iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 01/10/2026

I want to know how the 13yo changed my contact info on my own phone

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 25/09/2026

My laundry app now offering payday loans

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 04/09/2026

This is driving me UP THE WALL. Do you have a gas-spring monitor arm? The arm is supposed to move, right? Mine will not budge, no matter how many times I turn the tension bolt. Like not at all, not even a hint of loosening. What am I doing wrong?

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 28/08/2026

Never ever apply for a car loan. Or do whatever I did to bring this on.

iPhone Voicemail screen: Voicemail
• +1 (844) 670-2469
I "Hey, Lauren Gallagher calling from Bayview Finance. I'm an..."
5:00 PM
00:59

• +1 (408) 963-0756
• "This is Vivian Walls with an update regarding your financ..."

4:32 PM
00:55

• +1 (559) 216-0991
• "Hey, this is Bonnie over at the Orlando Promotion Center. I j..."
11:31 AM
00:50

• +1 (385) 402-6837
• "This is Vivian Walls with an update regarding your financi..."
Yesterday
00:57

+1 (620) 945-5643
"Hi, this is Edgar Gonzalez. I'm 01:08
calling about your personal lo..."
Tuesday

+1 (855) 390-3151
"Hi Miriam, this is Donna Wood 00:23
with Beacon Financial Relief...."
Tuesday

(i
+1 (780) 484-0593
• "Hello, this call is regarding the 01:09 status of your personal loan..."

Monday

• +1 (310) 410-9504
• "Hi, good afternoon, Marianne.
This is Bianca from counseling..."

Monday 00:20

+1 (872) 799-9201
"This is Elliana Castillo calling you with good news. Hi, this is...

Monday 00:29

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 17/08/2026

Finally dispatched the latest batch of postcards featuring my book cover! If you'd like one (or several), just LMK--I have SO many. Makes great home decor? docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

A hand holds a colorful postcard that reads Seeing Like a Supply Chain: The Hidden Life of Logistics by Miriam Posner. The illustration is a multicolored series of lines that branch out as they descend.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 06/08/2026

I tried so many different terms! I think there's a real phenomenon here and many of us are struggling to find the right word for it.

Handwriting on an index card reads: convenient useful
discrimiatatin
genu. ne
spasmodie
beneficial sporatic profitable munifactured
deliberati
apacity agnogenesis
vacuum
lacuna
ignorance
bolind spot/ binaness
agnosin
blur
Obscurity disreas
hazinass incomprehensibility void
aperture clou darkness shroud

Handwriting on an index card reads:
unintentional secrecy
obdurate secrecy

genuine bur intentional

beneficial agnostiese

opportune aquos

finerional aacity

pragmatic opacity

cavantagions opacity

bevanicige as agnos
profitable
vagues
convenient

advantageous agnosta

adraugeous apertur
местона

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 01/08/2026

Anyway I need to maybe lay off the FB Marketplace because this was supposed to be a beanbag chair for a 6yo.

An enormous pink beanbag chair occupies most of the floor space in a carpeted area.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 31/07/2026

Algorithm thoroughly borked at this point

Alarmingly realistic pig head rests on a sofa. Text: Life Size Pig Head Prop Halloween
$175

Description
Huge detailed pig head prop is made of a rubber or latex material with a realistic tan and brown finish.
It has a metal hook attached to the top... See more

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 31/07/2026

There’s also…this. But you gotta move fast!

Photo shows pile of nondescript light-blue beanbag chairs. Text:
I only have ONE Justin Bieber 's Choachella 2026 After Party Bean...
$200 $400
4 comments
& Like Comment • Save ~ Share
~ Message seller
Hello, is this still available?
Send
Description
One of a Kind VIP Bag Chair from Bieber's Rhode Coachella 2026 After Party
Own a unique piece from the exclusive Bieber x Rhode Coachella 2026 After Party! This VIP bag chair was custom-made in a special color exclusively for the event hosted by Justin Bieber and his wife, Hailey Bieber, for Rhode. This color was never released for retail, making this a truly one-of-a-kind item.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 31/07/2026

All kinds of stuff for sale on LA’s FB Marketplace

A creepy, apparently deteriorating silicon head stares blankly. Text: Silicone heads for makeup or other porpoises
$100

A goofy-looking Martian holds a scepter and wears a crown. MOVIE PROP LIFE-SIZE MARTIAN
THAT LIGHTS UP ONE OF A KIND B...
$3,800

MINIONS THE RISE OF GRU PROMO FOOSBALL TABLE

A man is dwarfed by a huge none depiction of Paul McCartney as seen in Yellow Submarine. GIANT ONE-OF-A-KIND PAUL
MCCARTNEY BEATLES NEON
$2,250

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 10/07/2026

Here's what the UCLA Library page looks like:

"Suggest a Purchase" page for the UCLA Library reads: Suggest a Purchase

If we don't own it, we can purchase it for your research. Use this form to suggest the purchase of non-course reserve materials not already owned by UCLA Library.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 10/07/2026

Libraries put their "purchase request" pages in different places, but often you can get to those pages via the catalog. This is what LAPL's looks like.

"Suggest a Purchase" form for LAPL reads:
Suggest a purchase

To suggest an e-book or digital audiobook title, please use Libby's "Notify Me" functionality. Please note: not all publishers agree to license their e-content to libraries. If a title is not available for the library to license due to publisher restrictions, it will not appear in Libby for recommendation.
E-mail Address
If given, a copy of your submission will be sent to your address.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 10/07/2026

Hey, I have these postcards of my book's cover (by Vera Villanueva for Yale UP). I'd love to mail you one. Will you send me a screenshot of 1) your pre-order OR 2) your (free!!) request that your library purchase the book? And of course an address to mail it to.

Book cover for Seeing Like a Supply Chain: the Hidden Life of Logistics by Miriam Posner shows a colorful arrangement of lines that branch out as they descend.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 06/07/2026

I guess my grandma saved all my thank-you notes

Dear grandma and grandpa: Do you like the picture? It’s what my piggy bank looks like. I don’t put money in it. It just sits on my desk. You might say it’s a decoraition. Well I guess it sort of is. Bye the way

Dear Grandma and Grandpa,
Sunday, August 1st
Hi! We went to the beach today. We had a lot of fun. We found a pit someone had dug, and we made it bigger. Yesterday we went to see the Music Man. I liked it all except the Music Man’s voice. Not his singing voice, his normal voice.
his normal voice. I sounded wicked.
dove,
Miriam K. Posner

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 03/07/2026

My grandfather, the renowned speed typist.

A man in a suit poses in front of a typewriter.

BEN POSNER, renowned speed typist and former holder of the World's Ama teur Typing Championship, has an official International Contest record o 128 net five-stroke words per minute for one continuous hour of writing

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 18/06/2026

This actually seemed to work? I mean, who knows, but

Assignment description on Canvas:
Synthesis Essay

Description here. Please submit your essay as some kind of document I can read. PLEASE don't use AI to write this (limited grammar and spell-checking is OK)—I'll know and it'll make me depressed.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 17/06/2026

Is anyone knowledgeable about pipes? I don’t have a spigot on my patio but I have…these. Do you know what they are? In an ideal world, I’d like to attach a hose to something.

A PVC pipe emerges from the ground, topped by a metal…possibly a cap?

A metal pipe emerges from the ground, topped by what appears to be a plastic cap.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 07/06/2026

Building Power to Win the Future of Higher Education and Democracy: new proposals from @aaup.org. We won’t survive the next few years unless we learn to fight. www.aaup.org/sites/defaul...

2026 AAUP BIENNIAL MEETING
BUILDING POWER TO WIN THE FUTURE OF HIGHER EDUCATION
& DEMOCRACY
FREEDOM
THE 2026 AAUP BIENNIAL IS A TURNING POINT-not only for our organization, but for the future of higher education and democracy in the United States.
Across the country, faculty, staff, and students are living through a steady erosion of our worldclass system of higher education. The principles of academic freedom, tenure, and shared governance are under sustained and coordinated attack from political actors, governing boards, and administrative leaders who seek to interfere in teaching and research, weaken faculty authority, diminish the speech and expressive rights of staff and students, and impose ideological and economic control over colleges and universities. Decisions are handed down from above with little meaningful input.
Departments are reorganized or eliminated. Tenure lines disappear. Budgets are cut while administrative layers grow. Consultants reshape institutions with no accountability to those who teach, research, and learn. Faculty and staff are asked, again and again, to absorb more work with fewer resources, while the core mission of the university is steadily narrowed.
Students are living this crisis as well. They face rising costs, growing debt, fewer course offerings, reduced support, and institutions that are less able to provide the time, attention, and resources needed for deep learning, discovery, and opportunity. What is being eroded is not only working conditions-it is the quality and promise of education itself.
FREEDOM!
DEFEND
HANDS
•EMO-
OFF
ECRACY
These experiences are not isolated or accidental. They are the day-to-day expression of a broader political and economic project—one that has driven declining public investment, rising student debt, the expansion of a low-wage contingent workforce, attacks on academic freedom and shared governance, and the rapid imposition of new technologies without oversight.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 04/06/2026

This book should come with a warning!

A child, her face obscured with an emoji sticker, holds a sign that reads “Dont do homework virtoul protest.”

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 03/06/2026

“Top new release” in globalization? Is that anything? Sounds impressive! www.amazon.com/dp/030025144...

Amazon page for Seeing Like a Supply Chain by Miriam Posner. Label announces it’s a “top new release in globalization.”

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 01/06/2026

Here’s what I said on the author input form.

1. IDEA
Please tell us an idea, a visual metaphor, or any aspect of the book you think is most important in the jacket design.
I have a soft spot for the design of technical manuals from the 1970s, like these. They're also a major primary source for the book.
An early (abandoned) title for this project was "Dendriform Capitalism," since the signature structure of the supply chain is an upside-down tree. I also talk a lot about networks.
I spend a good deal of time in the book discussing the bill of materials, which is called the BOM in shorthand and is expressed in diagram as an upside-down tree. To process the BOM, you say you "explode" it. When globalization ramped up, I talk about the "atomic BOM."
Writers often refer to supply-chain management as the "nervous system" of the business.
Other potentially evocative images that appear in the book: flow chart, factory, container ship, punchcards, black box, circuit, modules, visibility and invisibility, circulation, globe.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 01/06/2026

They started telling me cover edits were final when I started opining about the kerning. (I was HELPING! First image is before; second is after.)

Two images which each say “Miriam Posner.” The image on the left is CLEARLY better because the kerning between the letters of “Miriam” is slightly more distributed.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 29/05/2026

One thing I found particularly offensive about the undergrad ed white paper was the use of the language of "equity" and "literacy" to promote the expansion of AI. Why are we pretending to be stupid? This is from my School's response (with footnotes).

We note, also, that measures like ensuring “equitable access to AI” and “AI literacy” are not
widely agreed-upon, commonsense imperatives but hugely controversial efforts to cast LLMs as
a neutral or even universally beneficial technology. It’s not clear, for example, that the best way
to ensure technological equity is to supply every student with a tool whose biases are deep and
well-recognized.3 Similarly, one might ask if the best approach to “AI literacy” is to encourage
the use of a tool whose effects on cognition are extensively documented and whose interior
workings are opaque by design.4

3 Yufei Guo et al., “Bias in Large Language Models: Origin, Evaluation, and Mitigation,” preprint, arXiv, November
2024, https://doi.org/arXiv:2411.10915v1.
4 Again, this literature is vast and growing, but examples include Jenna Burrell, “How the Machine ‘Thinks’:
Understanding Opacity in Machine Learning Algorithms,” Big Data & Society 3, no. 1 (2016): 2053951715622512,
https://doi.org/10.1177/2053951715622512; Nataliya Kosmyna et al., “Your Brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation of
Cognitive Debt When Using an AI Assistant for Essay Writing Task,” arXiv:2506.08872, preprint, arXiv, December
31, 2025, https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2506.08872.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 29/05/2026

LOLOL "What stood out most was ꜱᴛʀᴜᴄᴛᴜʀᴀʟ ʙᴀᴄᴋ-ᴇɴᴅ ꜱʜɪᴘᴘɪɴɢ ᴛʀᴀᴄᴋɪɴɢ, which feels like the kind of nuance that naturally sparks layered and honest conversation in our group."

Hello Miriam Posner,

I hope you’re doing well.

My name is Aileen, and I’m the founder and organizer of Boozy Bronx Book Club, a 1,400+ member in-person reading community in New York City centered around thoughtful, high-engagement discussions.

I recently came across Seeing Like a Supply Chain, and was especially drawn to its exploration of technological systems of distribution. What stood out most was structural back-end shipping tracking, which feels like the kind of nuance that naturally sparks layered and honest conversation in our group.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 28/05/2026

The Perfect Human Specimen www.sfgate.com/sports/artic...

Photo of a deeply plastic-looking man in a suit holding a mic. Caption:
Max Martin, co-founder and CEO of Enhanced, speaks during a press conference ahead of the Enhanced Games at Resorts World in Las Vegas on May 23, 2026.
Etienne Laurent/AFP via Getty Images

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 23/05/2026

www.theringer.com/2026/05/22/n... jesus THANK YOU

1. "They were blocking my path." Not an excuse!
2. "They were touching my car." Not an excuse!
3. "They disagreed with my politics." Not an excuse!
4. "They were rude to me." Not an excuse!
5. "They kept asking me hard questions and filming me with their phones, and I'm a powerful man who's used to being treated with deference." Buddy! You cannot ram your Cadillac into a pedestrian just because you're an easily flustered rich guy! This is so obvious!
At least, I used to think it was obvious. That was before the president of Cornell backed his car into a group of students and got away with it scot-free.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 22/05/2026

I like to give a little talk about the origins of hustle/grind culture when we talk about labor in my classes and talking about Who Moved My Cheese? is surprisingly useful. Being Sniff or Scurry sucks!!

Slide illustrating the themes of Spencer Johnson’s Who Moved My Cheese? Illustration of 2 mice and 2 people, with a caption reading The 4 Protagonists Which one are you???

Sniff
- sniffs/looks ahead;
anticipates change
Scurry
- scurries ahead and bumps into change
Hem
Haw
"To discuss, deliberate, or contemplate rather than taking action or making up one's mind. (e.g., If you hem and haw long enough, someone else will do it first.)* - Wiktionary

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 21/05/2026

Why would…? What the fuck

A case study at the
National Railway Museum
We will all have our own stories of how this lack of efficiency manifests itself. A recent experience of a friend of mine, whilst trivial in the broad scheme of things, captures the problem.
They were having a clear out at home and decided to dispose of her husband's extensive and vintage model railway set. She noticed that the local branch of the National Railway Museum was having its annual model railway exhibition. This must surely be a good way of getting rid of it.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 20/05/2026

Often think about this article from 1992 hailing the rise of the "system controller" (who will control the tech that replaces manufacturing jobs)

The “Systems Controller,” 1992

“The making of the product is almost completely transferred to the technical system, and the worker's job is to ensure that the system functions as efficiently as possible.”

“This interest in professional education is not politically motivated as it was for the German labor movement of the past, when knowledge was seen as a source of collective power. The systems controllers see education as a source of individual leverage in the labor market, as a way to advance their individual careers.”
“The systems controllers are not natural members of the union movement. It is impossible to mobilize these workers with the traditional argument that the interests of workers are harmed through their subordination to capital and that the union is the champion of the oppressed.”

Horst Kern and Michael Schumann, “New Concepts of Production and the Emergence of the Systems Controller,” in Technology and the Future of Work, ed. Paul S. Adler (Oxford University Press, 1992).

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 19/05/2026

Bleah www.ycombinator.com/blog/scale/

Screenshot: Title reads "Scale is an API for human labor." A photo shows a woman and a man standing behind a Y Combinator sign. Text reads: Scale is an API that lets companies outsource manual tasks. With one line of code, companies can employ a human to do on-demand tasks like data extraction, calls, or categorization. Founders, Lucy Guo and Alexandr Wang, sat down with us to tell us more about Scale.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 17/05/2026

As a side note, I always hated stuff like this as a kid because the thing is, learning is still hard. It will *always* be hard, because it stretches your brain. Dress it up with as many monsters as you want; if you’re learning, it will hurt.

like a video game. As my son indignantly showed me, Prodigy surfaces multiple-choice questions in between cartoon-monster attacks. Correctly identify an isosceles triangle or the square root of 49, and your "Aquadile" or "Bonasaur" - barely veiled rip-offs of Pokémon characters-gets a health boost that will help it fend off your opponent's next salvo.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 15/05/2026

Coming tomorrow to Canvas, if your university subscribes at the Canvas Next tier (IDK what that is either) and your IT department enables "Ignite AI." community.instructure.com/en/discussio...

Sample screenshot from a Canvas page called Lesson Introduction: Introducing Psychology features a sidebar called "Study Tools" that contains a summary of the text on the main page. Caption: The Summarize option displays a summary of the page content [1]. Students can provide feedback using the like and dislike buttons to indicate helpfulness [2].

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 14/05/2026

Absolutely deranged website. Private developers have proposed putting a (controversial!) gondola in LA State Historic Park. This requires a General Plan Amendment, on which comments must be solicited. The "virtual open house" is BONKERS lastatehistoricparkgpa.com/voh/

A nondescript virtual room in which three easels are visible. Each shows a generic photo of a park. They say "Future State Park Approvals and Agreements," "Public Input Process," and "What We've Heard to Date," in English and Spanish.

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 13/05/2026

Good article on i-Ready, the ubiquitous K-12 software everyone hates. I thought this was interesting. www.nbcnews.com/news/educati...

Jeff Lisciandrello, an education sales consultant, said i-Ready's advantage over competing software - such as Renaissance STAR, IXL, NWEA MAP Growth and others - was its user-friendly dashboard for principals and administrators.
"That's a smart business decision because the people who buy things are administrators," he said. "Teachers generally don't make the decision to purchase a particular product, especially one like i-Ready."

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 10/05/2026

Sweet 6yo made me breakfast in bed and it’s butter with cheese on it and now she wants to watch me eat it 😬

Plate contains grapes, strawberries, and a stick of butter cut into pieces with shredded cheese sprinkled on top

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 09/05/2026

Bots are breaking the web. This sucks.

eScholarship
UC Open Access Publications
eScholarship is experiencing performance issues related to extreme levels of unexpected bot traffic.
The service is in
maintenance mode this weekend.
UNDER
MAINTENANCE

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Miriam Posner @miriamposner.com · 08/05/2026

I knew I wasn’t just hallucinating it: Jim Groom talking about “edupunk” from 2012 (!) sites.udel.edu/openteaching...

Photo of a man in glasses showing his fists to the camera. The word EDUPUNK is written on them. Accompanied by text: Quote
I think the problem is not so much credibility as in-credulity: The
greatest scam ever pulled off by "vendors"
was convinc-
ing management that an LMS isn't just a database. The second biggest? That they really needed one. The third? That is is a
"Learning" "Management" System.
- Jane Bozarth, comment to Mark Oelhert's
blog.post

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