#Tag · bonfire.cafe

After 400+ issues tracking digital literacy, I'm convinced the biggest AI risk isn't machines getting too smart. It's us getting too comfortable with cognitive shortcuts.

New analysis: Why "useful friction" might be the most important concept for our automated age.

Full analysis with research links: https://digitallyliterate.net/dl-401/

#DigitalLiteracy #AI #CriticalThinking

"Technological change is neither additive nor subtractive. It is ecological." —Neil Postman

tante

@tante@tldr.nettime.org · 2 months ago

There's a popular "digital rights" perspective that turns "not having kids on social media before 14 or 16" into a binary. That allows to make this a thing about overreach and censorship and all that. In combination with the complexities of ensuring access/restrictions it builds a great straw man.

But I do totally think that just throwing kids into general social media (think Instagram, TikTok but also Bluesky or Mastodon) is harmful to them and is just us older people being lazy and not wanting to give them time to grow into this digital life.

But it's not a binary. There is value in creating spaces for kids to express themselves and find community and their own voice. Question is how to build that in ways to protect them - not just from creeps but also the negative side effects of many commercial social media platforms.

It's not "but Kids need to learn to live with social media so let's throw them on TikTok". It's about figuring out ways for kids (or TBH some older people as well) to make those experiences in the digital "non-swimmer's pool". (Not sure if digital swimmers exist.)

Heliograph

@Heliograph@mastodon.au replied · 2 months ago

@tante i really like this

"figuring out ways for kids (or TBH some older people as well) to make those experiences in the digital "non-swimmer's pool"

this would give folks the right + enough time to learn how to integrate digital aspects into their lives, without being all consumed and overwhelmed (=drowned)!

#digitalLiteracy #digitalLife #learnersPool

Alex Akselrod boosted

DoomsdaysCW

@DoomsdaysCW@kolektiva.social · 2 months ago

#Scotland - #Librarian cuts at #Glasgow schools will 'rob kids of opportunities' as #SNP Government urged to intervene

EXCLUSIVE: #Labour warned library cuts on Scotland's largest local authority risked worsening the country's 'shameful attainment gap'.

Chris McCall Deputy Political Editor, 02 Aug 2025

Excerpt: "Glasgow Life, which manages the library service for the council, is proposing to take 16 librarians out of the city's education system. The plans would see the school service headed up by a principal librarian along with three area-based librarians, while an 'assistant' would be placed in high schools.

"An online petition against the cuts and shared among parents has since been signed more than 1,300 times.

"Joy McLean said she was concerned about how a decline in #LibraryServices would impact her daughter and other pupils. '#Librarians are essential #educators who foster a love of #reading, support research and #DigitalLiteracy, and help students thrive #academically and personally,' she added."

#LibrariesRule! #EducationCuts #ScotlandPol #LoveOfReading #BuildingCommunity #Literacy #SupportingResearch #CriticalThinkingSkills