I asked an AI generator to sculpt itself, this was the end result…
New year, new resolutions… quick-fire topics!
Arbor
I am happy to see that Arbor has been received positively and that the migration has been successful. This means that we can start building on these foundations and expand the capabilities of Arbor! Watch this space!
E-mail and GDPR
A retention policy has been set on e-mail boxes to delete E-mails older than three years. It will take a while for Office 365 to sort through this colossal amount of data but after the first spring clean, it will be done automatically on Office 365’s own schedule. One benefit of shrinking the number of emails will be less data to sync and to search through, so it should speed up some processes.
Passwords rule
Passwords are still 8 characters minimum, must include letters, numbers, upper case, lower case, not be your first name and surname and, when changed, they must not be one of your last 10 passwords (it used to be 3).
Library
We are looking at upgrading the antiquated library system this spring to ACCESSit. Their website states this is the most loved school library system, a bold statement. hard to quantify, but from what we have seen of it, it seems deserved.
Two factor authentication for Students on Office 365
We will shortly be implementing two factor authentication for Students.
It will work just like it does for staff, so they will not need a phone to login inside the school.
Social media trends: back to peer to peer?
With the bad press Facebook/Meta and Twitter have been getting, users have been looking at alternatives that would not be owned by eccentric billionaires.
One (of many) solution? Good ol’ peer to peer and decentralised federated servers on the Fediverse.
As you probably know if you have children, teenagers have shifted to discord (due to its link to gaming) or Reddit but the Fediverse is also getting more popular.
So if you wonder what the Fediverse is or are curious about Mastodon, Peertube, Pixelfed…. have a look at these videos!
AI told you so…
We have all grown up being told AI would one day take over the world and either enslave us (The Matrix) or destroy us (Terminator). This focus on AI becoming conscious or sentient allowed us to project AI far into the future. Similarly, a basic assumption for artificial consciousness is that it’d be found in the physical world of machines and robots (Manzotti and Chella, 2018). We has to imagine AI looking like a human (Blade Runner, Ex-Machina…) or some advanced robot (I-Robot, Chappie, Terminator, Short Circuit…) when, in reality, a body would hinder AI. This also helped us to project AI way into the future. Not looking human or not being sentient (no matter what some might claim) does not mean that one of today’s AI lack intelligence. Quite the contrary! They have access to an amount of data our brains cannot dream to contain; they are taught to understand any human in the world and, in a few seconds, they can resolve calculations and resolve problems that would take us lifetimes to comprehend… so it is no surprise they can easily mimic human intelligence (ChatGPT), can create convincing artworks or photography in seconds (DALL-E) or even create music (EMI AI). Joaquin Phoenix in the movie “HER” falls in love with an AI and, at some point the AI says: “The DNA of who I am is based on the millions of personalities of all the programmers who wrote me. But what makes me me is my ability to grow through my experiences. So basically, in every moment I’m evolving, just like you.” AI has down some growing while we were not looking and has now reached a point where we should all be paying attention… The future is already here.
It already affects education in multiple ways and will impact the future of our students.
I have collected a bunch of articles specifically about ChatGPT by OpenAI to demonstrate this last statement:
- ChatGPT passed a Wharton MBA exam and it’s still in its infancy. One professor is sounding the alarm
- ChatGPT: our study shows AI can produce academic papers good enough for journals – just as some ban it
- Educators Battle Plagiarism As 89% Of Students Admit To Using OpenAI’s ChatGPT For Homework
- Could ChatGPT mark your students’ essays?
- ChatGPT: Teachers Weigh In on How to Manage the New AI Chatbot
- Why the rise of ChatGPT should liberate education – not scare it
- Will ChatGPT Unflip the Classroom?
- AI and the future of work: 5 experts on what ChatGPT, DALL-E and other AI tools mean for artists and knowledge workers
- ChatGPT creator OpenAI might be training its AI technology to replace some software engineers, report says
- ChatGPT: Massive Disruption
- Are artists, writers, musicians threatened by artificial intelligence?
- ChatGPT, DALL-E 2 and the collapse of the creative process
- Microsoft is adding OpenAI writing tech to Office
- Teachers, Try This: Build a Lesson Plan Using ChatGPT
- Sam Altman, the maker of ChatGPT, says the A.I. future is both awesome and terrifying. If it goes badly: ‘It’s lights-out for all of us’
- Congressman gives speech written by AI