Aula Fellowship for AI Science, Tech, and Policy

Newsletter Launch! ???? Friend of the Aula Fellowship Susan Furnell invites you to join in the conversation on AI: AI RESET: Shaping AI’s Path & Future Help her out and take the poll, please. ??

Connecting the dynamics of Technology, Social Justice, and Public Interest empowers lawyers and legal scholars. How? Why does it matter? Human Rights Lawyer, educator, Aula Fellow, and all-round nice person Jake Okechukwu Effoduh explains.

Thanks, Luiza Jarovsky !

Consultancy reporting on AI isn’t doing enough. ?? New Research Alert: Easy to Read, Easier to Write: The Politics of AI in Consultancy Trade Research How well do we understand AI use in business and policymaking? Consultancy reports are among the most widely read sources on AI implementations, and for good reason. They are well written, engaging, pertinent, and timely. At the same time, our research finds major gaps in evidence quality, transparency, and breadth of coverage. Our latest study, published Open-Access in Cogent Social Sciences (Taylor & Francis Group), examines consultancy reporting on AI since the launch of GPT and highlights key strengths and weaknesses: ? What consultancy reports do well: ?? Speed. Rapid production keeps them relevant ?? Client-focused. Tailored to business needs ?? Actionable. Clear, practical recommendations ?? Where they fall short: ? Self-referential. Often cite their own surveys rather than independent data. ? Transparency issues. Data collection methods can be unclear & reports often include consultancy services in the strategic recommendations, obscuring the line between strategic report and sales pitch. ? Limited scope. Mostly focus on large firms, leaving SMEs unaddressed. Little or no consideration of well-known patterns of abuse in the AI labour force, nor of environmental, energy infrastructure, and second-order consequences. The takeaway? We call for more collaboration between business consultants, management scientists, and policymakers to produce reliable, well-rounded insights on AI in business. We believe that the function of business is to provide opportunities for people to work together to build great things. Our practical experience is that consultants have a vital role in the endeavour to make AI tools a part of a bright future for everyone. ?? Read the full article here and please share: https://lnkd.in/eA_WYnqW Citation: Mackenzie, T., Radelji?, B., & Heslinga, O. (2025). Easy to read, easier to write: the politics of AI in consultancy trade research. Cogent Social Sciences, 11(1), 2470368. DOI: 10.1080/23311886.2025.2470368 About the Aula Fellowship: ?? Coalitions are a powerful force for change. Co-authors Tammy Mackenzie, Branislav RADELJIC, PhD SFHEA and Olivia Heslinga are Green Hall Aula Fellows. This research is part of the work we do at The Aula Fellowship for AI Science, Tech, and Policy. Our mission is to get everyone to the conversation on AI. We are available to discuss this research and your work. #AI #BusinessStrategy #Policy #Management #Consulting #AIinBusiness #AIReporting #Research #AulaFellowship #rand #pwc #accenture #deloittes #mckinsey #ey

It's quite timely that our new Prime Minister announced a new "Culture and Identity" minister! Digital and cultural sovereignty are cardinal to our identities, and the freedom to live by our values. It is why our agenda focuses on the creative economy and its the implications of Generative AI for the arts and cultural sector. Expect an upsurge of disinformation coming our way, from our neighbours this time, and lots of tough decisions to be made on how can we adopt AI, be innovative WITHOUT giving all our data to American Big Tech. How do we not completely isolate and maintain, or build new, partnerships in creative economies? In this short blog, I explain how I define "creativism" in this context, and I do believe it might be among the most important tools we have to navigate this chaos. I ask business leaders, economists and policy makers, especially those who aren't used to thinking our of the box and might not be thinking of the arts as key, to come and listen attentively March 27th. By the way, I can help your business organize workshops to a digital governance strategy and AI policy. It's no longer a luxury! #creativeeconomy #identity #culture #canada #digitaleconomy #knowledge #disinformation #art #ai Kelly Wilhelm Cultural Policy Hub at OCAD U Inspirit Foundation Michael Power Teresa Scassa Samuel La France Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada Patrimoine canadien -- Canadian Heritage

POLITICO readers may have caught sight of this today: a brief mention of some questions that a small group of technologists, researchers, and policy people, informally calling ourselves the Sycamore Collective, drafted yesterday morning in response to Keir Starmer's announcements on AI on government. These are the questions we shared: Labour’s escalating claims around the potential use of?AI in government are borne out of relatable constraints and welcome ambition for the UK. But we are deeply concerned that in an effort to increase efficiency and find savings, the UK could end up wasting ￡100s of millions of public money in failed projects. This risks damaging public services - and ultimately holding the UK back -?rather than taking the opportunity to make them fit for the future. It might sound like a silver bullet but we can’t just shoehorn AI into existing services. Here are 10 questions that we believe the Government needs to demonstrate it has answers to before signing away millions of pounds of taxpayer’s money with no break clause on the contracts if things go wrong. ?? 1 Are the technology and the data ready and if not how much will it cost to make them ready before AI can be used?? ??2 Are the needs of the public or public servants expected to benefit from new AI technology sufficiently well understood?? ??3 Are staff ready and trained to use AI technologies - if not how much will this cost and how long will it take?? ??4 Has proper evaluation been done of the jobs required to make use of AI as well as those that can be cut?? ??5 By what process will the impact of AI use in government be evaluated?? ??6 What mechanisms exist to make corrections when things go wrong? ??7 What processes exist for frontline workers to contribute expertise and raise concerns about the impact of AI use in government? ??8 What steps are being taken to avoid locking the UK into expensive contracts which cannot be easily undone if the technology doesn’t deliver?? ??9 What parliamentary oversight will there be of new AI systems which make decisions affecting the quality of life of people in the UK?? ??10 How will you trial and gradually introduce changes to avoid the risk of going too far too fast and losing valuable expertise? The Sycamore Collective consists of concerned citizens with experience working across the technology sector, government, academia and civil society. As part of a bigger group of contributors and collaborators, was great to work with Anna Dent Simon Cross (PHD) Peter Wells Julian Tait Jonathan Tanner Gordon Guthrie and others to frame these questions.

Brilliant paper! "Pitfalls of Evidence-Based AI Policy." This challenges recent calls to wait to regulate AI because of lack of evidence. This "deny and delay playbook" has been used before by big tobacco and big oil in their efforts to fight regulation. To be clear, we have plenty of evidence of AI harms across numerous domains, from AI that encourages children to commit suicide or kill their parents to deceptive deepfakes to scams and fraud to discrimination and bias. There is no need to wait! But the authors go further than calling out historical parallels—they argue that there is also an inherent paradox in these calls to wait for more evidence. Without deliberate policymaking, we actually will have a much harder time collecting evidence, so waiting on policymaking until some arbitrary line of "adequate" evidence is obtained actually actively reduces the chances that such evidence is ever gathered. They provide a list of 15 different categories of AI policy that would support evidence collection. There's also a fantastic analysis here of how AI companies generate a disproportionately large amount of academic research in the field, and that numerous people who have called for "evidence-based policy" have undisclosed relationships with AI companies. So next time you hear someone talking about AI say "we shouldn't regulate until we have more evidence," remember that this line has been used in bad faith before, and that we need policies to help gather evidence. From the opening: "At this very moment, I say we sit tight and assess. "– President Janie Orlean, Don’t Look Up "Abstract: Nations across the world are working to govern AI. However, from a technical perspective, there is uncertainty and disagreement on the best way to do this. Meanwhile, recent debates over AI regulation have led to calls for 'evidence-based AI policy' which emphasize holding regulatory action to a high evidentiary standard. Evidence is of irreplaceable value to policymaking. However, holding regulatory action to too high an evidentiary standard can lead to systematic neglect of certain risks. In historical policy debates (e.g., over tobacco ca. 1965 and fossil fuels ca. 1985) “evidence-based policy” rhetoric is also a well-precedented strategy to downplay the urgency of action, delay regulation, and protect industry interests. Here, we argue that if the goal is evidence-based AI policy, the first regulatory objective must be to actively facilitate the process of identifying, studying, and deliberating about AI risks. We discuss a set of 15 regulatory goals to facilitate this and show that Brazil, Canada, China, the EU, South Korea, the UK, and the USA all have substantial opportunities to adopt further evidence-seeking policies." Massive thanks to the authors, Stephen Casper of CSAIL MIT, David Krueger of Mila - Quebec Artificial Intelligence Institute, and Dylan Hadfield-Menell also of Massachusetts Institute of Technology CSAIL. #AI #AIPolicy

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Getting more involved with the Women in AI Norway and the stunning people who drive it ?? Rialda Spahi?, Dianne Christine Geronimo, Rosangela Sarno +++ ... and having more and more important conversations with people from the #GlobalMajority (#globalsouth) about the need for AI networks that center their voices, needs, and perspectives. ?? Can my network help grow this list? ?? Drop a comment tagging high-quality AI networks and groups that connect people in the Global South and I will add —and flag what kind of connections you’re looking for! ??(I will do my absolute best to connect you.) 1?? AI FOR DEVELOPING COUNTRIES FORUM - a fantastic networking arena. Next physical meeting in June! Link to an earlier post in the comments. 2?? Artificial Intelligence for Development (AI4D) - highly recommended by Alice Liu. 3?? AI & Equality - exposed me to excellent critical voices and hands-on training by South African researchers. 4?? Empire Partner Foundation - yet another in South Africa! 5?? What about the spaces in Indonesia and Malaysia, Hesti Aryani & Endry Lim Zhen Wen? 6?? The Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR) - an important group to follow. "Creating spaces for communities to question elites". 7?? The Algorithmic Justice League - streams lot of great online events. 8?? AI Global South Summit - hoping there will be 2025 conferences? 9?? Aula Fellowship for AI Science, Tech, and Policy with Tammy Mackenzie - recommended by Branislav RADELJIC, PhD SFHEA. ?? Datasphere Initiative w/ Lorrayne Porciuncula & Sophie Tomlinson. 11 Global Center on AI Governance w/ Rachel Adams 12 GobLab UAI - great rec by Paloma Baytelman 13 AI Now Institute - ???? Mrinalini Luthra 14 Deep Learning Indaba - "goal of Africans being active shapers and owners" 15 Check out Raymond Suns open-source AI regulation tracker - link in comments 16 Data Science Africa(DSA) - ???? Morine Amutorine 17 ?? 18 ?? 19 ? Without #globalsouth-centered spaces, it unfortunately looks very easy for interest groups to exploit people who are pivoting to the AI field - through the promise of access to elite AI spaces, often dominated by the US, marketed as otherwise inaccessible. We need to join - and make! - community-based, distributed spaces for people to grow and share their AI skills (from dev to policy analysis), impact and steer AI use and policy, and, as DAIR puts it, create the technological future that WE want.