Ben Werdmuller helps leaders at newsrooms, non-profits, and mission-driven organizations to navigate their biggest technology challenges.
Arc, my default browser for a year now, recently launched a set of AI-driven features. I’m finding two to be particularly useful — and one of those is problematic in a way I want to discuss. They’re worth considering because, while Arc has a relatively small userbase for now,
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"What makes this news more interesting is the fact that the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has abandoned its Threads account but is still maintaining its self-hosted Mastodon accounts online." #Media [Link]
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"Website business models that depended on clicks from social media are now broken." It was always a good idea to own your own relationships with your audience, but there's never been a better time than now. #Media [Link]
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To be fair, you could draw a picture of this in Photoshop, too. But I suspect a few brands might have a few things to say about Microsoft hosting this tool. #AI [Link]
I’ve written and open sourced a rubric for assessing new technologies as part of your organization. It’s written for use in non-technical organizations in particular, but it might be useful everywhere. The idea is to pose questions that are worth asking when you’re selecting a vendor, or
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Amazing work. Consider how much this team has been able to achieve with a tiny fraction of the budget of a VC-funded tech startup - and the impact of their work is phenomenal. #Technology [Link]
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It turns out that Google quietly alters your search queries into ones it can more easily monetize, without you knowing. It's the kind of anti-user nonsense only a monopolist could pull off. #Technology [Link]
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I think I'm a clone now. #AI [Link]
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"Crime predictions generated for the police department in Plainfield, New Jersey, rarely lined up with reported crimes, an analysis by The Markup has found." In fact, much less than 1% of the time. #AI [Link]
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A look at the inner workings of getting standards built within the framework of the W3C. It honestly sounds like technical writers should be a part of the mix alongside other practitioners. #Technology [Link]
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Notable to see a newspaper run an ad campaign that genuinely competes with another one. Kind of a bold move in a world where the whole market is declining. #Media [Link]
In her latest (excellent) book Doppelganger: A Trip Into the Mirror World, the author Naomi Klein makes an offhand comment that, as a leftist, flags make her itchy. I feel the same way, in a way that goes beyond the Stars and Stripes or the Union Jack. At its worst,