A truth about today’s AI Tools

"A truth about today’s AI tools: They’re not really information experts. They have challenges determining which source is the most authoritative and most recent. It’s fair to ask whether relying on any of these AI tools as your new Google is a good idea. In many ways, AI is best suited for complex questions that take some hunting. In the best cases, AI tools could find needles in a haystack — answers that weren’t obvious in a traditional Google search." - Washington Post

CS Grads Can't Find Jobs

A recent graduate triple-majored in computer science, math, and computational science and has completed the coursework for a computer-science Ph.D. He would prefer to work instead of finishing his degree, but he has found it almost impossible to secure a job. “We’re in an AI revolution, and I am a specialist in the kind of AI that we’re doing the revolution with, and I can’t find anything.” -The Atlantic

20 Recent Articles about the Impact of AI on Students

What the panic about kids using AI to cheat gets wrong - Vox 

How AI Is Changing—Not ‘Killing’—College – Inside Higher Ed

AI Makes Research Easy. Maybe Too Easy. – Wall Street Journal 

The Computer-Science Bubble Is Bursting – The Atlantic

Students Are Using ChatGPT to Write Their Personal Essays Now – Chronicle of Higher Ed

These workers don’t fear artificial intelligence. They’re getting degrees in it. – Washington Post

Almost all the class of 2026 are using AI to do their work – The Atlantic

Duke Just Introduced An Essay Question About AI—Here’s How To Tackle It - Forbes

ChatGPT’s Study Mode Is Here. It Won’t Fix Education’s AI Problems – Wired  

AI is helping students be more independent, but the isolation could be career poison – The Markup

I'm a college writing professor. How I think students should use AI this fall - Mashable

ChatGPT's new study mode won't give you the answers - Axios

University students feel ‘anxious, confused and distrustful’ about AI in the classroom and among their peers – The Conversation

I Teach Creative Writing. This Is What A.I. Is Doing to Students. – New  York Times

How Are Students Really Using AI? Here’s what the data tell us. - Chronicle of Higher Ed

So long, study guides? The AI industry is going after students – NPR

At one elite college, over 80% of students now use AI – but it’s not all about outsourcing their work - The Conversation

Students have been called to the office — and even arrested — for AI surveillance false alarms – Associated Press  

AI in education's potential privacy nightmare - Axios 

AI to the Rescue It’s an all-purpose study tool — it’s changing students’ relationships with professors & peers - Chronicle of Higher Ed

Selling Out

We "sell out" whenever we fail to take ownership of who we are. It's much easier to default to the expectations of friends/work/society/church rather than taking responsibility for our thinking and actions. Turning control over of what we have been entrusted with to someone (or something) else is an attempt to take the responsibility off our shoulders, so there’s someone else to blame.  

AI Advice for Students

AI Advice for Students

1- Think Beyond Academic Integrity

         Not just “Is this cheating or not cheating?”

         But also, “Am I taking the opportunity to learn, practice, and cultivate my skills?”

To some students, college now feels like, “How well I can use ChatGPT.” Others describe writing essays as a coordination problem: get the prompt, feed it to the bot, skim the output, add some filler, hit submit. No thinking required, just interface management. 

2-Define Your own Educational goals

Ask yourself: “Besides grades, what are my goals as a student?”

Prioritize learning and skill development

Seize opportunities to get the practice you need to become a better thinker, writer, and communicator. 

3-Prompt to Challenge your Thinking

Instead of outsourcing your thinking (“Suggest a thesis statement I can use for my essay.”). Look for ways to think critically about the subject (“Ask me tough questions to help me figure out my thesis statement.”).

Don’t just ask, “Am I outsourcing the writing to AI?” Ask, “Am I outsourcing the thinking to AI?” We must use AI to expand our mind’s capacity to engage, rather than using it to outsource our thinking.  

4- Focus on AI Literacy & Integration

Unless you want to build AI systems and become a data scientist, focus on taking outdated processes and updating them to make use of the available AI tools. Understanding the benefits and limitations of AI in light of ethics should be the goal, along with figuring out how to mesh it into your workday. 

5- Double Down on your Humanity

•  We can’t let it strip us of our humanity.

•  Optimistically, AI may be “a piece of technology that, instead of replacing humanity, amplifies it.”

•  We must retain oversight & not lose ourselves by depending on the machine.

•  Doubling down on what makes you human may be what saves you from being replaced or minimized by AI. 

6- Get Well-rounded         

Be well- rounded in liberal arts: think of your gen ed classes as now core classes. Focus specifically on growing these skills: analytic thinking, creativity, information literature, resilience, agility, leadership, self-motivation, empathy, curiosity. Their value will rise as AI takes over routine tasks.  

7- Distinguish between AI-generated content, AI-assisted content, & AI-supplemented content

Group A ❌                    Group B ✅                              Group C 🤔

AI-generated content              AI-assisted content/writing                AI-supplement content

Facilitated writing/learning    

AI-generated content ❌ is entirely produced by the AI or sections are produced by the AI, based on detailed instructions (prompts) provided by the author. Some AI is best thought of as a set of automation tools that function as closed systems that do their work without oversight—like ATMs and dishwashers. 

In academia, it is not acceptable under normal circumstances unless there are significant and clear reason why this was necessary. However, in business, it is likely to be treated as acceptable when the content is merely informational and not intended to be creative. The focus in this situation is accuracy and speed with minimal effort as opposed to authenticity. For instance, a summary of a business meeting or an email answering a particular question about the business, where it is assumed, the writer may incorporate AI-generated content.

Group B ✅ is work that is predominantly written by an individual but has been improved with the aid of AI tools. AI is part of the process. The author remains in control, and the AI merely acts as a polishing tool. As opposed to automation tools, these collaboration tools—like chain saws and word processors. In any given application, AI is going to automate or it’s going to collaborate, depending on how we design it and how someone chooses to use it.

This kind of assistance is generally accepted by most publishers as well as the Committee on Publication Ethics, without the need for formal disclosure. This includes: creating outlines, improving clarity, grammar, summarizing, brainstorming, generating transcription, condensing notes, creating study guides, practice questions, editing, and suggesting alternative approaches to a problem. 

Group C 🤔 includes changing phrasing, generating a citation list, revising sentence structure, reducing word count, etc. Writers and publishers disagree about whether using AI in this way is ethical or not.

22 Articles about Relationships with AI

OpenAI to safeguard ChatGPT for teens and people in crisis - Axios

ChatGPT-powered dolls are becoming caregivers in South Korea – Semafor

AI has passed the aesthetic Turing Test − and it’s changing our relationship with art – The Conversation

AI Chatbots Have New Boundaries, So I Tried to Get One to Break Up With Me - PopSugar

Dating an AI: How Much Is It Really Happening? – Wall Street Journal  

The personhood trap: How AI fakes human personality - ArsTechnica 

A Troubled Man, His Chatbot and a Murder-Suicide in Old Greenwich. – Wall Street Journal

They're Stuffed Amimals: They're also Chatbots – New York Times

ChatGPT is not your therapist – The Miami Hurricane

OpenAI Is Updating ChatGPT to Better Support Users in Mental Distress – Wall Street Journal  

What My Daughter Told ChatGPT Before She Took Her Life – New York Times 

Meta’s flirty AI chatbot invited a retiree to New York. He never made it home. – Reuters

The Looming Social Crisis of AI Friends and Chatbot Therapists – Derek Thompson

Illinois blocks AI from being your therapist – Axios  

Support Group Launches for People Suffering "AI Psychosis” – Futurism

Teens say they are turning to AI for friendship – Associated Press

What Would a Real Friendship With A.I. Look Like? Maybe Like Hers. – New York Times

He Had Dangerous Delusions. ChatGPT Admitted It Made Them Worse. - Wall Street Journal

Large language models are proficient in solving and creating emotional intelligence tests – Nature

A.I. Griefbots Are Just Our Latest Attempt to Talk to the Dead – New York Times

He said, she said, it said: I used ChatGPT as a couple's counselor. How did we fare? – NPR  

Can an AI Companion Substitute for Real Human Relationships? – Psychology Today

Does AI Replace the Expert?

The question is not whether AI can do things that experts cannot do on their own—it can. Expert humans often bring something that today’s AI models cannot: situational context, tacit knowledge, ethical intuition, emotional intelligence, and the ability to weigh consequences that fall outside the data. The value is not in substituting one expert for another, or in outsourcing fully to the machine, or indeed in presuming the human expertise will always be superior, but in leveraging human and rapidly-evolving machine capabilities to achieve best results. -David Autor and James Manyika writing in The Atlantic

Places to Keep up with News

Major Broadcast Networks

ABC News

CBS News

NBC News

NPR

Aggregate Sites

Google News

The Week

Yahoo News

 

eNewsletters

1440 Newsletter

Axios

Next Draft                                       

 

Aggregation Apps

Apple News

Flipboard (you’ll need to mute weak & non-news sites)

 

Explainer Journalism

Fact Tank (Pew)

the Intersect - WaPo

Up Shot (NY Times)

Vox

Wonkblog (WaPo)

the Conversation (articles written by university and research experts)

 

National News

NPR (morning edition)

Washington Post (list of daily print articles)

New York Times (list of daily print articles)

Semafor

 

Tech   

Tech Crunch  

MIT Tech Review

Social Media Today

BBC (future section)

Ars Technica


Politics

Politico

Washington Post (politics section)

Investigative Journalism

ProPublica
 

Education

Chronicle of Higher Ed

Inside Higher Ed

Scholarly Kitchen

Retraction Watch

 

Business

Quartz

Economist (sub. req.)

Fast Company

 

Science

Live Science

SciCentral

New York Time (science section)

Futurity

Greater Good

The Naked Scientists

Quanta

 

Religion

Christianity Today

Religious News Service

Washington Post (Acts of Faith section)

Ministry Watch

 

Health

Stat

New York Times (health section)

Study Finds

 

News Media

MuckRack Daily

Nieman Reports

Poynter

 

Opinion

The Atlantic

Big Think 

26 Articles from August about AI & Data Science

Why RAG Might Actually Matter More Than Ever In 2025

AI Definitions: Shadow AI

Can AI systems that make accurate predictions in one area apply that process to other area?

Proposed method for the intelligent generation of lightweight QNN

Towards responsible geospatial foundation models 

If You’re Trying to Get Into AI, This Is What You Need to Do

Corrected study rekindles debate over Microsoft’s quantum computing research 

A problem-first approach rather than leading with AI solutions

How to Catch AI Failures Before They Destroy Your Product 

How I Use AI Agents as a Data Scientist in 2025

A journey from corporate ML to freelance AI

The trajectory of Bayesian statistics

AI Definitions: Context Engineering

Machine learning in space

5 Routine Tasks That ChatGPT Can Handle for Data Scientists

Six Principles for Production AI Agents 

Claude Code has considerably changed my relationship to writing and maintaining code at scale 

Top 10 Collections of Cheat Sheets on GitHub to increase the productivity of developers and data scientists

Is your AI benchmark lying to you?

The role of data science will likely shift from number crunching to one of a supervisory, strategic, and ethical oversite role 

How NASA Is Testing AI to Make Earth-Observing Satellites Smarter

AI definitions: Artificial Intelligence  

Data science is among the jobs most exposed to gen AI replacement

AI Definitions: Data Scientist 

Top Skills Data Scientists Should Learn in 2025

A systematic review of multimodal models for satellite image captioning and geospatial understanding

This is daring greatly

When we spend our lives waiting until we're perfect or bulletproof before we walk into the arena, we ultimately sacrifice relationships and opportunities that may not be recoverable, we squander our precious time, and we turn our backs on our gifts, those unique contributions that only we can make.

We must walk into the arena, whatever it may be—a new relationship, an important meeting, our creative process, or a difficult family conversation—with courage and a willingness to engage. Rather than sitting on the sidelines and hurling judgment and advice, we must dare to show up and let ourselves be seen.  This is vulnerability. This is daring greatly.

Brené Brown, Daring Greatly

9 Webinars this Week about AI, Journalism & Media

Tue, Sept 2 - Strengthen Your Nonprofit’s Social Media Presence: Best Practices

What: Social media is more than just posting — it's how nonprofits raise awareness, reach new supporters, promote events, and build trust with their communities. But without a clear plan or the right tools, it’s easy to fall behind or burn out.  In this webinar, we’ll share the latest best practices for nonprofit social media in 2025: what platforms matter, what content drives engagement, and how to build a sustainable plan — even if you have a small team.  We’ll also introduce Tapp Network’s brand-new social media services, designed specifically for nonprofits that need expert guidance, editable templates, or both. Whether you're just starting out or looking to improve your strategy, this session will give you practical steps to strengthen your presence and save time.

Who: Lisa Quigley, Tapp Network, Director of Account Strategy.

When: 1 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Tech Soup

More Info

 

Tue, Sept 2 - From Innovation to Infiltration: The Role of AI in Modern Cybersecurity

What: A look into the intersection of AI and its impact on organizations worldwide and explore how AI-powered attacks are reshaping the threat landscape. We will learn about cutting-edge strategies for organizations that are domestically and globally distributed, and discover how AI-driven security solutions can detect anomalies, mitigate cyberattacks, and protect critical infrastructure.

Who: Eva Abergel, Senior Solution Expert, Radware; Michael Morgensten, Partner, Dayblink Consulting.

When: 1 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Tech Target

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Wed, Sept 3 - From Disruption to Domination: The New Ad Playbook for News Media

What: A look at the future of advertising and what it means for news media companies and the forces reshaping publisher revenue models and the strategies needed to thrive.

Who: INMA CEO Earl Wilkinson; Gabriel Dorosz, lead of INMA’s Advertising Initiative.

When: 10 am, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free to members

Sponsor: International News Media Association

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Wed, Sept 3 - Comms coach: The data to power your AI strategy

What: Axios HQ and Off the Record surveyed communicators to find out how they’re actually using AI at their organizations — and we’re bringing you a first look.

Who: Gab Ferree, Off the Record Founder; Jason Tomassini, Axios HQ Senior Vice President, Services.

When: 12:30 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsors: Axios & Off the Record

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Wed, Sept 3 - Solutions Journalism for Beat Reporters: From Introduction to Implementation

What: The fundamentals of solutions journalism and how to integrate it into your beat or newsroom. You’ll learn the steps for crafting a solutions story for every platform, how to avoid common pitfalls, and how to use the 16,000 solutions stories in the Solutions Story Tracker, to discover promising responses in other communities. 

When: 2 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Solutions Journalism Network

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Thu, Sept 4 - The Future of Journalism

What: This session explores the rapidly evolving media landscape from a journalist’s point of view, with a particular focus on how PR and communications professionals can adapt to and navigate this new terrain.  

Who: Guy Cocker, a seasoned journalist and former Editor-in-Chief at Maximum PC magazine (Future Publishing).

When: 8 am, Eastern

Where: Microsoft Teams

Cost: Free

Sponsor: epresspack

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Thu, Sept 4 - Transforming Sales Performance with AI

What: We’ll go beyond traditional sales training to explore how artificial intelligence is reshaping the way high-performing teams learn, adapt and close more deals. Our lineup of industry experts will share innovative methods for putting AI to work alongside your people, whether by turning data into actionable guidance, delivering tailored content at scale or freeing up time for sellers to focus on what matters most — relationships with clients. Don’t miss this opportunity to discover how you can equip your team with a powerful blend of human insight and technology to drive greater results in a world that’s constantly evolving.

Who: Lauren Nisbet, Sales Enablement Leader; Vyond Joel Fleet, Director of Sales Readiness, Salesloft;

Richard Barkey, Founder & CEO, Imparta; Tim Riesterer, Chief Strategy Officer, Corporate Visions; RK Prasad, MBA, Ph.D., CEO and Co-Founder, CommLab India; Andy Springer, Chief Client Officer, RAIN Group.

When: 11 am – 4 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsor: Training Industry

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Thu, Sept 4 - Reader-Driven Strategies for Local Engagement

What: Innovative approaches to fostering reader engagement and trust in local journalism. Learn how thoughtful reader engagement strategies are strengthening local newsrooms and deepening community ties.     

Who: Chris Coates, senior director of local news, oversees newsrooms across several East Coast and Southern states; Allison Petty, director of local news, manages teams in the Midwest and leads digital production efforts.

When: 1 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: $35

Sponsor: I Media Campus

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Fri, Sept 5 - Covering the Federal Takeover: Gathering arrest data, knowing the law, and other tips for journalists covering D.C.

What: Learn best practices for gathering arrest data, learn the D.C. Codes that address access to arrest records, and gain insight into covering the law enforcement agencies that are active in the capital city. 

Who: Robert Becker, D.C. Open Government Coalition board member; Fritz Mulhauser, secretary and co-chair of the D.C. Open Government Coalition’s legal committee; Elliot C. Williams, National Press Club Journalism Institute Training Manager.

When: 12 pm, Eastern

Where: Zoom

Cost: Free

Sponsors: National Press Club Journalism Institute & the D.C. Open Government Coalition

More Info

GoLaxy AI

Generative AI is making it exponentially easier for China to create believable, engaging content. GoLaxy — which operates in close alignment with the Chinese government's interests — appears to be tapping generative AI to mine social media profiles and create content that "feels authentic, adapts in real-time and avoids detection. "Documents show that GoLaxy has created profiles for at least 117 members of Congress and over 2,000 American political figures and thought leaders. -Axios