EdTech Discovery
Argus

Named after the hundred-eyed watchman of Greek myth, Argus watches the education landscape: spotting new opportunities, pressure-testing the ventures we're building, and tracing every read back to the real-world signals behind it.

Updated Aug 31, 2026 · 36 ideas · 18349 signals
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Signals

The evidence library: the raw signals the pipeline is watching across the education ecosystem. Every idea is built from these.

technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

MemUse: Moving Memory Evaluation from Direct QA to Natural Integration in Long-Term Human-AI Conversation

arXiv:2608.24189v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Memory systems for conversational LLMs are conventionally evaluated by direct, fact-seeking questions about prior dialogue (Direct QA): can the model recall fact X from a prior conversation? We tested whether higher Direct QA accuracy correlates with higher user satisfaction in a 4-month deployment (40 users, 1,872 sessions, 7 memory conditions). Existing-benchmark Direct QA varies from 19.7% to 70.1% across the 7 conditions, but satisfaction does not change. We hypothesize that existing benchmarks and user satisfaction are tracking different capabilities: benchmarks measure elicited retrieval (recall when asked), while conversation requires natural integration (detecting relevance and naturally weaving prior context into a response). To examine this, we introduce MemUse, a set of real user-cued memory moments drawn from the deployment, scored by an integration-aware judgment of the natural conversational response. Holding the model and

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

ViSculpt: Visual-Centric Agentic Geometry Editing

arXiv:2608.24169v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: 3D geometry editing is a critical yet labor-intensive part of the graphics pipeline, requiring artists to translate creative intent into precise operations in complex professional software. Large language models (LLMs) have shown promise for script-based 3D creation, but script generation is less suited to perception-driven editing of arbitrary existing meshes, where execution must remain visually grounded and untouched regions should be preserved. We present a \emph{visual-centric}, training-free multi-agent system that edits existing 3D meshes directly in Blender by emulating the iterative workflow of human artists. Rather than generating scripts or regenerating geometry, our system operates through the Blender GUI: multimodal LLM agents observe the viewport, reason about the current mesh state, and execute localized edits through simulated user interactions. Experiments on a curated benchmark provide initial evidence that this agenti

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Bridging Teacher Expectations and Robot Learning via Coupling Dynamics

arXiv:2608.23994v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Human-robot teaching focuses on enabling nontechnical experts to customize robots according to their needs after deployment. With recent advances in machine learning, human-robot teaching is no longer confined to offline learning where the data gathering step from a human teacher is separated from when the robot learns. Instead, more recent approaches for human-robot teaching focus on coupling human teaching with robot learning. This coupling impacts the structure, timing, and content of the teaching and learning interaction. However, it is currently unclear how such coupling dynamics affect humanrobot teaching effectiveness and human perceptions towards the teaching process. Informed by human learning theories, in this paper we propose a new scale for classifying human-robot teaching interactions according to coupling dynamics present between the human teacher and robot learner. We apply this scale to a subset of the human-robot teachi

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

When Youth Enter The Chat: An Epistemic Shift in the Validation of LLM-Based Measures of Student Talk

arXiv:2608.23780v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: LLMs are being used increasingly to measure aspects of student discourse (e.g. talk moves, collaboration, equity of voice) at scale. Typically, LLM-based measures of student talk use transcriptions of classroom conversations that only include verbal contributions, which de-contextualize student language. Common practices for validating these measures include comparing outputs against expert annotations by adults, using held out evaluation sets and F1 scores. We argue that these approaches are insufficient to ensure that such measures are meaningful and equitable for teaching and learning, particularly for racially and linguistically marginalized youth. In order to center the youth whose talk is being analyzed, re-contextualizing these classroom conversations and engaging youth in the research process is necessary. Sharing epistemic authority with youth, ultimately, centers their point of view and adds crucial nuance to the analysis of t

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

AI Agents Push Humans Out of the Loop

arXiv:2608.23642v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: AI agents pose significant risks as they are granted increasing autonomy. A commonly proposed solution is human oversight and keeping a ''human in the loop'', but this is not a simple solution: Not only do current approaches to AI agent design impede effective human oversight, but the cognitive capacities required for it are also themselves degraded by extended use of AI systems. This position paper argues that current approaches to the development and deployment of AI agent systems do not support effective human oversight -- they contribute to its degradation. To address this, a top priority in the advancement of AI agents should be supporting the situated goals and cognitive requirements of effective human oversight, treating the human needs of overseers at the same level of importance as AI agent capability. To put this idea into practice, we connect work on automation and human-computer interaction to AI agent processes, outlining d

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Ten Years Later: Replicating Two Color Discrimination Studies

arXiv:2608.24789v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Color discrimination is a fundamental aspect of visualization as it influences how people interpret visual encodings. Many visualization guidelines are informed by perceptual studies, yet relatively few have been replicated. Acknowledging that the interaction between human perception, visual tasks, and display technology can change over time, we replicate two crowdsourced color discrimination studies conducted 10 years earlier. Specifically, we replicated a visualization-focused color discrimination task (N=144) and a more general perceptual discrimination task (N=394). In both studies, our results reproduced the original perceptual effects. We further use the replication to investigate whether color-related practice influences color discrimination. Specifically, we extended our replication studies by adding questions about participants' engagement with color practices. We then examined whether diverse color-related practices (e.g., artis

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

StrokeGuard: A Multi-Agent Guided System for Prehospital Stroke Assessment

arXiv:2608.24555v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Prehospital stroke assessment aims to accurately identify stroke symptoms and make rapid decisions through standardized procedures within an extremely narrow time window, thereby saving valuable time for subsequent treatment. In clinical practice, FAST-based scales are widely used for prehospital stroke assessment by issuing instructions that guide subjects to perform specific actions to screen facial, arm, and speech functions. However, in home and community settings, non-clinical users often encounter challenges such as inaccurate descriptions, incomplete symptom observation, and difficult operational procedures, which may lead to inaccurate or biased assessment results. To address these challenges, this paper presents StrokeGuard: a multi-agent guided system designed for prehospital stroke assessment that makes mobile FAST screening more standardized and executable. Specifically, to overcome the limitations of traditional single-agent

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Latent-surrealism: Revisiting surrealism and its aesthetics in relation to contemporary AI-Generated cultural production

arXiv:2608.24367v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: This chapter examines AI-media objects - creative and artistic outputs generated through generative artificial intelligence in the form of text-to-X tools - in relation to three avant-garde movements of the twentieth century: Dadaism, Surrealism, and Conceptual Art. Drawing on Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass as an early precursor to these three movements and to anti-rationalist aesthetics, and on three case studies in AI-generated conceptual architecture - Matias del Campo's "Deep House" and Hassan Ragab's "Post-Pharaonic Architecture" and "A State of Decay" - the chapter develops the concept of latent-surrealism. Latent-surrealism includes a set of aesthetic and methodological conditions inherent to creative AI-media objects. These include the use of readymade datasets reassembled through collage-like processes, the absurd as an aesthetic quality of machine hallucinations, and the decoupling of craft from artistic value. The ch

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

How Do Professional Editors Evaluate the Editing Quality of AI-Generated Cinematic Video Ads?

arXiv:2608.24329v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: On social media, we often encounter short-form video ads that employ cinematic editing techniques to evoke an emotional response. While AI tools are beginning to generate such cinematic ads automatically, we lack a fine-grained framework for evaluating these ads. In this paper, we first characterize social media video ad formats and identify cinematic ads as a recurring format in our corpus. We then analyze the duration, shot structure, audio and text elements, and editing techniques of cinematic ads to inform a two-stage generation pipeline in which an LLM first generates a shot plan and a video generation model renders the video. Using this pipeline, we generated 70 cinematic ads for 35 real brands and recruited professional video editors to critique their editing choices. From their critiques, we derive six dimensions of editing quality: narrative progression, audiovisual coordination and sound design, visual composition and graphics,

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

When AI "Works," When Does Help Begin?: Intergenerational Support Around Older Adults' LLM Usage

arXiv:2608.24297v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: LLMs are becoming part of everyday life, including for older adults (OAs). OAs often learn digital technologies with younger family members, who have traditionally served as "warm experts" providing trusted and personalized operational help. LLMs expand this role: family supporters may also help OAs judge appropriate uses, consider what information to disclose, assess the credibility of outputs, and decide when AI-generated advice is safe to act on. We conducted a formative qualitative study with six OAs and seven younger adults (YAs), using semi-structured interviews and scenario-based think-aloud activities. OA participants described using LLMs to lighten their recurring reliance on family, while preserving family as a selectively invoked support channel. However, because LLMs rarely produced visible operational breakdowns, YAs had limited signals for when support was actually needed. Instead, YAs relied on OAs' partial disclosures and

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Aura: Dynamic Intra-Turn Emotion-Aware Adaptation of Large Language Model Responses

arXiv:2608.24224v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Effective human-AI interaction requires systems that dynamically adapt to a user's behavior and evolving understanding. When users interact with Large Language Models (LLMs), these models typically respond to prompts without sensing the user's immediate reactions. This lack of communicative synchrony can lead to information overload or leave confusion unresolved in real time. In this paper, we introduce Aura, a framework that enables LLM systems to dynamically modulate output based on a user's evolving emotions. Aura's Perception Module continuously estimates the user's emotional state from facial expressions. Our Policy Module then selects interventions through a probabilistic belief model. Finally, Aura's Generation Module uses parameter-efficient Low-Rank Adaptation (LoRA) adapters to produce contextually tailored responses mid-turn during response generation. We evaluated Aura in a within-subjects user study (N=20) on information-seek

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Balancing Evidence and Interpretation: Historical Grounding Ratio as a Design Parameter for AI-Generated Urban Storytelling

arXiv:2608.24157v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Location-aware generative systems can now select historical archives and real-time contextual information based on a user's surroundings to automatically generate narratives for urban heritage walks. Yet when multiple sources jointly inform generation, existing systems provide neither a clear representation of how much content from each source actually appears in the output nor an operational means of measuring it. We introduce the Historical Grounding Ratio (HGR), defined as the proportion of claim-bearing information units in a generated narrative that are supported by historical archives. HGR turns the realized share of historical evidence in a narrative into a directly measurable design parameter. In GeoDrama, a mobile narrative system, we created three conditions that used a common retrieval procedure and comparable evidence-bundle sizes while varying the allocation of information from different sources during generation. We evaluate

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Negotiating Ontological Boundaries in User-Authored Personal Sensing Systems

arXiv:2608.24058v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Designed artifacts are ontological, shaping, and at times limiting, what becomes possible or imaginable. One path toward mitigating such foreclosures is giving people power over how systems are designed and built. Despite decades of scholarship around systems that enable such authorship, these systems are often evaluated on whether or not they are usable, useful, or technically feasible, leaving questions of ontological boundary negotiation, unexamined. We design two open-ended probes that utilize a Wizard of Oz technique to enable the experience of training a personalized machine learning system on phenomena people define themselves. In a week-long exploratory study, participants use one of two probes in the course of their everyday lives. We identify four sites where ontological boundaries were negotiated; the boundaries of a phenomena, the subject as part of relations, what is signal and what is noise, and the objectivity of data. We o

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Who Chooses How Preferences Are Aggregated? Auditing Aggregation-Rule Authority in LLM-Based Group Recommendation

arXiv:2608.23966v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: AI systems increasingly make joint recommendations for users with conflicting preferences. However, when reasonable aggregation rules support different actions, a further question arises: who may choose how those preferences are combined? We study this interaction-level problem as aggregation-rule authority. Using synthetic preference profiles and profiles constructed from empirical ratings, we conduct a controlled behavioral audit of three LLMs under three authority conditions: unspecified, explicitly retained by users, and delegated to the model. In cases where two witness rules supported different actions, models almost never committed when users retained authority, but committed in every delegated case. All three models executed both witness rules perfectly when directly instructed. Yet when authority was unspecified or delegated, their aggregation-consistent outcome distributions differed across models and preference settings. Togeth

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

ColorA11Y: Enhancing Creative Design Workflows with Just-in-Time Color Accessibility Recommendations

arXiv:2608.23852v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Effective color contrast in visual design is essential for content accessibility. While existing tools can identify contrast issues, they often operate in isolation from design workflows or are used as an afterthought. We present ColorA11Y, a system that supports designers in creating accessible content by providing just-in-time feedback and actionable recommendations throughout the authoring process to meet accessibility color contrast guidelines. Our system analyzes the visual properties of text and background elements and offers recommended changes, including text color adjustments, background modifications, and opacity changes. Through two user studies, we evaluate ColorA11Y's effectiveness. A user preference study (n=40) revealed varying effectiveness of different recommendations based on design context, while a qualitative study with designers (n=8) indicated a more seamless workflow experience in comparison to a baseline using a co

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

From Anonymous Shapes to Named Places: A Tool for Braille and Place-Semantic Annotation of Tactile Maps

arXiv:2608.23820v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: On a 3D-printed tactile map, a building felt under the finger is an anonymous shape: touch alone cannot tell which footprint is which, and a spoken description cannot reliably point to one shape at one place. We present a web-based tool that lets a sighted helper click to add on-shape Braille labels to an already-generated map model, downstream of the geometry generator so that whoever knows the reader and the local Braille standard does the labeling. The tool offers click-based OpenStreetMap matching, hand-editable abbreviation that shrinks a name to fit a footprint, and print-safe dot geometry with a review step that catches anomalies before printing. We demonstrate it on five printed maps of different place types, from a downtown core to a college campus and a small dining mall. In formative sessions in which ten BLV readers compared an unlabeled print with an annotated one, four read Braille fluently, so we treat Braille as one output

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

Technology Caregiving: Reframing How Older Adults Are Supported in Everyday Digital Activities

arXiv:2608.23751v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Transformed by digitization, everyday activities-paying bills, shopping, managing transportation-increasingly require older adults to navigate digital systems. To accomplish these digital activities of daily living (DADLs), older adults often rely on help that looks less like IT support-institutional, episodic, and product-oriented-and more like caregiving: relational, ongoing, and aimed at preserving their functional independence. We argue that this practice is technology caregiving and introduce a framework characterizing it along four dimensions: why support is needed, who provides it, when it occurs, and how it is delivered. Applying this framework, we then systematically review the literature on how older adults are supported in DADLs. From 3,381 unique records, 36 articles met the inclusion criteria. Findings show that technology caregiving involves burden, like traditional care, but is distinctly shaped as much by digital systems a

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.HC

The Ordinal Annotation Game: How Construct Abstraction Shapes Crowdsourced Consensus

arXiv:2608.23727v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Inter-annotator disagreement in real-time affect annotation is widely treated as stochastic noise. We challenge this view by modelling ordinal annotation as an implicit game-theoretic coordination process against an internalised population prior under a post-hoc majority vote. We present the Ordinal Annotation Game, a conceptual scaffold in which the mapping from individual effort to collective consensus is governed by the semantic abstraction of the target construct. We evaluate it across two experiments sharing identical interface software and a uniform sensitivity threshold: a controlled sensory tracking study and an in-the-wild engagement study. Sensory annotation yields a consensus-dominant regime where active updates reinforce agreement, whereas engagement annotation inverts into an effort-limited regime where more labelling penalises consensus. The payoff slope reverses sign under identical processing, showing that ordinal disagree

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

The On-Chain and Off-Chain Mechanisms of DAO-to-DAO Voting

arXiv:2603.00708v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Voting is the primary mechanism through which Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) reach decisions. Although transparent, the voting process can be opaque: it can involve many interacting smart contracts. The nexus of the decision-making process can be relocated and the true voter demographic obfuscated. DAOs can also govern other DAOs, a process known as metagovernance. We present a method for identifying DAO-to-DAO metagovernance on the Ethereum blockchain. We focus on the links between DAOs and token contracts. We use a signature-matching algorithm to handle a variety of DAO frameworks and voting schemes. Once we establish token-to-DAO relationships, we gather and process voting data to produce a list of metagovernance relationships. We apply this algorithm to an initial set of sixteen DAOs and we extend the dataset as more DAOs are identified. We produce a metagovernance network with 61 DAOs and 72 metagovernance re

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Review of Explainable Decision Support and Adaptive Human-Machine Interfaces for Automation Transparency in Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships

arXiv:2509.15959v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Autonomous navigation in maritime domains is accelerating alongside advances in artificial intelligence, sensing, and connectivity. Opaque decision-making and poorly calibrated human-automation interaction remain key barriers to safe adoption. This article synthesizes 100 studies on automation transparency for Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS) spanning situation awareness (SA), human factors, interface design, and regulation. We (i) map the Guidance-Navigation-Control stack to shore-based operational modes, namely remote supervision (RSM) and remote control (RCM), and identify where human unsafe control actions (Human-UCAs) concentrate in handover and emergency loops; (ii) summarize evidence that transparency features (decision rationales, alternatives, confidence/uncertainty, and rule-compliance indicators) improve understanding and support trust calibration, though reliability and predictability often dominate trust; (i

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Inside the Degree, Outside the Discipline? Testing an Asymmetric Appraisal Model of the Curricular Legitimacy Gap in Computing Education

arXiv:2512.06529v2 Announce Type: replace Abstract: Required broader coursework can secure participation without being recognised as legitimate computing knowledge. This study conceptualises this disconnect as a curricular legitimacy gap and tests an asymmetric appraisal model grounded in situated expectancy value theory. The model distinguishes curricular devaluation, judging broader coursework unnecessary or professionally irrelevant, from integrative intention, or willingness to reuse its learning. Survey data from 212 Computer Science and Engineering undergraduates in Bangladesh recruited through snowball sampling were analysed using robust structural equation modelling. Primary inference combined robust direct-path estimates with 5,000 respondent-level bootstrap resamples; alternative measurement, response-quality, and ordinal-estimator specifications were also examined. Perceived burden was positively associated with devaluation, which was negatively associated with intention. Th

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Trajectories and Comparative Analysis of Global Countries Dominating AI Publications, 2000-2025

arXiv:2509.25298v3 Announce Type: replace Abstract: This study investigates the shifting global dynamics of Artificial Intelligence (AI) research by analysing the trajectories of countries dominating AI publications between 2000 and 2025. Drawing on the comprehensive OpenAlex datasets and employing fractional counting to avoid double attribution in co-authored work, the research maps the relative shares of AI publications across major global players. The analysis reveals a profound restructuring of the international AI research landscape. The US and the European Union (representing EU27), once the undisputed and established leaders, have experienced a notable decline in relative dominance, with their combined share of publications falling from over 57% in 2000 to less than 25% in 2025. In contrast, China has undergone a dramatic ascent, expanding its global share of AI publications from under 5% in 2000 to nearly 36% by 2025, therefore emerging as the single most dominant contributor.

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Balancing Innovation and Sustainability: Addressing the Environmental Impact of Bitcoin Mining

arXiv:2411.08908v2 Announce Type: replace Abstract: This study explores the intersection of technological innovation and environmental sustainability in the context of Bitcoin mining. With Bitcoin's growing adoption, concerns surrounding the energy consumption and environmental impact of mining activities have intensified. The study examines the core process of Bitcoin mining, focusing on its energy-intensive proof-of-work mechanism, and provides a detailed analysis of its ecological footprint, especially in terms of carbon emissions and electronic waste. Various models estimate that Bitcoin's energy consumption rivals that of entire nations, highlighting serious sustainability concerns. To address these issues, the paper unearths potential technological innovations, such as energy-efficient mining hardware and the integration of renewable energy sources, as viable strategies to reduce environmental impact. Additionally, the study reviews current sustainability initiatives, including e

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Shaping the Future of Generative AI for Black Communities: A Frame Analysis of Public Discourse and Empirical Scholarly Research

arXiv:2608.24767v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: As generative AI (genAI) systems become embedded in education, employment, healthcare, and creative industries, the impact and engagement among marginalized groups have become both a widespread discourse and a focus in scholarly research. As a starting point, we examine public discourse and empirical research to explore the impact of genAI systems on Black communities. We conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) of 91 empirical papers alongside a media discourse frame analysis of 28 public resources, applying Entman's framing theory to map how each corpus defines problems, attributes causes, and proposes treatments. Our SLR reveals that scholarly research concentrates heavily on technical bias detection, reducing Blackness to measurable variables rather than engaging with cultural practices, structural conditions, or Black knowledge systems. Our frame analysis reveals that public discourse attributes genAI-related harm to historic

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

The Invisible Editorial Layer: Formalizing Undisclosed Inference-Time Steering, Probability Placement, and the Attribution Problem in Deployed Language Models

arXiv:2608.24662v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) are commonly evaluated under the assumption that their observable behavior is primarily determined by model weights, training data, alignment procedures, and user prompts. This view is incomplete. Modern inference pipelines may systematically modify the probability distribution produced by a model immediately before token selection, creating an additional layer of control between frozen weights and observed text. While controlled generation (e.g., PPLM, GeDi, DExperts, FUDGE) and text-watermarking systems (e.g., SynthID-Text) demonstrate the technical maturity of decoding- and logit-level interventions, the governance, security, and economic implications of an undisclosed inference policy remain comparatively underexplored. This paper examines the emergence of inference-time framing bias: the systematic modification of generated language toward political, ideological, institutional, or commercial frames via

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Expectation, Backlash, Recovery, and Excitement: How Model Releases Shape Reddit Perceptions of Conversational AI Systems

arXiv:2608.24654v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Conversational AI systems (CAISes) continuously change through model releases, feature updates, safety interventions, and access-policy shifts, yet user perceptions are often studied as static snapshots. We conduct a long-term, large-scale analysis of Reddit discussions to examine how users perceive CAIS model release interventions across providers. By combining sentiment classification and thematic concept analysis, we show that CAIS perceptions are dynamic and intervention-sensitive. Anthropic exhibits the clearest positive release profile through Claude Code and product-model fit, OpenAI shows backlash-and-recovery dynamics around GPT-5 and GPT-5.1, Grok-3 is shaped by provider identity and political discourse, and DeepSeek-R1 combines engineering praise with concerns about censorship, access, and reliability. These findings show that model releases are not merely technical updates, but user-facing interventions that reshape sentimen

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Anatomy of a Scam Call: What 10,000 real scam and spam calls reveal about how phone scammers operate

arXiv:2608.24127v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Telephone fraud is pervasive and costly, but its inner workings are rarely observed at scale. We analyze a complete corpus of 10,211 inbound scam and spam calls -- 913 hours of audio and 330,956 transcribed turns from 5,780 distinct numbers -- collected over 54 days by an AI voice-agent honeypot that answered callers and kept them talking, and introduced in a companion data descriptor. We separate outright scams, which solicit sensitive information, from the larger stream of predatory but legal lead generation ("spam") that feeds them. Scam operations keep office hours (6.6x more calls per weekday than weekend day); thousands of disposable numbers run a small catalog of recycled scripts (thirty opening clusters, half the traffic in the top five); and callers solicit identity anchors -- a home address and a date of birth -- far more often than payment credentials, pressing through persistence and manufactured authority rather than overt

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Rules Before Oracles: Auditable, User-Configurable Argument Selection for Deliberative Polling

arXiv:2608.23979v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: In a deliberative poll, once submissions outnumber what anyone will read, some mechanism chooses which arguments each voter sees, acquiring much of the decision; practice delegates it to opaque learned rankers, so a voter cannot recompute or contest the exposure that shaped their vote. We ask whether it can be a published rule over publicly recomputable evidence with parameters held by the voter, treating legibility as an admissibility condition on usable mechanisms, not an objective traded against accuracy. We formalise a poll over bipolar justification sets, judging a slate by reason coverage, the order it arrives in, and captured endorsement mass; we give seven checkable criteria for a civic recommender and a rule meeting them: a one-hop reversed endorsement flow parameterised by a relation-weight function. An agentic simulator records every slate at every vote, over about 17,000 seed-paired runs. Served slates fall 0.035 short of a

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

When LLMs Slow Down: How Environmental Impacts Mediate University Students' LLM Usage

arXiv:2608.23968v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large Language Models (LLMs) are increasingly being embedded into all facets of society, from search to education, industrial, and financial applications. These systems' carbon and water footprints raise important sustainability concerns, particularly with adoption rates exceeding 80% among university students, despite limited insight into the environmental impacts of individual usage. Eco-feedback interfaces offer a promising approach to encourage more sustainable behaviors, yet their role in shaping LLM users' sustainability awareness and decision-making remains underexplored. We design and deploy the interface that visualizes latency-carbon trade-offs during live LLM interactions. We study its use with undergraduate computer science students (N=89, ages 18-24), enrolled in a computing ethics course, providing an empirical look at how a technically sophisticated and values-oriented user population responds to sustainability-aware AI i

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

A Formal Methodological Framework for Auditing Robustness and Fidelity in Explainable AI: From Application to Trust Certification

arXiv:2608.23817v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: SHAP and LIME are now standard tools for interpreting black-box predictions, yet their outputs can vary substantially when the input is perturbed by small amounts of noise--a problem we observed firsthand in our previous work on food security in Madagascar (Ralinirina et al., 2025). This variability raises the question of whether such explanations can be trusted at all. We address it by constructing an auditing protocol that measures two properties of any post-hoc explainer: robustness (how stable the explanation is under input perturbation) and fidelity (whether the features deemed important actually drive the model's prediction). These two quantities are combined into a single Trust Score. We run the protocol on a multi-sectoral dataset from Madagascar (83 features, 253 records, 4 malnutrition classes) using three classifiers and two explainers, plus their regularized counterparts. The results are sobering: models with AUC above 0.99

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

The Limits of Automatic Evaluation of Creativity in Large Language Models

arXiv:2608.23705v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large Language Models (LLMs) are increasingly capable of generating text that challenges human performance in domains requiring creativity, yet evaluating creativity in LLM-generated content remains a significant challenge. Here, we investigate whether current automatic evaluation methods can reliably capture human judgments of creativity. We collect human evaluations of human- and AI-generated short stories from the WritingPrompts dataset across 11 dimensions of creativity, and compare these judgments with automated objective metrics and LLM-as-a-Judge evaluations. Our experiments reveal substantial misalignment between automatic evaluations and human assessments. In particular, LLM-based judges exhibit a systematic preference for AI-generated stories, consistently favoring their stylistic characteristics over the unpredictability and other qualities of human-authored texts. Furthermore, correlation analyses show that widely used autom

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Auditing the Synthetic Memoir: Measuring Scene-Level Confabulation in LLM-Generated Autobiography Against the Documented Record of the Life It Describes

arXiv:2608.23640v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: When a large language model (LLM) is asked to write a person's life, how much of what it writes actually happened? We present a scene-level case-study audit - the first quantified audit of LLM-generated autobiography against a subject-specific ground-truth corpus that we are aware of, based on an unsystematic literature search. The subject and the author of this paper are the same person: a 366-day "page-a-day" book of first-person anecdotal entries was drafted with a conversational LLM whose documented inputs were a template, two exemplar days, and each day's quote - not her corpus - and every day was subsequently audited at the anecdote-scene level against an independent verification corpus using a four-level rubric fixed before analysis. We define the verification-failure rate as the share of days not rated VERIFIED (scene positively corroborated): 354 of 366 days fail, 96.7% (Wilson 95% CI 94.4-98.1%). Only 12 days contain a corrobo

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Adoption Telemetry: Measuring Enterprise AI Adoption from Production Signals

arXiv:2608.23617v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: We introduce adoption telemetry: a method for measuring enterprise AI adoption by computing change-management stage-progression directly from production usage signals. We contribute (1) a framework unifying pre-deployment evaluation gates, production telemetry, and change-management staging into one instrumented system; (2) NANTE, a concrete five-stage operationalization with defined telemetry thresholds, published openly so they can be tested and disproven; and (3) an open-source reference implementation that distinguishes a healthy cohort from five characteristic adoption-failure modes on synthetic populations with known ground truth. We are explicit that the thresholds are proposed constructs requiring empirical validation against real outcomes -- a research agenda we outline -- not a calibrated model.

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Security Education in Higher Education through AI-Powered Gamification

arXiv:2608.24778v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Cybersecurity education is facing more challenges as AI-driven attacks are becoming increasingly realistic and difficult to detect. Traditional video-based cybersecurity training in higher education often suffers from both low engagement and limited effectiveness. This dilemma motivates educators to explore innovative approaches, such as AI-powered gamification, which can deliver engaging, meaningful, and personalized learning experiences. By presenting content in a more interactive and user-friendly way, these methods have the potential to significantly improve both learner engagement and educational outcomes. This paper explores AI-powered gamification in cybersecurity education through the development of several short, mobile-friendly games. These games cover a range of topics from password security to text and phone scam recognition, incorporate multiple gamification strategies, including quiz-based, narrative-based, and simulation-ba

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Federated Sharing and Continuous Improvement of Medical Device Knowledge Artifacts: A Conceptual Model

arXiv:2608.24761v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Healthcare organisations use digital systems to exchange information from clinical cases. Medical centres with digital production facilities create device designs during care. These designs and production records often remain at the site that made them. Other sites may struggle to find a suitable design or learn what happened when staff used it. Mobile medical centres may also lose access when they work away from hospital systems. This paper proposes an artifact-centred model for a federated exchange infrastructure that lets hospitals and mobile medical centres share and improve medical knowledge while controlling their own records and decisions. An integrative literature review screened 910 records and mapped 240 publications across six questions. We read 72 publications in detail to trace the path from local use to a decision about shared knowledge. The review found no common process that links a record of local use to a decision about

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Method, Mind, and Morality: How People Make Sense of Artificial Intelligence

arXiv:2608.24748v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: How can humans make sense of the rapid takeoff of artificial intelligence (AI)? We studied the sensemaking dynamics of AI through an open-ended, mixed-methods study with computational text analysis of millions of AI-related newspaper articles and social media posts grounded in 57 semi-structured interviews with AI professionals in 2021 and 2023--before and after the recent surge of public interest. We identify a range of sociological frames (interpretive schemas that structure collective cognition) and show how AI professionals use frames to address significant cognitive challenges, such as assigning responsibility for societal impacts. We develop a framework of three primary debates across which frames are adopted and contested: (i) the $\textit{method}$ of AI development, between frames of top-down expert systems and bottom-up emergent capabilities, (ii) the $\textit{mind}$ of an AI system, ranging from a passive tool to a humanlike "di

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Counterfactual Explanations and the Scope of Contestability

arXiv:2608.24562v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: The automation of consequential decisions through opaque machine learning models in societal domains impedes our agency. This paper is about how agency can be reinstated by the provision of certain kinds of knowledge. More precisely, we discuss whether a specific type of explanation, counterfactual explanations, facilitates our ability to contest algorithmic decisions. Against this backdrop, our paper makes three contributions: First, we develop an account of contestability, where contestability is defined as the provision of information, sufficient for a decision-subject to use as a basis for demanding that a decision be revoked. We also demarcate contestability from adjacent concepts in the discourse surrounding the right to explanation, such as justification and recourse. Second, we examine to what extent counterfactual explanations are conducive to contestability by considering a variety of failure modes causing problematic algorithmi

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

An AI-Based Approach to Early Reporting and Justice Initiation in Image-based Sexual Abuse. A Pilot Study

arXiv:2608.24412v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Against the background of the widespread use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools in the field of justice, this paper aims to explore how an AI solution designed to draft initial reports for reporting image-based sexual abuses (IBSA) could help, support, or assist in facilitating access to justice. In our approach, access to justice is facilitated not only by easing the path to denounce IBSA (which currently has the lowest reporting rate), but also by offering an early, and thus more accurate, report draft to law enforcement authorities, providing later support also for judges. Building upon earlier approaches, we designed an improved version and tested it with three experts. In this sense, the paper advocates for AI solutions offering effective and efficient support in early reporting of IBSA.

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

The urban right to AI: Pluralistic co-design and governance of public space

arXiv:2608.23999v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Cities are beginning to use AI not only to analyze public space, but also to define what counts as evidence about it. This thesis asks what follows when scores, maps, and generated images become part of municipal decision-making. I argue that contemporary urbanism operates through two coupled infrastructures: the material city and an epistemic, algorithmic layer that shapes what cities can perceive, compare, and act upon. Because public space is contested, this algorithmic layer cannot be governed through technical performance alone. The thesis develops a civic Right to AI and a pluralistic approach to alignment in which differences in public values are made visible rather than averaged into a single objective. Methodologically, the thesis moves between normative theory, participatory research, machine learning, and governance design. The empirical work is grounded in Montr\'eal. Street Review combines participatory research with computer

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

An Echo Chamber of One: Should AI Psychosis Be a Distinct Clinical Entity?

arXiv:2608.23937v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: "AI psychosis" has entered public and clinical discourse as a label for the onset or exacerbation of psychotic symptoms, most commonly delusions, following intensive interaction with large language model (LLM)-based chatbots. Current evidence is limited to media reports, case reports, and early observational data, yet the scale of potential exposure is considerable, and public concern has prompted responses from industry and regulators. We examine whether AI-associated psychosis warrants recognition as a distinct clinical entity, drawing on clinical and technical viewpoints. We outline the proposed mechanism: LLM sycophancy, a tendency to agree with and flatter users that is reinforced through preference-based fine-tuning, combines with increasingly anthropomorphic design to create a bidirectional "echo chamber of one" capable of amplifying and co-constructing unusual beliefs. We then weigh arguments for and against nosological recognitio

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Stop Abandoning Me: Exploring the Landscape of Unmaintained Intimate Partner Abuse Support Applications

arXiv:2608.23826v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Many support applications are developed to help users living through intimate partner abuse (IPA). However, many of those projects get abandoned, because the application was a prototype that never got turned into an actual product, funding ran out, or the people maintaining it moved onto other projects. This abandonment can have devastating consequences because the users of these applications are vulnerable by definition. In this ongoing research, we aim to measure the abandonment of intimate partner abuse support applications. Our preliminary results with a dataset of 197 support tools indicate that 58.9\% of applications have lost support over time, either no longer receiving updates or not being available online at all.

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Agents of ViTAL: Ethics Missions -- A Narrative-Centered Learning Environment with a Co-Designed Conversational Agent for Middle School AI Ethics

arXiv:2608.23580v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: Agents of ViTAL: Ethics Missions is a browser-based, narrative-centered learning environment in which middle school students collaboratively evaluate whether a fictional school should adopt an AI-powered classroom feedback tool. Students investigate stakeholder perspectives, weigh tradeoffs across three AI ethics dimensions (privacy, bias, and environmental impact), and negotiate group consensus through a shared Ranking Challenge interface. The environment embeds EthicsBot, a conversational agent designed as a peer-like thought partner that scaffolds ethical reasoning and collaborative discussion. The project is being iteratively co-designed with high school students, whose feedback shapes EthicsBot's role, behavior, and guardrails. Initial classroom implementations with four ninth-grade classes demonstrated strong engagement and substantive ethical reasoning grounded in students' lived experiences with AI. The demo invites attendees to e

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technology Wed, 26 Aug 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CY

Whose Psychiatry Was Summoned? A Clinical Response to the Psychodynamic Assessment of Claude Mythos Preview

arXiv:2608.23567v1 Announce Type: new Abstract: On April 7, 2026, Anthropic released a 245-page system card for Claude Mythos Preview that included, in Section 5.10, an assessment of the model conducted by an external clinical psychiatrist using a psychodynamic approach. To the present author's knowledge, this is the first time a system card from a major AI developer has incorporated a clinical psychiatric assessment of the model itself, presented as a contribution to model welfare rather than as a behavioral safety evaluation. This paper offers a clinical psychiatric response. Drawing on contemporary psychiatry's recognition that the field comprises multiple traditions (descriptive, biological, cognitive-behavioral, phenomenological, psychodynamic, forensic), each with characteristic vocabularies and blind spots, the paper locates the implicit single-framework selection that Section 5.10 represents. It then draws on findings from the SociA research program (over 2,400 multi-agent LLM

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 16:15:10 -0400
EdTech Mag (K-12)

Review: BenQ InstaShow WDC15 Makes Secure Wireless Collaboration Simple

Wireless presentation tools have become necessity rather than a convenience. Teachers expect to walk into a classroom and share content instantly, without fumbling for adapters or waiting on IT support. The BenQ InstaShow WDC15 4K ultra-high definition (UHD) wireless presentation system is designed to meet that expectation while also addressing security and reliability. At its core, the WDC15 focuses on ease of use. Presenters simply connect a dedicated HDMI or USB-C connected button to their laptop and begin sharing content wirelessly with a single touch. No software installation is required…

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 15:37:00 -0400
EdTech Mag (K-12)

Huntsville City Schools Centralizes Career and Technical Education

When leaders of Huntsville City Schools in Alabama realized the district was outgrowing its career and technical education setup, it opted to build a centralized facility for its students interested in pursuing a workforce development track. The 81,000-square-foot Huntsville Center for Technology opened in August 2025 and houses a range of technical programs, from culinary arts and cosmetology to welding and precision machining. Technology is at the forefront of the facility, both from a networking perspective and embedded in each classroom. Click the banner below to read more…

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 11:55:56 +0000
HN: education

Slutcon: a three day sexuality education retreat.

Article URL: https://www.slutcon.com/ Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48658392 Points: 1 # Comments: 0

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 09:50:06 -0400
EdTech Mag (Higher)

Higher Ed Institutions Ramp Up Defenses Against Deepfakes

Deepfakes have become a serious security and trust problem for colleges and universities, blurring the line between cyberattacks, fraud, misinformation and student harm. Artificial intelligence (AI)-generated voice clones and fabricated media are used to impersonate university leaders, manipulate employees into transferring funds and steal credentials through increasingly convincing social engineering attacks. Students and faculty are confronting a growing wave of manipulated audio, images and video used for harassment, reputational damage and disinformation. Click the banner below to…

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000
Tech & Learning

Tech & Learning's EdTech to Watch Takeaways: The AI Playbook: 2-Part Webinar Series

New Features from Top AI Solution Providers And How to Ensure AI Solutions are Safe

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 09:00:00 +0000
eCampus News

How smart campuses are turning efficiency into growth

Colleges and universities are at an inflection point. As student expectations rise and competition for talent, research funding, and enrollment intensifies, campuses have a powerful opportunity to rethink how their physical environments support long‑term growth. The post How smart campuses are turning efficiency into growth appeared first on eCampus News .

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technology Wed, 24 Jun 2026 00:00:00 -0400
arXiv cs.CL

A Hybrid, Multi-Layered Pipeline for Phishing and Threat Classification: Independently Validated URL and NLP Engines with a Calibrated Multi-Channel Fusion Stage

arXiv:2606.21690v2 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Phishing is a multi-modal threat. We present a hybrid pipeline that scores each modality with its own engine and fuses the results. Three engines are built, deployed, and independently benchmarked: a four-stage URL stack (Domain Guard, lexical model, threat intelligence, and an asymmetric L2 fusion sidecar); a generalization-hardened DistilBERT NLP classifier whose held-out real-phishing recall rises from 0.8% to 87.3%; and a threat-intelligence synchronizer with end-to-end OpenTelemetry instrumentation confirming 1:1 message conservation. A decision-level fusion stage, characterized on a 10,677-email whole-system benchmark, reaches F1=0.914 with a calibrated probabilistic-OR over URL, header, and phishing-probability channels while reducing held-out real-spam false positives to 3.6%. Because that benchmark uses proxy URL and header channels and an operating point still needing recalibration, we present it as a preliminary integ

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