Dani Shanley
@danishanley.bsky.social
assistant prof in philosophy @ maastricht university. thinking about ethics and politics (human factors) of new tech. critical of the hype and critical of the critics.
Reposted by Dani Shanley
«The global AI industry is fueled by hidden and precarized labor: workers who collect and annotate data, keep data centers running, and mine rare earth minerals—not to mention the artists, translators, writers, and actors whose work fuels so-called generative AI» 📢 NEW PAPER!
November 28, 2025 at 10:30 PM
«The global AI industry is fueled by hidden and precarized labor: workers who collect and annotate data, keep data centers running, and mine rare earth minerals—not to mention the artists, translators, writers, and actors whose work fuels so-called generative AI» 📢 NEW PAPER!
Reposted by Dani Shanley
"Ms. Borsook proposes a Silicon Valley Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
She imagines...confessions from the men who came up with the labels “sharing economy,” “disruptive innovation” and “thought leader.” The proceedings would, at the least, clear the air and provide greater understanding"
She imagines...confessions from the men who came up with the labels “sharing economy,” “disruptive innovation” and “thought leader.” The proceedings would, at the least, clear the air and provide greater understanding"
It happened! The @nytimes.com profiled Paulina!
The Writer Who Dared Criticize Silicon Valley
Paulina Borsook’s “Cyberselfish,” which offered dire predictions about the tech world’s love for libertarianism, is finding fans. It only took 25 years.
Gift Link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/27/t...
The Writer Who Dared Criticize Silicon Valley
Paulina Borsook’s “Cyberselfish,” which offered dire predictions about the tech world’s love for libertarianism, is finding fans. It only took 25 years.
Gift Link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/27/t...
November 27, 2025 at 6:48 PM
"Ms. Borsook proposes a Silicon Valley Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
She imagines...confessions from the men who came up with the labels “sharing economy,” “disruptive innovation” and “thought leader.” The proceedings would, at the least, clear the air and provide greater understanding"
She imagines...confessions from the men who came up with the labels “sharing economy,” “disruptive innovation” and “thought leader.” The proceedings would, at the least, clear the air and provide greater understanding"
Reposted by Dani Shanley
"Her view of tech was practical, the way many engineers thought at the time. It was just like indoor plumbing or electricity: infrastructure, not magic."
It happened! The @nytimes.com profiled Paulina!
The Writer Who Dared Criticize Silicon Valley
Paulina Borsook’s “Cyberselfish,” which offered dire predictions about the tech world’s love for libertarianism, is finding fans. It only took 25 years.
Gift Link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/27/t...
The Writer Who Dared Criticize Silicon Valley
Paulina Borsook’s “Cyberselfish,” which offered dire predictions about the tech world’s love for libertarianism, is finding fans. It only took 25 years.
Gift Link:
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/27/t...
November 27, 2025 at 5:48 PM
"Her view of tech was practical, the way many engineers thought at the time. It was just like indoor plumbing or electricity: infrastructure, not magic."
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Queen!
I heard a story about a female academic giving a paper at the IHR who, after receiving a long and aggressive question from a senior male professor, simply leaned back with her hands behind her head and replied “Oh, do fuck off.”
One of my colleagues went to a seminar at Berkeley and when someone asked a question Derrida brushed it off saying ‘what you ask may be important but it is not interesting’.
November 27, 2025 at 8:52 PM
Queen!
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Thankful for all my fellow luddites today. Hammers up
🤖🔨❤️
🤖🔨❤️
November 27, 2025 at 9:21 PM
Thankful for all my fellow luddites today. Hammers up
🤖🔨❤️
🤖🔨❤️
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Tired of all the slop? I built a browser extension called Slop Evader that only returns search results from before Nov 30, 2022 - the pre-ChatGPT internet. Sure, the info is a couple years old, but at least you know a human wrote it :) chromewebstore.google.com/detail/slop-...
Slop Evader - Chrome Web Store
An extension for avoiding AI slop
chromewebstore.google.com
October 29, 2025 at 2:25 PM
Tired of all the slop? I built a browser extension called Slop Evader that only returns search results from before Nov 30, 2022 - the pre-ChatGPT internet. Sure, the info is a couple years old, but at least you know a human wrote it :) chromewebstore.google.com/detail/slop-...
Reposted by Dani Shanley
I usually create a thread of options for people who would like to donate to a Native cause or struggle, but it has gotten HARDER to fundraise on socials over the past couple of years, so I am zeroing in on one ask this year. Pls support Native organizing infrastructure: nativeorganizing.org/donate/
November 26, 2025 at 5:58 PM
I usually create a thread of options for people who would like to donate to a Native cause or struggle, but it has gotten HARDER to fundraise on socials over the past couple of years, so I am zeroing in on one ask this year. Pls support Native organizing infrastructure: nativeorganizing.org/donate/
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Everything about this might be the saddest thing I’ve ever seen
November 24, 2025 at 1:07 PM
Everything about this might be the saddest thing I’ve ever seen
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Omar El Akkad, winner of the 2025 National Book Award for non-fiction for his book “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This” about the genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, speaking tonight at the awards gala in New York City where he accepted the award.
#NationalBookAwards
#NationalBookAwards
November 20, 2025 at 3:28 AM
Omar El Akkad, winner of the 2025 National Book Award for non-fiction for his book “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This” about the genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza, speaking tonight at the awards gala in New York City where he accepted the award.
#NationalBookAwards
#NationalBookAwards
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Racism is not justified by immigration levels or rising poverty, unemployment or crime.
It is not justified, period.
I see the rising wave of voices & arguments justifying the rising levels of racism as the most sinister political development in 2025 on the British landscape.
It is not justified, period.
I see the rising wave of voices & arguments justifying the rising levels of racism as the most sinister political development in 2025 on the British landscape.
The Home Secretary explaining that the rise in racist violence is, actually, the natural response to higher levels of immigration is a state of affairs that can't exist without the government having largely decided that racist violence is, if not legitimate, at least understandable.
November 22, 2025 at 11:20 AM
Racism is not justified by immigration levels or rising poverty, unemployment or crime.
It is not justified, period.
I see the rising wave of voices & arguments justifying the rising levels of racism as the most sinister political development in 2025 on the British landscape.
It is not justified, period.
I see the rising wave of voices & arguments justifying the rising levels of racism as the most sinister political development in 2025 on the British landscape.
Reposted by Dani Shanley
sts researchers: :spend decades tracing the way well-intentioned design choices constrained by culture, capital, and the material environment can have negative outcomes in aggregate:
ai companies: lets put a chatbot in a doll that tells kids to set fires
futurism.com/artificial-i...
ai companies: lets put a chatbot in a doll that tells kids to set fires
futurism.com/artificial-i...
AI-Powered Toys Caught Telling 5-Year-Olds How to Find Knives and Start Fires With Matches
AI-powered toys are flying off the shelves -- but they're engaging in horrifically inappropriate conversations with children.
futurism.com
November 13, 2025 at 2:34 PM
sts researchers: :spend decades tracing the way well-intentioned design choices constrained by culture, capital, and the material environment can have negative outcomes in aggregate:
ai companies: lets put a chatbot in a doll that tells kids to set fires
futurism.com/artificial-i...
ai companies: lets put a chatbot in a doll that tells kids to set fires
futurism.com/artificial-i...
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Reposted by Dani Shanley
“Housing shortage – Jews to blame," letter sticker, German Reich, 1938
zwangsraeume.berlin/en/context
zwangsraeume.berlin/en/context
November 14, 2025 at 2:16 AM
“Housing shortage – Jews to blame," letter sticker, German Reich, 1938
zwangsraeume.berlin/en/context
zwangsraeume.berlin/en/context
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Exactly the same for AI products
If you need me, tap me on the shoulder. I’ll be happily working all day listening to this on a loop.
November 14, 2025 at 10:48 PM
Exactly the same for AI products
Reposted by Dani Shanley
NEW from me: a new report found that national resistance to data centers skyrocketed between March and June of this year—especially in red states like Georgia and Indiana:
The Data Center Resistance Has Arrived
A new report finds that local opposition to data centers skyrocketed in the second quarter of this year.
www.wired.com
November 14, 2025 at 4:46 PM
NEW from me: a new report found that national resistance to data centers skyrocketed between March and June of this year—especially in red states like Georgia and Indiana:
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Reposted by Dani Shanley
November 12, 2025 at 10:25 PM
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Many modern technologists and computer scientists are very cogent systems thinker because any sufficiently advanced technology *is people*, all technical systems are socio-technical. The capital T Tech dipshits talking about “alpha” are mainly cosplaying finance people, regardless of their training
This is absolutely the case. Tech Guys of previous generations, to the extent that that category can be read back into the 19th and 20th centuries, were shockingly well-read by modern standards
it’s also notable how the techbros of today really don’t read *books* anymore - this was really not the case for the Tech Guys of earlier generations, far as I’ve been able to tell
November 12, 2025 at 2:13 AM
Many modern technologists and computer scientists are very cogent systems thinker because any sufficiently advanced technology *is people*, all technical systems are socio-technical. The capital T Tech dipshits talking about “alpha” are mainly cosplaying finance people, regardless of their training
Reposted by Dani Shanley
100% true. Some of the best critics of AI are computer scientists or engineers with a holistic intellect: people who truly understand the tech and therefore its limits — eg @cloudquistador.bsky.social. It’s not a matter of tech experts versus intellectuals. The AI cultists do not understand tech!
Many modern technologists and computer scientists are very cogent systems thinker because any sufficiently advanced technology *is people*, all technical systems are socio-technical. The capital T Tech dipshits talking about “alpha” are mainly cosplaying finance people, regardless of their training
This is absolutely the case. Tech Guys of previous generations, to the extent that that category can be read back into the 19th and 20th centuries, were shockingly well-read by modern standards
November 12, 2025 at 7:38 PM
100% true. Some of the best critics of AI are computer scientists or engineers with a holistic intellect: people who truly understand the tech and therefore its limits — eg @cloudquistador.bsky.social. It’s not a matter of tech experts versus intellectuals. The AI cultists do not understand tech!
Reposted by Dani Shanley
What an amazing essay from the former chair of Africana Studies at Bowdoin. I'll share a few sections in the reply but seriously, read the whole thing. It's all insightful and beautifully written.
lithub.com/maybe-dont-t...
lithub.com/maybe-dont-t...
Maybe Don’t Talk to the New York Times About Zohran Mamdani
It’s remarkable, the people you’ll hear from. Teach for even a little while at an expensive institution—the term they tend to prefer is “elite”—and odds are that eventually someone who was a studen…
lithub.com
November 8, 2025 at 7:11 PM
What an amazing essay from the former chair of Africana Studies at Bowdoin. I'll share a few sections in the reply but seriously, read the whole thing. It's all insightful and beautifully written.
lithub.com/maybe-dont-t...
lithub.com/maybe-dont-t...
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Reposted by Dani Shanley
Something I've really noticed among institutional "responses" to generative technologies is that "DO NOT USE THIS TOOL, IT'S COMPLETELY INAPPROPRIATE" is fudamentally erased from any possibility of ever being an option
Often paired with fatalist stuff like "this isn't going away"
Often paired with fatalist stuff like "this isn't going away"
November 8, 2025 at 10:15 PM
Something I've really noticed among institutional "responses" to generative technologies is that "DO NOT USE THIS TOOL, IT'S COMPLETELY INAPPROPRIATE" is fudamentally erased from any possibility of ever being an option
Often paired with fatalist stuff like "this isn't going away"
Often paired with fatalist stuff like "this isn't going away"
Reposted by Dani Shanley
one day i will learn that i need to finish my stack of unread books before reserving more from the library but today is not that day
A new nonfiction history, Let My Country Awake, explores the complexity of Indian resistance against the British Empire during World War I.
Book Review: Let My Country Awake Puts the Pacific Northwest at the Center of an Anti-Colonial Struggle
A new nonfiction history, Let My Country Awake, explores the complexity of Indian resistance against the British Empire during World War I.
www.portlandmercury.com
November 7, 2025 at 6:49 PM
one day i will learn that i need to finish my stack of unread books before reserving more from the library but today is not that day
Reposted by Dani Shanley
In 2008, a blogger named Curtis Yarvin called for a future president to kill foreign aid programs as part of a plan to replace democracy with dictatorship.
Now 600,000 people are dead—and 14 million will die by 2030, according to the Lancet. This is the running death toll of tech fascism.
Now 600,000 people are dead—and 14 million will die by 2030, according to the Lancet. This is the running death toll of tech fascism.
One analytical model shows that, as of November 5th, the dismantling of U.S.A.I.D. has already caused the deaths of 600,000 people, two-thirds of them children. https://newyorkermag.visitlink.me/jUzNSc
The Shutdown of U.S.A.I.D. Has Already Killed Hundreds of Thousands
The short documentary “Rovina’s Choice” tells the story of what goes when aid goes.
newyorkermag.visitlink.me
November 7, 2025 at 10:28 PM
In 2008, a blogger named Curtis Yarvin called for a future president to kill foreign aid programs as part of a plan to replace democracy with dictatorship.
Now 600,000 people are dead—and 14 million will die by 2030, according to the Lancet. This is the running death toll of tech fascism.
Now 600,000 people are dead—and 14 million will die by 2030, according to the Lancet. This is the running death toll of tech fascism.