Ben Werdmuller helps leaders at newsrooms, non-profits, and mission-driven organizations to navigate their biggest technology challenges.
Thomas Stringer on compensation in open source: And then finally, there’s my uninteresting (to me) OSS project. What once resembled passion project is now unrecognizable from a motivation perspective. But the demand is high. There are lots of users, many in a corporate sense using my software to further
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"The more access dads have to paternity leave, [...] the better able they are to adjust to parenthood, helping also make them more effective co-parents as their children get older." All the more reason to ensure that everywhere has fantastic parental leave for all parents. The US is
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Written before the news broke about Sam Altman moving to Microsoft, this remains a nuanced, intelligent take. "My understanding is that some members of the board genuinely felt Altman was dishonest and unreliable in his communications with them, sources tell me. Some members of the board believe that they
We saw the latest Mission Impossible last night - one of the most expensive movies ever made, with a leading man who famously still does at least most of his own stunts, which promised amazing set piece after set piece after set piece. Halfway through, I realized I was really bored.
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A beautifully written and executed visual essay about AI, parenting, what it means to be intelligent, and the fundamental essence of being human. #AI [Link]
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This is a good critique of some of the less analytical AI criticism, some of which I've undoubtedly been guilty of myself. "The fork in the road is this: we can dismiss “AI.” We can call it useless, we can dismiss its output as nonsense, we can
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"The blueprint for modern digital computing was codesigned by Charles Babbage, a vocal champion for the concerns of the emerging industrial capitalist class who condemned organized workers and viewed democracy and capitalism as incompatible." "Babbage documented his ideas on labor discipline in his famous volume On the
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I'm pretty shocked that people are sharing Osama bin Laden's letter because they agree with it. Mostly because it is absolutely rife with antisemitic tropes. This is one of the most dangerous aspects of the place we're in: the conflict in Gaza is leading
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This feels like a good use for AI: taking in more data points, understanding their interactions, and producing far more accurate weather forecasts. We're already used to some amount of unreliability in weather forecasts, so when the model gets it wrong - as this did with the intensification of
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"Coal must be phased out seven times faster than is now happening, deforestation must be reduced four times faster, and public transport around the world built out six times faster than at present, if the world is to avoid the worst impacts of climate breakdown, new research has found.
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I feel this myself, but I don't think it means that coding is going away, exactly. Some kinds of coding are less manual, in the same way we don't write in assembler anymore. But there will always be a place for code. Lately I've
I want to write something on Israel / Palestine, and I've tried about six times to gather my thoughts, but there's so much to the situation, and there are so many people who will take you to task no matter where you stand, that it's