Alex Hanna
@alexhanna.bsky.social
Director of Research, @dairinstitute.bsky.social
Roller derby athlete
https://alex-hanna.com
Book: thecon.ai
Pod+newsletter: https://dair-institute.org/maiht3k
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🏳️⚧️ she/هي
📸 @willtoft.bsky.social
Rep📘 @ianbonaparte.bsky.social
Roller derby athlete
https://alex-hanna.com
Book: thecon.ai
Pod+newsletter: https://dair-institute.org/maiht3k
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🏳️⚧️ she/هي
📸 @willtoft.bsky.social
Rep📘 @ianbonaparte.bsky.social
Pinned
Alex Hanna
@alexhanna.bsky.social
· May 13
On the Very Real Dangers of the Artificial Intelligence Hype Machine
As long as there’s been research on AI, there’s been AI hype. In the most commonly told narrative about the research field’s development, mathematician John McCarthy and computer scientist Marvin M…
lithub.com
It's book press day! The AI Con is available where ever you find fine books! Check out thecon.ai for details.
@emilymbender.bsky.social and I think we wrote a damn fine book, and we hope you'll enjoy it too.
For a taste, check out the preview of Chapter 1, graciously published by LitHub.
@emilymbender.bsky.social and I think we wrote a damn fine book, and we hope you'll enjoy it too.
For a taste, check out the preview of Chapter 1, graciously published by LitHub.
Reposted by Alex Hanna
It's truly wild to me that this just keeps happening. Coca-Cola runs an AI ad and people overwhelmingly react with disgust. They do it again, and people are disgusted again. Now McDonald's makes an AI ad that's so bad that so many people are furious about it they pull it down.
People hate AI slop!
People hate AI slop!
McDonald's Pulls Down AI-Generated Holiday Ad After Deluge of Mockery
McDonald's Netherlands is catching flak for a stupefying AI-generated video, which was roundly condemned on social media.
futurism.com
December 9, 2025 at 8:29 PM
It's truly wild to me that this just keeps happening. Coca-Cola runs an AI ad and people overwhelmingly react with disgust. They do it again, and people are disgusted again. Now McDonald's makes an AI ad that's so bad that so many people are furious about it they pull it down.
People hate AI slop!
People hate AI slop!
Reposted by Alex Hanna
Still so excited for everyone who showed up to this yesterday! It was stunning to see a sea of creatives overwhelm that tiny hearing. We had an overflow room of artists and the line for 30 second public commentary literally had to be cut off!
You made a huge difference
yesterday.
Thank you!
You made a huge difference
yesterday.
Thank you!
Actors and artists pack Stanford hearing to demand new AI transparency law
SAG-AFTRA and other groups say the measure offers basic transparency for performers whose work is being scraped without consent.
www.sfchronicle.com
December 9, 2025 at 9:07 PM
Still so excited for everyone who showed up to this yesterday! It was stunning to see a sea of creatives overwhelm that tiny hearing. We had an overflow room of artists and the line for 30 second public commentary literally had to be cut off!
You made a huge difference
yesterday.
Thank you!
You made a huge difference
yesterday.
Thank you!
Reposted by Alex Hanna
Ding ding ding. It's not that AI is a distraction, rather it's the instrument through which class war can proceed. If you are reading this, you are too expensive for the purposes of this quarter's p&l statement but your layoff may juice the stock. Free money is done. Real progress is expensive.
Same for lawyers, some medial specialities, marketing etc - fields previously thought too specialized. I don’t think they believe the tech is good enough to replace these workers. They believe it no longer matters to making a profit. And they are kind of right in the short term.
December 9, 2025 at 4:04 PM
Ding ding ding. It's not that AI is a distraction, rather it's the instrument through which class war can proceed. If you are reading this, you are too expensive for the purposes of this quarter's p&l statement but your layoff may juice the stock. Free money is done. Real progress is expensive.
New workers' inquiry from the @dataworkersinquiry.bsky.social project: the story of Michael Geoffrey Asia, who tells his story of impersonating romantic and sexual partner for users who think they are speaking to a chatbot.
data-workers.org/michael/
data-workers.org/michael/
December 9, 2025 at 4:16 PM
New workers' inquiry from the @dataworkersinquiry.bsky.social project: the story of Michael Geoffrey Asia, who tells his story of impersonating romantic and sexual partner for users who think they are speaking to a chatbot.
data-workers.org/michael/
data-workers.org/michael/
Going to start collecting all of Google Docs's suggested corrections to critical race, trans/queer theory terms
December 9, 2025 at 3:51 PM
Going to start collecting all of Google Docs's suggested corrections to critical race, trans/queer theory terms
Reposted by Alex Hanna
Hey folks - I lost a major contract and am back on the hunt for any/all work involving Words and Sounds. i make them. i edit them. i teach them. i have 15 years of experience in the media industry and have been published in VICE, e-flux, the New Yorker, and many other places!
💌 [email protected]
💌 [email protected]
Muck Rack | For journalists and public relations
Find Janus Rose's articles, email address, contact information, Twitter and more
muckrack.com
December 4, 2025 at 7:16 PM
Hey folks - I lost a major contract and am back on the hunt for any/all work involving Words and Sounds. i make them. i edit them. i teach them. i have 15 years of experience in the media industry and have been published in VICE, e-flux, the New Yorker, and many other places!
💌 [email protected]
💌 [email protected]
Can't believe there was a marketing department that thought any of these were selling points.
December 9, 2025 at 1:48 PM
Can't believe there was a marketing department that thought any of these were selling points.
Reposted by Alex Hanna
I gotta up my community service
There are way too many people in the world that have not heard 'fuck off' enough.
December 6, 2025 at 4:26 PM
I gotta up my community service
Reposted by Alex Hanna
It is interesting (derogatory) that productivity is operationalized as "uploading to preprint servers"
After ChatGPT, increase in productivity of male researchers was higher than for female researchers, widening the productivity gap. male researchers use generative AI more & see higher efficiency improvement from its use than female researchers
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
Gender disparities in the impact of generative artificial intelligence: Evidence from academia
Abstract. The emergence of generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT has substantially increased individuals’ productivity. In this stu
academic.oup.com
December 9, 2025 at 1:15 PM
It is interesting (derogatory) that productivity is operationalized as "uploading to preprint servers"
How can I make my expense reports more provocative
The breathtaking, audacious confidence of this passage…
You’re telling me you came up in political journalism of the 2010s and 20s and *never once* worried about job security? Really???
That’s… diagnosable.
You’re telling me you came up in political journalism of the 2010s and 20s and *never once* worried about job security? Really???
That’s… diagnosable.
December 9, 2025 at 1:14 PM
How can I make my expense reports more provocative
@joelleforestier.bsky.social it's AO3, put some goddamn respect on her name
December 9, 2025 at 2:29 AM
@joelleforestier.bsky.social it's AO3, put some goddamn respect on her name
Reposted by Alex Hanna
404 Media is making a print zine! About the surveillance technologies used by ICE. 16 pages, riso printed. Shipping early January. Features reworked versions of our best reporting and a few new things. We're very excited! And hope to do more if people like it:
www.404media.co/404-media-is...
www.404media.co/404-media-is...
404 Media Is Making a Zine
We are publishing a risograph-printed zine about the surveillance technologies used by ICE.
www.404media.co
December 8, 2025 at 3:42 PM
404 Media is making a print zine! About the surveillance technologies used by ICE. 16 pages, riso printed. Shipping early January. Features reworked versions of our best reporting and a few new things. We're very excited! And hope to do more if people like it:
www.404media.co/404-media-is...
www.404media.co/404-media-is...
Oooh this cover goes hard. Congrats!
Coming May 19, 2026 from Amistad Books and HarperCollins
THE OVERSEER CLASS:
A Manifesto
by Steven W. Thrasher
cover art by Jamaal Barber
Available for pre-order now www.harpercollins.com/products/the...
THE OVERSEER CLASS:
A Manifesto
by Steven W. Thrasher
cover art by Jamaal Barber
Available for pre-order now www.harpercollins.com/products/the...
December 9, 2025 at 1:16 AM
Oooh this cover goes hard. Congrats!
What I've always wanted, to spend 6 hours sitting next to a CrossFitter who just did a gnarly WOD and is now pounding 160 grams of lean protein
Duffy on what he's doing to improve the airport experience for travelers: "Maybe I want a workout area where people might get some blood flowing doing some pull ups or step ups in the airport."
December 8, 2025 at 10:44 PM
What I've always wanted, to spend 6 hours sitting next to a CrossFitter who just did a gnarly WOD and is now pounding 160 grams of lean protein
Reposted by Alex Hanna
Reposted by Alex Hanna
🎧TODAY: Tune in to the livestream of the Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 podcast 🎧
@emilymbender.bsky.social and @alexhanna.bsky.social will be digging into one recent attempt to define so-called "AGI"...
TODAY, December 8, noon Pacific
www.twitch.tv/dair_institute
@emilymbender.bsky.social and @alexhanna.bsky.social will be digging into one recent attempt to define so-called "AGI"...
TODAY, December 8, noon Pacific
www.twitch.tv/dair_institute
dair_institute - Twitch
Twitch account for The Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR).
www.twitch.tv
December 8, 2025 at 5:10 PM
🎧TODAY: Tune in to the livestream of the Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 podcast 🎧
@emilymbender.bsky.social and @alexhanna.bsky.social will be digging into one recent attempt to define so-called "AGI"...
TODAY, December 8, noon Pacific
www.twitch.tv/dair_institute
@emilymbender.bsky.social and @alexhanna.bsky.social will be digging into one recent attempt to define so-called "AGI"...
TODAY, December 8, noon Pacific
www.twitch.tv/dair_institute
I need Venjent to turn this into a drum and bass song immediately
can't stop watching this clip of a tesla Optimus teleoperator taking his headset off before properly logging out the robot
December 8, 2025 at 1:33 PM
I need Venjent to turn this into a drum and bass song immediately
Reposted by Alex Hanna
can't stop watching this clip of a tesla Optimus teleoperator taking his headset off before properly logging out the robot
December 8, 2025 at 9:29 AM
can't stop watching this clip of a tesla Optimus teleoperator taking his headset off before properly logging out the robot
This is from assimilating a Spartan race, who just thought they looked fucking sick
Okay but why does the Borg hive mind need him to have a six pack plate?
December 8, 2025 at 5:14 AM
This is from assimilating a Spartan race, who just thought they looked fucking sick
Reposted by Alex Hanna
discussed this in seminar yesterday, albeit with reference to “race science” generally. If you understand science as a historical phenomenon then the question is what was science then, not whether it would count as science now, and the implication is that what science is now is not forever, either
1. Historically, eugenics was not a pseudoscience. It was *science* Almost every scientist, social scientist, academic, etc. believed in the validity of eugenics. You would have to search far & wide to find a scientist that didn't believe in some form of it. They taught it in college!
December 4, 2025 at 1:24 PM
discussed this in seminar yesterday, albeit with reference to “race science” generally. If you understand science as a historical phenomenon then the question is what was science then, not whether it would count as science now, and the implication is that what science is now is not forever, either
Milton Friedman's grandson poo poos the suggestion that network-state projects in Africa would be colonizing, although he says that people from their prospective sites would need to be resettled.
This is all very on the nose.
This is all very on the nose.
December 8, 2025 at 1:42 AM
Milton Friedman's grandson poo poos the suggestion that network-state projects in Africa would be colonizing, although he says that people from their prospective sites would need to be resettled.
This is all very on the nose.
This is all very on the nose.
Reposted by Alex Hanna
STS/Communications scholar Morgan Ames (whom these authors don't cite) has repeatedly demonstrated that OLPC was ineffective at best, and harmful at worst, including in an award-winning book published in 2019.
The real question is why economists don't acknowledge work in other fields.
The real question is why economists don't acknowledge work in other fields.
December 7, 2025 at 11:18 PM
STS/Communications scholar Morgan Ames (whom these authors don't cite) has repeatedly demonstrated that OLPC was ineffective at best, and harmful at worst, including in an award-winning book published in 2019.
The real question is why economists don't acknowledge work in other fields.
The real question is why economists don't acknowledge work in other fields.
Walking past a sports bar in O'Hare as the Packers scored that TD has filled me with enough schendenfraude to get through the end of the year.
December 8, 2025 at 12:25 AM
Walking past a sports bar in O'Hare as the Packers scored that TD has filled me with enough schendenfraude to get through the end of the year.
Scratch a definition of general intelligence, find a eugenicist. That and more on tomorrow's Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000!
One problem with all the “AGI” discourse is that “AGI” isn’t actually defined.
Someone tried recently … and predictably it didn’t go well. Join us for the next Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 livestream, in which @alexhanna.bsky.social and I dig into the attempt:
Monday, December 8, noon Pacific
Someone tried recently … and predictably it didn’t go well. Join us for the next Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 livestream, in which @alexhanna.bsky.social and I dig into the attempt:
Monday, December 8, noon Pacific
dair_institute - Twitch
Twitch account for The Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR).
twitch.tv
December 7, 2025 at 10:41 PM
Scratch a definition of general intelligence, find a eugenicist. That and more on tomorrow's Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000!
Folks could have read Morgan Ames's book and came to the same conclusion. But good to have the econometricians confirm.
mitpress.mit.edu/978026253744...
mitpress.mit.edu/978026253744...
December 7, 2025 at 7:53 PM
Folks could have read Morgan Ames's book and came to the same conclusion. But good to have the econometricians confirm.
mitpress.mit.edu/978026253744...
mitpress.mit.edu/978026253744...