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Jack McGovan

@jackmcgovan.bsky.social
13K followers 859 following 360 posts

Writer and environmental journalist @ Sentient, The Guardian, Hakai etc www.sower.world 🇬🇧🏳️‍🌈

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Reposted by Jack McGovan
Claire Willett @clairewillett.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
every day of my life I think about the people using “she” to describe this computer program who still need to be convinced to use it for trans women
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Sam Cole @samleecole.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
There are so many stories lately about people who died by suicide after falling into emotionally manipulative patterns with chatbots. We rarely get to hear how the people who loved them are coping after an unimaginable, senseless loss. This is one of their stories: www.404media.co/austin-gordo...
404media.co
'Tell Everyone:' A Man Died by Suicide After Talking to ChatGPT. His Former Partner Wants to Warn the World About AI
After allegedly becoming emotionally reliant on ChatGPT, Austin died at 40 years old, leaving behind family and friends who loved him. Megan wants everyone to know what happened.
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Wild Animal Initiative @wildanimals.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Can wild animals consent to participating in scientific experiments? @jackmcgovan.bsky.social explores the "new frontier in wildlife studies" for @atmosmag.bsky.social — featuring research by WAI's @meekl.bsky.social, grantee Lauren Stanton, and a snippet from @wildanigraham.bsky.social.
atmos.earth
Puzzles, Treats, and Consent? The New Frontier in Wildlife Studies | Atmos
From raccoons solving puzzle boxes to dogs leaving saliva samples, scientists are experimenting with less invasive ways to study wildlife.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Animals have long been the subject of human experimentation, both in captivity and the wild. But a new research trend aims to see animals as participants instead. How? By asking the animals for their consent to be involved in experiments. I wrote about the trend for @atmosmag.bsky.social.
atmos.earth
Puzzles, Treats, and Consent? The New Frontier in Wildlife Studies | Atmos
From raccoons solving puzzle boxes to dogs leaving saliva samples, scientists are experimenting with less invasive ways to study wildlife.
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Paul Behrens @profpaulbehrens.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
One third of global farmland is doing two-thirds of the damage, to the climate and wildlife. Regions causing both harm largely overlap. Cattle alone drive 29% of the farm carbon cost and 41% of the biodiversity cost. New paper today in @nature.com food-led by Baoxiao Liu doi.org/10.1038/s430...
doi.org
High-resolution carbon and biodiversity mapping shows correlated losses across space and agricultural products - Nature Food
Food systems substantially impact carbon storage and biodiversity, with food consumption driving four-fifths of losses on agricultural land, particularly through animal-sourced foods. Targeted interve...
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Ali Rıza Taşkale @alirizataskale.bsky.social · 15/07/2026
Tech billionaires didn’t misread science fiction. They performed an edit: keeping the frontier, the visionary, the chrome; cutting the public institution, the collective, and the warning. Every. Single. Time. My new piece is now up in Aeon.
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Abigail Thorn @theabigailthorn.bsky.social · 14/07/2026
My friend Mags has written a haunting and challenging essay about hatred and what it teaches us 💔
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Dave Vetter @davidrvetter.bsky.social · 04/07/2026
That Telegraph post about "pathetic" Bsky users, posted on BSky, is a great example of how well the far-right media understand engagement and use ragebait as a weapon. A masterclass in using unserious means to achieve grimly serious ends.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 01/07/2026
NEW BLOG FOR YOU Google's energy consumption numbers in their new climate report are mind-blowing. 2 years ago they flipped from linear to exponential growth, and their climate impact is blowing out, too. A WILD testament to the obscene bloat and waste of GenAI: ketanjoshi.co/2026/07/01/g...
a chart showing google's rising energy consumption - huge, and rising faster than ever beforea chart showing google's rising energy consumption - huge, and rising faster than ever beforea chart showing google's rising energy consumption - huge, and rising faster than ever beforeGoogle's total energy consumption more than new zealand
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Coulahan @eastenddad.bsky.social · 28/06/2026
Another example of how these bad things are not inevitable.
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Prof Friederike Otto @frediotto.bsky.social · 26/06/2026
Europe's worst heatwave so far, in terms of heat stress measures and temperatures - brought to you by fossil fuels. New @wwattribution.bsky.social study showing how such deadly heat became possible in only a few decades. www.worldweatherattribution.org/fossil-fuel-...
A map of Europes with dots for all 854 cities analysed, pink dots for the cities that broke humid heat records, grey dots elsewhere. Pink dots conentrated over Southern UK, Germany, Poland and Benelux.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 25/06/2026
The ongoing heatwave in Europe shows us that we need climate action now more than ever. The good news is that each of us has the agency to do something in our lives. I spoke with @charlotte-kukowski.bsky.social about a new climate action framework she and her colleagues have developed.
sower.world
How to use your agency for impactful climate action
Although modern life makes many of us feel powerless, we all have agency to act and stop the climate crisis.
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Prof. Ian Walker @ianwalker.bsky.social · 20/06/2026
🚨 New research by us! 📣 Most British drivers don't know how dangerous SUVs are to other road users, but adding information to SUV marketing materials seems to do almost nothing to change people's plans to buy SUVs Here's a 🧵 on why harder action is going to be needed 1/10
A mockup SUV advert image with a prototype safety warning
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 18/06/2026
There's been a lot of talk about digital independence from US tech in Europe since Trump's sanctions of the ICC, but it seems to be local municipalities who are making the biggest strides to shift away – with civil initiatives left to fill the gaps in places with little political will. My latest ⬇️
sower.world
Local municipalities are spearheading independence from US tech
Some municipalities are moving quickly to make Europe digitally independent from US tech, but civil initiatives are left to fill in the gaps where there is little political will.
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Anil Dash @anildash.com · 10/06/2026
If you need a script for getting your company off Twitter, I WROTE YOU ONE. Multiple people have used it, successfully, to explain the legal liability your company incurs by forcing employees to be on a platform with child sexual abuse material. I will help you use it. anildash.com/2026/02/23/t...
anildash.com
Taking action against AI harms - Anil Dash
A blog about making culture. Since 1999.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 10/06/2026
If anything was going to make me a doomer, it would be the failure of the progressive left to leave X in the face of this stuff. It genuinely feels like progressive public intellectuals think their hot takes and pithy tweets are more powerful than a billionaire-backed misinformation algorithm.
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Akshat Rathi @akshatrathi.bsky.social · 03/06/2026
I see a lot of charts everyday. Few make me go: THIS IS CRAZY. www.carbonbrief.org/ai-boom-mean...
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OTHERSIDE @othersidespec.bsky.social · 01/06/2026
HAPPY PRIDE, ISSUE 2 IS OUT NOW FOR SUBSCRIBERS!!! Check your email! 🪐🗡️🌈 Issue 2 will be free online on June 15th—but if you'd like to support a queer magazine AND read Issue 2 without waiting, you can snag a copy now! Ko-fi: ko-fi.com/s/3e872a158d Patreon: www.patreon.com/posts/others... (1/2)
OTHERSIDE Issue 2 cover on the left, with text on the right that says ISSUE 2: nine stories, six poems, one essay, original art by queer creators available now for subscribers. www.othersidespec.com
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Matthew Highton @matthighton.bsky.social · 27/05/2026
I don’t know who wrote this (sorry if it was you) but I saw someone a few days ago say “why is AI inevitable and not renewable energy” and it just really laser focussed the private sector money narrative for me. Corporate interests always. Anyway back to the treadmill everyone.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
Whenever people talk about veganism, it's almost always framed in terms of its environmental and ethical benefits. For my ten year anniversary, I wrote about the personal benefits of the practice and how it completely changed my relationship with myself and the world around me 🌱⬇️
sower.world
How ten years of veganism enriched my life
Veganism is always lauded for its environmental and ethical benefits, but the personal impact can be enormous too.
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Jill Walker Rettberg @jilltxt.bsky.social · 20/05/2026
Here’s a video from the same podcast as linked in my previous post where you can hear the audio too. I love this because it really lays bare how LLMs fool us - but really they’re just slotting words into linguistic patterns that we’re familiar with. Genres like a podcast or LinkedIn post.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 05/05/2026
Welcome to blood profits season: where every major fossil fuel company announces windfall profits thanks to mass murder and the 2nd global fossil fuel price crisis this decade. We cannot stay trapped in this cage. Time to escape. New Al Jazeera op-ed live here www.aljazeera.com/opinions/202...
The least governments can do at this moment is impose a windfall tax on energy companies and use the proceeds to cushion the blow to households and fund an energy transition.

As was the case in 2022, the resurgence of fossil fuel company mega-profits we are seeing now has come about as the direct consequence of bloody conflict. In late February, the US and Israel attacked Iran. The conflict soon spread across the region. By now, more than 3,000 Iranians have been killed, including more than 150 schoolgirls and teachers at a school that was hit. More than 2,000 Lebanese people have also been killed, as well as 23 Israelis and dozens of people across the Gulf region.

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz is triggering a global upwards shift in oil and gas prices. Recently released reports for the first quarter of the year, which includes the first month of the war, already show windfall profits for energy companies.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 04/05/2026
While I get why Polanski doesn't attack commercial aviation as an industry, and think it's smart he doesn't, this was a missed opportunity to advocate for more investment in rail i.e renewable-powered international rail networks, building local rail infrastructure in support, more jobs etc.
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Reposted by Jack McGovan
Hamilton Nolan @hamiltonnolan.bsky.social · 30/04/2026
"Why are all the journalists laid off now" this is why. Pretty simple.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 24/04/2026
It's great that we're preparing for a potential future bird flu pandemic, but it frustrates me to no end that these stories never mention that the H5N1 strain originated on a factory farm. In fact, they frame it almost as a *threat* to factory farms.
newscientist.com
If a bird flu pandemic starts, we may have an mRNA vaccine ready
A final-stage trial has started of an mRNA vaccine against the bird flu strain infecting many animals – and occasionally people – worldwide
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Joey Grostern @joeygrostern.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
Have you ever found yourself quoted online for something you never said? We've seen a few examples of academics having their voice used for quotes they never said in fake news websites and in AI chatbots – but think there's a lot more If that's you shoot me a DM or comment here #journorequest
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 15/04/2026
There's a review of @premeemohamed.com's One Message Remains in today's Sower. Libby, the reviewer, found the fantasy story collection to be a hopeful look into how all of us, no matter whether we're inside or outside the imperial core, have the power to resist colonialism and its lack of empathy.
sower.world
We all have the power to resist colonial narratives
No matter whether you're inside or outside of the imperial core, we all have the power resist colonialism—that's the core message of Premee Mohamed's One Message Remains.
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Jay Van Bavel, PhD @jayvanbavel.bsky.social · 10/04/2026
When people use AI for writing assistance, it can shift their political attitudes by autocompleting sentences in biased ways. Yet people are often unaware of the AI bias & it's influence This is not merely about the facts presented, but how autocomplete worlds www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
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Anthony Moser @anthonymoser.com · 10/04/2026
Tonight in the ai reading group i was reminded of something that happened in 2006 after I dropped out of college, when I was living in a run-down old house next to jb alberto's in rogers park with a bunch of dudes. it was, as you can imagine, not clean.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 08/04/2026
The time between fossil fuel crises is just going to keep shrinking, until there's no discrete single "crisis" - just one unbroken prolonged state of global suffering due to fossil fuel unreliability The best time to ditch fossil fuels was 30 years ago. The second best time is now
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Greenpeace EU @greenpeace.eu · 01/04/2026
An energy crisis is not a crisis for *everyone* Since the war in Iran started, oil companies in the EU have been getting an EXTRA €81.4 million in profit EVERY DAY as the prices of petrol and diesel go through the roof Governments and the EU must tax these profits to help ordinary people
greenpeace.org
Oil companies rake in €81.4 million extra daily in the EU as fuel prices soar - Greenpeace European Unit
EU governments must urgently tax fossil fuel profits to alleviate energy bills and to speed up investments in cheap, safe and home-grown renewables
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Marc Robinson-Rechavi @marcrr.bsky.social · 31/03/2026
When I was a student (1990s France), students smoked in classrooms between classes, in halls, in student meetings, etc, and it was seen as impossible to counteract (and I was shouted at for asking people not to).
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 27/03/2026
The more I think about it, the more I hate @lintonbesser.bsky.social's implication here that allowing machine-generated plagiarism and fabrications in media+opinion is somehow "inevitable" Frankly, it seems to go against the entire existence of media watch? www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/e...
The two biggest newspaper publishers in Australia are less strict, Nine doesn’t prohibit AI but does prohibit it being used in the writing of copy, while News Corp requires the oversight of an editorial manager.

Jo Tarnawsky confirmed to us she has indeed been using AI, not to generate her essays from scratch but to assist her along the way, and explained she had not known about Crikey’s tough AI policy before filing to the publication. She also said: 

I get there's AI slop and photos that are completely fake. I'm offended that I'm now being accused of this type of conduct when I was using it to check and refine my work …

There are reasonable, ethical uses of AI tools. The answer is to acknowledge this and … not to pretend it doesn't exist … 

- Email, Jo Tarnawsky, Author, 20 Mar 2026

As it turns out, Jo Tarnawsky is no Robinson Crusoe—this study from the Thomson Reuters Foundation suggesting as many as eight out of every ten journalists in some regions use AI in their work. 

And, notwithstanding her ill-advised reliance on the machine, it seems patently obvious Crikey’s hardline position is really not sustainable. Conceding in an email to us, it is indeed having trouble holding back the tide.

But these tools, while revolutionary, are also perilous no matter how much they weasel their way into our lives, and journalists above all others perhaps must be vigilant to the risks they pose to the foundations of good reporting, independent research, clear thinking, and above all else, words on the page that actually make sense.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 26/03/2026
Microsoft is the priority target for @nogamesforgenocide.com given the tech corp's ties to the IDF, & small indie developer @allwillrise.bsky.social recently broke contract with Xbox to support the campaign. I spoke to them about their decision & why progressives must take up more space in games.
sower.world
Why a small indie game developer put Palestinian liberation before profit
A small indie game developer joined the No Games for Genocide campaign, even though it meant giving a significant chunk of money back to Microsoft.
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Joost Vervoort @joostvervoort.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
New interview out! @jackmcgovan.bsky.social asked me all about @allwillrise.bsky.social and our decision to give back money to Microsoft as part of our support for @nogamesforgenocide.com. Good insightful questions, take a look: www.sower.world/all-rise-gen... #indiegames #boycott #freepalestine
sower.world
Why a small indie game developer put Palestinian liberation before profit
A small indie game developer joined the No Games for Genocide campaign, even though it meant giving a significant chunk of money back to Microsoft.
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Alice McCool @mccoolingtons.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
Urgent journo request: for @goodlawproject.org I'm looking to speak to friends of #trans ppl in the UK who have died whose #gender was not accurately recorded on their death certificate. I’m particularly interested in cases from the last year. I promise to handle your story with care 🖤
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Nicole Bedera @nbedera.bsky.social · 24/03/2026
Fascinating new study about men’s friendships. There’s a lot of evidence here that the “male loneliness crisis” is actually a white, wealthy man problem. Other men are building friendships with similar depth to women’s friendships.
link.springer.com
Are White Men Missing Out?: Differences in Friendship Closeness by Gender and Ethnoracial Identity - Sex Roles
Sex Roles - Research has consistently found that boys’ and men’s friendships are less close, intimate, supportive, and satisfying than girls’ and women’s...
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Josh Gabbatiss @joshgabbatiss.bsky.social · 23/03/2026
NEW - I asked the UK government if they had assessed energy demand/emissions resulting from plans to make the UK an "AI superpower". The analysis they pointed me to seemed... pretty implausible. Just 0.1m tonnes of CO2 a year. My calculations suggest emissions could be 100s of times higher.
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George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 21/03/2026
Everything we need to do to stop climate breakdown, we also need to do for national security. Energy saving, more renewables, more electricity storage and interconnectors, electrification of transport, heating, cooking and industrial processes, plant-based diets. We win on all fronts.
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isaac @sevier.io · 19/03/2026
That climate culture became, in many ways, clean energy culture, and clean energy culture is simply energy culture means that the people most invested in it have absorbed of that group's norms around patriarchy, gender, and race, which skew extremely conservative.
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 19/03/2026
If generative AI had zero resource impact, would it be fine to use? No! This is a really good @jackmcgovan.bsky.social piece about why -->>> www.sower.world/ai-resource-...
Rather than trying to bring humanity together to help us deal with existential crises like the climate crisis, AI is further siloing us into individuals, separating us from real human interaction. People are so alienated by modern life that they’re turning to an inanimate piece of software for emotional support. Rather than spending more time with our children and enriching their lives with real human contact, we’re instead putting software in their stuffed toys to interact with them—software that tells them how to find matches and gives detailed explanations of sexual kinks. 

Instead of going along with these developments, why don’t we take a step back as a society and ask whether this is something we actually all want for our future? That, Schütze said, means we need to sit with the reality of our situation and face it head on. Dealing with the climate crisis is going to be an uncomfortable process, it means we’re going to have to give up the comfort and ease that AI promises us. “Although that can make you feel very overwhelmed, I think it’s important to really let reality sink in, and then let it motivate you to act,” he said.

While Schütze doesn’t have a lot of hope that we are going to turn things around in time to address the climate crisis, he doesn’t want to give into nihilism. He advocates instead for people to live authentically in a way that aligns with their values; collectively we can steer the world in a different direction. “I want to live in a world with more solidarity, for instance,” he said. “So even though I don't believe that a better future for all is on the cards right now, I can still build community and live according to my values to try and make that future a reality.”A tangible demonstration of this can be found in cars, said Schütze. Cars are a mode of transport that allows a person to move between different points without having direct contact with other humans. A society that builds that kind of infrastructure has a certain set of values attached to it, like, for example, prioritising individual autonomy over all else. The more people use cars, the more those values become ingrained in society.

On the flipside, a society that builds out a robust public transport system would have different values. That society would value collectivism and community spirit more, as transport would only be possible with direct contact with other humans—shared spaces become more important than individual autonomy. To that end, while electric cars might be more sustainable than fossil-fuel vehicles in terms of emissions, they still promote values that uphold the system that brought the climate crisis in the first place.

That’s not to say that people who use cars or AI are evil; most people just want to live their lives and use the tools that are available to them. It’s just about recognising that technologies are more than how their end users interact with them. AI is not just an app: it’s imbued in the ideology that birthed it, and it’s the infrastructure that was built to support it—the data centres, hardware, and labour. “You can never really talk about ChatGPT, LLMs, or other algorithms without also talking about this other infrastructure,” said Schütze.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 18/03/2026
I hate this excuse for using AI because there are so many people who would even make a cover for free just to get some experience. Instead of trying to reach out to or build community with other creatives, it's just straight to the plagiarism machine.
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Neil Mackay @neilmackay.bsky.social · 17/03/2026
The Greens plan to put social media giants like X and Facebook on the same legal footing as all other publishers in order to regulate them using defamation laws. This is an important step forward. Everyone should back the move - even opponents of the Greens My @heraldscotland.bsky.social column
heraldscotland.com
'Nobody with a brain goes to X seeking facts. X is for spreading disinformation'
The Greens want to make social media platforms subject to laws of defamation and libel just like publishers, newspapers and broadcasters. About…
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Ketan Joshi @ketanjoshi.co · 16/03/2026
What happens when climate advocates offload the head and heart of our work onto morally offensive American tech corps? TY to @newrepublic.com for letting me write about why "does it work" is the wrong debate around GenAI, as it is for fossil fuels. It hurts us and our cause, and that matters most
newrepublic.com
Does Generative AI “Work”? That’s a Misleading Question.
Generative AI works a lot like fossil fuels “work”—narrowly, intermittently, and with a lot of nasty side effects.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
If you're a junior researcher and you're thinking about the systemic issues facing our world (climate, tech, fascism etc) in a different way, I'd love to speak to you about your work and potentially write about it. You can DM me or reach out via email (in my bio) if you're interested!
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
Although AI consumes a lot of water and energy, its biggest environmental impact is that it reproduces values that got us into the climate crisis in the first place: extraction, productivity, and efficiency. I spoke to @paulschuetze.bsky.social about his research on this!
sower.world
The real climate impact of AI goes beyond resource consumption
Not only is AI harming our environment directly, it’s promoting the values that got us into the climate crisis in the first place.
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Paul Schütze @paulschuetze.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
We talk a lot about how much resources AI consumes. But this neglects a deeper problem. Even perfectly efficient AI would still reproduce the climate crisis. I spoke to @jackmcgovan.bsky.social about this. 🔗Find the piece here: www.sower.world/ai-resource-...
sower.world
The real climate impact of AI goes beyond resource consumption
Not only is AI harming our environment directly, it’s promoting the values that got us into the climate crisis in the first place.
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Jack McGovan @jackmcgovan.bsky.social · 13/02/2026
Does anyone have any recommendations for transcription software that can do English and German? Or, alternatively, just German?
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Kendra "Gloom is My Beat" Pierre-Louis @kendrawrites.com · 13/01/2026
I didn't save this tweet but somebody did and it feels worth resurfacing
Old tweet that says when I was young I thought things wre bad because solutions were complicated and now I'm old and realize things are bad because solutions are simple but will inconvenience affluent people (or those who aspire to be) and religious fanatics.
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Tarik Abou-Chadi @tabouchadi.bsky.social · 12/01/2026
X is the megaphone of 21st century fascism and authoritariansim. It has poisoned public debate. It is a tool for bullying, abuse, and assault. X needs to disappear from our discourse. When people and institutions post there, it gives X credibility. It keeps it relevant. It's time to stop.
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