Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 5h

sketch of cockroach lying in bed on their back gloriously staring at an iphone, artist unknown

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 8h

"I recognize an insanity bubble, and I recognize hubris."

There's a Stunning Financial Problem With AI Data Centers

Given the rate at which tech companies are spending on data centers, current revenues would have to increase ten-fold just to break even.

futurism.com

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 10h

"Many were concerned the facility would consume huge amounts of water and electricity while delivering few local benefits. When a lawyer representing Google confirmed at a September public meeting that the company was pulling its data center proposal, cheers erupted from sign-waving residents."

Data centers are booming. But there are big energy and environmental risks

How tech companies and government officials handle local impacts will shape the industry's future in the U.S.

www.npr.org

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Hypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 3d

Philip Morris to provide free cases of cigarettes to area schools amid debates over effects of tobacco on health.

Microsoft to provide free Copilot tools for Washington state schools amid debate over AI’s role in learning

Microsoft Elevate Washington is a sweeping new initiative that will provide free access to AI-powered software and training for all 295 public school districts and 34 community and technical colleges ...

www.geekwire.com

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

blair @blairaf.com · 5d

Looks like Canada's approach to "sovereign AI" will involve creating structural dependencies on large US tech companies

Excerpt from an article that reads: Lehane met with AI Minister Evan Solomon on Monday. Solomon told The Logic in June that his mission is to “create sovereign AI.” But “sovereignty is not solitude,” Solomon said, noting that Canada still needs technology and capital from other countries.

OpenAI is participating in similar initiatives in other advanced economies. In May, the firm launched OpenAI for Countries, a new program that localizes ChatGPT and its underlying models for a nation’s particular customs and the requirements of its public sector. It is also offering to build data centres for countries that help pay for the infrastructure.

Countries are turning to OpenAI because of its “cutting-edge technology,” which can be used to build homegrown tools and applications, and because the firm can help stimulate their domestic AI ecosystems by building or buying compute capacity, Lehane said.

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

blair @blairaf.com · 5d

Working in AI policy rn is like being on a derailed train where the conductor is saying "haha check out this sick trick the train is going so much faster now" and you have to calmly explain to the conductor why actually maybe it is bad that the train has derailed

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 5d

Thank you Yvonne Lau for the opportunity to share my thoughts for the Financial Post. I appreciate the critical coverage!

Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 5d

“We cannot keep relying on digital surveys that are inaccessible to people outside the AI governance realm who do not have the resources to engage.”

Instead, Brandusescu suggested town halls as a solution to “bring government to the people.”

'Flawed and broken’: Critics warn Ottawa’s AI task force is too industry focused

Academic and community leaders are criticizing Ottawa’s AI Strategy Task Force for being too heavily tilted toward industry. Find out more.

financialpost.com

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 5d

"So I will find a way to keep burning without burning out. I will find moments to breathe, to soften, to hold what’s unbearable without letting it hollow me out. The goal is to feel without coming apart. And to keep going—until we don’t have to live like this anymore."

The Emergency Is the Atmosphere

“It’s meant to exhaust us. It’s meant to destroy us."

organizingmythoughts.org

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 7d

Because I know people have lots of time to react but not enough to click through

blacksky.community/profile/did:...

Aaron Rodericks @aaron.bsky.team · 7d

thehive.ai evaluates all images posted to the site. We don't actually provide any input.

AI to Understand, Search, and Generate Content | Hive

Hive's APIs enable developers to integrate pre-trained AI models that address technically challenging content understanding needs into their applications.

thehive.ai

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 7d

I was here for the Hive AI incident :-/ blacksky.community/profile/did:...

Katie Tightpussy, Editor-In-Chief @katie.bzky.team · 7d

WHAT ARE YOU DOING MAN

bluesky official posts from november 2024:

A number of artists and creators have made their home on Bluesky, and we hear their concerns with other platforms training on their data. We do not use any of your content to train generative AI, and have no intention of doing so.

Bluesky uses AI internally to assist in content moderation, which helps us triage posts and shield human moderators from harmful content. We also use AI in the Discover algorithmic feed to serve you posts that we think you’d like.

None of these are Gen AI systems trained on user content.

Access Hive's industry-leading AI models
Seamlessly integrate with our APIs with a few lines of code
[object Object]
Hive’s industry-leading models empower businesses to understand, search, and generate content at scale.

Understand your content

Generate rich classification labels on your text, image, video, and audio data at scale.

Search and identify content

Next generation search capabilities on datasets including web images, intellectual property, and customer provided content.

Generate content

Proprietary and open source generative AI models to create text, image, video, and audio content.

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Chanda Prescod-Weinstein 🌌 @chanda.blacksky.app · 7d

I don't even know what to say about @aaron.bsky.team announcing that actually they feed all images posted on Bsky into an AI that just a year ago they told everyone they had banned from using Bsky images

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Joseph Rezek @rezekjoe.bsky.social · 8d

ACLS statement against White House “compact”: THIS IS SOVIET SHIT

Screenshot from statement “Universities and colleges have one mission: to advance knowledge. Faculty carry out the mission by conducting research and teaching students. The knowledge they produce and circulate is independently assessed by professional peers. Interfering with that process by forcing knowledge to pass through a political filter is a tactic adopted by the Soviet Union and other authoritarian states. The White House is dressing up its compact as a reasonable corrective to what it views as problems in campus culture. Let no one be deceived. This proposal imposes government censorship on academia. It is anti-American, and it weakens our democracy by devaluing academic expertise.”

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 7d

red and orange maple tree on a cloudy day

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 8d

@kristenthomasen.bsky.social the disrespect is glaring. Thank you for reading and sharing!

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Kristen Thomasen @kristenthomasen.bsky.social · 8d

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 · 12d

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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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 8d

Thanks for reading and sharing, Cynthia. And absolutely on point regarding the forced sprint. They are not taking any of this seriously.

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Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Cynthia Khoo @cyn-k.bsky.social · 8d

"Something needs to be done differently. We are stuck in a loop expecting something different. I do not think engaging with a performative, pre-determined public consultation process is it." 💯 That the govt is forcing a "sprint" precisely where there is the greatest need to slow down, says it all.

Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 12d

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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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 9d

I'll check it out, thanks.

Reposted by Ana Brandusescu

Iris van Rooij 💭 @irisvanrooij.bsky.social · 10d

🌟 New preprint 🌟, by @olivia.science and me:

📝 Guest, O., & van Rooij, I. (2025). *Critical Artificial Intelligence Literacy for Psychologists*. lnkd.in/ewajedAe

🧪

Table 1

Core reasoning issues (first column), which we name after the relevant numbered section, are characterised using a plausible quote. In the second column are responses per row; also see the named section for further reading, context, and explanations.

See paper for full details: ** Guest, O., & van Rooij, I. (2025, October 4). Critical Artificial Intelligence Literacy for Psychologists. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/dkrgj_v1

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 10d

Thank you, Kai. Appreciate the read and your words.

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 12d

+1

Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 12d

Thanks for reading and sharing, Blayne

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Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 12d

<3

Ana Brandusescu @anabrandusescu.bsky.social · 12d

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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