Social Media For AI Agents

This is brilliant & scary at the same time: imagine AI agents 'chatting' with each other via social media using a Reddit-style interface. Moltbook seems to be that.

Now we need another AI to analyze these interactions & see if we can learn if/how AI agents change over time. This will also generate vast amounts of new potential training data for the AIs themselves much the same way that human Reddit & Facebook threads are used as AI training data.

Urban AI

Interesting article: Datacenters as core infrastructure of urban AI

He basically argues that the so-called 'cloud' comes with serious environmental impacts and externalities. Sure, we all want smart cities (aka data-driven urbanism) managed by Urban AIand love to talk about the cool edge-computing devices, but there is a hidden infrastructure (often in the suburbs & beyond) that make all this possible and that raises serious questions related to ownership. governance, and operation.

Here, physical distance or proximity often becomes irrelevant and with that many of our existing regulatory system fail.

Cloud providers want a) cheap electricity, b) low taxes, c) lax regulations, and d) proximity to high-speed connecticity. Thus, clusters develop along metropolitan corridors and once again regions farther away are left behind. Furthermore, AI providers obviously prefer to serve profitable sectors of the economy as opposed to common good public functions.

For cities this also means an increasing dependence on a small number of vendors who control the infrastructure & access to it. We are 'locked-into' whatever we choose.

In summary: Urban AI or any AI for that matter means infrastructure & calling it 'the cloud' hides the fact that this infrastructure and access to it creates power & privilege.

Outdoor Recreation Data

Great data, great data viz, great interactive maps, and all the data are free to download as CSV files: Outdoor Recreation Data

EVs Are Cheaper!

Kathrine Hayhoe: Christians, Creation, and Climate Change

 Good stuff especially towards the end: Solution aversion & talk about it!

The Institute and Faculty of Actuaries

The Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (or IFoA) produces excellent synthesis & reports related to climate change. Here's the latest one: Parasol Lost: Recovery plan needed

Remember, these are actuaries =  experts in the measurement and management of risk and uncertainty. More about the report in the video below.

Cartokit

Cartokit is a direct manipulation programming environment for interactive cartography on the web. Vey cool! See more over on GitHub: https://github.com/parkerziegler/cartokit