AI exploitation

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This video illustrates how AI is used to spread disinformation. YouTube (Google), Facebook, TikTok, and other social media sites facilitate the publication of falsehoods. It’s all about generating money from increased online traffic. Outrageous and obviously untrue statements are recognizable examples of clickbait.

Cost reductions = quality of healthcare reductions

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“Over the past 40 years, many health-care systems that were once publicly owned or financed have moved towards privatising their services, primarily through outsourcing to the private sector. But what has the impact been of privatisation on the quality of care? A key aim of this transition is to improve quality of care through increased market competition along with the benefits of a more flexible and patient-centred private sector.

“However, concerns have been raised that these reforms could result in worse care, in part because it is easier to reduce costs than increase quality of health care.”

Lancet Public Health 2024; 9: e199–206.
Department of Social Policy
and Intervention, University of
Oxford, Oxford, UK
(B Goodair MSc, A Reeves PhD)

Returning soon

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I have not been active at IN-SIGHTS for a while, but I intend to resume. Wife Gwen and I have done a little travelling recently, including days in Amsterdam and three weeks in France. During recent months, we have also been involved in home renovations, a task that consumes time, energy, and money…

Outrage

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Fareed Khan describes himself as a “human rights and anti-hate activist, fighting for justice for the oppressed and persecuted.” He has written and commented extensively about these issues. Khan’s Substack account expresses his barely contained outrage about human rights topics. Some examples:

Words come back to bite

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Cole Bennett correctly wrote that Kirk’s murder will not advance any of the causes he opposed. Violence against leaders is most often a consequence of damaged trust in political and social systems. It is perpetrated by isolated and disenfranchised people who live outside the rules of society. Kirk’s organization had plenty of those, so the immediate future is a dangerous time for moderate American political figures.

Jackassery in Alberta

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Alberta Conservatives recently declared that publications their supporters consider inappropriate should be removed from schools. A government order specified that students should not be exposed to sexual content. Among other things, there was to be no written mention of masturbation. Danielle Smith’s government fears that teenagers might discover and engage in the practice if it is mentioned in reading material…

Labour Day – Canadian heritage moment – Rerun

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In modern times, the Canadian union movement has lost influence but not relevance. It is easy to forget that unions enabled a broad middle class. Workers in unionized company towns in BC’s 20th century resource economy set the bar for others. They showed how positive full employment with good wages enables high quality life for the entire community.

Old and uncollectible

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Our magazine collection is rather large. Beyond hundreds of Scientific American, Archaeology, craft, cooking and gardening publications, we have about 500 National Geographic, including editions from the middle of the last century to the beginning of the current one. If you want some free reading material, contact me in the next few days. Rescue these old publications from destruction.

Global Peace Index

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The 19th edition of the Global Peace Index (GPI) ranks 163 independent states and territories according to their level of peacefulness. It covers 99.7 per cent of the world’s population. Produced by the Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP), the GPI is the world’s leading measure of global peacefulness…

Bear with me

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Our family has lived for decades at the edge of the forest in North Vancouver’s Seymour River valley. Bear encounters are not rare. We’ve had these animals in our yard countless times, […]