iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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James Medlock @jdcmedlock.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

In related news, I'll be starting the Medlock sportsbook. Every line is even money, no vig, max bet $580, both sides mandatory, one visit per six months. It's time to gamble our way to Medicaid for All.

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Laura K. Nelson @lauraknelson.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

New preprint! A review article on Generative AI and Society, with the fantastic @thomasdavidson.bsky.social & Danny Karell (smartly not online!) osf.io/preprints/so... The lit on genAI is sprawling and mostly not in sociology. Our goal is to synthesize core themes relevant to sociologists. +

GENERATIVE AI AND SOCIETY
Laura K. Nelson,
Daniel Karell,
and Thomas Davidson

ABSTRACT
For sociologists, generative AI inherits the legacy of earlier computational technologies: it is an advancement of machine learning already adopted as a methodology, and it intervenes in a society already shaped by algorithmic systems. Yet it also has a dimension that distinguishes it from previous computational methods, and one that makes it inherently sociological: its interactivity. In this review, we conceptualize the interactivity of generative AI and introduce a framework for understanding how it operates across individual, organizational, and institutional life. Specifically, the framework specifies how generative AI expands users, functions as a proxy for society, and expresses power,
both in sociological practice and in society. We conclude by suggesting three dynamics driven by generative AI that sociology will face in the near future: the transformation of scientific practice, the reorganization of social interaction, and the acceleration of algorithmic governance.

Keywords: generative AI, interaction, computational sociology, methods, algorithms, algorithmic governance

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 13/06/2026

This guy gets it

“Trump is, on the one hand, placing a curtain over the inner workings of the administration,” Moynihan told us. “At the same time, he’s making one of the few sources of that information, which is civil servants, more and more vulnerable to punishment. What that means is we’ll see less and less about abuses of power being publicly reported.”

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Rebecca Solnit @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social · 11/06/2026

NYT is always "progressives should abandon their principles! Sell out! Sell out! SELL OUT!" This is something you will constantly find at the NYT, a piece dressed up as a news article that is editorializing frantically for a political position, not neutrally presenting the facts.

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/11/climate/democrats-climate-change-oil-gas.html

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Jennifer Ouellette @jenlucpiquant.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

Scientists ejected from diabetes conference for distributing journal reprints of editorial critical of the Trump administrations's ongoing attacks on science. Those ousted included ADA journal editor-in-chief Steven Kahn and former ADA president Desmond Schatz arstechnica.com/science/2026...

arstechnica.com

Scientists ejected from diabetes conference for distributing journal reprints

Those ousted included ADA journal editor-in-chief Steven Kahn and former ADA president Desmond Schatz...

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 15/05/2026

New piece in Science: Sudden elimination of USAID grants triggered waves of violence in affected regions in Africa, undermining civic governance and fueling civic unrest. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

science.org

Aiding peace or conflict? The impact of USAID cuts on violence

Less than a week after its inauguration, the second Trump administration issued a blanket stop-work order for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the largest national human...

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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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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

@jakemgrumbach.bsky.social kicked off a debate about the focus on polarization fed a failure to understand the nature of how power is being used in America. I think an equivalent problem with the commentariat is a focus on culture war stuff, the desire to punch left.

I think there is an equivalent problem in the commentariat. We are living in an era of unprecedented concentration of wealth and power, an era of extraordinary democratic backsliding. When I read blogs on Substack or op-ed pages, this is featured, but not with the sense of frequency and alarm one might expect. People have set up entire new media operations on the premise that now, now is the perfect time to punch left. Or now is the time to argue that wokeness is the reason for the backlash we are seeing. People should write what they want, but at some point these perspectives are simply failing to engage in real criticism of power or defend American democracy.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

New from @pamherd.bsky.social and I: Trump has added work requirements to Medicaid, expanded them in SNAP. Now he is going after public housing. You can do something about it: take 5 mins to write a public comment opposing this change. Instructions enclosed.🧵 donmoynihan.substack.com/p/the-trump-...

donmoynihan.substack.com

The Trump plan to add work requirements to public housing

Here is something you can do about it

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Jae Yeon Kim @jaeyeonkim.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

New from me. Teaching is an act of care: jaeyeonkim.substack.com/p/teaching-i... I’ve been thinking about how to end the course I taught this semester (The Politics of Public Policy) in a way that actually matters.

jaeyeonkim.substack.com

Teaching Is An Act of Care

How to End a Course So It Stays With Students

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Alondra Nelson @alondra.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

Every day brings a new AI product, use case or outcome. But one method endures for knowing what these systems actually do and to whom: auditing. Thrilled to share my new coauthored book, Auditing AI-a roadmap for accountability across this dynamic terrain #openaccess mitpress.mit.edu/978026205172...

Auditing AI by the Marquand House Collective

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Amy Siskind @amysiskind.com · 20/04/2026

They are ALL awful. All incompetent, one dysfunctional alcoholic, one playing army like a 12 y-o, one in charge of our nation’s health who stopped on 684 to cut off a raccoon penis, and so on. And yet all three of the firings have been of women.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 20/04/2026

Apparently Sam Altman also wrote a manifesto (on top of Marc Andreessens a while back). Are there others? Genuine question: why do we think the tech bros are doing this? Which need does this fulfill for them?

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Wendy Thurm @wendythurm.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

From new Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Magyar's acceptance speech tonight. This is the absolute BARE MINIMUM platform for any Democrat running for President in 2028.

A series of posts from journalist Mark Chadbourn reporting on the acceptance speech of Péter Magyar after Hungarian elections:

Péter Magyar: "Our country wants to live again. It wants to be a European country again."

Mark Chadbourn• @chadbourn.bsky.social • 24m
Magyar's speech is powered. From a contact in the audience: "He's basically just asked all the puppets, all the supreme justices, all the heads of media, all the heads of the ministries to leave their jobs tomorrow and not wait to be fired."

•..
Mark Chadbourn• @chadbourn.bsky.social • 22m
He's announced that Hungary will join the European Prosecution Office so anyone in the country can be charged.

Mark Chadbourn• @chadbourn.bsky.social • 21m
Magyar: "No mercy, they will need to take responsibility for all their actions."

...
Mark Chadbourn• @chadbourn.bsky.social • 20m
Magyar says he's starting work with the EU and NATO immediately.
"The EU doesn't have to worry anymore."

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Victor Ray @victorerikray.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

This is cause for celebration. May the entire white supremacist international he helped create also fall.

nytimes.com

Hungary’s Orban, Beacon to the Right, Concedes Election Defeat

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sarah jeong @sarahjeong.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

my level of stress has crossed a threshold where i think it would be funny if trump attended the birthright citizenship oral argument and scotus incoherently ruled in his favor 6-3. cortisol levels so high that i can't stop lolling about all my family members in danger. wouldn't it be funny tho

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Catherine Rampell @crampell.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

Only 23% of government workers believe they “can report a suspected violation of a law, rule, or regulation without experiencing retaliation.” That's way down form the share the prior year (72%) who said they could report suspected illegal activity without fear www.thebulwark.com/p/two-more-g...

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 25/03/2026

My colleague @justinwolfers.bsky.social offers a brilliant explainer of the collapse of federal employee workplace conditions, and why you should care about it. youtu.be/LQuzvEkr7vE?...

youtu.be

How Fear and Chaos Costs Taxpayers

YouTube video by Justin Wolfers

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Congress had embedded actors into the executive branch who were meant to maintain basic institutional standards and accountability. The Trump admin's position is that any such positions are unconstitutional and have treated them as such. The Inspector General position is no longer credible.

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Pavel @spavel.bsky.social · 23/03/2026

Simultaneously: - Microsoft bragging that 90% of the code its devs ship is AI generated - Microsoft demanding that its devs burn 10x fewer tokens because it's getting too expensive - Every week brings new and exciting emergency security patches for Windows 11

forbes.com

‘Major Issues’—Microsoft Confirms Emergency Update For Windows Users

Microsoft update breaks Windows — emergency fix suddenly released and available now.

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Timothy Snyder @timothysnyder.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

Americans opposing concentration camps. We are deciding now whether we want to be a country with concentration camps and ethnic cleansing.

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Roger Parloff @rparloff.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

Some Anthropic updates: On 3/4, just hours before Hegseth declared Anthropic a “supply chain risk”—allegedly due to fears of “sabotage” & “data exfiltration”—his under sec’y wrote Anthropic that they were “very close” to a deal, asking to change a prepositional phrase. ... 1/5

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That Film Nerd with the Book @thatmatt.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

"I am instead going to try to set out what happened, which is that I believe Andreessen read a book."

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 16/03/2026

"administrative burdens in disability benefit access were disproportionately borne by people with limited technological literacy and internet access, those with psychiatric, cognitive or communication disabilities, people with unstable housing, and members of mixed-status immigrant families."

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Brendan Nyhan @brendannyhan.bsky.social · 16/03/2026

Endless mafia-style tactics

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John Pfaff @johnpfaff.bsky.social · 16/03/2026

This is a very, very, quite surprisingly dead canary in Stephen Miller’s coal mine. I’d say the violence and cruelty of ICE/CBP is most definitely a kitchen table topic if this is where the backlash is reaching.

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Aaron Reichlin-Melnick @reichlinmelnick.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

We don’t have any info on these new facilities but I expect detention bed costs will be something closer to $300/day than $200/day.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

Holy shit - this would be very, very bad: "The databases, called “Numident” and the “Master Death File,” include records for more than 500 million living and dead Americans, including Social Security numbers, places and dates of birth, citizenship, race and ethnicity, and parents’ names."

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Marisa Kabas @marisakabas.bsky.social · 06/03/2026

SCOOP — Body camera footage obtained as a result of my lawsuit against the DC Metropolitan PD confirms DOGE and the Trump administration openly admitted they were entering private property when they raided the building on March 17, 2025. That didn't stop MPD from breaking down the doors. My report:

thehandbasket.co

Police body cam footage shows DOGE knew Institute of Peace was private property during raid

Footage obtained by The Handbasket’s lawsuit shows a hostile takeover on March 17, 2025.

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Claire Zagorski, PhD, MSc, EMT-P @clairezagorski.bsky.social · 04/03/2026

Different angle, showing the lead-up:

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Asha Rangappa @asharangappa.bsky.social · 25/02/2026

Please read this article to the end. Even before ICE got involved, this started because this *blind man who speaks no English and uses a curtain rod as a walking stick* got lost on a walk and some Karen called the police on him and they tasered and beat him bc he didn’t drop the rod. WTF

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Timothy Snyder @timothysnyder.bsky.social · 25/02/2026

Our federal government killed a disabled genocide survivor and is covering up for a child rapist. And that is just today’s news. It is just unconscionable to be treating this as normal or acceptable in any way. www.investigativepost.org/2026/02/25/b...

investigativepost.org

Blind refugee abandoned by Border Patrol dies in Buffalo.

A nearly blind refugee abandoned by Border Patrol miles from his home dies in Buffalo after having been missing for nearly a week.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 18/02/2026

Honestly curious if anyone has done messaging on Trump’s parsons-for-cash scheme because it is leagues beyond what any previous president had done

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Cyd Harrell @cydharrell.bsky.social · 17/02/2026

hi friends, I’m about to be low internet for the next week or so!! I would love it so much if you could tell your amazing Bay Area Eng leader folks about this job, which closes 2/24!! that way when I get back to my inbox it will be full up with lovely applications 🙏🏻❤️

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Sarah J. Jackson @sjjphd.bsky.social · 15/02/2026

Someone has sure already made this observation but the fact they can convert all those empty warehouses into prison camps means they could have converted them into housing, community centers, job training centers or, hell, libraries or schools all along. It’s always a matter of will not resources.

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Per Engzell @pengzell.bsky.social · 17/02/2026

Problem about the loneliness epidemic is, it's everywhere except in representative survey data. Let's look at where the claim comes from. 1/

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Mike Hixenbaugh @mikehixenbaugh.com · 14/02/2026

“I’ve never seen federal agents so out of control and acting in such a malicious manner,” a former federal prosecutor and federal judge said. “They said they were going after ‘the worst of the worst,’ then they became the problem. Read this by @jonschuppe.bsky.social & @natashakorecki.bsky.social

nbcnews.com

Broken bones, burning eyes: How Trump's DHS deploys 'less lethal' weapons on protesters

Federal immigration officers have repeatedly used force in ways that appear to violate their own policies or general policing guidelines, NBC News found.

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Loren DeJonge Schulman @lorenraeds.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

“We need not lose faith in the administrative state itself; we would do better to view it as having functioned with its hands tied tighter and tighter. But we are now starting, particularly in the climate and energy space, to hit real limits.” At @scientistsorg.bsky.social fas.org/publication/...

fas.org

An Argument for Renewing the Administrative State

The American administrative state, since its modern creation out of the New Deal and the post-WWII order, has proven that it can do great things. But it needs some reinvention first.

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 12/02/2026

This is a very good open source resource on the variety of ways that DOGE damaged government:

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Chloe N East (she/her) @chloeneast.bsky.social · 09/02/2026

New @nber.org paper with @caitlinpatler.bsky.social & @elizabethacox.bsky.social out! We examine how ICE arrests differ in Trump 2.0 vs. 1.0 Key Findings 🧵 1) MANY more arrests in Trump 2.0 than 1.0 2) When arrests spike, % arrested w criminal conviction falls www.nber.org/papers/w3479...

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