Can the #openweb reboot scale without copying the #dotcons?
Hamish Campbell,
#OMN (Open Media Network),
2026/10/02
This is very much the sort of question that has been central; in my thinking for the last few years. "Can a federated network scale without turning itself into a platform? And underneath that is can the openweb grow without becoming the thing it was built to replace?" My response is that anything that looks like centralization is a point off weakness, a potential point of failure. That includes initiatives like the Openweb Governance Body (OGB), "the proposal for a native governance layer for a federated network, using the same principles that make federation possible – autonomous communities, open protocols, distributed participation, federation between communities, local decision-making, shared standards, negotiation and mediation, accountability between participating groups." I know, OGB doesn't look very central, but to my view the seeds are there.
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Why AI doesn’t replace education - it demands it
Brent Yergensen,
eCampus News,
2026/10/02
"There are three reasons AI demands that we go to college. We need to study its effects and see it as a viable human tool. We must confront our need to discern and critique it. We need to be able to use it in a data-now, rapid world of information sharing. And we need to realize it is a new professional industry that, at its foundation, is an extension of human thought and inquiry." I know this looks like four reasons, but only the latter three points (discern and critique, be able to use it, extension of human thought) are discussed at any length. Of these, probably the first is most important. And we need to be able to set AI reasoning against human experience in a way that makes sense.
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Taking ideas for a walk: Forging a path into experiential learning
Sharon Boyd, Andrew Gardiner, Cynthia Naydani, Andrea Roe,
Teaching Matters,
2026/10/02
I had to look up what the author could possible mean by 'Easter Bush' - it could be a type of plant, but more likely, the reference is to the University of Edinburgh campus of that name. The reference comes up in this discussion of experiential learning, and specifically a 'walk-shop', or walking workshop, modeled after Berger's essay Why Look at Animals, but instead titled 'Why look at Easter Bush' (one wonders after reading Berger: are the students like animals in a zoo?). The point, though, is to actually see what is there, more in the spirit of Kimmerer's Learning the Grammar of Animacy. "Imagine the access we would have to different perspectives, the things we might see through other eyes, the wisdom that surrounds us." As the article says, "Walking in this way can quickly become a radical act because the ideas you get are sometimes far-out and unusual. It provides us a moment to be playful and sometimes some of the best ideas come that way." That's my thinking as well, and why I take care to experience the places I visit, and to not merely pass through them. Of course, being able to do that in a place like Easter Bush is a privilege.
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Reddit is ending RSS support: What this means for Inoreader
Inoreader blog,
2026/10/02
The popular social media platform Reddit is killing RSS support. As they explain, "Because RSS is now a common surface for large-scale scraping and automated abuse, we'll stop supporting RSS feeds on November 13, 2026 while preserving moderation workflows that depend on it through supported alternatives." I should note that the website is also a common surface for large-scale scraping, so there are probably plans in the works to limit access to this as well. The change hits moderators especially hard because they often use RSS to view posts within their own workflow. As one commenter notes, "Dropping a text based interface and replacing it with a UI only control panel is a huge loss of usability. Anyone who works with technical stuff knows this." Via Grant Potter.
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Why real intelligence is something more than optimisation | Aeon Essays
Sasha Mudd,
Aeon,
2026/10/02
This is a very nice article framing the discussion of machine intelligence within the context of the debate between David Hume and Immanuel Kant. Reason, said Hume, is and ought to be a slave of the passions. This includes (I would add) for Hume a moral sense, which is not (but should have been) discussed in this article. Kant, by contrast, argues that reason is the source of our freedom, giving us the means to determine which of those passions (goals, wants, ideals) are rational and consistent with the world and society within it. The AI argument that intelligence is no more that optimization, argues author Sasha Mudd, aligns with Hume's view, but this leaves us passive clients of machine intelligence. "What if we become so accustomed to being predicted, nudged, ranked and served that we lose confidence in the older, harder activity of asking what ends deserve our allegiance in the first place?" I don't agree, but I appreciate the crystal clear and accurate summations of Hume and Kant's respective philosophies, and the argument Mudd has build on them. Via Fredrik Graver.
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Data in Dialogue: An Interactive Atlas of Critical Data Visualization
Marian Dörk,
Fachhochschule Potsdam,
2026/10/02
As the 'About' section says, "This atlas holds an expanding body of work about the power dynamics at play when visualizing data. It is an attempt to keep tabs on projects and publications that show how data visualizations can foster conversations about intricate matters." The sites - too many to count - are presented first as a loosely connected graph, but you can also view them as cards or in a list. There's a lot of great stuff - websites, papers, maps - all discussing data visualization. The image, for example, is from Kusnick, et al.'s Survey on Visualization-based Storytelling, which is listed in the collection. There's an RSS feed, which I've added to my list. Via Alan Levine.
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The AI Crisis in Higher Education: A Strategic Proposal
Mark Carrigan,
University of Manchester,
2026/10/02
This short book (63 page PDF) looks at the issues around the use of AI in educational institutions and considers ways to cope with it. There's a lengthy discussion of what it is and what the dangers are. I note especially that the core danger outlined here is lock-in - institutions get to the point where AI is an essential technology, whereupon providers start squeezing them on price and capacity. How could institutions gt to this point? The issue, argues author Mark Carrigan, is that universities especially lack the institutional capacity to respond to change. "The point is to keep building institutional capacity while the ground shifts beneath our feet. This is what has often been missed by both agendas. The organisation itself needs to change while this is taking place, connecting professional development to the networks through which academics cluster into disciplinary and problem-based communities." This means building learning networks, forums for discussion, distributed governance, professional development, LLM-ready learning designers, and technology deployment. Via Alan Levine.
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Nothing about me without me: Moving from Student Voice to student partnership
Emily McIntosh,
Teaching Matters,
2026/10/02
I've seen student representation on boards, committees and agencies from both sides. There's truth to what's being argued here, but it's not the whole truth. Emily McIntosh argues here that student representatives feel like they do not matter - no matter what they say, the decisions have already been made without them. McIntosh argues for "Authentic Student Voice (that) is not simply being listened to. It combines influence, ownership, and shared responsibility." I don't disagree with any of that. But if we go back to the beginning of the column we read that the student "had been invited to a significant institutional meeting as the 'Student Voice'." They were 'selected' or 'chosen', presumably because they could be counted on to do the research and to be responsible. Something like that. But an authentic student voice is often much less compliant that an especially selected student voice. They won't take the same truths for granted, and won't share the same background assumptions about presentation and decorum (and not should they; for all the good intentions in promoting student agency, we all know that as soon as agency becomes pushback there is the risk that it will be shut down).
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