OLDaily

Welcome to Online Learning Daily, your best source for news and commentary about learning technology, new media, and related topics.

Wrenching Around Google URLs, Get Your Old Skool Search Back (for now)
Alan Levine, CogDogBlog, 2024/05/30

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This is from a few days ago but I want to make sure I don't forget it. Alan Levine, channeling some Mastodon discussion, points to a nice trick to get right of all the garbage in Google search engine results (by 'garbage' what I mean is all the stuff Google puts in the results page that isn't part of the search results). In particular, if you add '&udm=14' to the end of the URL on your results page, you can force it to display search results only. I do a similar thing with my personal Start Page, where I've created a small form to handle that for me. I also use '&tbs=qdr:y' to force it to return results only from the last year, so I'm not getting out-of-date results.

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Systems: The Purpose of a System is What It Does
Anil Dash, 2024/05/30

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I've had discussions with people from time to time about the difference between networks and systems, and to me one of the main differentiators is this: a system has a purpose, and a network doesn't. Sometimes this difference can be difficult to parse, and this phrase, which originates with Stafford Beer, sits right along that dividing line. The idea that "The purpose of a system is what it does" (POSIWID) allows us to retroactively assign an intent to a system, even if it was not designed that way. A network, by contract, does not imbue cognitive properties; the structures and processes are purely physical, with no cognitive guidance whatsoever.

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AI Is a False God
Navneet Alang, The Walrus, 2024/05/30

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If you have beliefs about AI, one way or another, that you hold with religious fervour, then perhaps your faith is misplaced. AI is neither the stuff or prayers or nightmares; it occupies that mundane space in between. Moreover, as the Walrus puts it trenchantly, "The problems facing Canada or the world—not just climate change but the housing crisis, the toxic drug crisis, or growing anti-immigrant sentiment—aren't problems caused by a lack of intelligence or computing power... the fixes are difficult to implement because of social and political forces, not a lack of insight, thinking, or novelty."

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Company "Sheepishly" Admits Its Employee Handbook Was Generated With ChatGPT, Doesn’t Have Anti-Harassment Policy
Noor Al-Sibai, Futurism, 2024/05/30

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There are two things we can draw from this short article. First, generative AI isn't to the point yet where it can reliably create things like employee handbooks (and therefore, other training materials). But second, the fact that companies are already using it for this makes it clear that when GAI is reliable, it will be widely used for this purpose. Via George Station.

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We publish six to eight or so short posts every weekday linking to the best, most interesting and most important pieces of content in the field. Read more about what we cover. We also list papers and articles by Stephen Downes and his presentations from around the world.

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