AI Is Stealing Our Voices
I’ve been thinking a lot about authorial voice and style lately, the thing that makes each person’s writing unique. Growing up, I was a voracious reader, in part because my parents had a rule that we could only stay up…
Tag Technology
What future do we want?
When my granddad died many years ago, I spent a long time thinking about the world he grew up in. A place where nature was abundant, where humans hadn’t caused so much damage yet, where insects flourished and where physical…
Nostalgia for the Early Internet: Rebuilding Serendipity in Algorithm Design
Nostalgic comments about the early internet often praise its random, chaotic aesthetic [...]
The Philosophy of Cyberpunk: High-Tech Rebels and Neon Dreams
The future has never seemed closer, yet we’re still struggling to find our place in it. It’s no surprise, then, that many of us are turning back to the cyberpunk genre. Its’ a world of hackers, rebels, and misfits, in…
The Dangers of Social Media: Why Australia Is Considering a Ban
Australia has proposed banning social media for children under the age of 16, with penalties for tech companies that don’t comply. Backlash against this idea has centered on the problem of enforcing age verification, which would affect all users, not…
Is the Internet Dying?
The first image to pop up on Google when you search for “Beethoven” is now an AI-generated image. This can be replicated for other famous composers, including Chopin. In some cases, there are real photographs of these composers being buried…
Drones could revolutionise the construction industry
The UK’s new Labour government has pledged to build 1.5 million homes during its first term in office. To achieve this, it promises planning reform and the reintroduction of local housing targets. Yet little attention has been given to the…
Art in the Age of Artificial Intelligence
We are entering an era of upheaval that some are calling the fourth industrial revolution.[1] The rise of artificial intelligence, and in particular generative art, threatens to upend our social and cultural landscape, leading to a renewed conflict between mechanical…
Recommender Systems: Automated decisions, AI and Human Freedom
(Below is a pre-print shared for educational purposes. The full article is available here, with credit to my co-author Jan Blockx: ) My latest academic work looks at recommender systems, the recommendations that shape our digital lives on YouTube, Amazon,…
Dreaming of a better future
There’s an interesting flaw at the heart of Olivia Wilde’s new movie, Don’t Worry, Darling, which reveals everything wrong with the ongoing culture wars. The premise of the film is simple. A 1950s housewife is living with her husband in…