Susan Leigh Star, a sociologist and theorist of infrastructure and networks, wrote in her 1999 influential paper, “The Ethnography of Infrastructure”:
“Study a city and neglect its sewers and power supplies (as many have), and you miss essential aspects of distributional justice and planning power. Study an information system and neglect its... See more
So is it possible to build AI tools that can help us all, rather than simply bolstering the dizzying wealth of a small number of tech companies? Is it possible to create an AI that democratises more than just financial insecurity for the majority of people—simply shifting a greater percentage of people below the wealth disparity gap rather than... See more
The anti-social century is the result of one such cascade, of chosen solitude, accelerated by digital-world progress and physical-world regress. But if one cascade brought us into an anti-social century, another can bring about a social century. New norms are possible; they’re being created all the time. Independent bookstores are booming—the... See more
New work: All Media Is Training Data, a catalogue of works by @hollyherndon and @matdryhurst, curated by @eva__jaeger. THREAD: (1/) https://t.co/pVcUqSQ3Ln
The past hundred years a canon that defined modernity, post-modernity, and our world was established, celebrated, illuminated, and constantly revised by critics and appreciators who used the pen to make their case. They’re the ones who helped establish cultural significance. They’re the ones who remind us to marvel not at demographics, but at... See more
All these points in AI’s favor prompt some nervous reappraisals. Essays that began in bafflement or dismay wind up convinced that the technology marks an epochal shift in reading and writing.