Ben Werdmuller helps leaders at newsrooms, non-profits, and mission-driven organizations to navigate their biggest technology challenges.
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OpenAI feels a bit like Napster: a proof of concept that shows the power of a particular experience while trampling over the licensing agreements that would have been needed to make the whole thing legal. The Napster user experience eventually led to our streaming music present: you can draw a
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"Dutch Jews who survived the death camps and returned to the Netherlands were for years monitored by the Dutch secret service because they were considered to be extremists and a danger to democracy." There's no context that can possibly make this acceptable. The Netherlands is still
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"Your individual risk depends on a large number of factors, but there's a consensus: one out of every ten people who catch Covid go on to develop Long Covid. It's not a one-time risk, either. You face these odds every single time you catch
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Technology news tends to center on the global north, but the implications of technology are global. Rest of World does a wonderful, necessary job shining a light on those stories. What I particularly appreciate about its coverage is that it's not just critical (although there certainly are critical
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If the Markup is jealous of another newsroom's coverage, you know the stories are good: the Markup has consistently been the most important outlet for investigative technology journalism. There's a special mention here for 404 Media, which has also been a fantastic addition to the tech
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I enjoyed Get Back and They Shall Not Grow Old, but what's obvious to me after reading this piece is that these upscaled films will look as outdated in 20 years as CGI from 2003 does today. They'll look like cartoons. Not without value, but nothing
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It took me several attempts to get into Bridge, but finally, this week, I picked it up again and was sucked in. There are plenty of other novels about traveling multiple universes to see the other yous, and Beukes knowingly stops to play with those expectations. The real story here
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That an AI model trained on Google Street View photos can look at a picture and figure out where it is isn't much of a surprise, but it's still jarring to see that it's here. I think the real lesson is that AI undermines
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A sober breakdown of what it may mean for Meta's new social network to finally join the open social web (aka the fediverse). For many people, this has been a hard pill to swallow: while it's clear that Meta has been a human rights disaster, its
Newsletter subscribers might be surprised to see a slightly new design. I’ve moved away from Substack and back to Buttondown, an indie mailing list service. Every email will be free from now on; paid subscribers will be refunded in full. Why? Here’s the New York Times with the
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I have so much respect for what everyone at The 19th does. It has one of the best work cultures I've ever encountered, and Amanda is a huge part of that. I'm deeply glad to have worked their and to have worked with her. The things
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"An investigation by ProPublica and Columbia University’s Tow Center for Digital Journalism shows how false claims based on out-of-context, outdated or manipulated media have proliferated on X during the first month of the Israel-Hamas conflict." "[...] We also found that the Community Notes system,