Digital Civics

My op-ed, out today in Internet Policy Review @policyr.bsky.social identifies the strategic blunder of under 16 social media bans, drawing on the work of @floridi.bsky.social & @informationlabs.org to address arising policy challenges. #DataPrivacy

New study finds that seeing a fellow scientist get harassed online makes other scientists much more anxious, but it doesn’t scare them out of communicating publicly. If anything, they trust the targeted colleague slightly more. journals.sagepub.com/doi/epub/10....

"Without humans doing the heavy lifting of conceptual novelty, the AI's brute-force engine has no direction to steer toward. It is a parasitic entity that requires the very human creativity it is economically devaluing." #AIEthics #AIPolicy #AcademicSky

"The concern is real. The attention and headlines are global. But a closer look at policy trends tells another story about the direction of social media age restrictions." Really useful piece from @johnperrino.com in @techpolicypress.bsky.social #TechPolicy #Edusky

A new startup plans to set AI agents loose in academic publications. Editing or reviewing for a journal could ultimately be about responding to the demand to curate high quality academic content for AI agents to crawl and collect valuable knowledge tokens. www.redpine.ai/insights/pub...

A new study finds that young adults who actively post and react on social media are worse at spotting misinformation, while passive browsing is linked to better discernment. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

The turn against Turnitin in UK HE is gaining momentum, with Cambridge U the latest to cancel its contract over its proposal to use student essays to train AI. I imagine more unis will now follow. TII will surely be going into crisis management now. Good piece on it here wonkhe.com/blogs/a-supp...

Timely "Ben Green presents a bold and interdisciplinary approach to data science... he argues that improving society with algorithms requires transforming data science from a formalist methodology focused on mathematical models into a practical methodology focused on addressing real-world problems."

A four-wave study in Sweden found that conspiracy thinking, use of right-wing alternative media, and social media reinforce each other over time. In contrast, mainstream news use was associated with lower levels of conspiracy thinking. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

New study suggests that teaching people to trust "reliable" outlets or distrust "unreliable" ones (e.g., NewsGuard-style tools) probably won't fix partisan misinformation belief, because people accept or reject claims based on whether the claims fit their politics, not based on who's reporting them.

I took this print screen because I was somewhat incredulous, yet simultaneously unsurprised. #AIEthics

Nice campaign by the Norwegian Consumer Council about the declining lifespan of products. Enjoy!

Some really interesting research made available here courtesy of The Wolfson Digital Archaeology & Heritage Lab (check them out at @dah-lab.bsky.social ) #AcademicSky #ResearchSky

We're urging everyone to stand up for human creativity and we need your help: please add your voice by signing the petition below.

Dear @mark-carney.bsky.social, we want to bring the relationship with Canada to the highest level possible. I would like to work with you on opening the door for Canada to being the first associate member of the EU. And create a common prosperity and economic security space.

"It is us who decide the rules, not big tech" Strong, necessary words from @vonderleyen.ec.europa.eu this morning @ec.europa.eu #SocialMedia #EU

The leaked KIDS Act makes child-safe settings the default until a service accepts you as an adult. Against our 12 design fixes: 10 delivered, 1 absent, 1 deflected. The exception? Variable rewards are banned around social media, but not directly in games. informationlabs.org/games-withou...

"Imagine dropping your kid off at school... then you find out that part of their day is actually spent talking and reading out loud to a cute, cartoonish AI avatar named Amira. And while they’re reading, Amira is recording their voice, without ever receiving consent from the parent or child" #EduSky

Everyone knows AI-written academic papers are embarrassing now, including their "authors", which is why even the publishers - who stand to benefit most from AI-amplified publication volumes - are now offering "Affordable human expert editing for AI-drafted or AI-edited manuscripts" 🤯

There's lots of things to consider when we integrate technology into the classroom. "But perhaps more importantly, we must consider the lived realities of educators working within a myriad of complex and challenging circumstances." #Edusky #Teaching #School literacyandtechnology.org/wp-content/u...

"... a social media ban is an exhaustible resource. Expending it without initiating long-term, large-scale educational and regulatory plans cannot succeed, undermines government credibility, and compromises future action..." #SocialMediaBan #Edusky policyreview.info/articles/new...

For the #Edusky community, at a time you're going back to school, especially if you're in Ontario, check out Tom Peace's #HiddenHistory on the stories behind some of the regions most interesting schools.

Fantastic #history #classics #Edusky

Really interesting, thoughtful research here "“It’s not just a site; it’s an entire environment where you’re interacting, viewing content, sharing content, and expressing yourself,” she said. Removing access can therefore affect different people in very different ways"

Check out this interesting research on citizen science data collection and how it could build trust. In "Shadow Foorprints" we looked at how this kind of data might be taken & used later to harm trust & how to protect it to prevent that. (publicera.kb.se/jdsr/article...). Cool aligned research.

"UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said the harms children face in digital spaces – from addictive design features to privacy violations – were not inevitable, but the result of deliberate commercial choices." #Edusky #SocialMediaBan

Such an insightful piece with so many terrific quotable statements from Caroline De Cock
 @informationlabs.org “the exclusion of young people from the speech infrastructure through which policy is debated does not reverse itself at a birthday” #Edusky #DataPrivacy #SocialMediaBan

🎯 @eff.org "The Settlement actually requires Meta to collect, analyze, and retain more information about its Teen users—when the pressure should have been on Meta to diminish its surveillance capitalism"

History is an invaluable pillar to Digital Civics, @willdalrymple.bsky.social's instructive work exemplifies just how vital it is. "The way these companies control crucial global choke points echoes the political and economic power of the East India Company " #AIEthics #History

"But, it is behavioral datasets providing the tools to remake the map of political influence." -Shadow Footprints and the provision of digital behavioral data, Journal of Digital Social Research #Privacy #AIEthics #DataEthics #Politics #Psychology Open Access: publicera.kb.se/jdsr/article...

What does Victorian society have in common with the world your students live in today? Discover the surprising parallels, and fresh ways to make a Victorian novel resonate with digital-age learners, in this free paper. #Edusky #Victorian #History #EngLit literacyandtechnology.org/wp-content/u...

#AIEthics

I've had the privilege of knowing Jennifer for well over two decades. She is a fiercely dedicated researcher, passionate about her subject, and methodical in her approach. Her research on the impacts of technological path dependence and rigid policy networks is well worth checking out jcgerrits.ca

"When court documents were unsealed last month it also emerged books were being destroyed in the process of training Anthropic's AI chatbot, Claude. ... They insisted sourcing books for training was a widely used approach across the AI industry." www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Plato's Phaedrus 275a/b Over 2000 years old. Still Relevant. #Classics #PhilTech #PhilSky #EduSky

"So, while knowing these images are fake, their realism manipulates the victim’s emotions. They can feel alienated, dehumanised, humiliated and violated – as if they were real intimate images shared. This effect may worsen as AI-generated videos provide ever more realistic sexual content of users."

I often argue the relevance of the ancient world to today’s digital age challenges. As Nolan’s #Odyssey spurs interest in Bronze Age Greece, check out Eric Cline’s @digkabri.bsky.social fascinating lecture about the collapse of the first (local) ‘globalised’ world #Classics youtu.be/M4LRHJlijVU?...

Useful Pointers dealing with social media ads: Start with the assumption its fake unless you can prove it isn’t Find a source you know is trusted Be especially wary of well-known faces Don’t go through the social media link There is a lack of regulation. You are not protected #Edusky #OnlineSafety

On the aims of digital civics pedagogy, from "A conceptual framework for digital civics pedagogy informed by the philosophy of information" doi.org/10.1108/JD-0... #EduSky #Civics #DigitalCivics #DigitalCitizenship #PhilTech

Relevant to #EduSky Has it's own section with Key Stage 3 school resource packs

Exclusive: Chinese startup DeepSeek is developing its own AI chip, according to three people familiar with the matter, a push that could reduce its reliance on Nvidia and Huawei chips, which it has depended on to train and run its globally popular models reut.rs/4eZLIuO

If you're trying to understand how some of the major players (people & companies) fit together in what is unfolding in tech & politics right now, this is a really useful resource from FES Future of Work. #EduSky #AIEthics #TechEthics #DataPrivacy #Politics #TechPolitics www.authoritarian-stack.info

Highly significant concerns for #TechEthics & #AIEthics ""“Basically he’s gotten to the point where he can do almost anything he wishes,” said Charles Elson, the founding director of the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware." www.nytimes.com/2026/06/17/b...

The online and offline worlds are conjoined. Protect and caretake them both. Recognise the value of the Natural World. This week: Bee and Ceanothus #ShareNature #Sustainability #EnviroSky #LoveYourWorld #Nature #DigitalCivics