One of the things I love about blogging is that it combines immediate publication with the archive – and that the people who are directly involved in something discussed on a blog will very often show up and add their point of view to whatever the blogger wrote. So something that was posted and discussed months ago can be brought up again later, and the discussion will still be there, archived. And people involved in the issue can comment on it at any time, often re-starting the debate.

Today I found a comment in my moderation queue from Dan Britton, a co-author of 200 pages of (pro-copyright, anti-government regulation) statistics. Dan Britton explains that while he can see how the section on piracy, for instance, might be interpretated as having a political agenda, “itís really not intended to be a political tool at all, or at least I never had that impression when I was working on it”. Interesting to have a bit of an insight into the process of making the book – though I still think there’s reason to be aware that even statistics may be skewed.


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1 Comment

  1. Alex H.

    A close-quote got away from you on the URL for the book…

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Academics in Norway: Sign this petition asking for research-based discussions of how to use AI in universities

I just signed a petition calling for Norwegian universities to use research expertise on AI when deciding how to implement it, rather than having decisions be made mostly administratively. ,  If you are a researcher in Norway, please read it and sign it if you agree – and share with anyone else who might be interested. The petition was written by three researchers at UiT: Maria Danielsen (a philosopher who completed her PhD in 2025 on AI and ethics, including discussions of art and working life), Knut Ørke (Norwegian as a second language), and Holger Pötzsch (a professor of media studies with many years of research on digital media, video games, disruption, and working life, among other topics).  This is not about preventing researchers from exploring AI methods in their research. It is about not uncritically accepting the hype that everyone must use AI everywhere without critical reflection. It is about not introducing Copilot as the default option in word processors, or training PhD candidates to believe they will fall behind if they do not use AI when writing articles, without proper academic discussion. Changes like these should be knowledge-based and discussed academically, not merely decided administratively, because they alter the epistemological foundations of research. Maria wrote to me a couple of months ago because she had read my opinion piece in Aftenposten in which I called for a strong brake on the use of language models in knowledge work. She was part of a committee tasked with developing UiT’s AI strategy and was concerned because there was so much hype and so few members of the committee with actual expertise in AI. I fully support the petition. There are probably some good uses for AI in research, but the uncritical, hype-driven insistence that we must simply adopt it everywhere is highly risky. There are many researchers in Norway with strong expertise in AI, language, ethics, working life, and culture. We must make use of this expertise. This is also partly about respect for research in the humanities, social sciences, psychology, and law. Introducing AI at universities and university colleges is not merely a technical issue, and perhaps not even primarily a technical one. It concerns much more: philosophy of science, methodological reflection, epistemology, writing, publishing, the working environment, and more. […]

screenshot of Grammarly - main text in the middle, names of experts on the left with reccomendations and on the right more info about the expert review feature
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Grammarly generated fake expert reviews “by” real scholars

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