I'm Actually At Capacity Right Now I have to apologize for nearly any invocation of Slavoj Zizek or Jacques Lacan, so fair warning. But I want to highlight a point made by Yuxuan Zhang in a paper on the LLM "Unconscious," where he draws on a
Imagining Language Without Imagination It's important to acknowledge that Large Language Models are complex. There's an oversimplified binary in online chatter between the dismissive characterization of LLMs as "next-word predictors" by many anti-AI proponents, and the pro-AI advocates who act as if the model
I read Benjamin Bratton's book, The Stack, in 2020 as a grad student in ANU's Applied Cybernetics program. I give it credit for directing my attention to the interaction between layers of digital and physical infrastructures. Trained as a social scientist in media studies, my mind
Technology's Distortions of Language Language is a vessel through which meaning is mutually constructed. From this shared imagination, we learn how others understand and aim to understand them. We also navigate how much of ourselves to put into this space. The imagination space is therefore negotiated through language:
Puppetry as Dream Analysis for AI Anxiety This is a discussion between Camila Galaz, Emma Wiseman, and Eryk Salvaggio, collaborators behind an experimental workshop linking puppetry and generative AI that took place at RMIT in Melbourne this summer at the invitation of Joel Stern and the National Communications Museum. We
Something I Can Tell Students Now That I Am Not Teaching You and I probably both keep hearing that students should be working toward AI literacy. That you should know what to type into prompt windows, because it will save you time. That will get you jobs in the economy
My father died on June 30 while rescuing a bird trapped inside his garage. While closing a window behind it, he fell from a ladder, lost consciousness, and died. It was the week of his birthday, and he had gone out with three groups of friends over the week. He
net art
Video & prepared remarks for the symposium with Vladan Joler, Valentina Tanni & Eryk Salvaggio examining the transformation and consolidation of the Web from the 1990s up to the age of generative AI.
policy
My latest piece in Tech Policy Press examines two AI copyright rulings and the legal rationales that will likely be setting precedent beyond the the short-term legal victories.
If you missed it, my piece in Tech Policy Press tackles the relationship the AI industry has with uncertainty: using what they don't know about AI as evidence that they're right, or that it should be feared, or that it can't be properly regulated.
A new paper from Apple proves what I've discussed before – that so-called "reasoning" models aren't doing much reasoning at all – but now that is clear even by the bizarre industry definitions of the term. The researchers created a series of puzzles with similar problem-solving
talks
Interfaces, and design of all kinds, exercise decision-making. Decision making is a form of power. What, then, is generative AI for design?