iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 14h

The Secret Life of Data, turning every government asset and worker into cops edition

Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 14h

Back in the heady, optimistic days of 2000, the New York Times ran a series of TV commercials. One featured an older white woman looking at the camera with a big, satisfied smile and saying "Another day to learn something new!" I think about that ad a LOT. Here's another from the same campaign:

youtube.com

The Sunday New York Times 2000 Commercial

YouTube video by Atlantic Southeast Nostalgia Commercials

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 16h

Maybe they should spend their money and talent trying to make our real-life experiences with tech less ghoulish. Then they wouldn't need such aggressive propaganda.

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Pé 🍺🧿 @forevernever.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

It's weird how the federal government is constantly being hacked after DOGE gutted the government's cybersecurity agencies.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 17h

The American people have never been subject to surveillance at this level. Yet our needs have rarely been so poorly met. The more they watch, the less they care.

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Michael Iantorno☔️🕹️ @michaeliantorno.com · 17h

The Mad Lib of our time: Modern ________ smart features could be used to spy on you, ________ warned.

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Matthew Dowd @matthewjdowd.bsky.social · 17h

Latest WSJ poll: "63% want to pause AI development 61% want a billionaire wealth tax 59% want Medicare for All 57% want a $20 minimum wage 58% want to end U.S. military aid to Israel" This is the center of the country politically. it is time all adjust to this political spectrum, esp. media.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 17h

The Secret Life of Data, brain surveillance quackery edition

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Jane Rosenzweig @janerosenzweig.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Something that's surprisingly useful is asking my students to draw their research papers. They make all sorts of interesting diagrams and some always say they find it clarifying in unexpected ways (realizing a side point is the main point kind of thing). Low tech, done in class, no outsourcing.

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Governor Wes Moore @govwesmoore.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Crews are still working on repairs following a power outage, but water remains safe to drink. Customers in Montgomery and Prince George’s should continue to limit water use today as they work to resolve the situation.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

AI-customized media vs human-authored media is not an either/or scenario. Suno may be great at background music (lofi beats to chill etc) while listeners' attachment to Taylor/Olivia/Bruno remains stronger than ever. What matters is economics, sociology, culture, context, & marketing. Like always.

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Denis - The COVID Info Guy @thecovidinfoguy.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

"Just 5 Infections Responsible For More Than 2 Million New Cancer Cases Annually" 🦠H. pylori 🦠Human papillomavirus (HPV) 🦠Hepatitis B virus (HBV) 🦠Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) 🦠Hepatitis C virus (HCV)

sciencealert.com

Just 5 Infections Responsible For More Than 2 Million New Cancer Cases Annually

Cancer may seem like an inevitable part of life, but there are so many factors that can help reduce your risk.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Sounds like a massive gift to a certain South African nazi trillionaire

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Important question from my dad. (the answer: Long Story Short)

Text message: "What's the name of the jewey cartoon you recommend!"

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Will Davies @will-davies.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Dada perfection

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alice e marwick @alicetiara.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

At UNC we all basically stopped using university email for anything except student communication because a) it's public and can be FOIA'd and b) the provost repeatedly searched faculty emails/OneDrive after someone (not faculty) leaked a donor agreement to the press.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Welp guess I'm gonna discontinue using my university email

Resolution of your Service Request:
Good morning, Aram,

After review, we are unable to approve the use of Canary Mail with your AU email account. AU email should be accessed through the university's approved email application, Outlook, and we are not authorizing connections to alternative third-party email clients.

Thank you for your understanding.

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Listening Habit @listeninghabit.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

And even more tragically, many rural areas still don’t have broadband because the methodology the govt used to track progress was whether any fiber existed in a zip, not whether the majority of residents could connect. Wasted subsidies for corps.

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Dr. Elinor Carmi @elinorcarmi.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

I see that digital consent is brought up a lot this week because Meta's Muse seems to do a lot of actions without people's consent (insert surprised face) So I want to share again my open access paper about the myth of digital consent journals.oslomet.no/index.php/se... ->

journals.oslomet.no

A feminist Critique to digital consent | Seminar.net

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Noel Healy @drnoelhealy.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

The assault on US universities didn't start in 2025. Our new paper traces the decades of corporate capture that made it possible, and why climate research is a primary target. Open access: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

After the decades of struggle to bring broadband to rural areas in the US, *this* is where the "information superhighway" brought them.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

"The consensus has been that algorithmic filter bubbles have locked us off from each other, which is why the highest echelons of pop music feel so stale. But what’s actually happened is that Silicon Valley created a new, worse version of popularity..."

garbageday.email

Why "Choosin' Texas" doesn't feel like a hit

Read to the end for FlubberLover01

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evacide @evacide.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Meta Muse appears to read your Apple messages and upload them to the cloud even if you explicitly tell it not to: appleinsider.com/articles/26/...

appleinsider.com

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Fascinating correlation. I can imagine a bunch of different causal models.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

The Secret Life of Data, insult to injury edition

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Sanho Tree @sanho.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Happy Stanislav Petrov day! He saved the world from nuclear annihilation on this day in 1983. My freshman year in college would have been so much worse without his courage.🧵

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Astra Taylor @astra.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Forget grandiose talk of curing cancer - this is what AI is actually doing to healthcare. In the words of one cardiologist: “it’s bots fighting bots, agents fighting agents, a horrible dystopic future nobody wants to live in.”

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Catherine D'Ignazio (she/her/ella) @kanarinka.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

MIT spent $3 million on 500 AI-capable surveillance cameras while laying people off, shutting down libraries, and canceling journal subscriptions. In this article, 4 faculty & I discuss our new arts initiative to celebrate surveillance and repression on college campuses: fnl.mit.edu/how-we-learn...

fnl.mit.edu

How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Campus Surveillance – MIT Faculty Newsletter

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404 Media @404media.co · 25/09/2026

Meta announced that its new AI agent, Muse could call businesses for you to do things like make reservations. But in reality, Meta is testing having these calls being made by human beings in call centers, 404 Media @jasonkoebler.bsky.social learned. www.404media.co/meta-tests-m...

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

She's looking more and more like him

Reuters photo of Melanie and Donald Trump, making the same face like a haggard speed freak who's just been busted mid-cop and is ready to start a-stabbin' with the sharpened piece of windshield wiper plastic they keep up their sleeve, while Chinese President Xi stands by looking serenely disgusted and amused

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🌬Breeze @cool-summer-breeze.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

This is the Stolen Neighbors Quilt. Each of the 11,000 squares represents a person taken by ICE in Minnesota.

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David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Wtaf is this question my university just asked me about my project?

Does the project involve any work that could be interpreted as promoting DEIA, climate change research, or non-compliant to any Presidential Executive Orders?

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Holy smokes this is good mayoring

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Terndis Shipperound @clearsonnyday.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Thereallo, a web developer, decompiled the app and published a detailed technical breakdown of what's running under the hood. It injects code into third-party websites, loads JavaScript from someone's GitHub, and tracks your GPS, among other things.

thereallo.dev

I Decompiled the White House's New App

The official White House Android app has a cookie/paywall bypass injector, tracks your GPS every 4.5 minutes, and loads JavaScript from some guy's GitHub Pages.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

Does anyone have a decent IMAP email program for Mac that can handle multiple accounts? Betterbird is a disappointment, Airmail went down the tube, MacMail is just an embarrassment...

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

'Tis said the perfect skeet does not exist Yet truth is found 'twixt Will's and Melville's lips

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Amy Jo (AJ) Cousins @ajcousins.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

This is not deporting people. Literally. Legally. There is a deportation process and this isn't it. This is rendition. This is disappearing people.

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August J. Pollak @augustjpollak.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

I feel what’s lost in the “Ellison asked Musk for money to buy WBD” story is this implicitly suggests Ellison *cannot afford to buy WBD* which you would think in a normal world would be the very first thing that kills a deal to buy WBD

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

And here I am, getting chuffed like a sucker whenever a publisher is willing to give me a 5-figure advance.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

I have nothing snarky to say. This is just plain impressive.

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Aram Sinnreich @aramsinn.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

The end of an era. Nothing but love and respect for @nancybaym.bsky.social and all the amazing scholars who have graced the SMC's halls over the years. 👏👏👏👏👏

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Blacksky Algorithms @blackskyweb.xyz · 23/09/2026

🎉 Acorn is officially open. You can now create a space for your community on the open social web - no wait required. acorn.blacksky.community

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