As Mike Edwards notes, “AI doomers will eagerly tweet this article, unaware that it’s not about the dangers of LLMs: it’s about *information literacy*”
In a cringe-inducing court hearing, a lawyer who relied on A.I. to craft a motion full of made-up case law said he “did not comprehend” that the chat bot could lead him astray.
As part of a journalism lesson about brand names, I just wrote this sentence: The term “Winnebago Vista” is a rollicking road trip for the ear, and no oath was ever minced with more tangy intensity than we find in the fricative phonemes of “Cheez-It.” I’ll probably murder that darling tomorrow, but right now I’m…
The very useful “media bias chart” is one of several useful ways to classify sources of journalism. While individual items published by any of these sources can vary considerably from the general location depicted in this chart, the takeaway message is that journalism can still be valid and useful even if it has a slant,…
Bit-Sized Productions was nominated for something like 12 awards for “Long Live the LARPers” and won the audience choice, best acting ensemble, best song, tied for best choreography… I lost track of the rest. What a fun night! I’ll post a link to the film as soon as I can!
I invest a lot of energy asking my college students to unlearn the pattern of summary and personal reflection that was enough to to earn a good grade in high school. I emphasize repeatedly that their high school teachers didn’t do anything wrong by teaching them what they needed to do in order to get…
Do the headlines encourage empathy, or do they “other” the victims of crime? (Click to zoom in.)
She waived a fee. He accepted a slightly expired coupon. Someone bent a rule in my favor. (I may or may not have deserved it.) I bent rules for five different people. (They may or may not have deserved it.) That 1/4 inch post that was too big popped off and under it was a…
When I worked at a radio news station in the late 80s, when I was about 20, I would often saunter into the newsroom a half hour before my shift started, so that I could sit down with a sandwich and a bottle of apple juice, and page through the newsroom’s copies of The Washington…
Federal officials have approved a site on the National Mall for the capital’s first memorial dedicated to journalists who have died while reporting the news and to the role of the free press in a democracy, the foundation planning the project announced Monday. The Fallen Journalists Memorial will be located on a third-of-an-acre parcel in…
A former dancer reckons with the rigors and ordeals of life in ballet. If ballet was all self-effacing torture, there would be no need to wrestle with it. But despite the inhumanity of its current training methods, Robb also makes it clear that it gave her so much. “At ballet, I had learned not only…
Rewatching ST:DS9 The opening acts remind me why I cringe at all the Fergengi-focused episodes, and the great writing, the mix of comedy and drama, impressive performances, and the plot twists remind me why I end up admitting that yeah, that Ferengi-focused episode was pretty good. A humming Sisko cooks up an analog dinner for…
Rewatching ST:DS9 With a come-hither glance and an obviously fake cough, the dabo girl Leeta introduces herself to Dr. Bashir. A very amused Dax interrupts with news that the valedictorian of Bashir’s medical class will be visiting the station soon. (Bashir was salutatorian, and he’s not bitter about that, no, not at all.) Sisko returns…
An amazing story of hope and dignity. That book club helped the inmates develop their analytical and communication skills. And out of that came a surprising insight: prison inmates read 9 times more books than civilians. So together with the National Justice Council, the Carambaia publishing house created a program called The Prison Reviews. The…
Very glad to see another of August Wilson’s plays is getting filmed. Sad to read that it won’t be filed in Pittsburgh, where Wilson grew up and where most of his plays take place. “The entire film industry of Southwest Pennsylvania is saddened to not be able to welcome August Wilson’s ‘Piano Lesson’ to Pittsburgh,…
Rewatching ST:DS9 After the recap of S3E20 “Improbable Cause,” we see Bashir, clearly missing Garak, holding forth on the decline of modern theatre during lunch with O’Brien, who kinda sorta pretends to listen. But this is the teaser for the second half of a two-parter, and there’s a plot to jump-start. A fleet of Romulans…
Rewatching ST:DS9 During his usual lunch with Bashir, Garak dismisses as farcical the notion that Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar would be surprised that his best friend betrayed him, in a literary reference that is definitely random and will certainly have nothing at all to do with this week’s plot. Garak departs with a promise to deliver…
When I’m stressed, or I feel life is spinning out of control, I buy lights. I’m sure there’s something symbolic in that action. Over the years I’ve picked up a half dozen photography lights with umbrella reflectors, and as the cool-white spiral fluorescent bulbs fail — one every two years or so — I’ve been…
Rather than wanting to make a film about Tetris the video game as such, Baird was fascinated by this human story that pushed the game into existence. “The original title of the film was actually Falling Blocs, just like the Eastern blocs that dissolved when the Soviet Union collapsed. I thought it was a really…