A friend gave me an invite code to Digg.
Yes, that Digg. Apparently, it’s coming back.
Sadly, my first post came with a shitty “Digg Intelligence” summary.
Administered by:
#aisucks
17 posts7 participants1 post today
The inevitable consequences of ‘just building a bigger model’ are not lost on this Ai developer.
“Personally, I’m not worried about The Singularity.
But my girlfriend’s annoyed about sleeping in the shed”.
For $100 I can write you a shitty song in under 4 minutes too.
Sure, it will be whatever pops into my head, and just me singing into my phone, but it will be a 100% authentic artisanal organic* human creation.
*mostly organic. Part of me contains plastic, and I don’t eat all organic foods, so ya know. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Continued thread
Also the complete evisceration of the word ‘Authentic’.
AUTHENTEC INTELLIGENCE
“It's Al uniquely built with expertise drawn from more than 40 years supporting British businesses, like tradespeople.”
Doubles all round for the copywriter that tried to put a spin on Ai.
Oh, they let him go, you say.
Replied in thread
@JustinDerrick
“It would’ve been quicker to do it ourselves, than spending so much time correcting it “ is going to be a mantra for 2026.
I played in a tennis tournament today that was “organised” by Chat GPT. About 40 players.
4 games into the tournament I was put against the same ‘kin player on the same ‘kin court. It was so borked that the coaches said it would have been easier to set it up themselves.
Absolute shambles.
Looking forward to Labour’s nationwide rollout.
Continued thread
So, if he’s saying Chat GPT can help people struggle to understand things, then I can’t argue with him.
The minister told PoliticsHome in January: “ChatGPT is fantastically good, and where there are things that you really struggle to understand in depth, ChatGPT can be a very good tutor for it.”
No words can adequately express the intense levels of irony implicit in this idiot’s statement.
#FDA employees say the agency's #Elsa #GenerativeAI #hallucinates entire studies
by Anna Washenko, July 24, 2025
Excerpt: "The CNN investigation highlighting these flaws with the FDA's #ArtificialIntelligence arrived on the same day as the White House introduced an #AIActionPlan. The program presented AI development as a technological arms race that the US should win at all costs, and it laid out plans to remove 'red tape and onerous regulation' in the sector. It also demanded that AI be free of 'ideological bias,' or in other words, only following the biases of the current administration by removing mentions of #ClimateChange, #misinformation, and diversity, equity and inclusion [#DEI] efforts. Considering each of those three topics has a documented impact on #PublicHealth, the ability of tools like #Elsa to provide genuine benefits to both the FDA and to US patients looks increasingly doubtful."
Read more:
https://tech.yahoo.com/ai/articles/fda-employees-agencys-elsa-generative-203547537.html
Yahoo Tech · FDA employees say the agency's Elsa generative AI hallucinates entire studies
Is #AI Making Us Stupider? This Study Certainly Thinks So
New research highlights the impact of AI on #CriticalThinking skills.
Posted August 21, 2025 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk
Key points
- Using AI to do the thinking impacts not only quality of work but also the long-term acquisition of skills.
- AI can have a place in education, but it needs to be carefully employed.
- Employing AI is having a detrimental impact on our ability to think critically.
Excerpt: "A new study by #MIT has published initial results highlighting a likely connection between large language models (#LLMs)—colloquially grouped under the banner of AI—and a direct cognitive cost, particularly when it comes to our ability to think critically. They conducted a study using a pool of 54 participants, divided into three groups. The groups were asked to deliver an SAT-grade essay, with the first group granted access to #ChatGPT, the second to traditional #GoogleSearch, and the third with no search resources at all. Group 3 was referred to as the '#BrainOnly' group.
"Over time, each participant had to produce several essays, and each time was attached to an EEG to record brain activity across 32 regions. Consistently, ChatGPT users had the lowest brain engagement for every essay, and worryingly showed decreasing brain activity over time, as they progressed through the essay assignments. What this represents is the ChatGPT participants getting '#lazier' with each subsequent essay, with many resorting to copy-and-paste content by the end of the study. The study also recorded that this group 'consistently underperformed at #neural, #linguistic, and behavioral levels.' The findings make sense; with ChatGPT doing much of the work, it's easier on our #cognitive processes, and it is unsurprising that it takes less mental effort.
"Perhaps the more concerning aspect of the findings is the connection between #ReducedBrainActivity and impact on long-term learning and memory. As well as recording the participants' level of satisfaction, #curiosity, #creativity and #memory as part of the study—which were all high for both the brain-only and the search assisted groups (groups 2 and 3)—a later part of the study asked each group to reproduce one of their earlier essays, with the ChatGPT group asked to do so without access to any tools. There was little evidence of this group's participants remembering much of their previous essay, highlighting the very necessary link between #CognitiveEngagement and memory and, therefore, the potential impact on #LongTermLearning and gaining new skills. Conversely, and perhaps reassuringly, however, the brain-only group was then permitted to rewrite their essay with access to ChatGPT, with their efforts showing higher levels of creativity and stronger arguments, while retaining original thinking and unique language. This could present reassurance that, employed properly, AI has a place in enhancing learning without diminishing cognitive capability.
"Despite awaiting peer review and using only a small participant sample, the research team decided to release their findings in advance of peer feedback, in what they highlight as an urgent consideration of #LearningWithAI."
Psychology TodayIs AI Making Us Stupider? This Study Certainly Thinks SoA new study has highlighted an apparent cognitive cost of using artificial intelligence when it comes to our ability to think critically.
There has been a LOT of human job losses due to #AI in the #GameDevelopment industry. Good to see folks taking a stand!
Pay rises, AI regulation, and layoff protection: what #ActivisionBlizzard's newly unionised employees want from #Microsoft
A big development.
By Connor Makar, Published on Aug. 22, 2025
Excerpt: "[Scott Alsworth from the #UK's #IWGB Union] credits the increase in #unionisation efforts to several factors: #TechnologicalDisplacement (especially poignant with the push for #AI), a greater number of #WorkingClass people joining the video game industry who bring a greater awareness of unionisation, and a response to the state of the industry as a whole."
Eurogamer.net · Pay rises, AI regulation, and layoff protection: what Activision Blizzard's newly unionised employees want from Microsoft
Is the #GenerativeAI bubble about to burst?
by Matthew Tyson, Aug 20, 2025
Excerpt: "The AI money trap
"We don’t have to look far for a more contrarian perspective. Economist Paul Kedrosky, for one, notes that capital expenditure on data centers has driven 1.2% of national GDP, acting as a kind of stimulus program. Without that investment, he writes, the US economy would be in contraction.
"Kedrosky describes an 'AI #datacenter spending program' that is 'already larger than peak telecom spending (as a percentage of GDP) during the dot-com era, and within shouting distance of peak 19th century railroad infrastructure spending.'
"Virtually all #AI spend flows into #Nvidia in one way or another. This is reflected in its recent valuation as the first publicly traded company to break $4 trillion in market capitalization (second up was #Microsoft).
"To put that number in context, market observers such as Forbes described it as being greater than the GDP of Canada or the annual global spending on defense.
"Nvidia alone accounts for more than 7% of the value of the S&P 500. AI gadfly Ed Zitron calls it the 'AI money trap.' "
https://www.infoworld.com/article/4041556/is-the-generative-ai-bubble-about-to-burst.html
InfoWorldIs the generative AI bubble about to burst?Developers have a front-row seat on the rollercoaster ride of generative AI. How we use it in our daily work tells us a lot about where the AI boom is headed.
Bank Fires Workers in Favor of #AIChatbot, Rehires Them After #Chatbot Is Terrible at the Job
Yet another tale of #AI's less-than-stellar employee track record has emerged.
By Lucas Ropek Published August 22, 2025
"Companies all over the world are currently racing to shrink their #workforces and replace them with AI. Often, it seems, this isn’t working out for the firms involved. Case in point: A bank in Australia recently did so, but then had to ask its workers to come back after it turned out that the chatbot that it had launched to replace them couldn’t cut the mustard.
"Last month, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia announced that it would be laying off 45 customer service workers as it rolled out a new AI-powered ‘voice bot’ that could supposedly do their job, Bloomberg reports. The bank claimed that the chatbot reduced the bank’s call volume significantly. However, the #WorkersUnion got involved and says it has determined that wasn’t the outcome.
"Australia’s Finance Sector #Union, which represents workers in the banking industry, called BS on the bank’s claims and engaged #CBA in a workplace relations tribunal. Now, it appears that the bank has admitted it made a grievous mistake, telling Bloomberg that its initial assessment that the customer service reps were no longer needed 'did not adequately consider all relevant business considerations and this error meant the roles were not redundant.' "
Gizmodo · Bank Fires Workers in Favor of AI Chatbot, Rehires Them After Chatbot Is Terrible at the JobYet another tale of AI's less-than-stellar employee track record has emerged.
#AI Is a #MassDelusion Event
Three years in, one of AI’s enduring impacts is to make people feel like they’re losing it.
"Who thought this was a good idea?"
By Charlie Warzel, August 18, 2025
Excerpt: "The interview triggered a feeling that has become exceedingly familiar over the past three years. It is the sinking feeling of a societal race toward a future that feels bloodless, hastily conceived, and shruggingly accepted. Are we really doing this? Who thought this was a good idea? In this sense, the Acosta interview is just a product of what feels like a collective delusion. This strange brew of shock, confusion, and ambivalence, I’ve realized, is the defining emotion of the generative-AI era. Three years into the hype, it seems that one of AI’s enduring cultural impacts is to make people feel like they’re losing it."
Read more:
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2025/08/ai-mass-delusion-event/683909/
Archived version:
https://archive.ph/KBAez
The Atlantic · AI Is a Mass-Delusion Event
#DataCentres to be expanded across #UK as concerns mount
Zoe Kleinman & Krystina Shveda, August 22, 2025
"The number of data centres in the UK is set to increase by almost a fifth, according to figures shared with BBC News.
"Data centres are giant warehouses full of powerful computers used to run digital services from #MovieStreaming to online banking - there are currently an estimated 477 of them in the UK.
"Construction researchers Barbour ABI have analysed planning documents and say that number is set to jump by almost 100, as the growth in artificial intelligence (AI) increases the need for processing power.
"The majority are due to be built in the next five years.
"However, there are concerns about the huge amount of energy and water the new data centres will consume.
"Some experts have warned it could drive up prices paid by consumers.
"More than half of the new data centres would be in #London and neighbouring counties.
"Many are privately funded by US #TechGiants such as #Google and #Microsoft and major investment firms.
A further nine are planned in #Wales, one in #Scotland, five in #GreaterManchester and a handful in other parts of the UK, the data shows.
"While the new data centres are mostly due for completion by 2030, the biggest single one planned would come later - a £10-billion AI data centre in #Blyth, near #Newcastle, for the American private #investment and wealth management company #BlackstoneGroup.
"It would involve building 10 giant buildings covering 540,000 square meters - the size of several large shopping centres - on the site of a former Blyth Power Station.
"Works are set to begin in 2031 and last for more than three years.
"Microsoft is planning four new data centres in the UK at a total cost of £330 million, with an estimated completion between 2027 and 2029 - two in the Leeds area, one near #Newport in Wales, and a five-storey site in #Acton, north west London.
"And Google is building two data centres, totalling £450m, spread over 400,000 sq m in north east London in the #LeeValley water system."
Read more:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clyr9nx0jrzo
Archived version:
https://archive.ph/GukDh
www.bbc.comData centres to be expanded across UK as concerns mountThe number of data centres is set to jump by a fifth in the coming years, figures seen by the BBC suggest.
"In 2023, Google operations worldwide consumed 6.4 billion gallons of water (24.2 billion liters), with 95%, 6.1 billion gallons (23.1 billion liters), used by data centers. Google reports that in 2024, the company’s data center in Council Bluffs, Iowa, consumed 1 billion gallons of water (3.8 billion liters), the most of any of its data centers."
https://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2025/08/inside-water-crisis-of-data-centers.html
Digital Information WorldInside the Water Crisis of Data Centers: Google, Meta, and the Hidden Costs of AI GrowthData centers consume vast water directly and indirectly, raising concerns as AI expansion intensifies demand globally.
% a witch 
The shift to #AI is happening faster than we know, it's blindsiding us and ruining humanity! We are being replaced in the name of capitalism and profit! Our art is being stolen and plagiarized! Cops are using it to profile people of color! The list goes on and on and on! #FuckAI #AIsucks
https://www.ebony.com/black-women-workforce-unemployment-exit-relief-fund/
Replied in thread
“I was just thinking what an interresting concept it is to eliminate the writer from he artistic process. If we can just get rid of these actors and directors, maybe we’ve got something here.”
Altman - 1992 - ‘The Player’ “movies are going to become video games and video games are going to become something unimaginably better”
Altman - 2024 - ‘The Fraudster’