Reposted by Rob FarrowMollie Katzen @molliekatzen.bsky.social · 29/09/2026There are more Cornell frat boys accused of raping one woman than there are trans athletes competing in all of NCAA sports. 121089325
Reposted by Rob FarrowShannon Vallor @shannonvallor.bsky.social · 24/09/2026It is a profound indictment of most media coverage of Big Tech that your best bet for getting an informed understanding of AI and its dangers is following a decently curated list of Bluesky shitposters 1030686
Reposted by Rob FarrowDr. Chinasa T. Okolo @chinasa.bsky.social · 21/09/2026"If Anthropic, OpenAI, and other AI giants want to keep referring to themselves as labs, they should adhere to scientific best practices: open-sourcing code, preregistering studies, and, most important, subjecting research to independent peer review." www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...theatlantic.comThere’s No Such Thing as an AI ‘Lab’The term lends an air of scientific rigor to what are really billion-dollar corporations. 06222
Reposted by Rob FarrowBen Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 19/09/2026Many out there want to treat AI in education seriously. Then there's this from *Napster*. "Trained on a teacher’s material, courses, and papers, these digital twins will live online, becoming a 'copy of yourself that you can then use to scale your time.'” www.wired.com/story/napste...wired.comNapster Is Back, and It Wants to Digitally Clone TeachersOnce the music industry’s biggest headache, Napster’s next act is bringing AI to the classroom. 32613
Reposted by Rob FarrowNeil Turkewitz @neilturkewitz.bsky.social · 18/09/2026“A Microsoft executive called the training of AI models the ‘largest theft of labor in human history.’ In another instance…that same executive called it ‘an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions.’” @gerritd.bsky.social @scottnover.bsky.social 👀 @kint.bsky.socialwapo.stMicrosoft exec called AI the ‘largest theft of labor’ in history, court records showThe quote headlined an unsealed document in the New York Times’s copyright case against Microsoft and OpenAI. 094
Reposted by Rob FarrowTyler King @tyleraking.com · 17/09/2026“A senior executive at Microsoft said A.I. systems built on the work of others will be seen as ‘an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions’ and possibly the greatest robbery of labor in human history, according to court documents unredacted Thursday in an ongoing Manhattan lawsuit.”orlandosentinel.comDocs in A.I. copyright suit reveal startling admission by Microsoft exec over ‘astonishing theft’The admission appeared in a newly unredacted filing in the landmark copyright infringement legal battle playing out between newspapers like the Orlando Sentinel and tech companies Microsoft and OpenAI... 9555432156
Reposted by Rob FarrowJason Kint @kint.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Eye popping. Court just unsealed Summary Judgment motions in New York Times v OpenAI / Microsoft. Easy to see why the AI companies had so many redactions (pink). Their own people wrote the lede for NYT, the "largest theft of labor in human history"... "more and more substitutive..." /1 4253422317
Reposted by Rob FarrowDavid Ho @davidho.bsky.social · 12/09/2026I resigned from ExxonMobil today. I spent the last three years doing fossil fuel extraction research at both BP and ExxonMobil. Neither company is acting responsibly. They are racing to maximize extraction while the window to act closes, and gambling with our lives. More below. 145136954892
Reposted by Rob FarrowErik Angner @erikangner.com · 12/09/2026The Prime Minister of Sweden 🇸🇪 Ulf Kristersson just dismissed my colleague Åsa Wikforss – Professor of Theoretical Philosophy at Stockholm University, Member of the Swedish Academy and the Royal Academy of the Sciences, and celebrated author of numerous books – as "princess" 🧵 3219127
Reposted by Rob FarrowRobert Paulett @robertpaulett.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Seriously, what percentage of the current economy is basically people pointing a (metaphorical) gun at higher ed and demanding money? 33811
Reposted by Rob FarrowAugust J. Pollak @augustjpollak.bsky.social · 11/09/2026A reminder that evangelical doctrine, up to and including the wildly popular Left Behind book series where the Democratic president essentially does exactly this, has for decades insisted this is how the antichrist will reveal himself. 17925287
Rob Farrow @rfarrow.bsky.social · 11/09/2026CFP: Open education principles between the tension of humans and machines in the Generative AI era Smart Learning Environments, deadline 30th December 2026. Share with your friends in #AI, #openeducation, #OER, #OEP, #OEGlobal26, #OpenEd26, #edtech, #aied etc. link.springer.com/collections/... 021
Reposted by Rob FarrowEryk Salvaggio @eryk.bsky.social · 10/09/2026I've added a glossary to my website to consolidate the themes I have been working with across various pieces over the years in a single place with concise definitions, clarifications, and links, all in citable formats. www.cyberneticforests.com/glossary-of-...cyberneticforests.comEryk Salvaggio: Critical AI & Culture | Glossary — Cybernetic Forests.Stochastic Flocks, Systems From Nowhere and other citable terms for describing AI systems without borrowing from cognition, by Eryk Salvaggio. 34518
Reposted by Rob FarrowTimnit Gebru @timnitgebru.blacksky.app · 10/09/2026Guys but it's the fictional machine god that needs to be regulated and that we should worry about. prospect.org/2026/09/09/a...prospect.orgAnthropic Is Building a Predictive Surveillance System to Monitor Activists - The American ProspectNew hires and comments in interviews show that the AI giant is using its capabilities against dissenters. 623397
Reposted by Rob Farrowsepoy @sepoy.bsky.social · 09/09/2026This is an insane detail in this report on cheating! nymag.com/intelligence... 122955
Reposted by Rob FarrowThe Author, Séamas O'Reilly @seamas.bsky.social · 08/09/2026Have seen this Nature piece about the effects of X's algorithm mentioned again and it bears repeating; exposure to a right wing algorithm makes you - measurably and predictably - more right wing, even after you stop using it. www.nature.com/articles/s41...nature.comThe political effects of X’s feed algorithm - NatureAmong users initially on a chronological feed, 7 weeks of exposure to X’s algorithmic feed in 2023 shifted political attitudes and account-following behaviour in a more conservative direction compared... 4239361777
Reposted by Rob FarrowPavel @spavel.bsky.social · 09/09/2026Imagine if you just gave mathematicians 22 million dollars 141598359
Rob Farrow @rfarrow.bsky.social · 08/09/2026On its 60th anniversary, thanks to #startrek for popularising the concept of fully automated luxury gay space communism 110
Reposted by Rob FarrowMaia @maiamindel.bsky.social · 07/09/2026i am a tech company from 2026. i am called nazgul after the evil soulless gouls from the lord of the rings that go around killing people. i have no viable products and no profits. my ceo is a crazy drug addict who keeps talking about war and jesus christ on tv. give me a trillion of your tax dollars 126256
Reposted by Rob FarrowTimnit Gebru @timnitgebru.blacksky.app · 07/09/2026Speaking of plagiarism: www.scientificamerican.com/article/open...scientificamerican.comOpenAI’s latest math breakthroughs commit research misconduct, experts sayOpenAI released 10 AI-generated results over the weekend. Some mathematicians are unhappy with their approach 12958393
Reposted by Rob FarrowJohn Oxley @joxley.jmoxley.co.uk · 06/09/2026So in one week: 1) Reform get stung for dodgy finances, and the regulators play pass the parcel about enforcement 2) Farage announces plans to largely dismantle independent scrutiny of govt, and barely any press discussion of it 3) Masked thugs blockade a port, with narry a word from senior govt 491821642
Reposted by Rob Farrow✨ˢᵗᵒⁿᵉᵈ // STAR WARS✨ @stonedstarwars.com · 05/09/2026George Lucas. Prophet. 1395
Reposted by Rob FarrowSaloni @scientificdiscovery.dev · 05/09/2026This is interesting. You get assigned to being born at a random place and time in history, to see what a typical person's life might have been like then. Unfortunately I was born in 1403 in the valley of Mexico and died at age 4 from dysentery.anyhumanever.comAny Human EverOne life, drawn at random from all who have ever lived. 54547188
Reposted by Rob FarrowFinancial Times @financialtimes.com · 02/09/2026The US Department of Justice claimed that limiting OpenAI's ability to train its models using millions of articles would 'hinder American prosperity and economic mobility'. ft.trib.al/uHc3dvZ 184516
Reposted by Rob FarrowRoss Johnson @rosserford.bsky.social · 26/08/2026We’re going to hear about how everyone loved Dolly, and that feels true. But it’s good to remember, and to her credit, that she was attacked for her AIDS activism, her vaccine advocacy, her LGBTQ+ support and even, more recently, for her reading initiatives. She ALWAYS stood firm when it mattered. 326301906759
Reposted by Rob FarrowEvan Greer @evangreer.bsky.social · 25/08/2026posted in the lefty folk group chat 43246789
Reposted by Rob FarrowDeidre Lynch @drbibliomane.bsky.social · 17/08/2026I got tired of waiting for the journalists at @theharvardcrimson.bsky.social to cover this (it IS summer), but this is to say that ALL the staff members in Women & Gender Studies here were laid off last week, on the top of the cutting of 5 lecturer positions in the program last year.+ 21920551
Reposted by Rob FarrowFereshte Goshtasbpour SFHEA @gfereshte.bsky.social · 17/08/2026Join us to earn a PG Cert in Researching Digital Education while preparing a PhD or EdD proposal or an application for a funded project! Alternatively, you can earn the certificate and continue on to our MA in Online Teaching (@oumaot) www.open.ac.uk/postgraduate... #digitaleducation #CPD #OUMAOT 014
Reposted by Rob FarrowEmanuel Maiberg @emanuelmaiberg.bsky.social · 17/08/2026We put a tracking device in a shipment of rare books acquired by an anonymous buyer. It ended up at an Amazon facility where the company scans books for training data and destroys them in the process: www.404media.co/we-tracked-a...404media.coWe Tracked a Shipment of Rare Books. It Ended at an Amazon AI Training FacilityWe placed a tracking device in a shipment of rare books to see which AI company was buying it, and found an Amazon facility where Amazon scans and destroys books. 391572915
Rob Farrow @rfarrow.bsky.social · 14/08/2026My news is that I have been promoted to full professor at The Open University. I will take up the title of 'Professor of Critical Educational Technology' in reflection of my disciplinary trajectory and distinctive approach to research. Grateful to all those who helped on the journey! 3151
Reposted by Rob FarrowMichael Clemens @mclem.org · 12/08/2026Incredible. When E—n M—k & his crew obliterated USAID in a weekend, they deleted a vast trove of publicly-funded knowledge: the Development Experience Clearinghouse. A Canadian high school student (!) happened to have downloaded the entire thing for a project. AidData has now posted it for all.aiddata.orgBefore reimagining development data, remember what we’ve learnedWhy we’re publishing a free, searchable, and ungated archive featuring a quarter-century of USAID evaluation reports. 374442808
Reposted by Rob FarrowShannon Mattern @shannonmattern.bsky.social · 13/08/2026“In the 1990s + 2000s, gov’ts, uni’s, + libraries—the institutions that historically bore responsibility for organizing + preserving public knwldg—declined to, or were prevented from, bldg the digital infrastructure plainly required by an age when democracy seemed ascendant + universally desirable”bostonreview.netWhat Was the Internet?As AI overtakes the web, five writers reflect on how far it’s fallen and what comes next. 215954
Reposted by Rob FarrowHypervisible @hypervisible.blacksky.app · 12/08/2026This is actually what chatgpt is for.futurism.comHomeschool Parents Are Planning Lessons With ChatGPT, Which Will Churn Out Anti-Evolution Curriculums With No PushbackHomeschooling was already a fraught practice, even before parents began turning to ChatGPT to plan out their lessons. 1325675
Reposted by Rob FarrowAras Bozkurt @arasbozkurt.bsky.social · 11/08/2025Must-read alert! A Critical Scholarly Conversation with Tony Bates: Insights on the Future of Online and Distance Education w/ @openpraxis.bsky.social www.researchgate.net/publication/...researchgate.net(PDF) A Critical Scholarly Conversation with Tony Bates: Insights on the Future of Online and Distance EducationPDF | This scholarly conversation features Dr. Tony Bates, a leading voice in educational technology, discussing the future of online and digital... | Find, read and cite all the research you need on ... 032
Reposted by Rob FarrowLee West @whodat35.bsky.social · 07/08/2026WTF? Amazon received a permit from the state of #Texas allowing its new gas power plant to emit 33 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere — the largest single source of pollution in the United States. newrepublic.com/post/214111/...newrepublic.comAmazon Is Creating the Biggest Pollution Source in the Entire CountryAmazon has bought a site in Texas where it plans to build a data center campus. 78087355647
Reposted by Rob FarrowSamuel Moore @samuelmoore.org · 07/08/2026It's funny that Elsevier can simply retract *650* papers because of "compromised peer review, authorship irregularities, tortured phrases and citation manipulation" and then Clarivate are satisfied and hand out an impact factor.retractionwatch.comClarivate removes hold on mega-journal Heliyon after internal audit, 650+ retractionsClarivate has lifted its hold on Heliyon after the journal’s internal audit led to over 1,000 retractions, expressions of concern and corrections. As a result, the journal will receive an impact fa… 11610
Reposted by Rob FarrowBen Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 06/08/2026Looks like if you're one of the 300miliion who ever took a MOOC with Coursera or Udemy, your data just got turned into assets for Andrew Ng's latest "AI native" edtech "personalized learning" scheme, which Coursera just invested $100m in. investor.coursera.com/news/news-de... 912878
Reposted by Rob FarrowBen Ansell @benansell.bsky.social · 01/08/2026Glad someone senior from the sector is pushing back. Labour MPs need to understand the serious real anger from graduates and the people who produce them. And the dangerous financial situation they have allowed to fester, or indeed worsened, in one of Britain’s leading sectors.ft.comLabour has harmed universities as much as Trump, London School of Economics head saysLSE vice-chancellor Larry Kramer points to domestic student fees freeze, international student limits and rise in employers’ national insurance 9671278
Reposted by Rob FarrowPat McGovern @patmcgovern.bsky.social · 01/08/2026Came across the Jason Arday affair at the end of a bad week for #sociology Still reading the details but let say that I have great regard for Martyn Hammersley’s work and especially his efforts to raise standards in qualitative research. retractionwatch.com/2026/07/27/c...retractionwatch.comExclusive: News outlet killed story on plagiarism allegations after Cambridge prof hired law firmJason Arday In September 2025, Times Higher Education had a bombshell story in the works: A star sociology professor at the University of Cambridge had allegedly plagiarized parts of his Ph.D. thes… 041
Reposted by Rob FarrowSamuel Moore @samuelmoore.org · 01/08/2026This post and the accompanying paper are worth reading. There is definitely an interesting lineage of open science that leads from philanthro-capital to present-day "gold standard science", but it's also worth pointing out this is only one lineage in a pretty complicated genealogy of open research. 1106