Desperately hoping we can settle on a better term for the various forms of AI backlash than "AI populism."
The Yudkowsky stan throwing a molotov cocktail and the Sierra Club member at a community meeting aren't parts of the same movement at all.
davekarpf.beehiiv.com/p/ai-populis...
As Hungary votes, would recommend this piece about how Viktor Orban has used public money to bankroll an international ultraconservative network - including Roger Scruton cafes and €10k a month for failed Reform candidate Matt Goodwin
democracyforsale.substack.com/p/orbans-brits
This is Apartheid.
It's morally disgusting - and comes at the same time as Israel is committing an ongoing genocide.
To see the Labour Government defend Israel repeatedly will horrify the British public - it cannot go on like this.
'The Quiet River: The Thames at Chiswick' (1943–4) by Victor Pasmore
(Tate)
Really looking forward to presenting on William Blake and James Barry at Cork Public Museum tomorrow as part of the Friends of @crawfordartgallery.bsky.social’s spring lecture series.
12:30pm Friday 6 March
Tickets €10, students go free with ID
crawfordartgallery.ie/friends-lect...
"The Islamists oppose women getting an education," I mutter, as I aim my missile at the girls school
📣New article📣
'There can be no compromising in the fight against the far right, reaction or fascism.'
@aurelmondon.com introduces our new Red Lines series: a space for critical dialogue on how to resist the rise of reactionary and fascist politics.
reacpol.net/why-red-lines/
The RPRN's two new publications are open for submissions!
Red Lines is a space for political interventions on resisting reaction. The Reactionary Politics Working Paper series aims to publish cutting-edge scholarship on reactionary politics.
Submit your work below!
reacpol.net/publications/
cover of The Washington Post on Wednesday Feb 4, 2026. Headline on bottom, right: Musk wanted to hook users; his chatbot got more sexual
My story on Elon Musk cutting safeguards at xAI is on the front page of today's @washingtonpost.com. I’m also among 100’s of reporters laid off. I absolutely loved my job my brilliant coworkers & the thrill of reporting @ the center of forces upending the world: AI & Silicon Valley’s political power
Micheál Martin has been a TD for 37 years. He’s been in government for 25 of those years and in cabinet for 20 of those years. He’s been either Tánaiste or Taoiseach since June 2020.
And every time he’s asked to anything other than build a data centre, he acts like he’s just been handed the job
A very large thank you to @briony.bsky.social for taking the time to engage with my research and to the folks at @reacpolrn.bsky.social for facilitating this interview!
Imagine if the hype was around the Greens' rise rather than Reform
Imagine if instead of putting far-right issues on the agenda, mainstream parties talked about hope, justice, redistribution, public services etc
That would put real change on the table and that's why Reform is a safer bet for them
The idea that journalists, politicians, groups or - you know, women, people of colour, LGBTQ+ people - should "stay on the pitch" doesn't really hold up.
Foreign Minister's account has 60k followers - 40 likes, 13k views?
Blue ticks straight to the top of the queue with misogyny, bile.
New Gist: The Abuse Factory
It shouldn't be difficult to act swiftly and without hesitation when the question posed is "Is it OK to work with the child sexual abuse material factory?" But our state failed this most straightforward of tests this week.
www.thegist.ie/the-gist-the...
New blog post! Joshua Farrell-Molloy explains how Irish #far-right groups use #masculinity and republican symbols to frame themselves as defenders of #Ireland. www.sv.uio.no/c-rex/englis...
🚨NEW PAPER
The Logic of Connective Faction:
How Digitally Networked Elites and Hyper-Partisan Media Radicalize Politics
w/ @yunkangyang.bsky.social & @mikecowburn.bsky.social
Online radicalization doesn't just affect the public.
It also reshapes how elites & parties behave. doi.org/10.1080/1058...
LA Times: Elon Musk company bot apologizes
Newsweek: Elon Musk's Grok Apologizes
International Business Times: Grok Issues Apologies
The Hill: Musk's AI chatbot Grok apologizes
1. Headlines everywhere today read "Grok apologizes."
This is bullshit. A chatbot is not something that can apologize.
Pretending otherwise is simple laundering these companies' bullshit about what AI is, while diffusing blame away from the human beings that developed and released this system.
Thank you, Kylie! Thanks for all the support on this and everything else!
Thanks, Aurelien! Yes, I’ll absolutely up for that in the new year!
This is the first publication to emerge from my postdoctoral research funded by @researchireland.ie. The article builds on a paper presented at the Media Frictions International Symposium, hosted by Jönköping University in May 2024.
🔗: doi.org/10.70064/mt....
A second key contention is that the ideas audiences express, both explicitly and implicitly, about their status as platform media stakeholders can reveal a great deal about how audiences conceptualise political and media power, including where they do and should reside.
A first key contention is that audience positionings in relation to reactionary influencers are marked by a tension between assent and dissent in which antagonism can entail both ideological support for mediated anti-pluralism and the contestation of reactionary influencer online content.
➡️ How tensions between (dis-)connection and (in-)visibility animate the platformised commercialisation of exclusion typifying reactionary media.
➡️ How influencer audiences position themselves, within the context of platform economies, as contributors in and against the mediation of reaction.
➡️ How content creation is situated as a mode of reactionary political action, including how media are viewed as a locus and motor of political agency.
➡️ How conceptualisations of sex and gender are mobilised antagonistically as mechanisms of social exclusion by reactionary influencers and their followers.
Taking Andrew Tate and Chaya Raichik (aka Libs of TikTok) as case studies, I consider the complexity of audience positionalities in relation to reactionary influencers—and the stances they promote—from several angles, including...
📃 NEW PUBLICATION 📃
I’m very happy to see this article published in the latest issue of @meejatheory.bsky.social. The article conceptualises the generative role of audience antagonism in the mediation of reactionary politics and is available to read open access here: lnkd.in/ew5jr-Yh
🧵
Join us for the book launch of Global South Creator Cultures on Tuesday, 20 January, 17:30–19:00, at King’s College London.
Further information and registration details: www.tickettailor.com/events/digit...
@kingsdh.bsky.social
@digitalculturekcl.bsky.social
@mediaindustries.bsky.social
My latest in @lawfaremedia.org: Nihilistic Violent Extremists (NVE) closely resemble two other forms of mass violence that have evaded simple characterization: incels and school shooters. Ambitious efforts to better classify such violence should be applauded. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/a-te...