OLDaily

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

Data Pipelines in Machine Learning Systems.
Aurimas Griciūnas, SwirlAI Newsletter, 2025/02/24

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This is long, detailed, really technical, and shouldn't be read so much as worked through with a computer and a lot of time. So why am I linking to it here? Well it would be a great episode of Stephen Follows Instructions if I ever found the time. But more to the point, it illustrates how working with AI can still mean doing some detailed and difficult work with computers. It's different work, sure. But if you thought it would be easier, just have a look at this.

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AI: Too Cheap to Control
Miguel Guhlin, Another Think Coming, 2025/02/24

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Miguel Guhlin adds another plank to the argument offered by people like Marc Watkins and Audrey Watters. "When you want to get everyone hooked on a product, you release it for free. Read the AI's description of AI Lock-In Strategy at the end of the post (oh, the irony)." The lock-in strategy is a lovely read, and people should quite rightly take it as a warning. But it isn't AI that's the problem, is it? The same strategy is described by Shapiro and Varian in Information Rules, published in 1999. It's what publishers did with books and then e-books. The product isn't the problem, the companies that control the product are. Educated people should be able to see the difference.

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Pluralistic: Pluralistic is five (19 Feb 2025) – Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
Cory Doctorow, Pluralistic, 2025/02/24

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This five-year post from Cory Dopctorow is getting a lot of traction, and I sort of see why, though I don't know why the Canadian nickel is copper coloured and there's a lot of A-lister name dropping. Still, I see the point of focusing your reading on who you follow and not who is recommended by the algorithm. I've never used alerts and notifications, so my attention stays pretty uninterrupted. I use RSS extensively and focus on finding people and topics that are of interest to me. I keep negative and distracting voices out of my head. Would this work for everyone? I can't say; for some people the fear of missing out (FOMO) is dtrong, and we need those people, so we can find out what's going on.

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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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