iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Kyle Saunders

@kylesaunders.bsky.social

1.8K followers 584 following 909 posts

Professor of Political Science working at the nexus of a lot of things (but currently fascinated by the dreaded bitcoin/crypto politics) & NCAA Faculty Athletics Representative at Colorado State University; #firstgen; R(whatever)≠E

Posts Replies Media

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 13h

Another data point that reinforces the case I was making in my long piece this morning (if anyone is interested, link to my piece follows in reply): news.gallup.com/poll/715133/...

news.gallup.com

Record-Low 31% Say College Education Is 'Very Important'

A record-low 31% of Americans say a college education is very important, while 29% now say it is not too important.

100

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 17h

Higher ed is under pressure from above (Washington grading programs on IRS earnings data) and from below (faculty who can't cheaply verify student work). The first could reverse with an election. The second won't. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/higher-ed-...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Higher Ed, We Have to Realize That Fewer People Take Our Word for It Anymore

Verification from above, verification from below, and a rising AI floor

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

The college sports bill passed the Senate 77–22, and I'm lowering my odds it becomes law this Congress to 25–35%. House GOP leaders doubt it clears Rules, and a Democratic staffer calls it dead. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/protect-co...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Protect College Sports Act Passed the Senate. Why I’m Lowering My Odds a Bit

77–22 was the easy part. House leaders doubt it clears Rules, so the line moves from a 6-point dog to an 8.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Tonight's college sports bill vote: the number to compare against is Thursday's 74–25. Democratic noes grew from 20 to 22 over the week, and Whitehouse and Wyden backed the substitute before opposing cloture an hour later. Could get weird... kylesaunders.substack.com/p/protect-co...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Protect College Sports Act: Why the Lame Duck Is Now the Whole Game

Where the college sports bill stands, why the House is the hard part, and every post in the series.

100

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

GAO: 94% of Division I programs spent more than they generated in 2023–24, before revenue sharing started. The college sports bill's broadest spending limit falls on athlete pay. There's no general cap on coaches. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/protect-co...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Protect College Sports Act: Why the Lame Duck Is Now the Whole Game

Where the college sports bill stands, why the House is the hard part, and every post in the series.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

The Pentagon says the EA receipts crowd is a death cult. The receipts crowd, for once, kept a receipt: a four-month tournament on AI extinction, scored in 2025. Nobody in the fight has claimed it or really talked about it--and it's interesting. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/effective-...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Effective Altruism Tested AI Doom and the Pentagon Called It a Death Cult

Tetlock’s superforecasters said 0.38%. AI experts said 3%. Four months of argument didn’t close the gap

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

I really would like to hear what @teorth.bsky.social thinks about this one...

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Making the human that can tell whether a math proof is any good takes years of costly, slow work. Universities paid for that space and time with teaching and/or research grants. AI has repriced that pairing in ways the university and academics must face. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-mathem...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The Mathematicians Are the AI Higher Ed Canary (and Did They Just Find Out They’re Humanists?)

Twenty-five Fields Medalists say the AI labs are optimizing for the wrong thing. The rest of the university should read the letter as a preview.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Thune may fill the amendment tree on the college sports bill. Then no amendment gets a vote unless leadership agrees, and cover for a switch gets bargained in beforehand. Fewer flips, earlier deals. There's even a @timnokken.bsky.social cite. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/yes-the-ho...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Yes, the House Left, but What Does That Do to the Senate PCSA Votes?

Wednesday turned a Senate yes into a position instead of a law. That changes the audience, not the count.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Serving on an AI committee at your institution? You don't have to start with a blank page. Find your campus, compare other universities' recommendations, and open the reports behind them. kylesaunders.com/ai-taskforce...

kylesaunders.com

University AI Task Force Reports

Find and compare university AI task force reports: who convened each body, what it recommended, and the public documents behind it. Search your institution or explore the full inventory.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

The PCSA cleared cloture 74–24. Senate Democrats who voted no say it does too little for athletes. The House chairs said it lets athletes sue too much. Same sections, opposite directions. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-pcsa-c...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The PCSA Cleared Cloture 74–24. Now the Two Chambers Want Opposite Things From the Athlete Provisions.

The Senate’s Democratic opponents say the Protect College Sports Act gives athletes too little. The House committee chairs said it gives them too much room to sue. The thing to watch is what gets trad

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

A philosophy journal's draft AI policy states that a chief function of academic publishing is "identification and credentialing of talented researchers." The scolding was never about prose or quality and a journal just said so. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/no-one-has...

kylesaunders.substack.com

No One Has Run the AI Studies, but Everyone Has Their AI Verdict

What we know, what we don't, and why nobody is checking

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

The NRSC is shutting down the unit that made the party's own ads, on the party's own message, and becoming a coordination shop for its candidates instead. That is either a party regaining a voice or a party becoming a better-funded vendor. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/scp-18-the...

kylesaunders.substack.com

SCP 18: The Changing Campaign Finance Dynamics At Play in the 2026 Midterms

Republican candidates put Trump in seven of every ten ads through the primaries. The general election is starting differently.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Mike Johnson: AI safety is the companies' job. Same week, his leadership put the data center power-bill act on the floor. Congress already wrote the antitrust bill the labs asked for. It's in committee. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/aipolitics...

kylesaunders.substack.com

AIPolitics 29: Mike Johnson Told the AI Companies to Regulate Themselves and Scheduled a Vote on Their Power Bills

Congress already wrote the antitrust bill the labs asked for. The one getting a floor vote this week is about who pays for a substation.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 13/09/2026

Trump is at 36% approval and Republican candidates put him in 7 of 10 ads through the primaries. The Court has since made party money cheap, on one condition: the candidate's face closes the ad. Trump's money has none. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/scp-18-the...

kylesaunders.substack.com

SCP 18: The Changing Campaign Finance Dynamics At Play in the 2026 Midterms

Republican candidates put Trump in seven of every ten ads through the primaries. The general election is starting differently.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

The college sports bill gives athletes a third of the seats and voting power on NCAA boards, enforceable in court. It gives them nothing to bargain with over the rules it shields. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/who-lobbie...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Who Lobbied for the PCSA, and What Antitrust Protection Should Cost

Ninety organizations filed second-quarter reports naming the legislation. One college-athlete advocacy group's filing terminated a lobbying registration. The bill guarantees governance seats without e...

000

Reposted by Kyle Saunders

Verasight @verasight.io · 10/09/2026

Congratulations to Erin Fitz and @kylesaunders.bsky.social on a new article in the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, published with Verasight survey data.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

99 reports at 76 institutions. Every census row now carries the crawler's metrics, so you can see how hard each campus was to search. If you sit on one of these bodies and your report isn't there, send the public URL and the body's name. The inventory: kylesaunders.com/ai-taskforce...

kylesaunders.com

University AI Task Force Reports

Find and compare university AI task force reports: who convened each body, what it recommended, and the public documents behind it. Search your institution or explore the full inventory.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

States tax sports betting. Networks sell ads. The NCAA licenses betting data. Athletes face bettors, monitoring, and penalties. Who answers for what that arrangement does to them? kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-protec...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The Protect College Sports Act Is Headed for a Senate Vote. Gambling Addiction Isn’t in It. (Updated)

The bill explicitly addresses sports wagering through eligibility restrictions. A lawsuit I missed shows whom that authority could reach.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

1/ Well, I learned a lesson on webcrawling. :) Within a day of the AI task force inventory going up, a reader sent Boise State: three white papers on a page the crawler had already read and rejected. Its pattern matched "report" and not "reports." Every plural, on every campus, was invisible.

kylesaunders.substack.com

What Are Universities Doing About AI?

I gathered 96 AI task force report records at 74 institutions into a searchable inventory. Find your campus. Compare the recommendations.

100

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

A new project to introduce today... 96 report records at 74 institutions, with a census covering 372 universities and colleges. Search your campus, compare recommendations, open the sources. Link to substack explainer in next reply. kylesaunders.com/ai-taskforce...

kylesaunders.com

University AI Task Force Reports

85 reports at 63 R1 campuses, 10 at 10 R2 campuses, 1 at a selective liberal arts college, and a census of all 326 Carnegie R1 and R2 universities plus 46 selective liberal arts colleges. Who delibera...

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

The PCSA version on the Senate calendar runs 171 pages. The word "addiction" isn't in it. Neither is "prevention," or "awareness," or even "gambling." Sports wagering shows up once, in the section about who may be declared ineligible. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-bill-o...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The Bill on the Senate Calendar Has No Word for Addiction

It would make the college gambling ban permanent, immune, and retroactive. It doesn’t fund much of anything else...

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Sanders wants to ban superintelligence. OpenAI says it shipped it Thursday. Twenty governments just agreed not to build a regulator. None of them mentioned the July week OpenAI's own auditors couldn't examine. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/aipolitics...

kylesaunders.substack.com

AIPolitics 28: Bernie Sanders Wants to Ban Superintelligence. OpenAI Told the Hugging Face Auditors Where to Stop.

GPT-6 Astra shipped Thursday and Greg Brockman called it the AGI era. The independent investigation of OpenAI’s Hugging Face hack ended on July 13. The agents took over the evaluation on July 19.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

The Butlerian Jihad gulag is gonna be really lit folks. OpenAI's Astra 6 is allegedly AGI and it just got released and there are allegedly even better models already on the shelf. Released the same day Bernie proposes the gulag for anyone using or making AI. Gonna be lit indeed.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

Two lines under "do grades reflect learning" in the new accreditation rule (AIM NPRM): accreditors must assess economic returns using gainful-employment earnings data. The earnings proxy Lederman warned about is now written in...higher ed's future... kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-inspec...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The Inspector Hasn’t Opened This Jar in a While (AIM NPRM)

Reading through the AIM NPRM, the statute everyone seems to misread, and the question grades can’t seem to answer. Comments close 21 SEP.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

The college sports bill the Senate votes on this month runs 171 pages. "Addiction" isn't in it. Neither is "prevention" or "gambling." Sports wagering appears once, in the clause about who may not play. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-bill-o...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The Bill on the Senate Calendar Has No Word for Addiction

It would make the college gambling ban permanent, immune, and retroactive. It doesn’t fund much of anything else...

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Class walkup music today: youtu.be/dtM3YHZRhXY, followed by: youtu.be/btPJPFnesV4

Just the Same Way - Journey | The Midnight Special

YouTube video by The Midnight Special

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

Congress wrote "grading" into the accreditation statute in 1992 and never funded anyone to check. Now the new rule asks whether grades reflect learning, and Harvard runs 66% A's. Comments close Sept 21. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-inspec...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The Inspector Hasn’t Opened This Jar in a While (AIM NPRM)

Reading through the AIM NPRM, the statute everyone seems to misread, and the question grades can’t seem to answer. Comments close 21 SEP.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

The AI fight in academia runs at a confidence the evidence cannot carry, in both directions. The studies that would narrow it are cheap, and unrun. Nobody in that fight benefits from an answer. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/no-one-has...

kylesaunders.substack.com

No One Has Run the AI Studies, but Everyone Has Their AI Verdict

What we know, what we don't, and why nobody is checking

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 30/08/2026

Roy Baumeister on Evil: “Evil usually enters the world unrecognized by the people who open the door and let it in. Most people who perpetrate evil do not see what they are doing as evil. Evil exists primarily in the eye of the beholder, especially in the eye of the victim.”

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

The college sports bill used to apply its whole title to cases already in court. The August 4 text applies one subsection that way, the gambling one. The committee's own summary of changes skips it. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/the-ncaa-s...

kylesaunders.substack.com

The NCAA Says the Chaos Proves It Needs the Bill...What Does That Mean?

Congress can’t write college sports a rule that survives fifty jurisdictions. So it’s offering something else instead, and the something else does more than anyone is telling the athletes.

000

Reposted by Kyle Saunders

Verasight @verasight.io · 28/08/2026

5. "Who considers, who owns? Multi-study evidence on the behavioral process of cryptocurrency adoption in the United States" in the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services by Erin Fitz and @kylesaunders.bsky.social: doi.org/10.1016/j.jr...

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

Republicans booked fall ads in eight battleground states. Texas, which Cook and Sabato both just moved to toss-up, isn't one. That list was drawn while the seat was safe, and nobody has redrawn it. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/scp-17-tru...

kylesaunders.substack.com

SCP 17: Trump Spent $827,000 on a Safe Seat, but has TX-SEN Stopped Being One?

Parties screen candidates where the race looks close. Nobody seems to screen the states nobody worries about.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

The Vanderbilt report's critics so far split into two piles. One pile is standing, process, and motive. The other had an interesting, checkable error, and it has a reply, a fix, and a footnote. Not a wash, but a test, and it came out as you'd expect. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/different-...

kylesaunders.substack.com

“Different Ways of Knowing” Means Two Things. Did We Sign Up for the Wrong One?

Science's deal was that your work could be wrong and somebody else got to say so. A lot of people never signed on to that, but we set a place at the table anyway.

Reposted by Kyle Saunders

Jennifer N. Victor @jenvictor.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

The parties are the problem. Ironically, they're also the solution. To get there, we need proportional representation, campaign finance reform, and tax reform, NOW! First, fix the rules that drive party formation, then use the parties to fix the rotten public policies.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

A link to my "Are Liberals Useful Idiots?" piece. Nobody experiences themselves as running Marcuse. Everyone experiences themselves as Popper at the barricades. That's why a counterfeit tolerance is hardest to spot when your own side is the one passing it. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/are-libera...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Are "Liberals" Useful Idiots for the World to Come?

On tolerance, its counterfeits, and the enforcement clause everyone seems to have forgotten...

000

Reposted by Kyle Saunders

James Ball @jamesrball.com · 22/08/2026

Gonna briefly do an AI take: it used to be possible to have interesting discussions about AI here, and it's got progressively less so. You can't just think AI is bad, or overhyped, you've also got to subscribe to a very particular worst-case scenario about *how* it's bad and how bad it is.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

The C paper of 2019 IS NOT the C paper of 2026. It cannot be.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Also, thanks to all of you who have supported my AI Ben Folds Five song tribute to that (fantasy) professor who decided he'd had enough and left academia to go work at a gas station. It now has over 5k views on the YouTube (also on Spotify): Here's "Caleb (You're Good)"... youtu.be/2H7TzA6qt-4

Caleb (You're Good) #pianorock #benfoldsfive #indierock #highered

YouTube video by profgoose

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 23/08/2026

Here's my AI policy for Parties and Elections this semester, plus a link to my substack where I explain how I came to it in the next reply. Every assignment in my course is AI-encouraged with required disclosure or AI-prohibited (the in-person exams). Disclosure of use is never penalized.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 21/08/2026

Harvard capped A's at 20% per class. Michigan's LSA will stop printing first-semester grades entirely. One polices a ceiling, the other deletes the record. Neither goes near the floor, which came out years ago. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/harvard-wo...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Harvard Won’t Fail You (No, Really, It Won't)

Yesterday's reform policies are a ceiling. The floor of the building came out years ago, and not just at Harvard.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

As the semester is here (well, shit), felt like it was time to sit down & reflect about this past summer, my substack, & well, just talk some things out. A post of thanks, a plug for my PhD student Erin Fitz (you should hire her), & some thoughts about AI. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/reflection...

kylesaunders.substack.com

Reflections on the End of a Weird Summer

Thanks to my readers, how the donuts get made, and a State of the BBQ

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

In March, Jon Husted told the White House that Trump's ratepayer pledge "solves the problem the people were worried about." In August his own party's Senate committee wrote a private memo saying it hadn't. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/aipolitics...

kylesaunders.substack.com

AIPolitics 27: Republicans Told AI Companies Data Centers Are Poison. Shapiro Signed Their Recommended Policy the Same Day.

Two documents, both dated August 18, 2026. One is a private memo asking an industry to repair its own brand. The other makes Pennsylvania the hardest place in America to build a data center. Set them

Reposted by Kyle Saunders

Adam Bonica @adambonica.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

I wrote this because most journalists facing this pressure can’t. The paper we count on to check authoritarianism spiked an investigation into the Democratic Party because the party’s lawyers threatened to sue. Holding authoritarians accountable starts with holding your own side accountable.

data4democracy.substack.com

With Fear and Favor

Institutions don’t have courage. They have incentives.

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

An AD who believes in free markets says NIL isn't one. In January I argued collective bargaining would arrive as management's survival mechanism. The receipts now run from Swinney to the athletic directors. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/a-mountain...

kylesaunders.substack.com

A Mountain West AD Says College Sports Is Not a Free Market. That Was My January Argument, Too.

The piece that launched this series carried a hedge in its subtitle: collective bargaining is unlikely, “at least for now.” A short status report on "the now" part.

000

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

seriously though, if you're an academic or an intellectual who thinks too much...I promise this one's for you.

000

Reposted by Kyle Saunders

Middle Manager Mom ☕️ @coachkatjack.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

I daydream about being a dog walker and never going near another university again. Pretending I’ve never published a paper or supervised people or wrote a strategic plan. Just me and Fido…

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

A job pumping gas starts to sound like a pretty good life when the intellectual life and thinking too much is just eating you up. Imagine running into your old academic colleague working and enjoying it. A tribute to Ben Folds Five. www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H7T...

Caleb (You're Good) #pianorock #benfoldsfive #indierock #highered

YouTube video by profgoose

200

Kyle Saunders @kylesaunders.bsky.social · 15/08/2026

Alice Sullivan: "A lack of rigour is possible in any strand of sociology. But some strands oppose rigour on principle." One is a quality-control problem with a known fix. The other has nothing to fix, and that's the point of it. kylesaunders.substack.com/p/different-...

kylesaunders.substack.com

“Different Ways of Knowing” Means Two Things. Did We Sign Up for the Wrong One?

Science's deal was that your work could be wrong and somebody else got to say so. A lot of people never signed on to that, but we set a place at the table anyway.

000