iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Daniel Solis @danielsolis.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

This week's t-shirt is a very silly joke for fans of linguistics, Ghibli, and milky drinks. #WeeklyTshirt #Ghibli #Boba danielsolis.threadless.com/designs/kiki...

A black spikey shape wearing a red bow and riding a witch's broom.
A blobby shape filled with milk and tapioca balls, with a red spiral stripped straw.

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Tze Ming Mok 莫志明 @tzemingdynasty.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Good article with the correct amount of @laragreaves.bsky.social touching on the self-selective nature of the recent exodus: You leave cos of no jobs, & everything NZers are traditionally proud of when abroad is being destroyed, while suffering as a migrant under rising xenophobia now infecting NZ.

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Chicago Manual 1st edition (1906) guidance on writing numbers

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

spring vibes i n the southern hemisphere this week #Tāmaki

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Danielle, Petty Hate Machine @dimsie.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Here is what I mean by sandwich generation: I have to repeat everything twice to both my children and my mother because the former are wearing headphones and the latter is going deaf

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

borrowed a legit button-making machine and loosed the kids on a pile of weird academic journals and print copies of @theonion.com and other sundry ephemera — the one on the left is made from the tattered inner sleeve of an old 45 💜

2 buttons on a backpack, one reading “abc records” the other reading “the internet down!”

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Merriam-Webster @merriam-webster.com · 26/08/2026

The first known use of 'nine-to-five' as an adjective was in 1927. The first known use of 'nine-to-five' as a noun was in 1975.

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

this venn diagram question on my comms intro course worksheet is doing a lot

Venn diagram of communication and technology including examples, moving left to right, of laughter, TV, and jackhammer — with this discussion question:

It seems obvious what the term "communication technology" means, but on closer inspection, both "communication" and "technology" are pretty slippery concepts! So this diagram might at first appear straightforward:
...but other terms are difficult to place! Is an alphabet a
"technology?" Are LLMs "communication?" Please think of a couple more tricky cases like this and explain why they might fit different places within the diagram

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Jess Calarco @jessicacalarco.com · 02/08/2026

I wonder if students today would be less likely to lean on AI for writing assignments if schools had made sure they could touch-type (at least 60wpm) before having them submit all their assignments online. 1/🧵

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Tressie McMillan Cottom @tressiemcphd.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

I like this notetaking example. it is a good case of how gender works. Notetaking has never been about producing a transcript. It is a bureaucratic skill in the 20th c. organixarion because it is SENSEMAKING. Those women socialized to take notes? They have been doing men’s metacognition for them

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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

that should go on the Annual Review for 2026-2027 for sure

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

“The problem dates back to the early 2000s when…publishers withdrew their NZ distribution warehouses to invest in Australia…[which] was, at first, considered no big deal…Books were commonly airfreighted at the low, low price of about 50 cents per kilo…That all changed with the coming of the plague…”

newsroom.co.nz

Publishers 'self-sabotaging' NZ books

An investigation into the biggest threat facing NZ bookstores

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

truly wild thing for a mayor of a major city to email a journalist www.stuff.co.nz/politics/361... cc @columjournreview.bsky.social @poynterinstitute.bsky.social @niemanreports.org

Email screenshot reading:

From: Wayne Brown
<
>
Subject: Re: Ponsonby News - link to July's issue
Date: 3 July 2026 at 5:48:50 pm
GMT+12
To: Martin Leach
<
>
If you are just going to publish Mike Lee bagging me then your paper will die
Wayne
Sent from my iPhone

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Shannon Mattern @shannonmattern.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

I think there’s a lot for Critical AI to learn from the mass society / propaganda roots of comm studies — and radical publishing + radio — of the early 20th c; the TV critics + radical media collectives / community media centers of the 60s + 70s…

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sami 🔵 @hellosami.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

I made a website that lets you cut out old magazines from the internet archive (or any PDFs you own) and make collage art out of them: ✂️ clipart.studio

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

this is a wholeass hybrid genre that could’ve been, or might be — anachronistic in the best way, if not timeless… 💙 @kidkoala.bsky.social

youtu.be

4 bit Blues

YouTube video by Kid Koala - Topic

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samuel mehr @mehr.nz · 10/06/2026

breaking new frontiers in the english language, in a faculty meeting on every academic's favourite topic (how to do expense reports properly) I just heard a person use the word "workflow" as a verb

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Russell Brown @publicaddress.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

It's been evident for a while that 95bFM would not continue to have a physical home at the University of Auckland. This morning, after a lot of work, they announced that the station will be moving to a new home on K Road. It's the right place. 95bfm.com/news/were-mo...

95bfm.com

We're Moving!

95bFM has announced it will relocate to Karangahape Road by Friday, 31 July 2026, marking a major new chapter in the station’s nearly six-decade history. After a long search for a suitable new home, 9...

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Laurie Winkless @lauriewinkless.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

I am *delighted* to have a new article in @spectrum.ieee.org - this one is all about Assoc Prof Te Taka Keegan's work. He's developing sovereign AI to aid in the protection and revitalisation of specific dialects of Te reo Māori spectrum.ieee.org/indigenous-a...

spectrum.ieee.org

Māori AI Voice Puts Language Ownership Back In Community Hands

Several projects around the world are working to develop indigenous-owned AI models

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

intended to get the most basic alarm clock but this joystick adjusts +/- so I really had no choice

Small, green digital clock shaped like a retro game console (next to a fork for scale)

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 29/05/2026

proposed NZ law allows Ministry of Social Development "use of an automated electronic system…to make any decision, exercise any power, comply with any obligation, or take any other related action under any specified provision, with appropriate safeguards."

rnz.co.nz

Proposed law could see government use AI to make decisions about people's benefits

Coalition parties say the proposed law would make welfare system administration more efficient.

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Sol Messing @solmg.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

New in Nature: LLMs give "the party line" in the languages of authoritarian regimes. This works when they control the media, which feeds pretraining data. We show more state control over the media means less critical LLMs. 6 studies spanning 38 languages & 13 models. Details ↓

Scatter plot of 38 countries plus China showing the proportion of LLM responses favorable to the regime in the local language vs. World Press Freedom Index score. Lower press freedom predicts more regime-favorable responses; all production models pooled.

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

“…hallucinated references disproportionately assign credit to already prominent and male scholars, suggesting that LLM-generated errors may reinforce existing inequities in scientific recognition…” 🧪 arxiv.org/abs/2605.07723

arxiv.org

LLM hallucinations in the wild: Large-scale evidence from non-existent citations

Large language models (LLMs) are known to generate plausible but false information across a wide range of contexts, yet the real-world magnitude and consequences of this hallucination problem remain p...

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 26/04/2026

"Researchers have mapped... over 1,000 previously unmapped coral reefs...invisible to conventional surveys... 'If you look at any one satellite image, the water just looks like turquoise paint... But if we overlay 200 images... the swirly patterns... average out while the reefs are constant'" 🧪

computerweekly.com

Scientists map coral reefs off northern Australia | Computer Weekly

Researchers have mapped a previously uncharted network of coral and rocky reefs hidden in the murky coastal waters of Australia’s north, without ever setting foot on a boat.

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Sonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

Pouring one out for all the librarians and archivists who are now confronting angry patrons demanding to see an item that doesn't exist because "AI told me it does."* *story just recounted to me by a friend

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Ryan Cordell @ryancordell.org · 21/04/2026

I can never resist: a little preview of the new lab we’re building @skeuomorphpress.org with @drtlwagner.bsky.social The “Undead Media Lab” has a pretty catchy ring to it

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

so preoccupied with whether or not they could

Bags of Cheerios branded granola in honey nut and chocolate flavours

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

sursedey chnam thmey to all who celebrate technically it’s not Khmer new year for a couple days but it’s the weekend and this remix is timeless

youtu.be

Khmer New Year feat Fatman Scoop - DJ JIMMY [O' REMIX ]

YouTube video by jimster112

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 31/03/2026

using r/AITA to study LLM sycophancy is hilarious doi.org/10.1126/scie...

Illustrated cover image of March 2026 issue of Science featuring a glowing 'thumbs up' hand reaching out of a computer to embrace a sullen-looking user and life them out of their office chair. Headline reads: "Toxic Praise: Harms of AI chatbots' sycophancy, flatter, and overly agreeable advice"

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

embracing my downward spiral into exclusively posting feijoa stan content

Multiple halved feijoa in front of a white bowl of yogurt with almond butter

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Ethan Plaut @ethanplaut.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

the biweekliest skeet that never-ever skouted

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Dylan Reeve @dylanreeve.com · 15/03/2026

I've been thinking about the fact that LLMs are increasingly training on the output of LLMs and I suddenly realised what I think it reminds me of... The end result of multiple generations of lossy video compression! Like this: www.youtube.com/watch?v=JR4K...

youtube.com

This Is What Happens When You Re-Upload a YouTube Video 1000 Times!

YouTube video by Marques Brownlee

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Mary Joy @maryjoy.bsky.social · 14/03/2026

Here is my best Habermas story. I am grad student waiting in LONG line for Habermas talk. There is a tall man waiting in front of me. Line moves so we are eventually visible to organizers, a woman looks over & makes horrified face. Runs out: "Prof Habermas! You don't have to wait in line!"

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