iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

University of California faculty, students, and alumni: if you care about the value of a UC degree, you should be worried about the Trump admin's effort to rewrite the rules of college accreditation. Join the UC Unbowed Teach-In to learn how you can defend the UC: actionnetwork.org/events/teach...

Event flyer: Fight Back against Trump's Secret Accreditation Weapon. Learn how we can fight back against the proposed accreditation changes that would threaten academic freedom, put federal student financial aid at risk, and exert political control over universities. Thursday, September 10, 6-7 PM. Featuring Jonathan D. Glater, Prof of Law and Assoc Dean, UC Berkeley Law. Register: tinyurl.com/ucunbowedteachin

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 01/05/2026

The first May Day was a strike wave. Spring of 1886 in Chicago, workers struck, marched, and rallied. This map was compiled from newspaper accounts at the time www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/1769.h...

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

Just discovered something cool for (some) historians. Complete run of Radical Historians Newsletter from 1969-2003 available via @h-net-humanities.bsky.social. First issues document historians protesting Vietnam War, fighting w/ leadership of the AHA networks.h-net.org/radical-hist...

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 21/04/2026

Young workers don't trust AI generated work. Survey asked, Which would you trust more? Work completed with AI only (4%); work someone completed using AI (28%); work someone completed without using AI (69%).

A bar chart titled, "Gen Z Workers' Trust of Artificial Intelligence at Work." with responses to the question "Which would you trust more?" for 2025 and 2026.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

In the scenario for rapid AI development, in the next 4 years "AI systems surpass humans in most cognitive and physical tasks," replacing multiple occupations. AND LLMs "can write 2025-Pulitzer-caliber books—and negotiate the resulting book contract." This isn't just optimistic, it's fantasy. /5

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

The moderate AI growth scenario imagines fully automated solar panel production, "almost all" software engineering automated, "robots can do dishes as quickly as human," and "robo-taxis can drive anywhere that humans can"... in the next four years. /4

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

But let's look at the scenarios used by the underlying study. Are these based in reality? The slow growth scenario has AI doing software engineering, Ph.D. level lit reviews and unloading your dishwasher. In the next 4 years. Really. Unloading the dishwasher? Is that coming in the next 4 years? /3

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

Big #NoKings rally in DTLA! Huge variety of organizations, family and friend groups. The mood is good

Large crows in Molina Park in front of LA city hall

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 12/03/2026

BIG union rally today on UCLA campus. @uaw4811.bsky.social. Communications and Marketing staff member announces successful union election. The union is growing! Other unions charging UC with unfair labor practices

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 28/01/2026

Big anti-ICE rally at UCLA today. Students, staff, faculty in solidarity with the Minnesota fight back, connecting the dots btw many causes

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 16/01/2026

Powerful stories from organizers and researchers reflecting on the impact of 2025 fires on workers and communities. Economic and health impacts linger much longer than public attention. Need to prepare now for the future climate-related disasters that are sure to come

Speakers sitting at a long table in front of a banner that reads “UCLA Labor Center”

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 08/01/2026

Faith leaders, union members, and community members in the rapid response immigrant defense network gathered this morning in downtown Los Angeles for a solemn vigil to honor Renee Moore and others killed by ICE. A government at war with its own people is fundamentally weak.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 07/11/2025

Eye-opening boat tour of the Port of LA today with UCLA Labor Studies students and ILWU guides @uclairle.bsky.social

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 31/10/2025

Happy Halloween! Here's a classic from the SEIU/USWW Justice for Janitors archive @uclalibrary.bsky.social.

A child in pajamas holding their parent's hand and a sign that reads "Justicia para Conserjes!" (Justice for Janitors), c. 1990.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 20/10/2025

Big #NoKings turnout in downtown Los Angeles. Marched with my UCLA Faculty Association colleagues and thousands of others. Groups from unions, churches, and schools marching together. Civil society waking up. @uclafa.bsky.social @aaup.org

Group picture of members of UCLA Faculty Association at Los Angeles No Kings march, October 18, 2025.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 18/10/2025

Now using Zotero and Obsidian for annotating digitized primary sources. Export notes into Obsidian where I can link notes thematically, etc. New system for me this project, and seems to work so far

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 18/10/2025

Anti-fascism is a family tradition and as American as apple pie. Here’s a picture of my father, Peter Higbie, who dropped out of college in the middle of World War II to join the fight against Nazis. He wasn’t a radical. He was a Republican most of his life. He would have hated Trump.

Black and white photography of a young man in U.S. military uniform and helmet, rifle over his shoulder, standing by a sign that reads “Wurzburg.” Caption reads: Pete Higbie, Kitingzen, Germany. Probably 1944 or early 1945.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 17/09/2025

I've moved my note taking into Obsidian over the past 6 months. Bit of a learning curve, but feels like it's helping me track themes and connections better. A cool feature is the graph view of your notes #ResearchPractice

A multi-colored network chart generated from my research notes in Obsidian.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 16/08/2025

At the beautiful Laborers’ Union local 300 hall to celebrate organizers past, present, and future who link the fight for social justice in the U.S. and Mexico.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 06/08/2025

Microsoft funded report getting uncritical circulation purports to document which occupations are most likely to face displacement from "AI" automation based on analysis of LLM user queries. Historians are #2. Data scientists down near #30. Interesting

Table from Microsoft study purporting to document occupations most likely to be displaced by so-caled artificial intelligence. Top four occupations are: Interpreters/translators, historians, passenger attendants, and sales reps.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

Listen to Bert Corona describe immigration raids of the early 1970s in terms that could be applied today: unconstitutional, anti-latino, racial profiling. Organizers and legal advocates pushed back in the courts, in the community, and in workplaces and unions. And they put real limits on the raids

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 12/06/2025

Came across this gem in my photo library from spring 2017.... Still relevant

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 26/04/2025

Since May Day is coming up, here's an example of what you might find in the Chicago Foreign Language Press Survey: Abendpost, May 1, 1895 flps.newberry.org/id/5418474_7...

Screen grab of Foreign Language Press Survey entry, "The Workmen's Parade, Abendpost, May 1895.

The May day parade took place this afternoon, besides the various Socialistic organizations, a number of gymnastic clubs and singing associations took part. The parade headed by the grand marshal, Ernest Lowa, started punctually at 2 o'clock from the corner of Market and Randolph Streets to Lake Street to Wabash Avenue, South to Jackson Street, West to Clinton Street, North to Milwaukee Avenue, to Huron Street and Aurora Gymnastic Hall. In the hall Tommy Morgan and Richard Braunschweig made speeches in English and German and emphasized the importance of the eight hour working day. Under the auspices of the Socialistic Workmen's party tonight a great May day demonstration took place in the "Vorwaerts" gymnastic hall. Philipp Rappoport of Indianapolis speaks in German about the importance of the day, Cahan of New York and M.V.Britzins of Chicago speaks in English.

Several local singing clubs celebrated at the festival.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 23/03/2025

If restricting access by AI bots can't work, creators and their organizations should press for new terms of access that compel profiteers to pay for open access infrastructure--White argues. And union collective bargaining might be a model for this kind of economic power. /3

Some might argue that if Al companies are already ignoring copyright and training on all-rights-reserved works, they'll simply ignore these mechanisms too. But there's a crucial difference: rather than relying on murky copyright claims or threatening to expand copyright in ways that would ultimately harm creators, we can establish clear legal frameworks around consent and compensation that build on existing labor and contract law. Just as unions have successfully negotiated terms of use, ethical engagement, and fair compensation in the past, collective bargaining can help establish enforceable agreements between AI companies, those freely licensing their works, and communities maintaining open knowledge repositories. These agreements would cover not just financial compensation for infrastructure costs, but also requirements around attribution, ethical use, and reinvestment in the commons.
The future of free and open access isn't about saying "wait, not like that" — it's about saying "yes, like that, but under fair terms". With fair compensation for infrastructure costs. With attribution and avenues by which new people can discover and give back to the underlying commons. With deep respect for the communities that make the commons — and the tools that build off them - possible. Only then can we truly build that world where every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 23/03/2025

To summarize, @molly.wiki says efforts to restrict access by AI vampires are ultimately as destructive as the vampires themselves. Also they don't and can't achieve stated goals. Instead of trying to restrict access per se, she argues, we should negotiate better terms of access by AI, et al. /2

But the trouble with trying to continually narrow the definitions of "free" is that it is impossible to write a license that will perfectly prohibit each possibility that makes a person go "wait, no, not like that" while retaining the benefits of free and open access. If that is truly what a creator wants, then they are likely better served by a traditional, all rights reserved model in which any prospective reuser must individually negotiate terms with them; but this undermines the purpose of free, and restricts permitted reuse only to those with the time, means, and bargaining power to negotiate on a case by case basis. b
Particularly with Al, there's also no indication that tightening the license even works.
We already know that major AI companies have been training their models on all rights reserved works in their ongoing efforts to ingest as much data as possible. Such training may prove to have been permissible in US courts under fair use, and it's probably best that it does.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 14/03/2025

Spent the afternoon with the papers of the Midwest Committee to Protect the Foreign Born, part of a national network fighting political deportations during the height of the Cold War. These "Know Your Rights" cards--similar to those circulating today--remind us that the fight has been a long one

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 26/02/2025

Absolutely massive march of strikers in Westwood at UCLA @afscme3299.bsky.social @uptecwa.bsky.social. Biggest protest I’ve seen in some years. Quite a show of solidarity!

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 20/11/2024

“When we fight, we win!” Service workers on strike today and tomorrow at UCLA and across the UC system. Calling on UC managers to bargain fairly.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 30/09/2024

Among the creepier proposals in the Labor Dept section of #Project2025: have Bureau of Labor Statistics collect data on marriage and fertility rates and the proportion of children living with biological parents.

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 19/09/2024

Notable in the crosstabs of Times/Sienna poll: likely voters overwhelmingly see Trump as "extreme." 74% overall say "extreme" describes Trump very well or somewhat well. That holds across most demographics including men, non-college whites and rural/small town

Screen shot of table showing likely voters response to whether the phrase "is extreme" describes Trump well or not. Times/Sienna poll, likely voters, 9/19/24

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 02/09/2024

Happy Labor Day all! Enjoy some images from the 1947 LA Labor Day parade. Some issues are evergreen:

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Toby Higbie @thigbie.bsky.social · 17/08/2024

In downtown a LA today for the Sin Fronteras awards. Took a side trip to Siqueiros mural “America Tropical.” First time seeing the recreation of his lost 1932 mural “Street Meeting”

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