In this episode, Dr. David Scales explores the complex landscape of the information environment, misinformation, and the importance of a systemic approach. He shares insights from his work at the intersection of medicine and social science, emphasizing the need for diverse pathways and generalist skills to understand and address systemic issues.

David is an assistant professor of medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine. He is an internal medicine hospitalist whose training in sociology, epidemiology, and medicine grounds his work on how structural factors shape health information environments. In addition to serving on the board of Questscope and providing medical assistance to Syrian refugees in Jordan, he co-founded a CHW program in the Levant, now serving as its research and program advisor.

David also happens to be a collaborator on our work assessing national information ecosystems.

About The Information Animal Podcast

The Information Animal Podcast draws on ideas from a book of the same name, exploring modern and historic information ecosystems. This limited series covers concepts like information competition and how an emerging field of information ecology can help us understand the human relationship to the modern information environment.

The series is hosted by Dr. Alicia Wanless, who is the director of the Information Environment Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which aims to foster evidence-based policymaking for the governance of national information ecosystems. Alicia is the author of The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality.

Watch past episodes.

Does anyone know where the summer went? Not sure about yours, but mine seems to be evaporating. But you know what that means – if it’s been a while since I posted, this list might be long.

But first, self-serving though this may be, allow me to invoke my forager’s prerogative and share some recent articles of my own.

In our new paper for Carnegie Europe, Raluca Csernatoni and I argue that getting ahead of hybrid threats means understanding the information ecosystem they move through: the people, technologies, and conditions that make manipulation possible in the first place. Symptom-level responses will always be playing catch-up.

And elsewhere, I dole out unsolicited advice to the new British Prime Minister, who inherits a UK information ecosystem under real strain – where the usual “digital sovereignty” fixes won’t be enough on their own.

Now, back to the originally scheduled programming.

Smartphones are the devil

It’s a foregone conclusion that smartphones and social media are bad for youth mental health – or is it? This TED Radio Hour episode with developmental psychologist Candice Odgers is well worth a listen.

Traipsing through the American Information Ecosystem

Speaking of the devil

The American information ecosystem has some troubling corners. Like this one featured in The Atlantic where charismatic Christians believe they are fighting against Satan and other demons – which includes Gods from other ancient religions.

Your Brain on Drugs

For all the worry over how artificial intelligence will rewire human brains, another product that seems to be just as newly prevalent might be as well. GLP1 drugs like Ozempic reduce more than just the desire to eat. As this Anthrodorphins explainer video asks: “What happens when capitalism creates the desire for no desire?”

A Post-Literate Wilderness

Keeping with that Insta-era theme, Gary Shteyngart gave an excellent interview, which was introduced so perfectly as: “A hypervisual, looks-obsessed, wellness-crazed, postliterate society where we’re constantly staring at screens and evaluating one another based on metrics, as the country around us feels like it’s falling apart: That sounds like the world we live in. It’s also the world Gary Shteyngart created in his 2010 novel, “Super Sad True Love Story.” I have not yet got around to the book itself, so curious to hear from those who have!

Political Agents & Their Activity

It’s been a hot minute since I consumed much of this content. Not all the commentary will have aged well (looking at you and your primary, Maine!) Horrible political candidates aside, this Ezra Klein Show episode with Chris Hayes was a good exploration of different types of media, the role of attention, and different candidates types within it. While it never says it, it’s a nice dive into the American information ecosystem, and the many micro ecosystems within it.

A little bit more of a desert

A while back I tried to access a news article on BBC and was hit with a paywall. Apparently, the vaunted British public broadcaster announced last year it would launch a paid subscription service in North America, which has come into effect. Granted, not everything is behind that dreaded paywall. Nonetheless, I can’t help but wonder how this will affect the information ecosystem in the United States, which is already so contested and rife with questionable media.

Only 16% of Americans pay for online news, which is how 77% get their news, according to the Reuters Institute at Oxford, which also recently released their annual report. That means most of the news Americans are consuming, at least online, is free. Sure, BBC was only being consumed by 9% of respondents - but now having looked at these stats, I have bigger questions. Even the most watched news outlet in the survey, Fox News, is only getting 24%, down from 31% in 2016. How much news are Americans really consuming? Granted, respondents could be consuming more than one channel, but given the whole echo chamber theory, the odds they do so in a Venn diagram is slim.

Yet another reason to hate prediction markets

As if more were needed. I can’t even muster up the appropriate snark on casino finance anymore. It’s just the worst of all the bad aspects of a Digital Age wrapped up into one. What sparked this ire, was people betting on forest fires.

And out into the Global Information Environment

All the world is a stage

During the World Cup DoorDash was busy hijacking attention, pretending to incorrectly tag a famous musician instead of a football player with a similar name. The stunt blurred the lines between reality and advertising, something that feels less and less novel.

That which is observed changes

Many types of disturbances upset information ecosystems. In a recent global study, Gina Romero, UN Special Rapporteur for the rights to freedom of assembly and of association, highlighted how “living under constant surveillance is to exist in a permanent state of hypervigilance”. Worst case scenario on this conjures up life under the Stasi if they had digital tracking tied to mobile devices and neighbourhood watch powered by everyone’s home security cameras.

Tremors in one information ecosystem ripple to others

In a recent survey of journalists in the UK, many are reporting “self-censoring stories about Trump and the right over safety fears.”

They thought they were free

I recently read Milton Mayer’s book They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1933-45 published in 1955. It’s a bit chilling in the current climate. Mayer charts how “little people” were easily swept up in a movement that met their needs materially and gave them something greater than themselves to belong. At a time when so many people perceive they are losing something, especially ground to others, this book is a chilling reminder how history repeats itself.

Following that book up with The Daily’s interview of Ben Casselman, was particularly bleak. In that episode, the chief economics correspondent for The New York Times, explained how the introduction of the Internet and the welcoming of China into global markets led to disastrous layoffs and the rise of grievance politics.

Culpability

Not everything I’ll share here will be hot news. Truth is, I’m a much slower reader these days. It’s funny how time accelerates with age. Anyway, Culpability by Bruce Holsinger is still relevant a year after publishing. It explores the growing role of artificial intelligence with just enough focus to give it primacy while still being accessible to the uninitiated or non-technical. It’s also more the present rather than a dark dystopian future (which is where mind naturally goes).

Something Fun

And seeing as I can’t seem to embed Facebook videos (add that to Apple Podcasta), you’ll have to settle with a book a review that made me smile. I have no idea who the heck wrote this about my book, but I’ll take it:

We promised a little break in the podcast series while we regrouped for a new format. Well, today is the day! As part of The Information Animal Podcast, we’re adding interviews with experts from a range of disciplines informing the field of information ecology - and Dr. Libby Hemphill agreed to the experiment.

Libby is a an Associate Professor in the School of Information at the University of Michigan. Her research sits at the intersection of AI, human labor, and data infrastructure. Her work on metadata generation and curation infrastructure advances the long-term accessibility and trustworthiness of data. She also directs the Resource Center for Minority Data and Social Media Archive at the Interuniversity Consortium for Political and Social Research.

Libby also happens to be a collaborator on our work assessing national information ecosystems.

We hope the quality of our podcasting improves over time, but if you can get past my initial stiffness, you’ll find a fun and insightful conversation.

About The Information Animal Podcast

The Information Animal Podcast draws on ideas from a book of the same name, exploring modern and historic information ecosystems. This limited series covers concepts like information competition and how an emerging field of information ecology can help us understand the human relationship to the modern information environment.

The series is hosted by Dr. Alicia Wanless, who is the director of the Information Environment Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which aims to foster evidence-based policymaking for the governance of national information ecosystems. Alicia is the author of The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality.

Watch past episodes.

It has been a while – a break foreshadowed in the last post. But you know what that means, the information I’ve foraged over the past few weeks is more hodgepodge than usual.

What’s the point of the AI race anyway?

Not being a close watcher of all things AI, I found Vivian Wang’s interview on The Daily insightful. She does a great job outlining the different approaches to Chinese and American AI development - with one focused more on economic development, and the other pursuing agentic AI. Given how different their approaches are, and just how dominate AI is in the US market, one really has to wonder about the nature of this supposed race to develop it - especially considering this piece from Wired, entitled “A Dark-Money Campaign Is Paying Influencers to Frame Chinese AI as a Threat”.

I’ll take that as a slightly related cue to drop this ad dressed up as a Public Service Announcement. If you aren’t paying for the product, you are the product - but then again, with few regulations, there is no guarantee that even when you pay for something your data isn’t being used to target you.

The Problem with America

That was a loaded headline. Here are some things that stood out over the past few weeks.

Billionares

Alright, to be fair, the US isn’t alone in this - but the numbers are disproportionately in their favour. CBC’s Ideas aired an insightful, if depressing, look at the rise of billionaires and what that means for society that is worth a listen.

Declining Local Media

The American media ecosystem continues to face challenges - even Trump’s once beloved Fox. As my friend Libby pointed out “over-air broadcasters in the US depend on sports revenue to cover the “public service” obligations” that make local stations possible. So any shift by professional sports organization, like the NFL, to move towards streaming options threatens what little local news access remains.

Incoherent Foreign Policy

NPR’s It’s Been a Minute ran an excellent interview with Daniel Immerwahr about America’s history of empire building - by any other name.

And Ezra Klein and Ian Bremmer take a dive into incoherency of American foreign policy.

Speaking of Ian, there were so many links to his Puppet Regime videos in my collection, that I’m just going to give it a shout out and leave this one in here - which warms my ecology-oriented heart:

Meanwhile Up in Canadaland

If you haven’t heard, some people in the Province of Alberta want to separate. It’s a crazy notion to me, but I’m from Ontario - the main target for the grievance politics that helped get people to this point. For anyone wanting to know more, CBC’s The House did a great episode on the situation.

If only the madness ended there. We recently had a national census, which some people decided to publicly protest by refusing to participate. Their reason? They reject the legitimacy of the current government. To their mind, Members of Parliament switching parties does not a majority make. Both ideas indicate a lack of civics understanding, which maybe shouldn’t be too surprising in the midst of an education crisis. The protest only hurts themselves. Census participation informs government resource allocation. And no matter how much its hated, floor-crossing is permissible in our Westminster parliamentary model.

The Problems with Genius

Yair Rosenberg’s piece on a new Broadway play about Roald Dahl is worth a read. In it he explores how perceptions of greatness distort expectations, and excuse awfulness.

Some Politics to Get Behind

And as usual, I’ll end on a lighter note with some political views I can finally get behind:

I should probably do these more frequently than once a month - because at this cadence, the selection grows, and the themes fracture. But then again, that feels indicative of these chaotic times. This month is a true hodgepodge. A mix of thoughts about words, the troubling things tech billionaires say and do, layoffs at the Associated Press, and, of course, Casino Finance.

Artifice and Intelligence

English can be such a fun language. Did you know it used to have pronouns for two people? As with most languages, things change — intimate pronouns are lost, and the meaning of words morph over time with different usage. A word like Artificial moves from the Latin word artificialis meaning "of or belonging to art” to become “made by man, contrived by human skill and labor" by the early 15th century, then “full of affectation, insincere” by the end of the following century, and “fictitious, assumed, not genuine” by the 1640s. It’s clearly changed in meaning since then, but the smarmy dialogue of many chatbots certainly comes across as affected and insincere.

Another word sharing the Latin roots ars "art" and facere "to make, do" — artifice — came to mind when watching the clip below. By the 1650s artifice was being used in military circles to mean “a crafty device or trick”. And it’s that sort of artful stratagem that came to my mind in watching Palantir’s CEO Alex Karp. The clip can easily be taken out of context, but nonetheless, the idea that a technology is being widely introduced which knowingly will tip the balance in favour of any group of voters over another is a disturbing revelation for democracy. It’s especially troubling taken in conjunction with other voices who think women shouldn’t have the right to vote at all.

Speaking of AI and the origin of words, apparently Elon Musk’s choice of the name Grok for his tool was inspired by a dystopian novel about an insidious, powerful man in a dark future who, as Tirthak Saha explains below, became a celebrity, started a cult, brainwashed people and controlled the government among other things.

And to close this section, here’s a cartoon tying artifice and groking that somehow isn’t as funny anymore - but I share it for all those feeling the social pressure to adopt AI:

On the Lack Thereof - Bad Choices about Iran

If you’re wondering why the “excursion” into Iran hasn’t exactly been a cakewalk, ran an excellent interview with Ali Vaez, who is the Iran project director at the International Crisis Group. Apparently someone lacked both artifice and intelligence.

Continuing with that theme, published an insightful article on the human error behind the unnecessary bombing of a girl’s school in Iran, again demonstrating why a technology like AI will not save us from ourselves. But maybe we can take some solace in that even Claude is uncomfortable with this outcome, according to :

AI-fuelled Iranian Lego Propaganda

Some of you were asking about the Iranian propaganda cartoons using AI-generated Lego characters. Maryam Ishani Thompson of the AFP offers a great overview on what’s different about the campaigns - and I don’t really think it’s the use of AI or even the outsourcing of efforts by Iran to third-parties, so much as the Regime is moving past hardline messaging from its perspective, to speak to American audiences in ways that resonate with them. Yes, AI will make it easier for just about anyone to create high-quality content quickly, and move that content faster and farther than before - a trajectory we’ve been on for a while. That said, I expect that while the tools will change, the tactics will remain the same - so the difference will remain in one’s ability to be creative and understand audiences. All the data in the world won’t help if you can’t communicate in a way that resonates. I know, I know, some are going to read this and say “but AI will eventually be able to do that!” — maybe, maybe not.

The Tactics Remain the Same

On that note about tactics remaining the same, for a solid read on how states have long been outsourcing to third parties to engage in hybrid threats, my publisher has a book coming out by Ahana Datta Fasel called Full Stack Spies: Cyber Espionage in the Age of US–China Competition. It’s an insightful look at the interdependencies shaping modern information ecosystems. A must-read for anyone grappling with the role of technology in US–China power competition.

Bad News for News Media - Good News for Casino Finance

The Associated Press announced layoffs and a move away from its original focus on newspapers. It’s unclear what this means in practice, but the AP originally started before the American Civil War as a means for New York newspapers “to share the costs of reporting outside their immediate territory.” Given that the AP had risen to be a major supplier of news coverage to most other media outlets, it’s not likely to be great for the health of the American information ecosystem, among others.

Just as troubling, AP struck up a deal to sell election data to Kalshi, one of those Casino Finance (aka Prediction Markets) platforms. The growing relationships between Casino Finance and news media is just a race to the bottom.

Not in the least because Canada seems primed to let Casino Finance into the country, this whole concept continues to bother me. From the mental gymnastics of founders claiming the practice isn’t gambling to the desperation to know something in an uncertain world driving users to these platforms, this business model leads nowhere good. What’s more, young people Americans and Canadians feel so left behind financially, betting on reality seems like a good money making scheme.

Power Grids Power Everything

I know I said it last time, and I’ll say it again. Modern information ecosystems are utterly dependent on electricity. Every aspect of our society — from finance to supply chain, healthcare to education — is riding on electric-powered information communication technologies. Some of the infrastructure is old, and maintaining function can involve a delicate balance between rates of generation and use. Take for example a recent episode in Virginia, where dozens of data centres abruptly dropping off the power grid threatened the stability of the entire system. Between AI disrupting power supplies just by existing, and the revelations around its growing capabilities in to find cyber vulnerabilities, colour me worried.

That CEO Mindset

And last but not least, an excellent performance by poet Sam Brown about the CEO mindset driving so much of today’s culture:

What if the cracks we’re seeing in today’s information environment aren’t unprecedented — but part of a pattern? This episode of the Information Animal Podcast examines how escalating information competition between two communities and differently changing conditions in the information ecosystem helped pull the United States toward civil war in the 19th century.

We will be taking a short break from production and returning with a new format, namely some interviews. So if you’re interested in hearing from other researchers that feed this brain, subscribe on here, on YouTube or Apple Podcasts.

About The Podcast

The Information Animal Podcast draws on ideas from the book of the same name, exploring modern and historic information ecosystems. This limited series covers concepts like information competition and how an emerging field of information ecology can help us understand the human relationship to the modern information environment.

The series is hosted by Dr. Alicia Wanless, who is the director of the Information Environment Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which aims to foster evidence-based policymaking for the governance of national information ecosystems. Alicia is the author of The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality.

Listen on Apple Podcasts

The Information Animal Podcast draws on ideas from a book of the same name, exploring modern and historic information ecosystems. This limited series will cover concepts like information competition and how an emerging field of information ecology can help us understand the human relationship to the modern information environment.

This episode also draws on and mentions several other articles including:

• Canada needs a national strategy for the information ecosystem—not just its parts

• The truth about the CBC in Northern Canada by L.E. Fox

Delinquent as usual, here is an overdue collection of things consumed along the way. Given how long it takes me to pull these collections together, I never know what the themes are until the end. This edition is giving salty middle-aged woman vibes, which tracks with a recent episode of ’s show :

Privacy Perishes

As someone who remembers life before the Internet, I’ve been a pretty big proponent of technology. While I still value the ways in which digital technology lets me stay connected internationally, the future with it feels bleak. With news stories like these, I keep coming back to the last chapter in The Information Animal and wondering what social good there is in letting new tools loose in the world under the guise of “innovation is everything.”

• Women filmed secretly for social media content - and then harassed online: This is so messed up. Given privacy concerns, should products like smart glasses be licensed to people? Should they be allowed at all? With trust issues rising, are products like this helping or hindering? I can’t imagine it will strengthen the fraying fabric of society.

• Regulator contacts Meta over workers watching intimate AI glasses videos: to disabuse anyone who wants to say how privacy-conscious they are in using their smart glasses, have you thought about who else is watching?

• “We had sex in a Chinese hotel, then found we had been broadcast to thousands”: as a reminder that there is no privacy where once it had been thought to exist. Although, that Hong Kong hotel room years ago, where the deadbolt had clearly been removed, and the phone kept turning back on quietly, will always remind me how low-tech surveillance can be.

Data Brokers, Candy Crush, and Mass Surveillance

Speaking of surveillance, come for the ever-thoughtful , stay for Joseph Cox explaining how behavioural advertising firms are sold to surveillance companies who then sell your data to governments. That data is collected through apps and games like Candy Crush, which can track your phone’s location.

Gambling on Reality

If there is one innovation I hate more than privacy-invading wearables, it’s so-called prediction markets. These gambling platforms enable people to bet on real-world events, from kidnapping Maduro to bombing Iran. If everything is entertainment, what can be taken seriously? Anyway, The Daily, ran a great episode on the topic - that I can’t embed, but I might be able to bet on. For no rhyme or reason, Substack inconsistently allows me to embed podcasts. Just another reminder that big tech platforms aren’t really our friends - just companies promising audiences, and controlling how you reach them. But I digress.

About Information Ecosystems

A lot of my work these days focuses on assessing national information ecosystems. This includes looking at the changing skill levels of adults as well as what communication services and content are available to them. I’m fascinated with how these complex systems function - or don’t. Modern information ecosystems are dependent on Information Communication Technologies for nearly all aspects of societal well being, to paraphrase Luciano Floridi. Taking out the power grid, takes everything else with it - from finance to health care. Thus, stories like this one from about hackers disabling communication devices in Polish energy facilities catch my attention.

Arctic Information Ecosystem

Speaking of power grid problems, while researching the wider Canadian information ecosystem, I came across this excellent article by L.E. Fox published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. This piece does a great job of describing the Arctic information ecosystem, and leaves me with many questions about how our fine country hopes to foster resilience there.

American Media Capture and Regulation

WYNC’s On the Media ran a couple insightful episodes on attempts to shape and control American news media, all worth a listen:

Please just read more.

No, this isn’t another pathetic appeal to read my book. (Seriously, just buy a copy for the pretty cover, there won’t be an exam.) But I beg you to read any books, especially if you plan to outsource basic cognitive functions to chat bots. Your brain, and society, will thank you in the long run. Don’t believe me? Have a listen to how reading “helped shape the modern world, and what its decline could mean for education, culture, and democracy today,” or this one from CBC Ideas:

On the Lighter Side… Sort Of

If you aren’t Canadian and haven’t heard of CBC’s This Hour has 22 Minutes, allow me to share something beautiful. I’ve clearly lost touch with the American zeitgeist, because most of what trends from SNL makes no sense anymore (see the opening salty middle-age woman intro). Thank the stars for this Canadian alternative! Whether it’s local or international politics or how brains rot in the modern information environment, 22 Minutes nails it almost every time.

Not to be outdone, ’s Puppet Regime lives rent free in my head these days:

And to that end, in reading War: How Conflict Shaped Us, I found Margaret MacMillan quite prescient here:

“We may be living through the end user of the hegemony of the American Leviathan and we are starting to realise that the world needs someone or something to maintain order. A less stable substitute of a coalition of powers of roughly equal size and strength that agree to work together to keep the peace.”

But seriously, join us in an exploration of how approaches from physical ecology can help build a field of information ecology fit for understanding the information environment and find solutions for problems within ecosystems.

The Information Animal Podcast draws on ideas from a book of the same name, exploring modern and historic information ecosystems. This limited series will cover concepts like information competition and how an emerging field of information ecology can help us understand the human relationship to the modern information environment.

Listen on Apple Podcasts

The series is hosted by Dr. Alicia Wanless, who is the director of the Information Environment Project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, which aims to foster evidence-based policymaking for the governance of national information ecosystems. Alicia is the author of The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality.

Given that Foraged Info is a hodgepodge of things consumed along the way, I thought to change it up a bit and move from that Florentine statue to Athena. Let’s face it, if I’d been more on the ball, the Greek Goddess of war would have made a more fitting cover for The Information Animal.

A lot has happened since the last Foraged Info. I’m not even going to try to make this edition relate to it all.

For the Love of AI

Given how artificial intelligence - er, I mean machine learning - is hounding us more than a small child who desperately wants something from their parent, this section is likely to become a staple of Foraged Info. Not because I go out seeking this material, but because the topic (and the technology) is inescapable.

Stop Saying Artificial Intelligence

Here’s an oldie but a goodie. I love Meredith Whittaker’s explanation for why we shouldn’t be saying "artificial intelligence" but "machine learning.” The TL;DW is that the former is a marketing term that tries to anthropomorphize the unfortunately pervasive technology.

A Disturbing PSA

This public service announcement is chilling and draws on real-world incidents involving AI.

What You Give Up When You Use AI

For whatever reason, this Facebook reel won’t embed, but it is a creative way to explain to people what they are giving up when they use AI to think for them. Watch it before you use anything “AI-powered” again.

Rethinking Testing

To that end, a professor in Denmark was extolling the virtues of oral exams as an engaging way to test students’ knowledge, helping address the AI-reliance challenge.

A Dark Tech Cloud

To be fair, I actually really like technology. At the same time, given the state of geopolitics, I’m super wary about the future for a multitude of reasons, including sovereignty on many levels.

The Power of Data Brokers

Le Monde published an investigation on the shadowy world of data brokers, who collect and sell personal data, and how those datasets can be used to target people. The issues associated with behavioural advertising are so undercovered, this piece is well worth the read.

A Very Short Primer on Techno-feudalism

At some point, I fell down an Anthrodorphins rabbit hole. It began with a video exploring Mar-a-Lago face, which was fascinating in explaining how physical image creates meaning. That led me to this post about Techno-feudalism, an excellent primer on a worldview that has taken hold in Silicon Valley, among others.

And finally, as a sort of mental cleanser, here’s one last video from that channel exploring how people might reject that world of technologically-driven domination. It’s a creative account, and I look forward to what they produce next.

On Enshitification

Cory Doctorow seems to be everywhere these days. Podcasting for CBC. Even here in Ottawa on 28 January for an event with Perfect Books. (Maybe I can get him to sneak my book up a few shelves - I bet he has that kind of pull.) Envy aside, he offers an easy-to-grasp explanation for why everything just seems a little shittier.

Make America Imperial Again?

I finally got around to reading Evil Geniuses: The Unmaking of America by Kurt Anderson. It follows a previous book I highly recommend called Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire. Anderson’s latest book traces the history of strategic conservative policy-making in the U.S. over the past few decades, particularly related to laissez-faire economics. Anderson argues that these policies have led to historic economic inequality and — as per the Foraged Info above — some pretty alarming wealthy influences at the highest level of governance. That argument got a boost from a recent study that found the U.S. Supreme Court seems to be favouring the rich over the poor.

It seems like the neo-Gilded Age might have more of a cage around anyone not rich, rather than the other way around.

That Promised Hope

Alas, I’m known for being a bit bleak. That’s why I work in national security! So here is that promised dose of how to generate hope:

@annaconnellyiscoolHope is a discipline, cuties!! … #uspolitics #americanpolitics #politicalcomedy #politicalhumor #american

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Now, that cover image is pretty inside baseball, but in embarking on this journey to create more content about The Information Animal, told me the process must be fun — for me. And mashing up Charles I with the sort of absolutist leader to which he seemed to aspire makes me smile.

Without further ado, though, allow me to introduce a new podcast series exploring key concepts from my book. This episode of The Information Animal Podcast jumps back to the early 1600s in England and its near abroad, exploring why the English information ecosystem was such a challenge for King Charles I - and more importantly, why the changes happening within it matter today.

Bonus points for any viewers who find the parallels with our current timeline.

The podcast draws on the book The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality. Returning to my need to have fun, viewers should expect a mix of explanations and misaligned animations generated with machine learning - no matter how detailed my prompts are, the outputs are often hilariously off. I leave them in as a matter of principle.

You can skip the AI slop and tune in on Apple or watch it complete on YouTube:

Welcome to a collection of information I’ve consumed recently, a (hopefully) regular feature where random bits of content I’ve enjoyed are aggregated with the barest of reasons why.

Tell Your Uncle He’s Fighting Twitter Bots in Bangladesh

It’s too late for American Thanskgiving, but other holidays are around the corner! On The Media ran a great episode implying that all might not be real on social media - a shocker!

Stranger Than Fiction?

If you don’t know Monocle’s Foreign Desk with Andrew Mueller, allow me to introduce it! Here is a fun episode interviewing “Veep writer David Quantick and former UK ambassador John Everard discuss how entertainment and politics interact”. Andrew also runs a What We Learned podcast each week that is delightfully witty.

History Teaches us how to Manage Risk

This article is part of a series by Laurence B. Mussio and Cosimo Pacciani in The Globe and Mail. I appreciate the long-term, systemic view they are taking on how we should be approaching risk.

How Cable News Fueled the Culture War and Broke U.S. Politics

A recent episode of On the Media introduced me to and his newsletter - both worth a follow. He just posted a great article exploring an academic study that finds cable news is likely setting the agenda when it comes to the raging information competition consuming the U.S. at the moment. It reminded me of something I wrote a decade ago about how some new outlets seemed to be engage audiences differently - it’s embarassingly old and pre-PhD days, and I’m already ashamed in linking it here.

Strength In Numbers

How cable news fueled the culture war and broke U.S. politics

Over the last decade, politicians have spent most of their ad budgets talking about issues we can broadly call “economic” or “affordability” issues: jobs, prices, health care, taxes, and social programs. Most of the bills the government passes are about these programs, and most of the ways in which everyday people interact with their government are also “economic” (we pay taxes and/or receive benefits). There’s a reason “It’s the economy, stupid” is a saying and “It’s the cancel culture, stupid” is not. If you ask voters today what their number one issue is…

Read more

9 months ago · 207 likes · 18 comments · G. Elliott Morris

This is What Consequence-free Misogyny Looks Like

Speaking of that information competition, it’s putting women’s rights in peril. Over at The Atlantic, Sophie Gilbert wrote a thoughtful piece on rising tide of misogyny.

A not so Quiet Rant About Artificial Intelligence

‘This is the War Against Human Nature’

Paul Kingsnorth is definitely in the doomer category, but for all the crazy hype about A.I., I feel it my duty to surface the dark sayers. He does just that in this Interesting Times interview. Apologies in advance if they’re holding this one only for subscribers.

Is There an A.I. Bubble? And What if it Pops?

OK, so this one is a little more balanced in its outlook on A.I., but nonetheless informative. It’s also a New York Times podcast, The Daily, featuring Cade Metz, who covers technology there.

AI’s Biggest Skeptic Sees a Bubble

My colleague, Jon Bateman, had an insightful conversation with Ed Zitron about, you guessed it, the A.I. bubble. I bet you’re seeing a pattern here…

The Future of Energy has Arrived - Just not in the U.S.

Seeing as we are talking about A.I., might as well raise the pesky issue of energy needs that comes along with it. As The Daily bills this one “David Gelles and Brad Plumer explain the growing showdown between global superpowers over the future of energy.”

And because I have a sense of humour, I’m just going to leave this here to close out my A.I. rant. Glad that’s out of my system.

Hiding in Plain Sight: It’s All Marketing

This one made it on the list in large part because it explains how j-walking was basically an influence operation by automobile manufacturers.

And For Fun

How the Heck did Cajuns Avoid the Melting Pot?

That was the question arising after watching stand-up comic Matthew Broussard talk about Cajuns. The short answer, found down the rabbit hole that followed, is that they didn’t, not until much later. This tidbit (or titbit, depending on who you are) is included here because the patchwork of people that make up a national information ecoystem that is the United States fascinates me.

The Mars House

These days I listen to fiction on Audible. The Mars House by Natasha Pulley somehow got into my library, and I finally got around to consuming it. This book is an imagining of an alternative society, which seemed particularly pertinent given the tech bro obesession with escaping the planet. The experimentation with language and social structure was fascinating, and yet somehow comforting in that no matter what happens, humans gonna human.

Ice, Ice, Anxiety

First, it’s a blast from the past. A song worm that will burrow deep for anyone my age. Second, who isn’t feeling anxiety these days? Seriously, what’s your secret if you're saying all is fine?

I had the opportunity to sit down with my colleague, Jon Bateman, to discuss "The Information Animal" on the Carnegie podcast, "The World Unpacked." He and the team do the episode far greater justice than I can with this introduction:

We’re living through an era of information disruption. Novel technologies like AI and social media are unleashing pent-up social and political energies—releasing floods of new information and triggering intense battles for narrative control.

While most analysts focus on small pieces of this puzzle, Alicia Wanless is a pioneering “information ecologist” who seeks to map the entire system. Her new book is The Information Animal: Humans, Technology, and The Competition for Reality.

In a lively new episode of The World Unpacked, Alicia and host Jon Bateman discuss what 2025 has in common with 1625, how novels spark civil wars, and why our frantic efforts to tame information often do more harm than good.

If you prefer your podcasts with fewer visuals, Apple has you covered below - but you’ll miss my socks.

Welcome to a collection of information I’ve consumed recently, a (hopefully) regular feature where random bits of content I’ve enjoyed are aggregated with the barest of reasons why.

This lawyer turns real legal cases into page-turners

Besides being a great story, the ending of this Philippe Sands lecture aired on CBC’s IDEAS is living rent-free in my mind:

“What we’re up against are the movements that began in 1945 as a consequence of the horrors of that period, which led to things like Nuremberg and then many years later the various international courts and tribunals, and then the remarkable ruling of the Pinochet case. And I think all of that is in play. We cannot be complacent. We cannot take it for granted. We have to understand that what is desired is simply to sweep away the totality of these achievements. Now, that is a big thing to say. And in the short term, I feel rather pessimistic, frankly, and anxious, but in the longer term, I feel much more optimistic. I think it’s very likely that we will go into an even darker place than we are now, and that there will be further catastrophes. But out of those catastrophes, I do think history tells us, that there will then be a rebuilding. And the rebuildings that have come in the past after terrible catastrophes, have always built on what came before. And so we are in a down moment, we don’t know where it’s going to lead to, and we need to start thinking about what comes next when we emerge from that down moment.”

This Is How the Democratic Party Beats Trump

Wherein argues that politicians wanting to win office should… represent their people better. I know, it seems shocking. It also reminds me of a very childish rant I had a decade ago about ending political parties in Canada.

The Next Economic Bubble Is Here

Now, I listened to this episode of Interesting Times with Ross Douthat and didn’t watch the video. Still, I did appreciate Jason Furman’s multifaceted take on AI and its gross importance to the American economy.

What it takes to become a ruthless tyrant

Yet another great one from IDEAS, this time exploring what Herodotus has to teach us about Tyrants.

Oops you fell for historical propaganda - Episode 3

This one is so short, I’m just leaving it here without comment.

Death by Lightning

Not going to lie, Matthew Macfadyen’s excellent acting made this a hard one to watch. This series on Netflix feels like a commentary on something else, if only I could put my finger on it.

Archive Anarchy

Some random oldies but goodies:

You might have noticed, I’ve been dabbling with Substack, not to mention different content forms. As my work develops from The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality, I’ll be sharing a bit of that here. This experiment will include short explainer videos, notes, and articles - and just maybe a limited series podcast exploring different information ecosystems interviewing other researchers. If you’re into that, give this substack a little subscribe or share.

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Disinformation is a disturbance in an information ecosystem. However, to enhance resilience to it, policymakers need to look past it as the problem. While tracking influence operations helps to understand the problem, it provides little insights into why disinformation is salient in different contexts, much less what to do about it. What’s more, popular counter measures like fact checking and content moderation are easily politicised as censorship, a perspective encouraged by the current United States’ administration and its key officials such as Vice President J.D. Vance. To get ahead of a problem like disinformation, policymakers need to look beyond the phenomenon to understand the space where it exists, namely, their information ecosystem. Leaders must find strategic interventions that are less likely to be politicised to address threats like foreign interference. The key is to understand what underlying factors and conditions are making an ecosystem susceptible in the first place, and address them such that disinformation, regardless of the narrative, is less likely to flourish. This can readily be done by connecting data from across various factors and disciplines to produce benchmarks and prioritize interventions.

Read the Bled Strategic Review

Despite major investments to counter disinformation, it remains a problem. It’s unknown just how much money democratic governments have spent on efforts to counter disinformation. Initiatives are spread across departments and militaries, making it difficult to track. That said, the European Union has spent at least €50 million since 2015, while in the United States the Pentagon alone awarded a single contract to a company “to counter misinformation” for nearly $1 billion in 2021.

A major challenge with rooting out disinformation as an approach is that it exists as manifestations of ideas or narratives. It’s a lot like pulling weeds, there must be something to weed out, making the approach inherently reactive. The definition of “misleading or false information that is deliberately shared” provides a theoretical framing for identifying disinformation, but to do so a claim must already be expressed against which the concept can be applied. This means that many current efforts to counter disinformation are by nature reactive attempting to counter instances of the phenomenon already present in an information ecosystem, shy of programs that focus more generically on helping citizens better critically assess information, like media literacy. But even there, questions remain about the efficacy of such programs and their ability to scale to a wider society. What if the problem needing solved isn’t disinformation at all, but addressing factors that allow it to thrive in the surrounding ecosystem?

Humans have faced similar challenges in other complex systems, and learning from those experiences can inform alternative approaches for addressing problems in the information environment. Weeds and other pests have plagued farmers since the dawn of agriculture. To address them, people have turned to pesticides. Such direct problem-solving has led to unintended consequences, much like counter measures to disinformation have in being politicised. For example, to deal with a tiny bug called an aphid that kills cotton – the direct solution is to kill the insect with pesticide. Sure, it might eradicate the pest, but the knock-on effects can include destabilizing that ecosystem with pollution killing species up the food chain. The aphid can also grow resistant, increasing costs to kill it.

Desires to avoid these negative effects led to an alternative approach called Integrated Pest Management. The approach uses multiple interventions based on how ecosystems work, including planting pest-resistant varieties, disrupting mating with pheromone traps, adjusting agricultural practices, and supporting natural aphid predators, like beetles and spiders. It takes more effort, but the approach is working. It’s led to an 10-15% increase in yields in cotton and 20-30% savings in pest control, to name some benefits.

To find such alternatives in the information environment, one must first understand what that system is and how it works. It’s difficult to do that if problems like disinformation continue to take up most of the research and policy focus. A first step forward, as I outline in my book The Information Animal: Humans, Technology and the Competition for Reality, is to articulate shared concepts across disciplines and policy silos that would galvanize stakeholders within a country or across the European Union around a shared strategic policy goal. This starts with a shared understanding of the space in question – the information environment and ecosystems within it. Much like in the physical world, the global information environment provides the conditions for information to exist – it includes all the systems supporting this, be it economy, infrastructure, electricity, education. Within that space, distinct information ecosystems form through interactions between people, tools and information in relation to the wider information environment.

Focusing on disinformation or awareness raising, without having a systemic understanding of the national ecosystem and factors behind its resilience is only scratching the surface. We will continue making guesses about what might foster resilience until we understand how the information environment and ecosystems work, with obvious implications for wasted time and resources. Currently, much of the discussion around healthy information ecosystems assumes that democratic values like having a pluralistic independent media and internet freedom are the key to resilience. Others still jump straight to desired outcomes, pinning hopes on trust and social cohesion as a measure of resilience. The problem is without scientific study of the system that is the information environment, at best these are just hypotheses. At worst, democratic values are dimming guiding lights growing ever distant to the very people those championing this approach are hoping to reach, along with the hypothesised end state. For people who feel their economic needs are not met or that politicians are doing little to address public concerns, authoritarianism has allure – for example, as it does among 37 percent of British adults.

Underlying issues like drops in traditional literacy rates, changing demographics, news trends, economic strains, and declines in social services might be creating a climate that makes disinformation salient in countries like the United Kingdom. Tracking disinformation, raising awareness, or trying to instil democratic values on a population who is struggling day-to-day, isn’t likely to address that overarching climate. Stepping back and assessing the national information ecosystem, could though.

This means looking at multiple factors in tandem – not just at narratives or news media. Understanding the information ecosystem entails looking at the people within it, who are they, what communities do they form around what languages, identities and in what spaces, but also assessing changes in their ability to understand information changed over time. It also requires assessing the means available to those people for creating, sharing and accessing information, what tools and services are involved, who controls them and how? And yes, it requires assessing what informational outputs are available and consumed by these communities – but this goes beyond social and traditional media and should be considered in the context of people’s skills, accessibility, language, location, and what’s expected of them in that information ecosystem. Taking a systems approach requires putting all of this data into the context of the wider information environment, which in turn is shaped by conditions like the economy, state of education, and governance. It might sound daunting, but it is doable. For most national information ecosystems this process will take months rather than years.

To support this development, policymakers should mandate a coordinating body to identify existing measurements of factors and build a team of researchers to collectively assess the national information ecosystem. This would provide a baseline against which future change could be tracked and identify gaps in knowledge that must be filled to fully understand the state of that information ecosystem.

By taking this systems approach, policymakers can develop a road map, identifying who needs to be at the table for whole-of-society approaches, and create frameworks for better coordination between those groups. Assessing national information ecosystems will also identify vulnerabilities, surfacing those that are not as obvious or receiving as much media attention as others—but could be more pressing. These could include overreliance on a particular service provider, such as a social media platform, or a gap in a fundamental skill, such as literacy. Taking a systems approach will ultimately help identify what constitutes resilience in an information ecosystem. And, if this work is done in tandem with other like-minded countries, a coordinated approach by democracies will advance an understanding of the global information environment—a much-needed step for the numerous countries around the world struggling with informational issues.

Ultimately, taking an ecosystems approach enables leaders to be strategic. Strategy is about making the best possible decisions from an array of options to achieve an aim. This means considering multiple factors to prioritise a series of choices with a clear aim. It’s highly unlikely a silver bullet will be the answer for a complex problem. Quite the contrary, if the cotton aphids teach us anything, it’s that multiple interventions in concert with each other are likely to lead to resilience in the information environment.

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