Donna Holford-Lovell’s Post

Interested in learning about Europe's Digital Markets Act and its implications for big tech policy? Check out this event from the Harvard Kennedy School: https://lnkd.in/e8GPYUiD

In our ever-evolving digital landscape, understanding the impact of big tech on society has never been more crucial. A new blog post delves into the necessity of conducting unbiased research to reveal the true effects of major tech companies on our lives. However, a significant challenge arises: the very means of investigation are often influenced or manipulated by the same entities we seek to understand. This article sheds light on the complexities and obstacles inherent in this critical research, highlighting the need for transparency and integrity in the pursuit of knowledge. To explore these important themes, read the full post here: [Is big tech harming society? To find out, we need research - but it’s being manipulated by big tech itself](https://ift.tt/FmIqLPz).

Among critical scenarious for the Platforms Future has been how to deal with online toxicity. Scholarly response by Mehmet Ali Üzelgün et al. explores contents, discussions and scenarios for technological disruption, societal fragmentation, and digital Enlightenment (Special Issue, 2024): https://lnkd.in/dSGfG29v

We--Australia--needs to start addressing the broader tech ecosystem necessary for strategic and economic competitiveness. Current structures, governance and incentives, carefully evolved over the last 30-40 years, no longer fit the bill. Here we look at advanced computation.

https://lnkd.in/gZ86vgd6 How Americans view big tech & other timely looks at a wide variety of subjects by Pew Research.

Last night, Berfin and I went live on the BBC World Service radio! 🌍😳 Not something I ever expected, but a testament to the incredible journey we've been on with the Bower Fellowship and Google.org. This experience has been truly transformative, both personally and professionally. Here's what made it so special: 💚 Working with an incredible team, where everyone was deeply committed to the mission of creating a trash-free world. It was both truly inspiring, and the energy was contagious! 🤝 The Fellows were recruited from all sides of Google, including DeepMind, Cloud, and our Geo Sustainability team. We've been able to share and learn from each other and discuss directly with the people leading sustainability at Google. ♻️ We built a groundbreaking machine learning model that can recognize almost any everyday item and match it with local recycling instructions. There hasn't previously been a unified place for recycling information globally, but with Bower, there now is. It's been a privilege to be part of something so much bigger than myself. I'm proud of what we've accomplished and excited to see the impact Bower will have on the world. 🌱🌎 Bower is now available, wherever you live. Help us further develop the solution, and in turn give better recycling advice everywhere, by actively using the app and giving us feedback. Oh, and here is the podcast version of what is now live on the BBC World Service. You'll hear us from 10:30: https://lnkd.in/ek3Y3JW6 #Bower #Google #BBC #Sustainability #Recycling #MachineLearning #AI

🌸 Now is time for innovation with a nice prize at the end. 💸 USD 5M for finalist teams. Very good opening from Google to challenge the status quo and to create awareness on top of marketing hype. And finally get an answer to a question, what to really do with the technology. Business case is still missing. #quantumcomputing #google #competition https://lnkd.in/giq_2Zm4

Last week I asked whether a best-practice process for building a national Quantum Technology (QT) ecosystem exists. Turns out it does, and several leading QT nations are doing many things right. My rhetorical questions gave me more messages about this privately than on the public thread, and that's considerate, but I actually welcome being challenged openly, as long as it's done respectfully and politely. In fact, I believe that's a key function of LinkedIn - to engender healthy debates. Dialectical discourse being a good thing and all that. Big thanks in particular to Amara Graps, who sent me the most material containing empirical evidence of processes transparently and inclusively executed in various leading QT nations. It is precisely this that I was looking for, from those who have actually done it/been a part of it. I can perform internet searches myself, but as I haven't "lived it" (i.e. been a part of a successful build-up of a leading QT ecosystem), pointers from those who have, and who wish to share their wisdom - in addition to written material - mean so much more). The graphic depiction of a thriving QT ecosystem below actually came from an article that Amara sent me (link in the comment field). Amidst its golden nuggets, phrased so as to seem self-evident (but being anything but in real life, in my experience), this sentence stood out for me: "The Lessons Learned is to pay particularly close attention to those with experience in your backyard, you’ll need them in the roadmap process." In other words: Use every available and willing resource at hand! The following sentence stood out for me as well: "QT is a field that is simultaneously fast-moving, yet steady, incremental progress, a long view perspective, but with surprising advances around every corner… can provide your country with new skills to upscale your society." Those last few words are "it"! Because upscaling society is precisely what QT will enable - on so many levels! And said society will need so many more people to enable it than just physicists/coders/engineers (who are obviously crucial)! This is not just a plea for more resources for public outreach purposes, so as to get many more people giving input to future use cases now, but a plea for democratic transparency as well. Any technology this powerful should not be designed, selected and deployed in closed corridors! Even if QT will lean much less on B2C than AI, the difference in *timely* societal uptake will depend on having a well-functioning ecosystem with many people sufficiently "in the loop". So inclusivity, transparency and accountability when the very first "train tracks are being laid" are key as we get cracking on the QT journey here! Have a look at the ecosystem blueprint below. How many of those boxes could we here in Norway presently fill out, even tentatively? (Rhetorical question.)

bravo 🙌 Marietje Schaake it is a fair and reasonable concern👌 big tech sold for too long “free services” when actually we, our sensitive data were the price to pay 💰 result today bye bye to our data 📊 and risk saying also bye bye to our democracies #Transparency of #AI #algorithm until #platforms #algorithms are designed to promote and reward engagement/clicks, impressions whatever the content of what is being promoted, shared well there is something fundamentally wrong, dangerous and which could damage/ kill democracies yes 👍 human review is necessary in all languages, bigtech should not only invest in English, Spanish and French languages ! Christel Schaldemose Andreas Schwab Stéphanie Yon-Courtin René Repasi

How can we find the right balance between opportunities new technologies are providing and protecting people‘s rights? Great to read Marietje Schaake‘s very insightful views.