Data & Society
@datasociety.bsky.social
Data & Society is a nonprofit research institute that studies the social implications of data-centric technologies, automation, and AI.
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🚨 New today! In "Turning the Tide: Climate Action In and Against Tech," @tamigraph.bsky.social examines how, in a time of AI ascendance and data center accelerationism, climate-conscious tech workers and larger coalitions have attempted to reform the industry. 1/3 datasociety.net/library/turn...
What a year! In 2025, our work both anticipated and responded to the big conversations about technology's impacts on people and society, and helped make sense of this moment. Check out our year-in-review for some of the highlights. We'll be back with more in 2026! datasociety.net/points/our-y...
December 19, 2025 at 4:24 PM
What a year! In 2025, our work both anticipated and responded to the big conversations about technology's impacts on people and society, and helped make sense of this moment. Check out our year-in-review for some of the highlights. We'll be back with more in 2026! datasociety.net/points/our-y...
This was the year that AI-generated images and videos became, sometimes, indistinguishable from real ones. But as @chaykak.bsky.social writes, “if 2025 marked the mainstreaming of slop, it also ushered in an accompanying slop backlash.” www.newyorker.com/culture/infi...
The Year in Slop
This was the year that A.I.-generated content passed a kind of audiovisual Turing test, sometimes fooling us against our better judgment.
www.newyorker.com
December 18, 2025 at 8:52 PM
This was the year that AI-generated images and videos became, sometimes, indistinguishable from real ones. But as @chaykak.bsky.social writes, “if 2025 marked the mainstreaming of slop, it also ushered in an accompanying slop backlash.” www.newyorker.com/culture/infi...
“What AI imperils is not human creativity itself but the ability to make a living from creative endeavor,” Caitlin Petre and @jticona.bsky.social write. “The AI industry claims that it wants to democratize creativity, but the real goal is dominance.” www.nytimes.com/2025/12/16/o...
Opinion | The Starving Artist vs. A.I.: Guess Who Is Winning?
www.nytimes.com
December 18, 2025 at 3:44 PM
“What AI imperils is not human creativity itself but the ability to make a living from creative endeavor,” Caitlin Petre and @jticona.bsky.social write. “The AI industry claims that it wants to democratize creativity, but the real goal is dominance.” www.nytimes.com/2025/12/16/o...
In new research, experts warn that the AI technology powering new toys is so novel and poorly tested that nobody knows how they may affect young children. www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-ne...
AI toys for kids talk about sex and issue Chinese Communist Party talking points, tests show
New research from Public Interest Research Group and tests conducted by NBC News found that a wide range of AI toys have loose guardrails.
www.nbcnews.com
December 17, 2025 at 7:19 PM
In new research, experts warn that the AI technology powering new toys is so novel and poorly tested that nobody knows how they may affect young children. www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-ne...
As the shine started to come off generative AI, 2025 has been a year of reckoning. @willdouglasheaven.bsky.social offers four ways to think about the state of AI as this year comes to a close, framing it as “the start of a much-needed hype correction.” www.technologyreview.com/2025/12/15/1...
The great AI hype correction of 2025
Four ways to think about this year's reckoning
www.technologyreview.com
December 17, 2025 at 4:06 PM
As the shine started to come off generative AI, 2025 has been a year of reckoning. @willdouglasheaven.bsky.social offers four ways to think about the state of AI as this year comes to a close, framing it as “the start of a much-needed hype correction.” www.technologyreview.com/2025/12/15/1...
“What is lost when we entrust Spotify’s systems of data collection and interpretation to do our year-end reflections for us? What...are we not writing and sharing when we hand over that labor to tech companies who would prefer to automate our thinking?” www.theguardian.com/music/2025/d...
Spotify Wrapped is taking over our feeds, but you don’t have outsource your relationship with music to AI | Liz Pelly
The streamer’s annual charts are just another version of the tech that’s alienating us from our inner lives. Hold on to your musical memories and reclaim ownership of your taste
www.theguardian.com
December 16, 2025 at 7:52 PM
“What is lost when we entrust Spotify’s systems of data collection and interpretation to do our year-end reflections for us? What...are we not writing and sharing when we hand over that labor to tech companies who would prefer to automate our thinking?” www.theguardian.com/music/2025/d...
Merriam-Webster’s president says the spike in searches for the word “slop” this year reflects that people have grown more aware of fake or shoddy content, and that they want the opposite: “It’s almost a defiant word when it comes to AI.” apnews.com/article/merr...
Merriam-Webster’s 2025 word of the year is 'slop'
Merriam-Webster’s 2025 word of the year is “slop.” The word was first used in the 1700s to mean soft mud. It evolved more generally to mean something of little value.
apnews.com
December 16, 2025 at 3:55 PM
Merriam-Webster’s president says the spike in searches for the word “slop” this year reflects that people have grown more aware of fake or shoddy content, and that they want the opposite: “It’s almost a defiant word when it comes to AI.” apnews.com/article/merr...
In OpenAI's decidedly "techno-optimistic spin," Vauhini Vara sees the company attempting “to redefine how objectivity functions in the first place” — in a way that favors their own algorithms, as they strive to get people to trust their product. www.theatlantic.com/culture/2025...
ChatGPT’s Self-Serving Optimism
OpenAI’s new guidelines ask its chatbot to celebrate “innovation,” contradicting its stated goal of objectivity—and raising questions about what objectivity even means.
www.theatlantic.com
December 15, 2025 at 8:00 PM
In OpenAI's decidedly "techno-optimistic spin," Vauhini Vara sees the company attempting “to redefine how objectivity functions in the first place” — in a way that favors their own algorithms, as they strive to get people to trust their product. www.theatlantic.com/culture/2025...
“If the last decade was shaped by viral lies and doctored videos, the next will be shaped by a subtler force: [AI] messages that sound reasonable, familiar, and just persuasive enough to change hearts and minds,” warn Tal Feldman and Aneesh Pappu. www.technologyreview.com/2025/12/05/1...
The era of AI persuasion in elections is about to begin
AI is eminently capable of political persuasion and could automate it at a mass scale. We are not prepared.
www.technologyreview.com
December 15, 2025 at 4:00 PM
“If the last decade was shaped by viral lies and doctored videos, the next will be shaped by a subtler force: [AI] messages that sound reasonable, familiar, and just persuasive enough to change hearts and minds,” warn Tal Feldman and Aneesh Pappu. www.technologyreview.com/2025/12/05/1...
Reposted by Data & Society
Last week, Jon Penney, Sarah Brayne, & I discussed the role of AI and surveillance in transforming and scaling restrictions on academic freedom & speech. @jessicapriest.bsky.social has an excellent story on how gen AI is being used to do so in Texas universities
www.texastribune.org/2025/12/15/t...
www.texastribune.org/2025/12/15/t...
Texas universities deploy AI for course audits
Records obtained by The Texas Tribune show how universities are using the technology to reshape curriculum under political pressure, raising concerns about academic freedom.
www.texastribune.org
December 15, 2025 at 1:47 PM
Last week, Jon Penney, Sarah Brayne, & I discussed the role of AI and surveillance in transforming and scaling restrictions on academic freedom & speech. @jessicapriest.bsky.social has an excellent story on how gen AI is being used to do so in Texas universities
www.texastribune.org/2025/12/15/t...
www.texastribune.org/2025/12/15/t...
The public overwhelmingly supports regulating AI. Yet the Trump admin is acting unilaterally to stop state governors, legislators, and AGs from protecting people from algorithmic discrimination, AI's impacts on workers, and the environmental impacts of data centers. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/11/t...
Trump Signs Executive Order to Neuter State A.I. Laws
www.nytimes.com
December 12, 2025 at 5:09 PM
The public overwhelmingly supports regulating AI. Yet the Trump admin is acting unilaterally to stop state governors, legislators, and AGs from protecting people from algorithmic discrimination, AI's impacts on workers, and the environmental impacts of data centers. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/11/t...
An AI-powered quote-detection tool could help journalists identify when coverage leans too heavily on a single type of source and "ensure that the voices shaping our understanding of the world are as diverse and accurate as the realities they aim to represent.” www.cjr.org/tow_center/t...
Toward AI-powered source audits.
Building a quote-detection tool for accountability in journalism.
www.cjr.org
December 11, 2025 at 8:38 PM
An AI-powered quote-detection tool could help journalists identify when coverage leans too heavily on a single type of source and "ensure that the voices shaping our understanding of the world are as diverse and accurate as the realities they aim to represent.” www.cjr.org/tow_center/t...
"The world that ChatGPT built is a world defined by a particular type of precarity," @cwarzel.bsky.social writes, reflecting on the destabilizing promise of imminent if uncertain transformation. "It is a world that is perpetually waiting for a shoe to drop." www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...
The World Still Hasn’t Made Sense of ChatGPT
OpenAI’s chaos machine turns three.
www.theatlantic.com
December 11, 2025 at 5:08 PM
"The world that ChatGPT built is a world defined by a particular type of precarity," @cwarzel.bsky.social writes, reflecting on the destabilizing promise of imminent if uncertain transformation. "It is a world that is perpetually waiting for a shoe to drop." www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...
🚨 New today! In "Turning the Tide: Climate Action In and Against Tech," @tamigraph.bsky.social examines how, in a time of AI ascendance and data center accelerationism, climate-conscious tech workers and larger coalitions have attempted to reform the industry. 1/3 datasociety.net/library/turn...
December 10, 2025 at 3:19 PM
🚨 New today! In "Turning the Tide: Climate Action In and Against Tech," @tamigraph.bsky.social examines how, in a time of AI ascendance and data center accelerationism, climate-conscious tech workers and larger coalitions have attempted to reform the industry. 1/3 datasociety.net/library/turn...
AI on the Ground Program Director Ranjit Singh considers the stakes of AI sovereignty, the tension between default settings and local autonomy, and who gets to decide what happens inside the systems that people come to depend on. datasociety.net/points/rethi...
December 9, 2025 at 8:46 PM
AI on the Ground Program Director Ranjit Singh considers the stakes of AI sovereignty, the tension between default settings and local autonomy, and who gets to decide what happens inside the systems that people come to depend on. datasociety.net/points/rethi...
This promises to be an amazing talk by D&S researcher @briana-v.bsky.social!
Join us for our next webinar on December 11th (12-1pm EST) when Dr. Briana Vecchione from the Data & Society Research Institute presents "Talking to Machines: How LLMs are Changing Mental Health Support in the Age of AI."
To register, click here:
upenn.zoom.us/webinar/regi...
To register, click here:
upenn.zoom.us/webinar/regi...
December 9, 2025 at 6:26 PM
This promises to be an amazing talk by D&S researcher @briana-v.bsky.social!
In our comment to the FDA, we draw on our ongoing research to focus on what people’s actual, everyday use of chatbots for mental and emotional support means for the FDA’s approach to generative AI-enabled digital mental health medical devices. datasociety.net/announcement...
Comment to the FDA on Generative AI-Enabled Digital Mental Health Medical Devices
datasociety.net
December 9, 2025 at 3:58 PM
In our comment to the FDA, we draw on our ongoing research to focus on what people’s actual, everyday use of chatbots for mental and emotional support means for the FDA’s approach to generative AI-enabled digital mental health medical devices. datasociety.net/announcement...
Indian startups are building AI tools to ensure the digital representation of so-called low-resource languages like Tulu, Bodo, and Kashmiri, report Tauseef Ahmad and Sajid Raina in @restofworld.org. That work involves building digital data sets nearly from scratch. restofworld.org/2025/chatgpt...
ChatGPT is huge in India. These locally focused startups found a way to compete
Indian founders are building digital data sets for low-resource languages by involving the community, and count on local relevance to go against big tech platforms.
restofworld.org
December 8, 2025 at 7:11 PM
Indian startups are building AI tools to ensure the digital representation of so-called low-resource languages like Tulu, Bodo, and Kashmiri, report Tauseef Ahmad and Sajid Raina in @restofworld.org. That work involves building digital data sets nearly from scratch. restofworld.org/2025/chatgpt...
We're navigating a moment where people are trying to make sense of the stories they're being told about AI, as they reckon with the technology’s place in the cultural conversation and in their own lives, D&S Executive Director Janet Haven tells @alixdunn.com. www.youtube.com/shorts/q3dxb...
December 8, 2025 at 5:12 PM
We're navigating a moment where people are trying to make sense of the stories they're being told about AI, as they reckon with the technology’s place in the cultural conversation and in their own lives, D&S Executive Director Janet Haven tells @alixdunn.com. www.youtube.com/shorts/q3dxb...
On #ComputerSaysMaybe, D&S Executive Director Janet Haven and Board President @cmcilwain.bsky.social sat down with @alixdunn.com to discuss the tech industry’s co-opting of academia, how giving the reins to tech oligarchs hurts people, and why independent research is essential. youtu.be/xUJbo0KmbOk
December 5, 2025 at 7:57 PM
On #ComputerSaysMaybe, D&S Executive Director Janet Haven and Board President @cmcilwain.bsky.social sat down with @alixdunn.com to discuss the tech industry’s co-opting of academia, how giving the reins to tech oligarchs hurts people, and why independent research is essential. youtu.be/xUJbo0KmbOk
Marking the third anniversary of ChatGPT's launch, Lila Schroff looks at how relying on chatbots has upended some people's ability to make decisions. www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...
The People Outsourcing Their Thinking to AI
Rise of the LLeMmings
www.theatlantic.com
December 5, 2025 at 5:20 PM
Marking the third anniversary of ChatGPT's launch, Lila Schroff looks at how relying on chatbots has upended some people's ability to make decisions. www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...
Monday is the last day to apply for this workshop!
New workshop! We invite researchers and practitioners to join us in examining how scientific reasoning and imagination are being reconfigured as AI systems become a part of the everyday practice of science. Learn more and apply by December 8. datasociety.net/announcement...
December 5, 2025 at 2:51 PM
Monday is the last day to apply for this workshop!
In a new Points piece, D&S’s @tamigraph.bsky.social and the Kapor Foundation’s Cecilia Marrinan consider how California’s longstanding ties to the tech industry — and a history of environmental harm — connect to the threats the industry poses to the state today. datasociety.net/points/beyon...
December 4, 2025 at 6:04 PM
In a new Points piece, D&S’s @tamigraph.bsky.social and the Kapor Foundation’s Cecilia Marrinan consider how California’s longstanding ties to the tech industry — and a history of environmental harm — connect to the threats the industry poses to the state today. datasociety.net/points/beyon...
New York's new algorithmic pricing law does not prohibit surveillance pricing or meaningfully explain how algorithms influence prices. But as Stephanie T. Nguyen outlines, it does offer some new ways for researchers to examine these practices. www.techpolicy.press/how-to-test-...
How to Test New York’s Algorithmic Pricing Law | TechPolicy.Press
New York’s ADPA exposes algorithmic pricing. Stephanie T. Nguyen discusses how these disclosures could reveal fairness issues and potential consumer impacts.
www.techpolicy.press
December 4, 2025 at 3:13 PM
New York's new algorithmic pricing law does not prohibit surveillance pricing or meaningfully explain how algorithms influence prices. But as Stephanie T. Nguyen outlines, it does offer some new ways for researchers to examine these practices. www.techpolicy.press/how-to-test-...
In a new Points piece, Hannah Lipstein & @tamigraph.bsky.social examine VA’s Data Center Alley, and explain why their research examines not only individual sites but “how the politics, economics, & cultural factors of a place" inform effective organizing strategies. datasociety.net/points/situa...
December 3, 2025 at 4:50 PM
In a new Points piece, Hannah Lipstein & @tamigraph.bsky.social examine VA’s Data Center Alley, and explain why their research examines not only individual sites but “how the politics, economics, & cultural factors of a place" inform effective organizing strategies. datasociety.net/points/situa...