Ideas that challenge / comfort / inspire
Stephen Goforth
Humans know how to deal with a chaotic and constantly changing world. Machines struggle to master the unexpected — the challenges, both small and large, that do not look like what has happened in the past. Humans can dream up ideas that the world has never seen. Machines typically repeat or enhance what they have seen before. -Cade Metz writing in the New York Times
People have been measuring what they believe is intelligence without having a really firm understanding of what it is that they are measuring. Many theorists in psychology believe that conventional tests of intelligence measures only a relatively narrow aspect of intelligence. The result is that what we may take as a difference between two people in their levels of intelligence may reflect only a difference in a fairly small portions of their levels of intelligence.
Robert Sternberg, Thinking Styles
New York passes a bill to prevent AI-fueled disasters - Tech Crunch
AI Chatbots Are Making LA Protest Disinformation Worse – Wired
OpenAI takes down covert operations using social media tied to China and other countries – NPR
The US to Become a Net Exporter of AI Talent in 2025 - Zekidata
AI-powered fanfiction blurs political reality – Semafor
A bid to bar states from regulating AI is getting pushback – Washington Post
Trump signs bill criminalizing revenge porn and explicit deepfakes - TechCrunch
America Is Winning the Wrong AI Race – Wall Street Journal
The UAE and Saudi Arabia are pouring billions into U.S.-backed AI infrastructure – Wired
States chase OpenAI’s $100 billion AI American Dream - Washington Post
Scammers use AI to spoof senior U.S. officials' voices, FBI warns – Axios
AI therapy is a surveillance machine in a police state – The Verge
How Taiwan can bolster U.S. in the global AI and tech race - Washington Post
The AI Slop Presidency – 404 Media
White House fires head of Copyright Office amid Library of Congress shakeup - Washington Post
US government is using AI for unprecedented social media surveillance – New Scientist
A startup is using AI to summarize local city council meetings – Columbia Journalism Review
House GOP eyes moratorium on state AI laws - Washington Post
Retrieval augmented generation (RAG) – RAGs (retrieval augmented generation) combine a retriever (used to collect relevant information from a document) and a generator (which compares the query vector to other known vectors, selecting the most similar ones), and then generates an answer to the user’s query. Rather than generating answers from a set of parameters, the RAG collects relevant information from the document. In effect, this coding technique instructs the bot to cross-check its answer with what is published elsewhere, essentially helping the AI to self-fact-check. RAG lets companies “ground” AI models in their own data, ensuring that results come from documents within the company, minimizing hallucinations.
More AI definitions here
"In a head-to-head test of AI bots, 'An AI tool’s capability in one field didn’t necessarily translate to another. ChatGPT, for example, might have been tops in politics and literature but ranked near the bottom in law. I’d also recommend running your document through at least two AI tools, so you can compare the results. And for anything that’s actually important in your life, it’s definitely worth taking the time to read it yourself.” - Geoffrey A. Fowler writing in the Washington Post
Agentic AI – Able to operate more independently than AI Agents, agentic AI adjusts its strategy and continuously “learns” as it encounters different situations. Agentic AI systems aren't passive tools waiting for input or mere automation. They can update plans based on intermediate findings without needing continuous human supervision. It’s not just following the rules as agents do, agentic AI is supposed to be a colleague that can analyze a problem, propose a plan, and take action. It might call out to additional models or external systems, such as a search engine or querying a database to complete a task. This can be particularly effective in data-heavy fields such as biology, chemistry, and drug discovery. On a personal level, instead of simply helping you find a hotel room to book, agentic AI can plan the trip if it is given access to programs with your schedule and preferences. Despite its capabilities, AI agents struggle in open-ended or unpredictable environments, especially when tasks lack clear structure or context. It will likely take years to for most agentic AI systems to be tailored to specific industries or problems.
More AI definitions here
If we want our children or students or employees to express themselves creatively, then we have to give them the opportunity to do so. It doesn’t matter much if we tell them that we value their creative thinking, and then criticize or forestall every idea they propose.
From time to time, I do workshops for teachers, parents, and businesses that are eager to encourage open-ended, exploratory, creative thinking. One unfavorable sign is when someone asks me exactly what they should do to encourage creativity. They want me to tell them step by step, blow by blow. Their desire is an unfavorable sign because if they want a recipe for creativity, the won’t find it. Moreover, someone who wants to be told exactly what to do is not likely to model a creative style, no matter how much they may wish to do so.
Ultimately, you must encourage creative thinking by modeling it. It is hard to encourage creative thinking if you do not model it.
Robert Sternberg, Thinking Styles
What: The panel will demystify sourcing challenges and share actionable strategies for producing powerful journalism despite growing obstacles.
Who: Senior Vice President and Chair of the Craig Newmark Center for Ethics and Leadership Kelly McBride; Poynter’s Kristen Hare, ProPublica’s Kavitha Surana; The Baltimore Banner’s Alissa Zhu.
When: 12 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Poynter
What: In this webinar, we’ll survey the dramatic changes to health equity programs under Trump, discuss potential outcomes for health systems, and identify reporting opportunities for relaying the human impacts of these abrupt shifts.
Who: Georges C. Benjamin, MD, has served as the executive director of the American Public Health Association; Usha Lee McFarling is a national science correspondent for STAT News; Monica Peek specializes in general internal medicine and preventive health for adults at the University of Chicago Medicine.
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: USC Annenberg Center for Health Journalism
What: This webinar will connect you to experts in inclusion in media and journalism. You will hear unique perspectives from the UK and beyond, and you can join in the conversation yourself as we work together to make our media fairer, better and more diverse
Who: Diane Kemp: Director of the Sir Lenny Henry Centre for Media Diversity and Professor of Broadcast Journalism at Birmingham City University; Jennie Kermode: Writer and journalist specialising in LGBTQ issues and film; Mike Findlay-Agnew: CEO International Network of Street Papers; Shirish Kulkani: Journalist, researcher and community organiser.
When: 11 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Bylines Network
What: A timely panel discussion on localizing Pride for communities nationwide. Experienced journalists will discuss the storytelling strategies needed to cultivate trusted community sources, navigate sensitive topics, and cover the experiences of LGBTQ+ Americans with depth and accuracy.
Who: Kathryn Varn, Tampa Bay reporter at Axios; Bill Canacci, regional features editor for Asbury Park Press/Gannett NJ; Jacob Reyes, GLAAD news coordinator and Texas Latino Pride vice president.
When: 12 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: The National Press Club Journalism Institute
What: In this interactive workshop, we’ll explore how your newsroom can help your community become more informed about AI. We’ll discuss: Where and how your newsroom could share AI education content (platforms, formats, tone); What your audience needs to know about AI; What support would make this easier (templates, visuals, access to experts); Who should be involved in creating and sharing this information (local journalists, national orgs, tech companies, universities).
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Trusting News shows
What: Pioneering news operations leaders will gather to talk about how their teams are using AI to select stories to cover and to streamline multiplatform production and distribution. What approaches and technologies are emerging as keepers?
Who: Colin Benedict, VP of News, Morgan Murphy Media; Amy Freeze, Meteorologist, AmyFreeze.ai; Michael Newman, Director of Transformation, Graham Media Group; Jay O’Connor, EVP Strategic Initiatives, Futuri; Jon Accarrino, the founder of Ordo Digita.
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: TVNewsCheck
What: Learn how data-driven strategies can optimize nonprofit performance.
Who: Julian Gerace, Tapp Network Digital Solutions Manager; Zach Patton, Tapp Network HubSpot Solutions Manager.
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: TechSoup
What: We’ll explore practical, forward-thinking ways media organizations and businesses can integrate AI into their workflows — from content tagging and personalization to image generation, data analysis, automation, and more. We’ll share real-world use cases, tools to consider, and how to think strategically about AI adoption that goes deeper than chat.
Who: David Arkin and Tara Jones, David Arkin Consulting.
When: 2 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Local Media Association
What: With more employers demanding AI skills, microcredentials in AI might be one way for colleges to engage new students and to better prepare them for the work force.
Who: Alexander C. Kafka, Senior Editor, The Chronicle of Higher Education; Karen Aceves, Director AgTEC, Elijah-Clark.jpg, Elijah Clark, Instructor of Marketing, Texas Christian University; Siobahn Day, Grady Director, Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Equity Research North Carolina Central University; Colter Harper, Research Assistant Professor, Anthropology University of Buffalo; Ian McCulloh Manager, AI Portfolio, Lifelong Learning Johns Hopkins University.
When: 2 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Chronicle of Higher Ed, Coursera
What: Expect an open, interactive conversation where your insights shape the discussion. No slides. No easy answers. Just real talk about what’s next. If you're ready to tackle AI’s biggest questions in L&D—and maybe leave with even bigger ones—this session is for you.
Who: Megan Torrance CEO and founder, Torrance Learning.
When: 3 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: OpenSesame
What: An introduction to ChatGPT designed for beginners; only a free ChatGPT account is required to follow along.
Who: Lois Newman, Customer Enablement, OpenAI: OpenAI Solutions Engineer Lauren Oliphant.
When: 3 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: OpenAI Academy
What: Join us to discuss the marketing trends that’ll shape your nonprofit’s future and grow your impact, including: Storytelling to impact your nonprofit; Using influencer marketing to increase fundraising; Creating digital experiences that create awareness; Building automation into your marketing and outreach efforts: Taking advantage of latest approaches to search engine optimization; How to use artificial intelligence (AI) to engage.
Who: Kiersten Hill, the driving force behind Firespring’s nonprofit solutions.
When: 3 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Firespring
What: Our Disability Narrative Webinar Series initiative is designed to empower journalists, storytellers, and advocates with the tools to create accurate, inclusive and impactful narratives about disability.
Who: Beth Haller, Professor, Co-founder, Co-Director Global Alliance for Disability in Media and Entertainment; Leah Smith, Director, Associate Director, Advocate Global Alliance for Disability in Media and Entertainment.
When: 11 am, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Military Veterans in Journalism
What: We’ll discuss five reasons why nonprofits are increasingly leveraging broadcast messaging. We’ll also share real-world examples and actionable takeaways that will help future-proof your communication and fundraising strategy and enable your organization to realize the power of one-to-many text messaging.
Who: Rabiah Elisa, Product Marketing Manager at Mobile Commons.
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Mobile Commons
What: How to get on the record about the goals and values that guide your coverage of democracy, civic life, and public institutions. Whether you’re reporting on local government, civic engagement, or community solutions, a public-facing mission statement can help explain your newsroom’s values and build trust with your audience. You’ll also learn how to create a user-friendly FAQ page that answers common questions and reinforces your editorial transparency.
Who: Lynn Walsh, Trusting News.
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsors: Advancing Democracy, Trusting News, Solutions Journalism Network, Hearken, and Good Conflict
What: In this OpenAI Academy session, Autoblocks will break down why evaluations (evals) are essential for any team serious about shipping trustworthy AI. We’ll share practical workflows, lessons learned from real-world deployments in healthcare and finance, and show how to create evaluation processes that keep pace with rapid development. Whether you’re just starting to productionize LLMs or looking to scale safely, this session will give you tactical strategies you can apply immediately.
Who: Haroon Choudery, CEO of Autoblocks; Mohammed Husain, Solutions Engineer at OpenAI.
When: 3 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: OpenAI Academy
What: Join experts from Salesforce for a forward-looking conversation on how agentic AI is transforming the mechanics of retail advertising—from streamlining sales processes to boosting targeting precision and automating key workflows. Learn how brands are leveraging this technology to optimize ad sales, enhance consumer experiences, and scale operations.
Who: Gaby Hosokawa, Product Marketing Manager, Salesforce; John Stamers, Director of Media Solutions, Silverline.
When: 1 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: AdWeek
What: A non-technical introduction to generative AI technology, tips for implementing AI effectively in your business, some great advice about managing the risks and ethical concerns involved, and will lead you a hands-on exercise using a generative AI tool. No matter what your level of technical know-how is, you’ll leave this session informed, confident and aware of both the risks and the benefits of this emerging technology.
Who: Isabel Krome, a Start-Up Consultant at Temple SBDC.
When: 8:30 am, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Temple University Small Business Development Center
What: A brief overview of her research examining the impact of the media on trauma survivors and the impact of trauma on members of the media, along with a compelling case for providing trauma education to student and working journalists.
Who: Tamara Cherry is an author, communications consultant and thought leader in the area of trauma-informed storytelling who spent the bulk of her career as an award-winning crime reporter in some of Canada’s largest newsrooms. Tamara’s latest book is called “The Trauma Beat: A Case for Re-Thinking the Business of Bad News.”
When: 4 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: College Media Association
What: A training topic brainstorm
When: 5:30 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: National Press Club Journalism Institute
What: How to assess your resources and tools to craft compelling video journalism for digital and broadcast. We’ll cover equipment needs for solo or small teams with various budgets for shooting and editing and tips for creating short form and 6-10 minute news feature video stories. Let this workshop be the catalyst for crafting a functional video strategy that fits your organization’s goals.
Who: Veteran visual journalist Robert Meeks.
When: 3:30 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Video Consortium
What: How media leaders can build organizational resilience through adaptive strategy and rapid experimentation. Participants will learn the core principles that define resilient news organizations: flexibility, continuous learning, and responsiveness to change, as well as gain hands-on experience using a practical framework for rapid experimentation to practice decision-making under uncertainty. Together, we’ll unpack how to build nimble teams, reimagine workflows for speed and adaptability, and identify emerging market opportunities before competitors do.
Who: Ashir Badami is a senior lecturer at Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism; Robert Hoekman brings 25 years of experience leading the development of consumer- & business-facing products at dozens of tech companies & several news companies. Hoekman has served as Director of Product Design for CNN digital, Process Innovation Director at Akamai, and Senior Innovation Strategist at Tangible.
When: 2 pm, Eastern
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free
Sponsor: Online News Association
"I use ChatGPT for comedy. It's not going to give me a finished joke, but it's going to start the conversation. I find it useful when I'm writing the setup for a joke. With a parody, it's not one-to-one. You're taking things that are different and exaggerating them. I was writing a roast speech for a guy at a coding conference. I asked ChatGPT to delve into the inside jokes of coding communities. What's amazing to me is I do not have writer's block anymore — like truly. I think writer's block is the feeling of solipsism and it is the feeling of being totally alone. And I don't feel alone anymore because of this tool." - Sarah Rose Siskind, comedian
Trouble with AI 'hallucinations' spreads to big law firms – Reuters
Alabama paid a law firm millions to defend its prisons. It used AI and turned in fake citations – The Guardian
New Arizona law prevents AI from making health insurance denials – AZ Family
Australian authors say no to AI using their work – even if money is on the table – The Conversation
AI firms say they can’t respect copyright. These researchers tried. – Washington Post
Artificial Intelligence is now an A+ law student, study finds - Reuters
Arizona Supreme Court unveils AI avatars to announce rulings - Arizona PBS
In lawsuit over teen’s death, judge rejects arguments that AI chatbots have free speech rights – Associated Press
Law&Crime Recreates Scenes From Diddy Trial With AI and Official Transcripts – Mediaite
ChatGPT Turned Into a Studio Ghibli Machine. How Is That Legal? – The Atlantic
Deepfakes on trial: How judges are navigating AI evidence authentication -Reuters
Former school athletic director gets 4 months in jail in racist AI deepfake case – Associated Press
AI copyright report sparks new fight - Axios
White House fires head of Copyright Office amid Library of Congress shakeup – Washington Post
This ‘College Protester’ Isn’t Real. It’s an AI-Powered Undercover Bot for Cops – 404 Media
AI Can Assist Human Judges, But It Can’t Replace Them (Yet) – David Lat Blog
Lawyers face sanctions for citing fake cases with AI, warns UK judge – Reuters
White House fires Copyright Office leaders as controversial AI report surfaces – Mashable
Anthropic's lawyers take blame for AI 'hallucination' in music publishers' lawsuit – Reuters
Disney and Universal Sue A.I. Firm for Copyright Infringement – New York Times
In order to live totally, we must face death totally. -Eugene Peterson
Scientists cannot even agree on a way of defining human intelligence, arguing endlessly over the merits and flaws of I.Q. tests and other benchmarks. Comparing our own brains to machines is even more subjective. This means that identifying A.G.I. is essentially a matter of opinion. -Cade Metz writing in the New York Times
You can prompt these tools to ask you questions, to get you thinking, to prompt you to start writing. The instinct is to say, 'Oh, this thing just writes for us.' But it can also ask me questions. It can also get me thinking and shape my ideas. What if instead of you being a prompt engineer, you see what it can prompt out of you? The Al can be a nonjudgmental collaborator that helps pull out these great, unique insights from you. -Stew Fortier, founder of Type.ai
Training data – This is the data initially provided to an AI model so it can create a map of relationships, which it then uses to make predictions. Giving the AI a wide data means more options and may lead to more creative results. However, this can also make it more vulnerable to the insertion of poisoned data by hackers and make the model more susceptible to hallucinations. Using more curated, locked-down data sets makes AI models less vulnerable and more predictable but also less creative.
More AI definitions here
What Is Agentic AI? Everything to Know About Artificial Intelligence Agents – CNET
Generative AI 101 - 1440
What Is Deep Learning and Why Is It More Relevant Than Ever? – Interesting Engineering
A Beginner’s Guide to Tokens, Vectors, and Embeddings in NLP – Sascha Metzger writing on Medium
How AI learns intuitive physics from watching videos – BD Tech Talks
How AI Mode and AI Overviews work – Search Engine Land
Generative AI: Everything to Know About the Tech Behind Chatbots Like ChatGPT – CNET
What Is Artificial Intelligence? From Generative AI to Hardware, What You Need to Know – Extreme Tech
What is a transformer model? - IBM
What are convolutional neural networks? – Tech Radar
What you Should know about Agentic AI – Information Week
Anthropic study reveals LLM reasoning isn’t always what it seems – BD Tech Talks
How much energy does AI really use? The answer is surprising - and a little complicated – Zdenet
The foundations of designing an AI agent – Towards Data Science
The moment we stopped understanding AI (video) – Welch Labs
What is a neural network? (video) - 3Blue1Brown
You Can Get a Google AI Certification for $99. Or Just Do the Training for Free – CNET
In a consumer society, there are inevitably two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of addictions and the prisoners of envy. - Ivan Illich
To be human is not to have answers. It is to have questions—and to live with them. The machines can’t do that for us. - D. Graham Burnett writing in The New Yorker
In a recent survey of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, a 40-year-old academic society that includes some of the most respected researchers in the field, more than three-quarters of respondents said the methods used to build today’s technology were unlikely to lead to A.G.I. Scientists have no hard evidence that today’s technologies are capable of performing even some of the simpler things the brain can do, like recognizing irony or feeling empathy. Claims of A.G.I.’s imminent arrival are based on statistical extrapolations — and wishful thinking. -New York Times
In some parts of American society, it is considered inappropriate for men to express any emotion save one—anger. When a man learns to express other feelings and not be so concerned about whether others think he is strong or “manly,” he takes a major step forward.
Sure, there’s a time and place to "come on strong and take no prisoners." But it's a denial of your humanity to oversimplify, hiding behind a narrow definition of manhood. Men are more complete when they are both tough and tender. Maturity comes with the understanding of which one is appropriate at what time.
Stephen Goforth
Three newsrooms on generating AI summaries for news - Harvard’s Nieman Lab
More than 2 years after ChatGPT, newsrooms still struggle with AI’s shortcomings – CNN
Think AI is bad for journalism? This story might change your mind: Letter from the Editor - Cleveland.com
The New York Times has reached an AI licensing deal with Amazon – New York Times
How this year’s Pulitzer awardees used AI in their reporting – Harvard’s Nieman Lab
ChatGPT referral traffic to publishers’ sites has nearly doubled this year – Digiday
Politico’s Newsroom Is Starting a Legal Battle With Management Over AI – Wired
Chicago Sun-Times Prints AI-Generated Summer Reading List With Books That Don't Exist – 404 Media
A New Report Takes On the Future of News and Search: AI’s impact on platforms and publishers - Columbia Journalism Review
Gannett Is Using AI to Pump Brainrot Gambling Content Into Newspapers Across the Country – Futurism
Americans largely foresee AI having negative effects on news, journalists – Pew Research Center
A startup is using AI to summarize local city council meetings – Columbia Journalism Review
Have journalists skipped the ethics conversation when it comes to using AI? – The Conversation
Tomorrow’s Publisher, a site about the future of news, is “powered by” an AI startup - Harvard’s Nieman Lab
Why some journalists are embracing AI after all - IBM
Musk's xAI "will pay Telegram $300 million to deploy its Grok chatbot on the messaging app. – Reuters
AI learns how vision and sound are connected, without human intervention – MIT
Teaching journalism students generative AI: why I switched to an “AI diary” this semester – Online Journalism Blog
Patch’s big AI newsletter experiment - Harvard’s Nieman Lab
Study Guide Supremacy Getting my news from ChatGPT - Columbia Journalism Review
Journalism is facing its crisis moment with AI. It might not be a bad thing. – Poynter
AI-Generated Content in Journalism: The Rise of Automated Reporting - TRENDS Research & Advisory
AI-Generated Fake Book List Seems Funny, but Reflects the Technology’s Danger to Journalism – Pen America
Politico’s Newsroom Is Starting a Legal Battle With Management Over AI – Wired
Journalists are using AI. They should be talking to their audience about it. – Poynter
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