key.

^GreenPT