we're back!


we're back!

Hi Reader,

It’s been almost exactly a year since I last emailed you...

To celebrate that ghosting anniversary, I’m here with some exciting news: we are finally launching the Computer Says Maybe podcast!

Over the next few months, we’re doing a few topical episodes on chunky issues, and over time will aim to develop into a weekly or bimonthly rhythm. We’ll have rotating co-hosts and expert guests that help us deep dive into a particular topic.

If you’re keen to explore your area in conversation, please don’t hesitate to reach out by replying to this email.

Our first episode will be on AI & elections and it will go live in February. I’m super fortunate to be working on this with Julia Rhodes Davis and Prathm Juneja as co-hosts, and I'm relieved to be supported by Sarah Myles on production. We’re timing the release of the episode for after I meet up with loads of folks thinking about this topic at the Knight Foundation ‘Informed’ event, starting today. If you’re working on AI & elections I’d love to talk more.

When the first episode goes live we’ll email you. If you don't want to get that email or other newsletter issues from us, there's an easy unsub link here.

As for the newsletter itself, it will be more on what we’re learning as we research and interview people for the podcast. Good news/bad news: you will get fewer provocative, barely-researched issues from me.

If you are curious about what's happening behind the scenes, this is part of a broader shake-up for me and for Computer Says Maybe. Rather than sharing the occasional thought on the side of consulting for organisations, I’m going to be spending a lot more time in conversation with experts and explorers in this area, making and building things within the field of folks I know and love.

We will also be building out our (already lovely) team, and I will share more on this as things progress.

In sum, I’m back! And soon there will be a real ‘we’ here working together to bring you more and better. I’m super excited for 2024.

So please reach out if you want to chat about your field, work, or just noodle on where things are headed in the world!

More soon,

Alix

P.S Let me know if you or any of your people are in Mexico City as that’s now home.


If this was forwarded to you, sign up here.

Computer Says Maybe

A newsletter & podcast about AI and politics

Read more from Computer Says Maybe

Trump just won the presidency — what do we do now? Hey there, Just before the election we had a drafted a normal newsletter about the impacts AI did or didn’t have on the election. But like many of the conversations about technology politics, it feels like we missed the forest for the trees. 🎧 Prathm and I sat down to reflect and discuss what this outcome might mean for the technology politics work we’re all doing. You can listen here. I also wanted to share my thinking at the personal,...

Hello friends of CSM! This year we’ve had a bottomless brunch of big tech trials, which somehow feels like progress but also sort of like… we’re slowly getting nowhere? We wanted to understand better what it means to take big tech to court: in what ways are they ducking out of being accountable for their harms? What kinds of expert witnesses are litigators calling on to build a case? And what makes an expert witness anyway? Yep, it’s a lot. A few weeks ago, we wrapped up a podcast miniseries...

Laws are like pancakes Hi hi hello everyone — we’ve just wrapped up our podcast series on FAccT. In case you weren’t aware that this series even existed and you now feel woefully behind, here’s a quick rundown: First I spoke to Andrew Strait about our favourite papers presented at the conference; it was a great chat and a good overview of what FAccT even is. Then I interviewed the authors of three of my favourite papers… In Abandoning Algorithms I Interviewed Nari Johnson and Sanika Moharana...