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This is my bi-weekly “newsletter” delivered straight to your inbox with at least one guaranteed typo I’ll catch after hitting send! If email collectors’ items aren’t your thing, don’t hesitate to switch to the RSS feed or just bookmark loudpoet.com and check in now and then. You do you!

NOTE: It’s a special evening edition, written from [redacted] on the first evening of a much-needed short vacation celebrating my wife’s [redacted] birthday. I was exhausted when I wrote this, forgive me if it goes astray…

_ONE

We should all be Luddites | Courtney C. Radsch

But the real Luddites weren’t afraid of machines; they were afraid of the social and economic impacts of the new technology on people—and of who controlled the terms of technological change. They were skilled workers: Craftsmen and artisans with deep technical expertise.

I’d always vaguely known Luddites were purposefully misrepresented in modern times, but I didn’t know the details until a few years ago when the pushback against the “inevitability” of “AI” led to anyone questioning the hype to be labeled as one. Radsch briefly corrects the record while putting their actions into context for four specific groups who should be embracing the label today: journalists, academics, policymakers, and educators.

Her call-to-action isn’t just relevant for dealing with “AI” hype in the present, it also serves as a useful reference point for remembering how each group has dealt with tech-driven hype in the past (poorly, for the most part), because technophiles thrive on short memories and overlapping hype cycles.

__TWO

AI Is Supercharging the War on Libraries, Education, and Human Knowledge | Jason Koebler

The resurgent war on knowledge, academics, expertise, and critical thinking that AI is currently supercharging has its roots in the hugely successful recent war on “critical race theory,” “diversity equity and inclusion,” and LGBTQ+ rights that painted librarians, teachers, scientists, and public workers as untrustworthy. This has played out across the board, with a seemingly endless number of ways in which the AI boom directly intersects with the right’s war on libraries, schools, academics, and government workers.

Every time someone says something like, “I use ChatGPT to do [usually some mundane task],” or “I use AI to do [usually something beyond their actual expertise and skill set],” I also hear a complete lack of concern about the inherent biases of the underlying technology, or the myriad ways it is being deployed to do harm to people they apparently don’t care about.

I used to feel a little bad about that silent judgement, but as 2025 comes to a depressing close, there really isn’t a good excuse for still being unaware of the various issues with so-called “AI” and the various tools that are being warped by it. At this point, I just assume they’ve made an informed choice and have to decide what that says about my relationship with them.

___THREE

NCTE 2025: Teachers Want More Than the Same Old Books | Kathy Ishizuka

So what are the most taught texts in U.S. classrooms? Romeo and Juliet is number one, followed by The Great Gatsby and The Crucible, according to the NCTE survey. Macbeth, listed fourth, was among the top 10 in 1989, as it was 25 years earlier, in 1964.

There are so many good tidbits in here; I particularly love the backlist vs. “canon” shout because I’ve been hammering that point for years. Ishizuka notes an important role that public libraries can play in supporting teachers, too.

It’s kind of weird seeing my former SLJ colleague writing for the competition, but their loss is PW‘s gain. I’m curious to see if this is a step towards boosting their library coverage after Albanese went independent with Words & Money (or will HE snatch her up?), because librarians need all of the support they can get these days.

____FOUR

Merriam-Webster goes old school with first new hardcover Collegiate dictionary in 22 years | Andrea Shea

“There’s been a presumption that the book is dead for a long time,” Sokolowski answered. “But people don’t know we sold a million and a half books in print last year.” A lot of those are paperbacks, crossword puzzle books and Scrabble dictionaries, he added, “but also big, hardcover dictionaries like the Collegiate. We recognize that real word lovers and word professionals — editors, journalists, writers — they use dictionaries all the time.”

A good dictionary and thesaurus are the only LLM real writers need — sorry, not sorry — and I realized when I read this that I haven’t owned a physical dictionary since the last time I worked in an office back in 2019.

I’m the stereotypical “I read the dictionary as a kid!” nerd, which still occasionally reveals itself when I don’t know how to pronounce a particular word because I’ve only ever seen it written. (I generally try to avoid using words in writing that I wouldn’t typically use in conversation, but there are a few good ones that slip in now and then because the writing and speaking parts of my brain aren’t always in sync.)

I would have bought this the day it came out, but I put it on my wish list instead because my family has complained the past few years that I’ve become difficult to shop for, and this will be an amazing Christmas gift! I want a new Thesaurus, too.

_____FIVE

The State of the Open Social Web | Ben Werdmuller

The open social web works the same way as the web itself: it’s permissionless. You don’t need to have a relationship with anyone in particular to have a profile and gain reach. And that means nobody can take it away from you.

Werdmuller does a nice job defining the social web — what it is and isn’t — primarily focusing on the differences between the truly open Fediverse (Mastodon, Ghost, etc), the slightly ajar ATmosphere (Bluesky, Blacksky, etc), and the dominant walled gardens everyone knows.

He offers a pretty neutral perspective along with some useful insights about notable differences, but mostly avoids going too deep on the cons. It’s a good overview for someone with one foot in the open web (hint: you’re soaking in it!), but it probably won’t convince anyone who prefers the closed networks to change their minds.

Personally, I’m fine with the open web not being everyone’s cup of tea, but I do wish everyone understood the tradeoffs we make when we prioritize closed networks over open ones. We can have a better world, but we have to actively choose it.

______BONUS

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