peterkwells

@peterkwells.com

2230 Followers 502 Following

BlackpoolFC, books, tech, people, policy & delivery, realist. Hopes to make stuff work for everyone. https://peterkwells.com

The sign outside the Departme for Culture, Media & Sport which has been formally renamed to Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
a t-shirt with the slogan "there is *no* kill switch (honest)"
Recognising that the transformative scale of Artificial Intelligence (AI) advances requires a strategic, whole-of-government approach from the centre, the Prime Minister is establishing a new AI Taskforce within the OPMC. Supported by a Prime Ministerial adviser on AI, this central team will drive the Government’s overall strategy on AI to unlock the opportunities it holds for growth, prosperity and public sector transformation. The Cabinet Office will also take the lead on AI adoption across the Civil Service, reflecting the urgency of delivering that transformation for the benefit of people across the country. To deliver this step change, responsibility for AI strategy, public sector AI adoption and the AI Security Institute will move to the Cabinet Office A strengthened Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) will bring together the current DCMS remit with responsibility for digital foundations, digital transformation, digital inclusion and skills, information resilience and online harms. This provides critical scale and recognises that culture and technology are inseparable drivers of our modern economy, while bringing coherence to the online safety agenda. It also emphasises our commitment that bringing together levers to support youth policy online and in real life will build a stronger package of support for young people.
Starmer first announced plans for a digital ID scheme last September, as part of plans to combat illegal working. It was planned to be rolled out by 2029. He said the proposed “Brit card” would be compulsory for those who needed to prove they were allowed to work in the UK amid growing fears about illegal immigration. The cards were to detail the holder’s residency status, name, date of birth and nationality, alongside their photograph. Starmer billed the rollout as “an enormous opportunity for the UK” and said the ID cards “will make it tougher to work illegally in this country, making our borders more secure”.
The new unitary councils will cover: North Lancashire – made up of Lancaster, Preston and Ribble Valley West Lancashire – made up of Fylde, Wyre and Blackpool East Lancashire – made up of Blackburn with Darwen, Hyndburn, Rossendale, Pendle and Burnley South Lancashire – made up of Chorley, South Ribble and West Lancashire
OpenAI’s newly surfaced device sounds like something of a departure from traditional smart speakers — as sources described the device to Bloomberg as having a “personality” and being able to proactively learn about its owner over time, providing more personalized service. The machine would have access to a user’s digital life, drawing off things like emails, sources said. The device is also weirdly described as involving “mechanical elements that can move on their own” and the Bloomberg report includes the detail that the device is designed to “feel like a companion and become a physical manifestation of OpenAI’s ChatGPT.”
an email from google saying "keep track of your google account data" and "you're receiving this email because you used sign in with google to sign in to Claude"
a search page for "current and previous members of the Scottish Parliament", an option to "filter by trans status" is highlighted
A sideboard with old patterned wallpaper behind it. Propped on the sideboard is a paint by numbers unicorn and a Pride flag
The side of a train on which the words HM Government Northern Powerhouse are painted
a red public health warning saying "Please Mind The Farage" on the sticker is a bin with some stinky liquid seeping out
a clip from movie Wargames where the computer WHOPR decides "a strange game. the only winning move is not to play"
a fair-haired small dog and a tortoiseshell cat curled up on a soft together, in roughly an interlocking yin and yang pattern
A festival stage with The Pet Shop Boys on giant screens on either side. Neil Tennant is visibly having a great time.
Chris Lowe of the Pet Shop Boys wearing a tuning fork mask while playing keyboards, on a giant screen at the sidebofva stage
A blue plaque with a picture of children's puppet Sooty on it, below the picture are the words in the post but it was actually Harry Corbett who discovered Sooty
An advert for Roy Chubby Brown gigs on Blackpool North pier
Blackpool Tower from below, the sky looks a bit chilly
I ran into a tooling limit here, so let me be straightforward about it: my image search doesn't reliably surface files with verified Creative Commons metadata (it pulls from general web results, including copyrighted restaurant marketing photos), and I can't fetch Wikimedia Commons pages directly to confirm licenses for you in this conversation
the eventbrite page for Solid World July 26
I assumed that if any cloud vendor put real money behind letting the public sector try things for free, it would be a smaller player with first-mover advantage to gain and less to lose. It was not. Amazon Web Services moved first
the Simpsons 'won't somebody think of the children meme" but about neo-nazis
"Mullvad is a political company. We fight for freedom of speech, freedom of information and the right to privacy. These are firmly held values of the founders of Mullvad."
Third, we believe the most significant opportunity for government in the next phase is exploring how AI generated outputs can be evaluated and validated. This is where government can add real value by building the tools and standards to assess whether AI outputs are trustworthy, rather than replicating what the private sector is already doing.
A man is sitting ilon the floor using a laptop, two kittens are crawling over the laptop
The Met will now run a procurement process for the further 12 months to appoint a supplier, with Palantir likely to be a leading candidate
King and Queen will not live in Buckingham Palace after renovations
a pop up box that says "by downloading this document you understand and agree that any sharing distribution or republishing of the content without prior written authorisation from the author or content managers at UK Finance, shall be constituted as a breach of the UK Finance website terms of use"
a coverage map of Western Europe. Countries are in different colours to show whether they work or not. The UK is the only country marked in 'red' for restricted
NHS England has defended Palantir, claiming that its federated data platform, which aims to bring together disparate NHS data, has contributed to 110,000 additional operations being carried out and to a 15 per cent reduction in discharge delays. Those figures have been widely cited as evidence of the platform’s success. But in a recently updated NHSE page outlining the methodology behind the figures, the health service stated it could not “draw conclusions about cause and effect as other variables have not been controlled for”. The statement, which is repeated seven times, did not appear on an archived version of the website from May and does not appear on the main uptake and benefits page.
part of the agenda for Think Digital, the event starts with a fireside chat with Aimee Smith and then a session called "library lessons" with speakers from data.gov.uk, London's data portal, and data science at the MoJ
a page of search results on gov.uk for national data library, none are a simple landing page describing either the "thing" or the wider policy/strategy
A cat and a dog sitting on a rug staring at each other
the front page of BBC News, the main story is about Andy Burnham being sworn in as new MP, the picture is of Andy Burnham taking a selfie with Labour MPs, the back of Andy Burnham's phone has an Incubator for AI sticker
Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. More information can be found at https://help.ft.com/faq/gifting-and-sharing-an-article/what-is-a-gift-article/. https://www.ft.com/content/4d1db23d-7747-4e8a-a95f-d63af64458c2?syn-25a6b1a6=1 The FT revealed last week that Derbyshire Police had suspended the officer from frontline duties and launched a criminal investigation over his AI use, in what is thought to be the first case of its kind in Britain. Further details of the case can now be reported. A person familiar with the events said that the officer had allegedly asked AI software to generate paperwork slanted towards outcomes that the police wanted. That had included preparing the “impact statements” — in which victims describe the effect of a crime on them, to inform the judge’s sentencing — by telling the system to maximise their impact. It is claimed that he similarly prepared briefings for prosecutors by allegedly telling the software to ensure they would authorise charges. “He’s used good-sounding words to make sure he gets the result [the suspect] probably deserves,” the person familiar with events said. Another person confirmed this account.
the results in the Makerfield by-election. 35% voted for Reform UK and 7% voted for Restore Britain
One of the overarching themes of the 21st century will be the expanding reach of intelligence and what we choose to do with it. We talk to artificial intelligences every day - and increasingly we talk to them about our health. Whether we’re talking to doctors or AIs, what we do with our health comes down to having data and an awareness of our bodies. You want as much data as you can get about your health as quickly and as cheaply as possible. In other words, you want a technology optimized for getting as many “megabytes per second per dollar” of information about your body. In an ideal and near-term future, we take this information and watch how it changes over time. We compare it to the general population, we talk to doctors, nutritionists, coaches, trainers, and AI friends. We become more aware of our health and we improve our lifestyles. We make smarter, more proactive, more frequent decisions. And we live longer, healthier lives, better lives. That's the dream - now let's step back to our machine:
But really, we just want you to be involved. A technology like this is intended for everyone, and we need your help to make sure it turns out that way. So with that, we invite you to join us. We’ll be publishing regular updates, exciting new scan images, and concepts of the spa as we design and build it out. We want to ask you lots of questions too! Your support and opinions help us be confident in our speed and scale and that we’ll make something in the first pass that everyone will love
the top of an email from North Tyneside Council asking "is the electoral registration information correct for your address?"
The UK Government encourages new source code to be open by default, with specific and justified exceptions. In practice, that creates a degree of shared visibility that attackers can also exploit. However, this openness also limits duplication and leads to cleaner, more easily maintained code. Code published in the open has also already passed extensive prepublication scrutiny, meaning it can be shared with frontier model providers with minimal additional review. This means that government departments can deploy new capabilities quickly and with confidence.
Qwen is an open-source model, meaning users can copy the code and run it on their own computer servers to prevent data from being sent to the developer. The MoJ said the data were anonymised and that it had run the system on its own “analytical platform”, meaning data would not have been sent to Alibaba servers. However, wider concerns have been raised about the use of Chinese AI. The US government has warned against using such systems, which experts have said are biased towards Beijing’s viewpoints and could make the West more dependent on China. ‘This will come back to bite us’ Luke de Pulford, the executive director of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China said: “Using Qwen opens the door to UK reliance on AI systems controlled by foreign adversaries, with attendant security vulnerabilities.” He added: “Depending on Chinese AI to run key parts of the state is an unnecessary risk that will come back to bite us. “Playing into Beijing’s AI propaganda war and trusting their software is an unforced error that does nothing to advance national security.” A review from the US-based China Media Project found that Qwen was trained “to subtly deliver positive messages about the country to an international audience”. US politicians have said that using Chinese models risks giving Beijing the upper hand in a global battle to set the rules of AI and have pressured companies using Qwen to drop the system
A tech tycoon and controversial figure: Who is Elon Musk? published at 17:19 17:19 Michael Race Business and economics reporter Elon Musk is now known across the world for much more than being a tech pioneer who owns SpaceX and the electric car company Tesla. Musk, who today became the first ever trillionaire, has a strong following, but has become a controversial figure. He has been described as both a mad genius and an internet troll who divides public opinion. Since he bought Twitter, now called X, he has increasingly aired his views on US politics, but also other countries, including the UK. This is a shift for Musk, who for a long time resisted efforts to label his politics until he endorsed Donald Trump for a second term in 2024 and became one of the campaign's foremost backers and influencers before the two fell out. The tech tycoon has entered into UK political debates, particularly around immigration, making claims that have been heavily criticised by UK government ministers.
‘Cancer patients’ lives would be at risk’ Mr Bartlett, a former deputy director for NHS England, worked for 22 years within the NHS and led the data engineering team that built and delivered the FDP. He spoke out after Labour ministers opened the door to ending its £330m data deal with Palantir when the break clause comes up next March. The Tories have warned that cancer patients’ lives would be put at risk if the Government were to pull the plug on its Palantir partnership.
a snippet from an email inbox of this morning's Politico London Playbook email, the headline text to the email reads "Another night of disorder - presented by Palantir", Palantir are sponsoring the email, but you can also comedically read it as Palantir presenting the night of disorder
the gov.uk search page results for "10ds", it starts off with a decision in the residential property tribunal decision before a page about the #10 Innovation Fellowship programme
the landing page for West Midlands Fire Service. It has a large pop up to manage cookie consent that takes up 1/3 of the screen, heck knows why it's using cookies, behind that popup is another half-hidden popup window saying "FAST. FIERCE. FATAL", behind that is faintly visible the website of an emergency service
An advert saying "free bin clearing, beautifully fragrances with Zoflora". The free offer bus for one (1) month
A letter marked "important information about your bins"
A beach in the background with people stamping shapes into the sand, in the foreground is an explanation of the Spectre aperiodic tile
Peter Kyle: State to take ‘aggressive’ stakes in UK firms The business secretary says government will ‘take more risks’ by using taxpayer money to back British firms and innovation and jump-start economic growth
an extract from a roadmap saying "Later, a single trusted gateway to high-quality public data"
One of my MA students is currently conducting a study that makes use of the swearword data from your UK Attitudes to Offensive Language and Gestures dataset. As we are preparing the thesis and any subsequent publications, I wanted to ask how you would prefer the dataset to be cited. https://github.com/peterkwells/uk-attitudes-to-offensive-language-and-gestures-data
a headline saying "Universal park officially named as government pledges £1.3bn"
The question now, said Omand, was how humans ensured that autonomous weapons systems could adhere to international law. UK military policy on the use of AI in defence states that “there must be context-appropriate human involvement in weapons which identify, select and attack targets”, adding that this could include “control exercised through the setting of a system’s operational parameters”. Omand argues that a drone’s actions can be split into to six variables which can be assigned levels of importance by a human operator – the one “on the loop” – which are then used to guide the drone’s decision on a mission. The ultimate result could be a moral decision-making system that is ethically superior to human decision making, said Omand, who has also held board positions at defence companies and is an adviser to investment firm Paladin Capital, which invests in cybersecurity companies. “It could actually work, whereas relying on humans in a very fast-moving seconds matter for warfare is probably going to lead to far worse results in terms of collateral damage,” he said
Peter Mandelson referring to Angela Rayner as an "instrument of destabilization"
A dog lieing down in a front room.
A paragraph of text that includes the term "chafing dish"
A picture along a train platform. On the left some blurred out passengers stand in the platform, to the right are the tracks, at the end is a tunnel. Before the tunnel are two red lights with tilted signals above them like angry eyebrows on an angry robots eyes
a map from the service. Several countries are green because of existing APIs or loaded bulk datasets, many other countries are "coming soon", the UK is coloured red and marked restricted
a marketing email from OpenIA saying "Start with any question Chat now You don’t need a plan or the perfect question to use ChatGPT. Just start typing whatever’s on your mind — a half-baked idea, a random question, a weird "what if." ChatGPT is built for all of it. No pressure. No perfect prompts. Explore ideas, create images, write stories, and summarize files in just a simple conversation. Best, The ChatGPT Team"