The Data Fix with Dr. Mél Hogan

Mundane, with Wendy H. Wong

Mon, 30 Mar 2026 10:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Wendy H. Wong explains the human rights implications of datafication. We talk about how data become valuable, sticky data, big tech’s encroachment on governance, our faces/selves as datapoints, and how the mundane underlies and explains so much of how data collection happens in the first place. Recorded Mar 20, 2026. Released Mar 30, 2026.

Wendy H. Wong We, the Data: Human Rights in the Digital Age

https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262048576/we-the-data/

Human Rights in the Digital Age

https://youtu.be/HyLV5Tf54QM?si=y08lMREdIgYVULcG

Big Tech companies govern our lives. It’s time they’re held accountable for it

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-google-amazon-apple-meta-microsoft-governance-accountability/

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Hollowed, with Olivia Guest, Iris van Rooij and Andrea Reyes Elizondo

Mon, 16 Mar 2026 10:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Olivia Guest, Iris van Rooij and Andrea Reyes Elizondo discuss why it’s important to the overall purpose and significance of the university to resist the uncritical adoption of AI in academia. The risk of AI adoption is that it’ll hollow out the institutions first, and then society at large. Recorded Feb 27, 2026. Released March 16, 2026.

Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia

Olivia Guest, Marcela Suarez, Barbara Müller, Edwin van Meerkerk, Arnoud Oude Groote Beverborg, Ronald de Haan, Andrea Reyes Elizondo, Mark Blokpoel, Natalia Scharfenberg, Annelies Kleinherenbrink, Ileana Camerino, Marieke Woensdregt, Dagmar Monett, Jed Brown, Lucy Avraamidou, Juliette Alenda-Demoutiez, Felienne Hermans & Iris van Rooij

https://philarchive.org/rec/GUEATU

*the 2nd quote read on the episode:

Guest, O. (2025). What Does 'Human-Centred AI' Mean?. arXiv. https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2507.19960

We've been here before! What do you mean?

Olivia Guest, 18 February 2026

https://olivia.science/before/

Summer School: Critical AI Literacies for Resisting and Reclaiming

https://irisvanrooijcogsci.com/2026/02/18/summer-school-critical-ai-literacies-for-resisting-and-reclaiming/ and https://olivia.science/ai/

Academic Collaborations and Public Health: Lessons from Dutch Universities' Tobacco Industry Partnerships for Fossil Fuel Ties. Zenodo.

Knoester, L., Pereira, A., Vanheule, L., Reyes Elizondo, A., Littlejohn, A., & Urai, A. (2025).

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15274865

Why AI transparency is not enough

https://www.leidenmadtrics.nl/articles/why-ai-transparency-is-not-enough

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Opposition, with Daisy Maldonado, Annie Ersinghaus & Gilberto Manzanarez

Mon, 02 Mar 2026 11:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Daisy Maldonado, Annie Ersinghaus, Gilberto Manzanarez and I discuss on-the-ground opposition to two data centers being built against the will of local residents: Project Jupiter (Oracle/Open AI) in New Mexico, and the largest data center in California -- in Imperial Valley. This conversation was part of: Powering AI from the Borderlands: Organizing Against Data Centers, facilitated by Dustin Edwards. Recorded Feb 24, 2026. Released Monday March 2, 2026.

Powering AI from the Borderlands: Organizing Against Data Centers

https://cal.sdsu.edu/humtech/events

Gilberto Manzanarez on Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/valleimperialresiste/

Resistance to data centers rises on the border

https://www.hcn.org/articles/resistance-to-data-centers-rises-on-the-border/

"Jupiter Watch" videos on Project Jupiter in New Mexico

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pi_phIsUpRg&t=5s

The Water Is Coming ¡Ya Viene La Agua!

Annie Ersinghaus’s short doc on the politics of the Rio Grande (Project Jupiter is pulling from underground water along the Rio Grande)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kgab5ICoWJI&t=430s

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Enough, with Adam Becker

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 11:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Adam Becker and I talk about our AI overlords and their “philosophical” influences — mostly eugenics-based pseudoscience and bad readings of sci-fi that make tech billionaires feel like they’ve earned their billions by being the smartest people on the planet… while ruining the planet. Recorded Feb 13, 2026. Released Feb 16, 2026.

More Everything Forever: AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley's Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity (2025) https://mitpressbookstore.mit.edu/book/9781541619593

BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w172zsskmkss5ll (start at 39:15)

Rolling Stone Q&A: https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/tech-billionaires-adam-becker-1235381649/

Dreaming Against the Machine

http://dreamingagainstthemachine.com/

Forthcoming: Adam Becker’s new podcast website (bookmark this now for later!)

Mentioned in our conversation:

I Am An AI Hater by Anthony Moser

https://anthonymoser.github.io/writing/ai/haterdom/2025/08/26/i-am-an-ai-hater.html

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Containment, with Zoë Sofoulis (Zoe Sofia) and Ingrid Richardson

Mon, 02 Feb 2026 11:00:00 GMT

Great theorists make you see the world differently forever after. This is the case with my guests for this episode, Zoë Sofoulis (Zoe Sofia) and Ingrid Richardson — brilliant scholars helping us rethink containers and containment as a feminist strategy to rework worldly narratives about what holds, filters, leaks. This conversation was a special honour for me. Recorded January 23, 2026. Released February 2, 2026.

Containment Technologies of Holding, Filtering, Leaking (2025)

https://meson.press/books/containment/

Zoë Sofia Container Technologies (2000)

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/227700296_Container_Technologies

Shoutouts to:

Re-Understanding Media: Feminist Extensions of Marshall McLuhan (Duke University Press) https://dukeupress.edu/re-understanding-media

Insufferable Tools: Feminism Against Big Tech https://www.dukeupress.edu/insufferable-tools

Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man Paperback –1994 https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262631594/understanding-media/

And much more…

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Friendship, with Am Johal and Matt Hern

Mon, 19 Jan 2026 11:00:00 GMT

In this first episode of 2026, I speak with Am Johal and Matt Stern, authors of the "O My Friends, There Is No Friend: The Politics of Friendship at the End of Ecology" (2025) to better understand what friendship means these days... at the "end of ecology". Is friendship political? Can an AI chatbot be a friend? Recorded Jan 16, 2026. Released Jan 19, 2026.

Matt Hern, Am Johal O My Friends, There is No Friend (pdf)

https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/id/022e1f6f-f14a-4c11-a94c-c95610919f8c/9783839470268.pdf

Below the Radar podcast:

https://www.sfu.ca/vancity-office-community-engagement/below-the-radar-podcast.html

***

New Cover art by Oona Ode!

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Predictable, with José Marichal

Mon, 22 Dec 2025 11:00:00 GMT

José Marichal is exceptionally good at making the case for why we should all become algorithmic problems and also much more reflective of our engagement with social media. We are altered by recommendation algorithms -- and we should probably think now about how to renegotiate these terms? Happy holidays! Recorded Nov 27. Released Dec 22, 2025.

You Must Become an Algorithmic Problem

Renegotiating the Socio-Technical Contract

https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/you-must-become-an-algorithmic-problem

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Advocates, with Meg Rintoul and Kathryn Barnwell

Mon, 08 Dec 2025 11:00:00 GMT

In this episode I speak with friends-neighbours-advocates Meg Rintoul and Kathryn Barnwell about current plans in place to build an AI data center in Nanaimo, B-C. -- and allowing ourselves to write a new story about the future. Recorded Nov 27. Released Dec 8, 2025.

'Very scary': Nanaimo neighbours have water worries about new data centre

https://www.reddit.com/r/nanaimo/comments/1oo24s3/very_scary_nanaimo_neighbours_have_water_worries/

'An Island concern': Nanaimo water advocates want new data centre stopped

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OQzc2bhtXw

CBC: AI-related data centres use vast amounts of water. But gauging how much is a murky business

https://www.cbc.ca/news/ai-data-centre-canada-water-use-9.6939684

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Tracking, with Stefanie Felsberger

Mon, 24 Nov 2025 11:00:00 GMT

In this episode, I got to walk through a recent report called “the high stakes of tracking menstruation” with its author, Stefanie Felsberger, a sociologist of tech & gender. I cannot express enough how much there is to learn from this topic that can help us understand the bigger landscape of tech promises and harms. Recorded Oct 23, 2025. Released Nov 24, 2025.

The High Stakes of Tracking Menstruation - MCTD Cambridge

https://www.mctd.ac.uk/femtech-high-stakes-tracking-menstruation/

https://www.mctd.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/The-High-Stakes-of-Tracking-Menstruation_Accessible.html

Menstrual apps harvest data that ‘puts women’s safety at risk’

https://www.thetimes.com/uk/healthcare/article/menstrual-apps-harvest-data-that-puts-womens-safety-at-risk-bd0srb8mt?

Period: The Real Story of Menstruation (by Kate Clancy)

https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691191317/period?

Website

https://www.stefaniefelsberger.com

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Surveillance, with Justin Hendrix

Mon, 10 Nov 2025 11:00:00 GMT

In this episode, I speak with Justin Hendrix, the CEO and Editor of Tech Policy Press, a nonprofit media venture concerned with the intersection of technology and democracy. We talk about ICE (US Immigration and Customs Enforcement), surveillance, and AI. Recorded Oct 21, 2025. Released Nov 10, 2025.

Republican Budget Bill Signals New Era in Federal Surveillance

DEAN JACKSON, JUSTIN HENDRIX / JUL 2, 2025

https://www.techpolicy.press/republican-budget-bill-signals-new-era-in-federal-surveillance/

Amidst Violent Immigration Raids, DHS Turns to Big Tech to Silence Dissent

JENNA RUDDOCK / OCT 3, 2025

https://www.techpolicy.press/amidst-violent-immigration-raids-dhs-turns-to-big-tech-to-silence-dissent/

AI Surveillance on the Rise in US, but Tactics of Repression Not New

DIA KAYYALI / MAR 26, 2025

https://www.techpolicy.press/ai-surveillance-on-the-rise-in-us-but-tactics-of-repression-not-new/

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Sovereign, with Paris Marx

Mon, 20 Oct 2025 10:00:00 GMT

Host of Tech Won't Save Us and acclaimed tech critic, author, and international speaker, Paris Marx joins me for this episode where we discuss AI futures in a Canadian context: the idea of a "sovereign cloud", an "AI minister", and much more! Recorded Oct 15, 2025. Released Oct 20, 2025.

Website

https://parismarx.com/

Tech Won't Save Us

https://techwontsave.us/

Disconnect

https://disconnect.blog/im-writing-a-new-book/

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Witnessing, with Michael Richardson

Mon, 25 Aug 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode, I get to chat with the brilliant Michael Richardson on the concept of "Nonhuman Witnessing" especially in how this relates to algorithms and AI. In his book, "Nonhuman Witnessing" (Duke), he argues that a "radical rethinking of what counts as witnessing is central to building frameworks for justice in an era of endless war, ecological catastrophe, and technological capture". Recorded August 13, 2025. Released August 25, 2025.

Nonhuman Witnessing: War, Data, and Ecology after the End of the World (Duke, 2024)

https://read.dukeupress.edu/books/book/3310/Nonhuman-WitnessingWar-Data-and-Ecology-after-the

Website

https://www.unsw.edu.au/staff/michael-richardson

Bluesky

@richardsonma.bsky.social‬

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Dopaminergic, with Rohit Revi

Mon, 11 Aug 2025 12:00:00 GMT

Rohit Revi walks us through paranoia, care, conspiracy, capitalism, and catastrophe, in relation to technology and culture, to draw us into a deeper consideration of collective psychic resources and psychological commons. We talk about psychometry and linger on the dopaminergic. Recorded July 16, 2025. Released August 11, 2025.

Great Delirium: Culture, Technology, and Paranoia in the New Age of Catastrophe

(2025-02-24) Revi, Rohit; Cultural Studies; Murakami Wood, David; McBlane, Angus

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Con, with Emily M. Bender and Alex Hanna

Mon, 28 Jul 2025 12:00:00 GMT

Emily M.Bender and Alex Hanna have been leading the charge against "AI", helping us understand it for the con that it is, and how AI companies are turning to health, education, and other social realms to try to recover their costs. In this episode we discuss LLMs vs. what the AI (and AGI) con is -- who benefits, and who loses -- and much more. Recorded July 15, 2025. Released July 28, 2025.

The AI Con

https://thecon.ai/

Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000

https://www.dair-institute.org/maiht3k/

The predatory fantasy of worker empowerment in AI marketing

Justine Zhang, Su Lin Blodgett, Nina Markl

AI x Crisis: Tracing New Directions Beyond Deployment and Use workshop, Aarhus 2025.

AI isn’t replacing student writing – but it is reshaping it

https://theconversation.com/ai-isnt-replacing-student-writing-but-it-is-reshaping-it-254878

Sparks of Artificial General Intelligence: Early experiments with GPT-4

https://arxiv.org/abs/2303.12712

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Control, with Paul Schütze

Mon, 14 Jul 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Paul Schütze and I pick apart the inherent contradictions of “sustainable AI”, marketing language that aims to convince the public that one of the most extractive industries can be used to solve climate change. We delve into the layers of control embedded in the logics of AI, when technology becomes the fix that needs fixing. Recorded May 20, 2025. Released July 7, 2025.

The impacts of AI Futurism

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10676-024-09758-6

The Problem of Sustainable AI

https://doi.org/10.34669/WI.WJDS/4.1.4

contact paul.schuetze@uos.de and website: paulschuetze.de

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Water, with Rebecca Kilberg, Mary-Clare Bosco and Jonathan Gilmour

Mon, 16 Jun 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode I speak with Rebecca Kilberg, Mary-Clare Bosco and Jonathan Gilmour who together use policy approaches to solve problems related to data center water usage and the various planetary and health outcomes that emerge from water consumption and extraction. They talk about how you get such data and what to do with it, and the importance of creating many local sites of resistance for a more sustainable future. Want in? Get in touch. Recorded May 19, 2025. Released June 16, 2025.

Voices: Data centers must be transparent about water usage — for the sake of the Great Salt Lake

https://www.sltrib.com/opinion/commentary/2024/12/31/voices-utah-data-centers-must-be

Reducing Data Centers’ Water Consumption

https://aspenpolicyacademy.org/project/reducing-data-centers-water-consumption

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Solidarity, with Shannon Wait

Mon, 02 Jun 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Shannon Wait — Alphabet Workers Union-CWA organizer — speaks with me about the labour conditions for data center and AI workers. We talk about contracts, sub-contracts, sub-sub-contracts, NDAs, invisible labour -- and how all of this leads to unions, solidarity, and a fight for tech workers’ rights globally. Recorded May 8, 2025. Released June 2, 2025.

Interview with Shannon Wait, Alphabet Workers Union-CWA Organizer (2024)

https://poweratwork.us/shannon-wait-interview

A union of Alphabet workers in the U.S. and Canada

https://www.alphabetworkersunion.org/

Google Raters Participated in Historic Action at Google HQ to Demand Google End Poverty Wages for 5,000 Workers

https://code-cwa.org/news/google-raters-participated-historic-action

The woman who took on Google and won (2021)

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56659212

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Remade, with Allison Carruth

Mon, 19 May 2025 12:00:00 GMT

Allison Carruth and I talk about her new book which gets at some of the material infrastructure and social systems that have made the US a settler state ever obsessed with new frontiers, including space. We talk about tech imaginaries, worlds remade, and better futures — a vision that invites confronting the state of things head-on, a slower redoing, and is based on connection, love, and friendship (maybe with aliens, too). Recorded May 7, 2025. Released May 19, 2025.

Novel Ecologies: Nature Remade and the Illusions of Tech (2025)

https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/N/bo239362741.html

Allison Carruth

https://allisoncarruth.com/

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Hype, with Dani Shanley and Gemma Milne

Mon, 05 May 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode, Dani Shanley and Gemma Milne walk me through "hype" -- what it means in various technological contexts, how it works, what it is definitionally, how it feels in the body, who it serves, who it harms, and how we might need to nuance our relationship to it, especially as critical (tech) scholars. Recorded May 1, 2025. Released May 5, 2025.

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Damage, with Dustin Edwards

Mon, 28 Apr 2025 12:00:00 GMT

Dustin Edwards and I discuss the damage caused by digital infrastructure and its extractive requirements. We talk about data centers and copper mines, but more than this, we delve into the what a decolonial, feminist, anti-racist approach can look like for white settler scholars grappling with their inheritances and obligations to the landscapes and to the stories they tell themselves, as we make (new) worlds. Recorded Apr 8, 2025. Released April 28, 2025.

Enduring Digital Damage: Rhetorical Reckonings for Planetary Survival

https://www.uapress.ua.edu/9780817322472/enduring-digital-damage/

The making of critical data center studies

Dustin Edwards, Zane Griffin Talley Cooper and Mél Hogan

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/13548565231224157

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Consent, with Jasmine McNealy

Mon, 14 Apr 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode, I ask Jasmine McNealy about the role of consent online, from social media exchanges to the circulation of deep fakes. Who gets to define harm? Who is responsible for the damage? Does anyone have to take accountability? We also talk about surveillance, sonic privacy, and the many data trails the body leaves behind. Recorded Apr 4, 2025. Released April 14, 2025.

Sonic Privacy.

Yale Journal of Law & Technology/Yale ISP-Knight Foundation Public Sphere Series.

https://law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/area/center/isp/documents/mcnealy.pdf

Consent (Still) Won’t Save Us

Chapter from: Feminist Cyberlaw

https://uplopen.com/chapters/e/10.1525/luminos.190.p

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Together, with Collin Bjork

Mon, 24 Mar 2025 12:00:00 GMT

Collin Bjork and I discuss the double (triple?) meaning of "extractive AI". Collin explains Otter.ai -- an AI powered voice-to-text transcription software, and the capitalist logics that enable it -- vs. Maori-led Te Hiku Media, based on principles of stewardship, community and collaboration. Collin also explains how rhetoric is about togetherness more than persuasion. Recorded Feb 12, 2025. Released March 24, 2025.

Mentioned in ep:

Bad Ideas About Writing (Ball & Loewe); Extractive AI and Its Challenge to Technical Communication (Bjork; forthcoming, Journal of Business and Technical Communication, October 2025); "The Acousmatic Question and the Will to Datafy" (Sterne & Sawhney); "Big AI Companies Need Higher Ed...But Does Higher Ed Need Them?" (Bjork); "ChatGPT Threatens Language Diversity" (Bjork); Te Reo Māori Speech Recognition (Te Hiku Media); Abundant Intelligences - Indigenous AI (Jason Edward Lewis, Hemi Whaanga, et al...)

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Deskill, with Hagen Blix

Mon, 17 Mar 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode Hagen Blix and I talk about how the fear of AI, from the non-billionaire CEO class, comes from the threat of deskilling workers. Recorded Mar 5, 2025. Released March 17, 2025.

Tech Workers Can Still Fight Silicon Valley’s Overlords

by Hagen Blix and Ingeborg Glimmer

https://jacobin.com/2025/02/tech-workers-silicon-valley-trump/

Why We Fear AI: On the Interpretation of Nightmares Paperback – March 21 2025

by Hagen Blix and Ingeborg Glimmer

https://www.commonnotions.org/why-we-fear-ai

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Unlearning, with Kane Murdoch

Mon, 10 Mar 2025 12:00:00 GMT

In this episode I speak with Kane Murdoch about the perils of contract cheating. As an integrity officer, he frames what's happening with "cheating" as an unlearning that we should all be paying attention to if we care about education. Recorded Feb 6, 2025. Released March 10, 2025.

Guerilla Warfare

https://www.guerillawarfare.net/

Ellis, C., & Murdoch, K. (2024). The educational integrity enforcement pyramid: a new framework for challenging and responding to student cheating. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 49(7), 924–934. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2024.2329167

Lures and violent threats: old school cheating still rampant at Australian universities, even as AI rises — The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/article/2024/aug/01/lures-and-violent-threats-old-school-cheating-still-rampant-at-australian-universities-even-as-ai-rises

Ghost writers helping UNSW students to cheat on assessments, leaked report reveals

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/cheating-unsw-students-hire-ghost-writers-from-messaging-site-wechat-to-complete-work-20200505-p54q3f.html

Cheating found at UNSW up by 2000% as new detection methods used

https://www.smh.com.au/education/cheating-found-at-unsw-up-by-2000-percent-as-new-detection-methods-used-20190814-p52gz4.html

University students caught paying others to do their work at record levels

https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/university-students-caught-paying-others-to-do-their-work-at-record-levels-20221025-p5bsrx.html

The Rise of Plagiarism: Contract Cheating

https://www.turnitin.ca/products/originality/contract-cheating

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Indexicality, with Roland Meyer and Gillian Rose

Mon, 24 Feb 2025 13:00:00 GMT

AI images are circulating more and more online and sometimes we can't tell the 'real' from AI-generated. But as I discuss with the inimitable Gillian Rose and Roland Meyer, we need to think about AI images beyond their indexicality, i.e. the idea that a photograph is a direct representation of the subject it captures. In this episode, we grapple with AI generators that are part of extractive, colonial industries, and how that shapes the affect of AI visuals. Recorded Jan 29, 2025. Released Feb 24, 2025.

It’s a flat world. The Synthetic Realities of Sora

https://rrrreflect.org/special-issue-1/its-a-flat-world-the-synthetic-realities-of-sora

“It’s a flat world. The Synthetic Realities of AI Video” by Roland Meyer at Hidden Layers 24

https://vimeo.com/1011342969

The New Value of the Archive

AI Image Generation and the Visual Economy of ‘Style’

https://image-journal.de/the-new-value-of-the-archive/

“Generic Pastness. AI Image Synthesis and the Virtualization of the Archive”

https://vimeo.com/873978726

Models All The Way Down by Christo Buschek & Jer Thorp

https://knowingmachines.org/models-all-the-way

Gillian Rose, Professor of Human Geography

Fellow of the British Academy and Academy of Social Sciences

webpage: https://www.geog.ox.ac.uk/staff/grose.html

bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/profgillian.bsky.social

blog: visualmethodculture.wordpress.com

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Asymmetries, with Jathan Sadowski

Mon, 10 Feb 2025 13:00:00 GMT

In this episode Jathan Sadowski discusses the 'risk industry' as imagined by FIRE (finance, insurance and real estate) and the asymmetries they create. Recorded January 15, 2025. Released February 10, 2025.

The Mechanic and the Luddite: A Ruthless Criticism of Technology and Capitalism

https://www.ucpress.edu/books/the-mechanic-and-the-luddite/paper

This Machine Kills: A podcast about technology and political economy

https://soundcloud.com/thismachinekillspod

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Lessons, with Charles Logan

Mon, 27 Jan 2025 13:00:00 GMT

Charles Logan is the go-to person to talk to about how AI is infiltrating the many layers of education, from K-12 to universities. In this conversation, we learn our lessons; we talk about what Ed Tech is, its promise and hype, and (ultimately) how to refuse it as professors and teach students to resist it as well. We also wonder about 'AI-proofing' the classroom and wether this is the way to deal with its onslaught. Recorded January 14, 2025. Released January 27, 2025.

Applying the Baldwin Test to Ed-Tech

https://www.civicsoftechnology.org/blog/applying-the-baldwin-test-to-ed-tech

The Captivating Creature from Educaria and Other Scary Stories

https://www.civicsoftechnology.org/blog/the-captivating-creature-from-educaria-and-other-scary-stories

Iggy Peck, Architect Is an AI Doomer and Other Things I Struggle to Talk with My Kids About

https://www.civicsoftechnology.org/blog/iggy-peck-architect-is-an-ai-doomer-and-other-things-i-struggle-to-talk-with-my-kids-about

Lessons on How to Practice Everyday Resistance and Refusal

https://www.civicsoftechnology.org/blog/lessons-on-how-to-practice-everyday-resistance-and-refusal

You need to talk to your kid about AI. Here are 6 things you should say.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/09/05/1079009/you-need-to-talk-to-your-kid-about-ai-here-are-6-things-you-should-say

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Storying, with Dillon Mahmoudi and Anthony Levenda

Mon, 20 Jan 2025 13:00:00 GMT

In this episode I speak with Dillon Mahmoudi and Anthony Levenda about the relationship (feedback loop) between data and urban planning. We focus on the idea of 'storying' data to make it compelling and to get past the inertia of data delivered as mere stats or numbers that have little resonance and don't (or no longer) move people to action, towards better living conditions. Recorded January 13, 2025. Released January 20, 2025.

The urban-tech feedback loop: a surveillance and development data-walk in South Lake Union

https://dillonm.io/papers/the-urban-tech-feedback-loop/

The Amazon Warehouse

https://dillonm.io/papers/the-amazon-warehouse/

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Defining, with Ali Alkhatib

Mon, 13 Jan 2025 13:00:15 GMT

I got to speak with the brilliant Ali Alkhatib about his blog post "defining AI" -- an object, subject, metaphor, and discursive formation used amongst all of us trying to figure out how to grapple with AI's ownership, deployments, and impacts. Who gets to define AI? Is it just computer scientists? What are the stakes of having it defined only technologically? Recorded December 23, 2025. Released January 13, 2025.

Ali Alkhatib (website)

https://ali-alkhatib.com/

Defining AI

https://ali-alkhatib.com/blog/defining-ai

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Colonialism, with Ulises A. Mejias and Nick Couldry

Mon, 06 Jan 2025 13:00:10 GMT

I start the new year with an episode on "data colonialism". I had the great pleasure of speaking with Ulises A. Mejias and Nick Couldry about our contemporary relationship to corporations, about the idea that there’s no capitalism without colonialism (and vice versa), about how human lives are being exploited these days, and about data being a cheap resource. Recorded December 16, 2024. Released January 6, 2025.

Data Grab: The New Colonialism of Big Tech and How to Fight Back

https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/D/bo216184200.html

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Investigative, with Déborah López and Hadin Charbel

Mon, 30 Dec 2024 13:00:30 GMT

Such a delight speaking with Déborah López and Hadin Charbel, incredible artists-architects-scholars as investigators of future possibilities in light of climate change rapidly changing arctic (and other) landscapes. We discuss a range of art projects, from large installations to projections to speculative fiction, and how these modes and conditions can help us think and feel about alternate endings -- in our teaching and in our day to day embodied, lived realities. Recorded Dec 12, 2024. Released Dec 30, 2024.

Artists website

https://pareid.com/

Artists Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/pareid.architecture/

Pareid creates organ-like installation from corrugated plastic tubes in Madrid

https://www.dezeen.com/2022/04/20/pareid-everywhere-nowhere-installation-urvanity/

Re: Arctic

https://vimeo.com/469736816?&login=true

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Collaborative, with Chris Gilliard

Mon, 16 Dec 2024 13:00:12 GMT

In this episode, I spoke with Chris Gilliard (@hypervisible) about AI’s encroachment on universities and what this means for collaboration — i.e. learning, writing, thinking and feeling. This conversation puts out a warning of sorts to universities adopting AI given that, as a technology, it is built off of stolen materials, relies on extraction and colonial labour practices, is racist, misogynist and transphobic in its outputs, and terrible for the environment — all issues the university claim to value and fight against? Recorded Dec 11, 2024. Released Dec 16, 2024.

“ChatGPT Should Not Exist” by David Golumbia (Dec 14, 2022)

https://davidgolumbia.medium.com/chatgpt-should-not-exist-aab0867abace

“Practico-inertia” by Rob Horning (March 1, 2024)

https://robhorning.substack.com/p/practico-inertia

“Critical keywords of AI in education” by Ben Williamson (November 8, 2024 )

https://codeactsineducation.wordpress.com/

“Big AI Companies Need Higher Ed … but Does Higher Ed Need Them?” by Collin Bjork (Dec 2, 2024)

https://www.insidehighered.com/opinion/views/2024/12/02/universities-must-beware-reliance-big-ai-opinion

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Regulated, with Jennifer Holt

Mon, 25 Nov 2024 11:00:15 GMT

It was a real honour and joy to speak with someone whose work has so significantly shaped my own (and many of us writing about data centers): Jennifer Holt joined me for a chat about US cloud policy. The Cloud is understood in this episode through the lens of policy, which means we grapple with who owns data, its infrastructures and our data futures. We also talked a bit about what the latest US elections might mean for Big Tech... Recorded Nov 20, 2024. Released Nov 25, 2024.

Cloud Policy: A History of Regulating Pipelines, Platforms, and Data

https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262548069/cloud-policy/

CMSW podcast: Jennifer Holt, “Cloud Policy: Anatomy of a Regulatory Crisis”

https://cmsw.mit.edu/podcast-jennifer-holt-cloud-policy-anatomy-regulatory-crisis/

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Frequencies, with Trent Wintermeier

Mon, 11 Nov 2024 11:00:39 GMT

Listen to the data center's hum with your feet first... on this episode, Trent Wintermeier and I discuss what it means to absorb sound through the body and "hear" vibrations with and through your limbs and ears. We discuss what this means for folks living near data centers, especially in places imagined as kinds of sacrifice zones. Recorded Oct 9, 2024. Release Nov 11, 2024.

Trent Wintermeier

https://trentwintermeier.cargo.site

Affective Footprints

https://www.heliotropejournal.net/helio/affective-footprints

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Safety, with Remmelt Ellen

Mon, 28 Oct 2024 10:00:46 GMT

In this episode, I have a conversation with Remmelt Ellen from AI Safety Camp. We discuss AI safety and his 44-page book Artifical Bodies outlining AI harms from the perspective of someone really grappling with the ethics, hype, and harms of the industry and beyond. Recorded Oct 4, 2024. Released Oct 28, 2024.

Artificial Bodies

https://workflowy.com/s/artificial-bodies/znDloerXJaEQvKF6#/846236876b45

AI Safety Camp

https://www.aisafety.camp/

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Deep, with Lisa Yin Han

Mon, 14 Oct 2024 10:00:25 GMT

Everyone should read Lisa Yin Han's Deepwater Alchemy! It's a stunningly well written book about how we come to value the ocean through various extractive mediations. Recorded Sept 27, 2024. Released Oct 14, 2024.

Deepwater Alchemy: Extractive Mediation and the Taming of the Seafloor

How underwater mediation has transformed deep-sea spaces into resource-rich frontiers

https://www.upress.umn.edu/9781517915940/deepwater-alchemy

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Dancing, with Joana Chicau

Mon, 23 Sep 2024 10:00:07 GMT

Joana Chicau is a designer, researcher and coder, with a background in choreography and performance. We had a truly delightful chat about how dance can make you understand data differently. Recorded Sept 13, 2024. Released Sept 23, 2024.

Website

https://joanachicau.com/about.html

Publications

https://researchers.arts.ac.uk/2383-joana-chicau/publications

Choreographing You

https://re-coding.technology/choreographing-you/

From Individual Discomfort to Collective Solidarity: Choreographic Exploration of Extractivist Technology

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/378139744_From_Individual_Discomfort_to_Collective_Solidarity_Choreographic_Exploration_of_Extractivist_Technology

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Geologica, with Siobhan Angus

Mon, 09 Sep 2024 10:00:00 GMT

It was such an honour to be in conversation with Siobhan Angus about what can only be describe as a masterpiece: her book Camera Geologica. Recorded August 8, 2024. Released Sept 9, 2024.

Camera Geologica: An Elemental History of Photography

https://www.dukeupress.edu/camera-geologica

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Reform, with Leslie R. Shade

Mon, 26 Aug 2024 12:00:30 GMT

In this episode, I speak with my dear friend and colleague, Leslie R. Shade about the importance of media reform from an intersectional feminist political economic perspective! Recorded Aug 1. Released Aug 26, 2024.

Chapter 5: From Media Reform to Data Justice: Situating Women's Rights as Human Rights from The Handbook of Gender, Communication, and Women's Human Rights Margaret Gallagher (Editor), Aimee Vega Montiel (Editor) ISBN: 978-1-119-80068-2 November 2023, Wiley-Blackwell https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+Handbook+of+Gender%2C+Communication%2C+and+Women's+Human+Rights-p-9781119800682#tableofcontents-section

Read all her work here: https://discover.research.utoronto.ca/2541-leslie-shade/publications

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Territorial, with Alina Utrata

Mon, 24 Jun 2024 12:00:02 GMT

Alina Utrata and I have a conversation about billionaires conquering space for personal pleasure, in the pursuit of energy sources or minerals, or, to push forward a longtermist interplanetary movement. Alina explains how when we think about outer space as "empty", we unwittingly thinking territorially -- an incredibly valuable contribution to critical space scholarship. Recorded May 20. Released June 24, 2024.

Engineering Territory: Space and Colonies in Silicon Valley

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-political-science-review/article/engineering-territory-space-and-colonies-in-silicon-valley/5D6EA4D306E8F3E0465F4A05C89454D6

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Futures, with Lee Vinsel

Mon, 10 Jun 2024 12:00:09 GMT

I invited Lee Vinsel to discuss with me a post he wrote from a workshop on "Politics of Controlling Powerful Technologies". In this episode we discuss how futures are (imagined to be) predicted through data modelling and crunching numbers, and how various alternatives to these statistical imaginaries also come short of knowing what awaits us. Can we stand to not know? And if we don't know what the future holds, how do we plan politically? Recorded April 19. Released June 10, 2024.

How to Be a Better Reactionary: Time and Knowledge in Technology Regulation

https://sts-news.medium.com/how-to-be-a-better-reactionary-1630b5098fbc

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Objective, with Lisa Messeri and M. J. Crockett

Mon, 27 May 2024 12:00:38 GMT

In this episode, Lisa Messeri and M. J. Crockett discuss how scientists are in danger of overlooking AI tools’ limitations, and how science is made stronger by questioning its obsession with objectivity. Recorded April 18, 2024. Released May 27, 2024.

Artificial intelligence and illusions of understanding in scientific research

Lisa Messeri & M. J. Crockett Nature volume 627, pages49–58 (2024)Cite this article

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07146-0

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Thirsty, with Shaolei Ren

Mon, 13 May 2024 12:00:23 GMT

In this episode, Shaolei Ren and I discuss the relationship between water and generative AI. We delve into what happens to water in the (very thirsty) data center, what it's used for, and how much fresh water the AI revolution will ask of the planet in the future, and at what costs. Big Tech doesn't yet disclose its water withdrawal or consumption, so researcher like Shaolei Ren take up the work and propose solutions for a more sustainable future for AI. Recorded April 19, 2024. Released May 13, 2024.

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Diversity, with Catherine Stinson and Sophie Vlaad

Mon, 22 Apr 2024 10:00:53 GMT

With Catherine Stinson and Sophie Vlaad, we discuss what diversity means in the context of AI -- its applications, conceptualizations, teams, institutions, networks, members, and ideals. As they ask in a recent article, "diversity" is often proposed as a solution to ethical problems in artificial intelligence (AI), but what exactly is meant by "diversity" and how it can it solve those problems? Recorded March 22, 2024. Released April 22, 2024.

A feeling for the algorithm: Diversity, expertise, and artificial intelligence

Stinson, C., & Vlaad, S. (2024). A feeling for the algorithm: Diversity, expertise, and artificial intelligence. Big Data & Society, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517231224247

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Unsustainable, with Matthew Archer

Mon, 08 Apr 2024 10:00:18 GMT

Listen to my conversation with Matthew Archer, author of Unsustainable: Measurement, Reporting, and the Limits of Corporate Sustainability. In his beautifully written book, Matthew makes a case for being highly skeptical of corporate sustainability initiatives, especially as they've become increasingly grounded in metrics of all kinds that measure just and exactly what the companies themselves determine to be worthy of measuring. Framing sustainability as a technical issue has been and continues to be a failure, and so we ask: what it might mean to take this criticism seriously? Recorded Feb 2, 2024. Released Apr 8, 2024.

Unsustainable: Measurement, Reporting, and the Limits of Corporate Sustainability (Feb 2024, Published by NYU Press)

https://nyupress.org/9781479822027/unsustainable/

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Change, with Sireesh Gururaja, Amanda Bertsch and Clara Na

Mon, 25 Mar 2024 10:00:45 GMT

Together, Sireesh Gururaja, Amanda Bertsch and Clara Na explain the paradigm shifts in Natural Language Processing that they've noticed themselves, observed in the community, and documented through a series of interviews with NLP researchers. They share their hopes for the NLP field -- as less focused on benchmarks, and as more self-reflexive and ethically-driven -- moving forward. Recorded Jan 19, 2024. Released March 25, 2024.

To Build Our Future, We Must Know Our Past: Contextualizing Paradigm Shifts in Natural Language Processing

by Sireesh Gururaja, Amanda Bertsch, Clara Na, David Gray Widder, Emma Strubell

https://arxiv.org/abs/2310.07715

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Adversarial, with Steph Maj Swanson

Mon, 11 Mar 2024 10:00:19 GMT

Steph Maj Swanson, aka Supercomposite and I discuss the spooky Loab phenomenon, generative adversarial network, negative prompts and the demons (maybe?) lurking in large datasets. Recorded Jan 19, 2024. Released March 11, 2024.

What I Learned from Loab: AI as a creative adversary

The artist behind the viral cryptid "Loab" reflects on her critical relationship to AI art tools

https://media.ccc.de/v/37c3-12052-what_i_learned_from_loab_ai_as_a_creative_adversary

Original Twitter thread:

https://twitter.com/supercomposite/status/1567162288087470081?lang=en

Insta

https://www.instagram.com/supercomposite/

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Mirrored, with Kyriaki Goni

Mon, 26 Feb 2024 11:00:40 GMT

Kyriaki Goni - an artist with a background in social and cultural anthropology - and I start our conversation reflecting back on the lockdowns of April 2020 in Athens; what this signified, and how it shaped her art, which ultimately manifested as "The Portal or Let’s Stand Still for the Whales", which was a reflection on the tensions between the darkness of pandemic realities and the quiet restoration of natural things in her surroundings, and beyond. We also talk about "Perfect Love #couplegoals #AIgenerated, 2020,2022", as an exploration of intimacy, doomscrolling and isolation. We finish our conversation on "Not Allowed for Algorithmic Audiences, 2021" which focuses more specifically on 'audio assistant' tech, and the way algorithms pull audio from social media and various corners of the internet to then classify and reorganize the way we're listened to and heard. One of the (MANY) things I love about Kyriaki's work is that it is decidedly not preachy -- instead it holds a mirror to the audience to reflect gently, and in their own time, on the significance of technology in various contexts. Recorded Jan 12, 2024. Released Feb 26, 2024.

KYRIAKI GONI

https://kyriakigoni.com/

ANTHROPOCENE ON HOLD

https://www.pcai.gr/anthroposcene-on-hold

NOT ALLOWED FOR ALGORITHMIC AUDIENCES

March 23, 2023–April 29, 2023

The Breeder Feeder

https://thebreedersystem.com/uncategorized/kyriaki-goni_-not-allowed-for-algorithmic-audiences/

studio international: Kyriaki Goni – interview: ‘For me, technology is an existential discussion’

https://www.studiointernational.com/index.php/kyriaki-goni-interview-for-me-technology-is-existential-discussion-data-garden-blenheim-walk-gallery-leeds-arts-university

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Efficient, with Anne Pasek

Mon, 12 Feb 2024 13:00:55 GMT

Most of us researching data centers have come to rely on various figures and stats telling us how environmentally impactful the internet has become: how big is the footprint? how much energy is used? Anne Pasek and I discuss in this episode just how these things get tallied, and by whom, and to what ends. We also discuss what gets omitted in these calculations, and how a "relational footprinting" approach might help us situate our knowledge about this topic. We also briefly talk about open access publishing and the power of zines in particular. Recorded Dec 12, 2023. Released Feb 12, 2024.

Digital Energetics

https://meson.press/books/digital-energetics/

Getting Into Fights with Data Centers (zine)

https://emmlab.info/Resources_page/Data%20Center%20Fights_digital.pdf

Pasek, A., Vaughan, H., & Starosielski, N. (2023). The world wide web of carbon: Toward a relational footprinting of information and communications technology’s climate impacts. Big Data & Society, 10(1).

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Conflicted, with Tobias Williams

Mon, 25 Dec 2023 13:00:15 GMT

Teaching in times of generative AI is weird, and sometimes wonderful. Tobias Williams and I discuss what it means to make art and teach art at this juncture and the conflicted feelings that emerge from resisting with the tools of creation. Recorded Oct 10, 2023. Released Dec 25, 2023.

Profile

http://tobiasjwilliams.com

Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/getrichnever/

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Impacts, with Irene Niet

Mon, 11 Dec 2023 13:00:30 GMT

Irene Niet and I have a conversation about how researchers might consider the environmental impacts of AI in relation to their social consequences, and in relation to their impacts on democracy. Recorded Oct 16, 2023. Released Dec 11, 2023.

Research profile

https://research.tue.nl/en/persons/irene-a-niet

Digital (Un)sustainability - Routledge

https://crowdusg.net/2022/06/06/digital-unsustainabilities-call-for-chapters/

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Chipified, with MC Forelle

Mon, 27 Nov 2023 13:00:07 GMT

Ever wonder about the microchips in your car? MC Forelle and I talk about the “chipification” process of cars, since the 70s and 80s, and how these processes and logics see to increased corporate control and surveillance, while making opting out and DIY tinkering more difficult. We briefly touch on subscription model for automotive features — like BMW did for its heated seats not long ago — remember that? Recorded Oct 5, 2023. Released Nov 27, 2023.

The material consequences of “chipification”: The case of software-embedded cars

https://journals-sagepub-com.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/doi/full/10.1177/20539517221095429

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Empathy, with Steven Gonzalez Monserrate

Mon, 13 Nov 2023 13:00:49 GMT

In this absolutely delightful hour, Steven Gonzalez, an anthropologist of data centers, walks us through various sites of ethnographic research — from places of abandonment post-climate disaster, the desert, to the suburbs. While much as been written and discussed about data centers in the last decade, nobody does it quite as thoughtfully as Steven — showing empathy and feeling in and through his writing. Recorded Oct 2, 2023. Released Nov 13, 2023.

Sordidez

https://egconde.com/books/sordidez/

Q&A: Steven Gonzalez on Indigenous futurist science fiction

https://news.mit.edu/2023/qa-steven-gonzalez-indigenous-futurist-science-fiction-sordidez-0821

The Staggering Ecological Impacts of Computation and the Cloud

https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-staggering-ecological-impacts-of-computation-and-the-cloud/

Steven Gonzalez Monserrate

https://www.stevengonzalezm.com/

The people of the cloud

https://aeon.co/essays/downtime-is-not-an-option-meet-the-stewards-of-the-cloud

La Nube sin Apagón

https://www.anthropology-news.org/articles/la-nube-sin-apagon/

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Open, with David Gray Widder

Mon, 23 Oct 2023 12:00:01 GMT

While efforts to make “AI” more “open” have gained momentum lately, it seems like both concepts are worth scrutinizing and historicizing so that we can better understand how these marketing terms become a focus (and distraction), as material conditions are downplayed. With David Gray Widder, we discuss where “ethics” are located and how “AI” workers of all kinds imagine responsibility to be someone else’s problem, or somewhere else down the chain. Recorded Sept 12, 2023. Released Oct 23, 2023.

The Myth of ‘Open Source’ AI

https://www.wired.com/story/the-myth-of-open-source-ai/

Open (For Business): Big Tech, Concentrated Power, and the Political Economy of Open AI

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4543807

Limits and Possibilities for “Ethical AI” in Open Source: A Study of Deepfakes

https://davidwidder.me/deepfakes.pdf

Dislocated accountabilities in the “AI supply chain”: Modularity and developers’ notions of responsibility

https://davidwidder.me/supply-chain.pdf

Computer scientists designing the future can’t agree on what privacy means

https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/04/03/1070665/cmu-university-privacy-battle-smart-building-sensors-mites/

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Chemical, with Josh Lepawsky

Mon, 09 Oct 2023 12:00:13 GMT

If you think you know anything about e-waste from what’s normally reported in the news, please have a listen to this episode with the brilliant Josh Lepawsky — it will really open up everything you thought you understood! We discuss global waste industries, shipping waste, the ideals of recycling, plastics and mining waste, and the need for collective action. And chemicals. Recorded Aug 3, 2023. Released Oct 9, 2023.

What E-Waste Journalism Gets Wrong

https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/what-e-waste-journalism-gets-wrong/

Sources and Streams of Electronic Waste

https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(20)30307-9

Materials in Flux - A Symposium curated by Formafantasma Session 2: Contextualizing

https://youtu.be/ChKchFQGcyc?t=1506

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Intimacy, with Mirabelle Jones

Mon, 25 Sep 2023 12:00:51 GMT

A truly delightful conversation with creative technologist and artist, Mirabelle Jones. Their work uses generative AI – early iterations of it – to make compelling observations about intimacy. Jone’s work is iterative, where reactions to projects invite new forms of self-reflection, and makes us wonder if we even have a ‘true’ self, if continuity is real, and what quantum alternatives might be out there. Recorded Aug 2, 2023. Released Sept 25, 2023.

Translating Trauma

https://www.instagram.com/p/CvF3Nkqrc_H/

Mirabelle Jones

https://www.mirabellejones.com/

It’s time We Talked

https://www.mirabellejones.com/digital-alchemy-its-time-we-talked/

Artificial Intimacy

https://www.mirabellejones.com/artificial-intimacy/

Embodying the Algorithm

https://aiperformance.space/mirabelle-jones-ill-be-very-nervous/

Zoom Reads You

https://www.mirabellejones.com/zoom-reads-you/

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Alien, with Gregory Betts

Mon, 11 Sep 2023 12:00:54 GMT

This is a fun conversation with scholar-poet Gregory Betts about communicating with aliens! How are humans on earth communicating with aliens? What technology does it require? Why? What void does it fill? And do aliens want to be in contact with us? What relationships are made possible by thinking poetically about aliens? On the episode we ponder the cultural contexts for thinking about alien life in a hostile [to human life] universe. Recorded Jul 21, 2023. Released Sept 11, 2023.

A Sign in Space

https://asignin.space/listening-to-space/

Extraterrestrial Signal Test (NYT)

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/24/science/extraterrestrial-signal-test.html

Aliens in the Void: Writing Beyond the Limits of Language in bpNichol’s The Martyrology (and (Luigi Serafini’s ((Code)x Seriphian(us))))

https://www.academia.edu/99536790/

Here’s the Discord Channel:

https://discord.com/channels/1066055437457297469/1110258553689739276/1111325509993898096

WRETI workshop:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9LLwepou8Q&list=LLDkmzBShjBSqUTvnlWaaKlQ&ab_channel=SETIInstitute

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Cycles, with Ana Valdivia

Mon, 28 Aug 2023 12:00:28 GMT

Ana Valdivia walks me through her research on the connections between data centers, AI, and mining. We discuss what it means to be a researcher looking at controversial, problematic, and difficult to access sites, and what resistance to the AI industry — which gobbles up water, minerals, land, and electricity at incredible rates — can look like. Recorded Jul 28, 2023. Released Aug 28, 2023.

Rural Spain could end up hosting infrastructure hubs for AI – here’s what the environmental cost could be

https://theconversation.com/rural-spain-could-end-up-hosting-infrastructure-hubs-for-ai-heres-what-the-environmental-cost-could-be-205504

Machines in Flames [Full Documentary]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGVMu5OPu7E&ab_channel=DestructionistInternational

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Contradictions, with Melissa Gregg

Mon, 14 Aug 2023 12:00:39 GMT

Melissa Gregg and I discuss what it means to think ecologically, in, through, and with technology, at a time of perpetually new things compelling us into a sense of urgency about the climate crisis. Together we untangle the affective investments and contradictions embedded in moment of reckoning with out place in the world and on this planet. Recorded Jul 12, 2023. Released Aug 14, 2023.

Keynote: The Ecological Impact of an Automated Society (2022 ADM+S Symposium)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWaBkHsUsqM

Circularity conference report

https://melgregg.com/2023/06/14/talking-in-circles-about-e-waste/

Where to donate your computer (US)

https://digitunity.org/get-involved/give-equipment/donate-your-computer/

Right to repair association

https://www.repair.org/

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Nuance, with Tega Brain

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 12:00:48 GMT

With Tega Brain — who, after many recommendations – I finally got to meet over Zoom, we discuss using bots to distort clicks related to climate and how the concept of ecology both informs and distorts our ideas about human-nature relationships. Art, addressing these concerns, requires a lot of nuance. Recorded May 23, 2023. Released July 24, 2023.

The Battle to Control the Carbon Media Cycle, Ding Magazine.

https://dingdingding.org/issue-4/the-battle-to-control-the-carbon-media-cycle/

Synthetic Messenger

https://syntheticmessenger.labr.io/#about

(on YouTube):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlFW1gL6AGU&ab_channel=SyntheticMessenger

The Environment Is Not A System

https://aprja.net/article/view/116062

The viral false claim that nearly 200 arsonists are behind the Australia fires, explained

https://www.vox.com/2020/1/9/21058332/australia-fires-arson-lightning-explained

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Resurrected, with Tonia Sutherland

Mon, 10 Jul 2023 12:00:30 GMT

“Resurrecting” means bringing back to life, raising from the dead, restoring to vibrancy, bringing into public view, reanimating… Tonia Sutherland does just this for the concept of the black body in the digital afterlife, through a critique of the archive, the HeLa cells legacy, holograms of entertainers, and emergent AI. An absolute honour to host this episode on an early read of Sutherland’s new book. Recorded May 22, 2023. Released July 10, 2023.

Resurrecting the Black Body: Race and the Digital Afterlife

https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520383876/resurrecting-the-black-body

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Neural, with Théo Lepage-Richer and Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal

Mon, 26 Jun 2023 12:00:57 GMT

n this episode, I have a truly delightful conversation about neural networks with Théo Lepage-Richer and Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal. We go through the many ways that the body gets ‘technologized’ and technology gets ‘biologized’ and how and why these conceptualization happen in specific historical and political contexts, and why they matter — and more than neural networks themselves, maybe? You’ll learn about neural media, parascientific media, and the various legacies of the brain-as-site and -model for various things. Recorded May 19, 2023. Released June 26, 2023.

Neural Networks (by Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal, Théo Lepage-Richer and Lucy Suchman)

https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/neural-networks

Mind-reading technology has arrived

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2023/5/4/23708162/neurotechnology-mind-reading-brain-neuralink-brain-computer-interface

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Refusal, with Blair Attard-Frost

Mon, 12 Jun 2023 12:00:21 GMT

In this episode Blair Attard-Frost and I discuss AI value & supply chains, AI policies and strategies in Canada and how queer and trans theories can help inform (and refuse) how we think and feel about AI governance. We also discuss the role of creative writing, as outlet and way to reach audiences that might be compelled by “AI”. Recorded May 9, 2023. Released June 12, 2023.

The Ethics of AI Business Practices: A Review of 47 AI Ethics Guidelines

https://montrealethics.ai/the-ethics-of-ai-business-practices-a-review-of-47-ai-ethics-guidelines/

Once a promising leader, Canada’s artificial-intelligence strategy is now a fragmented laggard https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-once-a-promising-leader-canadas-artificial-intelligence-strategy-is/

Object Type 3

https://objecttype3.com/

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Imaginaries, with Fenwick McKelvey

Tue, 30 May 2023 12:00:49 GMT

A recent open letter by Future of Life Institute calling for a six-month ban on AI development has received widespread attention online. Fenwick McKelvey and I discuss the hyped-up ideas from tech leaders about “powerful digital minds” and how fear of AI functions as a marketing tool. We also go over regulation and policy initiatives in Canada. Recorded April 25, 2023. Released May 30, 2023.

Let’s base AI debates on reality, not extreme fears about the future

https://theconversation.com/lets-base-ai-debates-on-reality-not-extreme-fears-about-the-future-203030

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Chatter, with David M. Berry, Peggy Weil, Arthur Schwarz, Mark Marino and Jeff Shrager

Sat, 20 May 2023 12:00:45 GMT

In this episode I speak with some members of the ELIZANGEN project: David M. Berry, Peggy Weil, Arthur Schwarz, Mark Marino and Jeff Shrager. ELIZA is the first “chatterbots”, emerging in the 1960’s. Listen to our conversation to learn more about finding the code for ELIZA in the archives, building various iterations of the bot, and how it helps us think about AI like Chat-GPT, today. Recorded April 24, 2023. Released May 20, 2023.

pr0c3ss1ng

https://www.reddit.com/r/pr0c3ss1ng/

Mr. Mind

http://82.223.169.27/MrMind/index.html

ELIZAGEN

https://sites.google.com/view/elizagen-org/team-eliza?authuser=0

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Risk, with Émile P. Torres

Wed, 10 May 2023 12:00:01 GMT

Ever wonder what longtermism is and how it’s come to be such a big influence over the tech world? I speak with Émile P. Torres about all things connecting AI hype, ideologies about future humans, big tech’s concentration of power, the idea of human potential (or humanity’s potential) and the idea of moral consequence. Recorded Apr 17, 2023. Released May 10, 2023.

Longtermism Hub

https://www.longtermism-hub.com/critiques

Against longtermism

https://aeon.co/essays/why-longtermism-is-the-worlds-most-dangerous-secular-credo

Understanding "longtermism": Why this suddenly influential philosophy is so toxic

https://www.salon.com/2022/08/20/understanding-longtermism-why-this-suddenly-influential-philosophy-is-so/

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Nostalgia, with Grafton Tanner

Sun, 30 Apr 2023 12:00:01 GMT

What is nostalgia? A memory? A feeling? A weapon?? Tune in to my conversation with Grafton Tanner about the relationship between tech, nostalgia, retrobate and much more! Recorded Mar 31, 2023. Released April 30, 2023.

Grafton Tanner

https://graftontanner.com/

Yesterday Once More

https://reallifemag.com/yesterday-once-more/

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Flesh, with Maya Indira Ganesh

Thu, 20 Apr 2023 12:00:08 GMT

Maya and I talk about [digital] flesh, [digital] intimacies, and how writing in and out of academic contexts helps us feel through our best ideas. We wonder what we owe the world in terms of representation and identity, and whether it’s okay to offer up an altered version of ourselves. Recorded Mar 30, 2023. Released April 20, 2023.

Between Flesh: Tech Degrees of Separation

https://13thgwangjubiennale.org/minds-rising/ganesh/

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Unsafe, with Gina Neff

Mon, 10 Apr 2023 12:00:51 GMT

Gina and I talk about her recent article(s) on Wired.com that track violence against women and girls on the internet. We discuss how the internet should be regulated for safety, and question the limits of technological solutions. Recorded Feb 20, 2023. Released April 10, 2023.

Minderoo Centre for Technology and Democracy

https://www.mctd.ac.uk/

The Internet Is at Risk of Driving Women Away

https://www.wired.com/story/online-harassment-women-internet/

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Stale, with Zane Griffin Talley Cooper

Thu, 30 Mar 2023 12:00:53 GMT

Zane and I delve deep into the materialities of the virtual world, and try to imagine who the Metaverse (in all its possible iterations) is for — with some attention to our uncomfortable, sweaty bodies, fussing with headsets and sensory overload. We conclude that Big Tech’s visions of the future are a bit stale. Recorded Jan 20, 2023. Released March 30, 2023.

The Metaverse

https://about.meta.com/what-is-the-metaverse/

Decenterland

https://decentraland.org/download/

Zane’s work

https://www.zanegriffintalleycooper.com/

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Greener, with Sasha Luccioni

Mon, 20 Mar 2023 12:00:13 GMT

Sasha Luccioni explains LLM to be their parameters and why these matter when thinking about the social and environmental ramifications of AI. Recorded Feb 8, 2022. Released March 20, 2023.

Publications (under “Alexandra Luccioni”)

https://www.sashaluccioni.com/publications/

ICLR 2023 Workshop: Tackling Climate Change with Machine Learning https://www.climatechange.ai/events/iclr2023

We’re getting a better idea of AI’s true carbon footprint by Melissa Heikkilä https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/11/14/1063192/were-getting-a-better-idea-of-ais-true-carbon-footprint

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Handled, with Hank Gerba

Fri, 10 Mar 2023 13:00:59 GMT

Hank Gerba was once one of Sophia The Robot’s handlers, and in this episode he reveals the magic (deception) behind social robots that promise to be one day autonomous. Recorded Jan 24, 2023. Released March 10, 2023.

Sophia

https://www.hansonrobotics.com/sophia/

The Most Realistic Humanoid Robots in The World

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjHNFP_773k&ab_channel=Motech

Creators of famous Sophia robot reveal AI robotics for children, elderly | Nightline

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRHdnkUjcZg&ab_channel=ABCNews

Sophia the Robot and Jimmy Sing a Duet of "Say Something"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-zyTlZQYpE&ab_channel=TheTonightShowStarringJimmyFallon

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Promised, with Jake Pitre

Wed, 01 Mar 2023 13:00:05 GMT

Jake Pitre and I discuss the concept of the Metaverse and the future it wants. Recorded Jan 18, 2023. Released March 1, 2023.

Who Wants the Metaverse?

https://daily.jstor.org/who-wants-the-metaverse/

Awkward Meetings

https://twitter.com/satyanadella/status/1455624165201887234

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Fake, with Gabriele de Seta

Mon, 20 Feb 2023 13:00:21 GMT

Gabriele de Seta and I have a great conversation about deepfakes in a Chinese context. One of the big insights of this episode is that we may have to one day soon consider the agency of replicas in digital (human) form. Recorded Dec 15, 2022.

Huanlian, or changing faces: Deepfakes on Chinese digital media platforms

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/13548565211030185

危特朗普与蓬佩奥向中国示爱的绝密视频流出我爱你中国

https://www.bilibili.com/video/av754473414/

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Soulless, with Eryk Salvaggio

Fri, 10 Feb 2023 13:00:27 GMT

Eryk Salvaggio and I discuss what GANs, stable diffusion and neural networks are, and we take listeners through the process of “reading” an AI image. Recorded Dec 13, 2022.

How to Read an AI Image: The Datafication of a Kiss

https://cyberneticforests.substack.com/p/how-to-read-an-ai-image

This person does not exist

https://thispersondoesnotexist.com

@Suhail They say it's "soulless"

https://twitter.com/Suhail/status/1575527122449231872?s=20&t=NDTtKG0ET9c42oRmf3Q5-A

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Death, with Tamara Kneese

Mon, 30 Jan 2023 13:00:28 GMT

Tamara Kneese and I have a truly delightful conversation about death and the personal data that complicates estate planning and digital doubles. The main takeaway for me from this episode — and there were many — is that we scrutinize our (and others’) likeness in digital form in ways that we didn't have to with memorabilia in material form.

Data Infrastructures of the Dead

https://www.heliotropejournal.net/helio/data-infrastructures-of-the-dead

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Terror, with Olivia Snow

Fri, 20 Jan 2023 13:00:56 GMT

Olivia Snow and I chat about the social implications of Lensa, technically a picture editor for selfies and photo retouching, or “an all-in-one image editing app that takes your photos to the next level”. We unpack how AI image apps like Lensa amplify racism, misogyny, transphobia and hatred of sex workers, while also providing a potential way to thwart expectations of ‘real’ representation. Recorded Dec 10, 2022.

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Allure, with Luke Munn

Tue, 10 Jan 2023 13:00:24 GMT

Luke Munn and I discuss the allure of ChatGPT technology. ChatGPT is a natural language processing tool driven by AI technology that allows you to have human-like conversations and much more with a chatbot. For me, one of the great insights from our conversation is that media scholars should pay attention to the meaning-making that happens culturally, even as technologies and their underlying logics are being/have been debunked. Recorded Dec 7, 2022.

Munn, Ferocious Logics: Unmaking the Algorithm (2018)

https://meson.press/books/ferocious-logics/

Munn, Logic of Feeling: Technology's Quest to Capitalize Emotion (2020)

https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781538148358/Logic-of-Feeling-Technology%27s-Quest-to-Capitalize-Emotion

Munn, Automation is a Myth (2022)

https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=34899&bottom_ref=subject

Magee, Arora, and Munn, "Structured Like a Language Model: Analysing AI as an Automated Subject" (preprint)

https://arxiv.org/abs/2212.05058

Munn, "The Uselessness of AI Ethics"

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s43681-022-00209-w

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Grievance, with Sarah T. Roberts

Sun, 01 Jan 2023 13:00:59 GMT

In this first episode of The Data Fix, I speak with Dr. Sarah T. Roberts, an expert in commercial content moderation and THE cultural critic we need right now, on all things tech & society related. We begin our discussion about how moderation on social media works, and what it presumes to parse out or let through, and explore for whose sake moderation is done. Because we focus on affect and feeling(s) in this series, we also discuss what it is about technology (and the Internet in particular) that has created such divisions in our worlds — specifically, what can we learn by asking about the legitimate grievances of the (lie-filled, meme-driven, bot-happy,) political right in the US and Canadian contexts? Recorded Dec 7, 2022.

Behind the Screen: Content Moderation in the Shadows of Social Media

https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300261479/behind-the-screen/

Modulating Moderation (Overton window mentioned)

https://mediarxiv.org/wvp8c

Algorithmic amplification of politics on Twitter

https://blog.twitter.com/en_us/topics/company/2021/rml-politicalcontent

Future Fetishists

https://www.boundary2.org/2019/08/sarah-t-roberts-and-mel-hogan-left-behind-futurist-fetishists-prepping-and-the-abandonment-of-earth/

Digital Detritus

https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/8283

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