In my experience, the justifications are assisted coding, summarising meeting recordings, and helping people write emails (?). But none of that feels like it will generate a gazillion dollars revenue either.

How much of "tech innovation" of the last two decades is the equivalent of slapping a label saying Not A Car, Trust Me onto a car and going 140 km/h in a school zone?

Taxis but without regulations; hotels but without regulations; stocks but without regulations; automated plagiarism but without ...

I feel blaming peaceful migration, women being allowed to say "no", and not being able to call your colleague the n-word for right-wing violence and oppression is the bully's "you made me hit you" more than the orphan meme.

This can be generalised.

With all the whining about the "decline of the West", are we declining? No, we are merely not growing our economies as fast; and duh, because they are already large.

And what would success look like to the whiners? Keeping most of humanity locked into destitution, forever.

Have we considered not overshooting?

Why is half the US economy cults of personality now? It is weird.

Various, depending on the habitat above that part of the cave system. She is preparing to publish her study.

Okay, but the problem isn't that deepfakes can stop a massive popular backlash, it is that they could swing a close election or ruin some average person's life.

The third keynote of the #asbs2025 is given by Helen Kennedy from our herbarium. Her topic is stewardship in botany.

The second is awarded to Jeremy Bruhl, emeritus professor at UNE. He is an expert in, among other taxa, Cyperaceae and Phyllanthaceae. The two recipients are giving a shared presentation, reflecting their close collaboration over many years. #asbs2025

Last talk of the day is by Niels Klazenga, on the upgrade to Keybase. I was very glad to hear that this is happening, because it is a crucial resource for those needing access to identification keys, those wanting to publish them, and for eFloras integrating the keys. keybase.rbg.vic.gov.au

Katharina Nargar looks back on the Decadal Plan for Taxonomy in Australia, and where to next. #asbs2025

Tim Hammer's second presentation is about the new electronic flora of South Australia. (FloraSA makes sense, but my brain goes "flora essay".) #asbs2025

Tim Collins gives an overview of the data-driven criteria for listing species as threatened. Estimating number of individuals when creating a record, instead of merely writing something like "frequent" or "rare", would be very useful for these assessments. #asbs2025

Siobhan Leachman encourages participants to contribute to wiki projects. The conference workshop on Sunday was about just that.

She also discusses the correlation between conference poster success and poster location (e.g., right next to the coffee).

#asbs2025

Melinda Laidlaw gives a broad overview of goings-on at the Queensland Herbarium, including staff changes and research priorities. #asbs2025