22 (or so) November 2023

Morning, afternoon, evening? Apologies for the delay on this week’s newsletter.

The New Yorker has a whole issue dedicated to AI, but that isn’t featuring here, as my hard copy hasn’t turned up yet, leaving me quite grumpy as for once I had a whole Saturday set aside just for coffee, and the papers. This was not planned with the New Yorker’s AI issue in mind. But it would have been nice. Instead I read this intriguing, but really quite sad, piece on the rise of interventionist foster parents. (I’m quite far behind on my hard copies, in fairness).

There’s an interesting story (in Dutch, maybe someone can confirm it’s interesting?) which suggests that the Dutch government is going to ban AI by civil servants. The devil is in the detail, I guess, and I wonder how AI is defined. Is it some super narrow definition, or would it cover things like the welfare provision case (SyRI – light house reports did a great series on this a while back too).

WIRED has a great story on AI and music generation. I find it so hard to believe that AI could ever generate music you could feel a connection to, but there must be huge potential there for it to assist with creativity.

I haven’t listened yet, but this podcast episode on facial recognition, privacy, and how Alexandria shaped the world sounds great. I’ve been listening to ‘Killing Thatcher‘ by Rory Carroll, which is absolutely fascinating, and my first ever audiobook. On to Sinead O’Connor’s autobiography next, as my adventures in audio books continue.

Leaving you with this absolutely gorgeous mix by Jon Hopkins.

Thanks to Sarah Zarmsky, have a lovely week.

Websites

Irish Independent, Anne-Marie Tomchak: Will AI be the great leveller to close the gender pay gap?

The Atlantic, AI Is About to Photoshop Your Memories

De Volkskrant (in Dutch), Government is preparing to ban the use of AI software by civil servants

Reuters, Seeking synergy between AI and privacy regulations

Cryptopolitan, Exclusive Report: How Does AI Facilitate the Misuse of Data and Privacy Abuse?

The Keyword, Accelerating climate action with AI

Communications of the ACM, Comparing Chatbots Trained in Different Languages

Communications of the ACM, Making Empathy Artificial    

The New York Times, Is Argentina the First A.I. Election? 

MIT Technology Review, Text-to-image AI models can be tricked into generating disturbing images  

Harvard Ash Center, Ten Ways AI Will Change Democracy

Tech Policy Press, When AI Systems Fail: The Toll on the Vulnerable Amidst Global Crisis

RAILS, Product Liability in the Age of AI: New Technologies are Calling for New Concepts

Financial Times, Can AI improve UK public sector productivity?

WIRED, Google DeepMind’s AI Pop Star Clone Will Freak You Out

The Register, UK won’t rush to regulate AI, says government minister

The Washington Post, 1 in 10 teens already use ChatGPT for school. Here’s how to guide them.

The Washington Post, These lawyers used ChatGPT to save time. They got fired and fined.

The Register, The FCC is taking a closer look at AI robocalls 

Financial Times, AI boosts breast cancer detection rates, new research shows

The Guardian, AI is coming for our jobs! Could universal basic income be the solution?

The Guardian, Rishi Sunak’s AI plan has no teeth – and once again, big tech is ready to exploit that

WIRED, Parental Advisory: This Chatbot May Talk to Your Child About Sex and Alcohol

WIRED, Underage Workers Are Training AI 

WIRED, Social Media Sleuths, Armed With AI, Are Identifying Dead Bodies

The Register, YouTubers asked to disclose AI-generated content – or else

The Washington Post, Google wants governments to form a ‘global AI corps’         

The Guardian, White faces generated by AI are more convincing than photos, finds survey

WIRED, The US Wants China to Start Talking About AI Weapons

The Guardian, ‘Alarming’: convincing AI vaccine and vaping disinformation generated by Australian researchers

The Register, Google’s AI Magic Editor won’t work on IDs, faces, or bodies

Algorithm Watch, Generative AI must be neither the stowaway nor the gravedigger of the AI Act

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, EU: France, Germany and Italy push for codes of conduct without a sanction regime for foundation models in AI Act, according to media reports         

Big Brother Watch, Wired – Police use of “highly intrusive” facial recognition tech sweeping the UK

Big Brother Watch, City A.M. – We’ve had dangerous AI with us for decades, and never had a summit for racist algorithms

Algorithm Watch, Not a solution: Meta’s new AI system to contain discriminatory ads

Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, USA: Cruise reveals flaws in driverless car software after horrible crash     

Big Brother Watch, Police using facial recognition to target protesters: find out if you’re on a watchlist

The Strategist, AI, arms control and the new cold war

Smithsonian Magazine, A Robotic ‘A.I. Chemist’ Could Make Oxygen on Mars

Defense One, DOD’s new AI and data strategy gives industry a challenge: share    

Blog Posts

Just Security, Is AI the Right Sword for Democracy?

Afronomicslaw, At the Intersection of Climate Change, AI, and Human Rights Law: Towards a Solidarity-Based Approach (Part 1) & Part 2  

The Conversation, South African university students use AI to help them understand – not to avoid work 

The Conversation, Long hours and low wages: the human labour powering AI’s development

The Conversation, AI is already being melded with robotics – one outcome could be powerful new weapons

The Conversation, Should the media tell you when they use AI to report the news? What consumers should know 

The Conversation, Can you spot the AI impostors? We found AI faces can look more real than actual humans 

Reports

UNESCO, Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence in an Era of Generative AI 

Media

ABC Listen (Podcast), Facial recognition and privacy. Alexandria: The city that changed the world 

Academic Literature

*Disclaimer: The following articles, chapters, and books have not been evaluated for their methodology and do not necessarily reflect the views of the AI & Human Right Blog 

M. M. Maas, Advanced AI Governance: A Literature Review of Problems, Options, and ProposalsS. El-Azab and P. Nong, Clinical algorithms, racism, and “fairness” in healthcare: A case of bounded justice

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