The 201st Block: IWD tech reads

Eight books for March 8 (belatedly, I know)

Mar 10, 2024

This week…

Your reading time is about 6 minutes. Let’s start.

A collage of the covers of all the books listed below.

It was International Women’s Day on Friday, March 8. Last year I recommended some reads from women who write about the effects of Big Tech on data, disinformation, and democracy. Here are a few more.

The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI (2023) by Fei-Fei Li, the creator of ImageNet, which is instrumental in the development of modern AI. AI ethicist Timnit Gebru was her doctoral student.
Unmasking AI: My Mission to Protect What Is Human in a World of Machines (2023) by Joy Buolamwini, the researcher who highlighted AI biases in facial recognition technology.
How Infrastructure Works: Inside the Systems That Shape Our World (2023) by Deb Chachra, a biological materials and infrastructure scientist whose book reveals the essential systems hidden in our walls, under the streets, and all around us.
Against Technoableism: Rethinking Who Needs Improvement (2023) by Ashley Shew, the bioethicist who argues that arguing that disabled people are the real experts when it comes to technology and disability.
Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World (2023) by Naomi Klein, who explored the online underbelly of conspiracies and misinformation after often being confused with conspiracy theorist Naomi Wolf.
Viral Justice: How We Grow the World We Want (2022) by sociologist Ruha Benjamin, the author of Race After Technology (2019) that detailed the many different ways bias is encoded into technology. This book is a manifesto of how we can transform society with the choices we make every day.
The Gospel of Wellness: Gyms, Gurus, Goop, and the False Promise of Self-Care (2022) by Rina Raphael, a journalist focusing on tech, health, and women’s issues. This book is an exposé of the wellness and self-care industry.
How to Stand Up to a Dictator: The Fight for Our Future (2022) by Maria Ressa, the journalist and Rappler CEO whose work detailing the weaponisation of social media by corrupt governments landed her multiple politically motivated charges.

And now, a selection of top stories on my radar, a few personal recommendations, and the chart of the week.

ICYMI: The Previous Block sought more third places to encourage discourse and potentially remedy extremist views. CORRECTION NOTICE: None notified.

TECH AUTHORITARIANISM

Internet shutdowns: Are we likely to see more in 2024?

Nita Bhalla for Context:

According to the global charity Internet Society, there have been 13 cases of internet shutdowns in the first two months of 2024, compared to two cases over the same period last year.
Digital blackouts have affected people in India, Pakistan, war-crippled Sudan, Senegal, Comoros and Chad.
Regional authorities in India's West Bengal, Uttarakhand and Rajasthan states suspended internet services for a variety of reasons, including, they said, to calm violence and prevent cheating in civil service exams.

Blackouts, roadblocks, Internet shutdowns. What else is new? Loosely linked:

Vietnam tightens grip on social media influencers by Tommy Walker for DW.
Kenyans use humour to counter unpopular state policies—memes are the latest tool by George Ogola (University of Nottingham) for The Conversation.
An unseen interview with Vladimir Kara-Murza: “Putin’s propaganda has taught us not to trust a lot of things” by Natalia Antelava for Coda.

SAFETY AND PRIVACY

Revealed: the names linked to ClothOff, the deepfake pornography app

Michael Safi, Alex Atack, and Joshua Kelly for The Guardian:

In the year since the app was launched, the people running ClothOff have carefully guarded their anonymity, digitally distorting their voices to answer media questions and, in one case, using AI to generate an entirely fake person who they claimed was their CEO.
But a six-month investigation, conducted for a new Guardian podcast series called Black Box, can reveal the names of several people who have done work for ClothOff or who our investigation suggests are linked to the app.
Their trail leads to Belarus and Russia but passes through businesses registered in Europe and front companies based in the heart of London.

Happy International Women’s Day, I guess. Loosely linked:

Survey by Statistics Canada says newcomers have lower rate of workplace harassment; experts say fear prevents reporting by Shilpashree Jagannathan for New Canadian Media.
After dating app murders spike in Colombia, Match Group offers to help the police by Austin Landis for Rest of World.
In South Korea, civil servant’s suicide spotlights privacy concerns amid ‘malicious’ cyberbullying culture ($) by Park Chan-kyong for SCMP.

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY

Vendor offering citations for purchase is latest bad actor in scholarly publishing

Katie Langin for Science:

In 2023, a new Google Scholar profile appeared online featuring a researcher no one had ever heard of. Within a few months, the scientist, an expert in fake news, was listed by the scholarly database as their field’s 36th most cited researcher. They had an h-index of 19—meaning they’d published 19 academic articles that had been cited at least 19 times each. It was an impressive burst onto the academic publishing scene.
But none of it was legitimate. The researcher and their institution were fictional, created by researchers at New York University (NYU) Abu Dhabi who were probing shady publishing practices. The publications were written by ChatGPT. And the citation numbers were bogus: Some came from the author excessively citing their own “work,” while 50 others had been purchased for $300 from a vendor offering a “citations booster service.”

For context, it would typically take two decades for a researcher to reach an h-index of 20. This fictionalised academic did it in a few months. Loosely linked:

Medieval women used informal social networks to share health problems and medical advice – just as we do today by Pragya Agarwal (Loughborough University) for The Conversation.
Fake academic papers are on the rise: why they’re a danger and how to stop them by Lex Bouter (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam) for The Conversation.
Teachers are using AI to create new worlds, help students with homework, and teach English by Ross Teixeira for The Markup.

What I read, listen, and watch…

I’m reading How to Stand Up to a Dictator: The Fight for Our Future (2022) by Maria Ressa. Although I think this is an essential read, I was quite uneasy with the constant reference to the terribly bad, awfully misguided practice of the golden rule. I am also uncomfortable with hero-worship or the general cult of personality situation around the author. And finally, maybe unpopular, I don’t think it is good practice to mix journalism with activism.
I’m listening to an episode of NPR’s Code Switch where Gene Demby and Huo Jingnan dive into a conspiracy theory about how “global elites” are forcing people to eat bugs.
I’m watching a DW documentary on the dangers of AI in the porn industry.

Chart of the week

According to the Reuters Institute, only 24 per cent of the top editors across 240 news outlets in 12 countries are women, just two points more than last year.