Michael Webb's Blog

Category: Uncategorized

  • AI APPG Horizon Scanning

    I’m on a train heading back from a crowded committee room in the House of Lords for an AI APPG (all-party parliamentary group) evidence session on horizon scanning. AI events always draw a crowd, and I suspect the presence of Yann LeCun was a big attraction. If you haven’t heard of him, he’s a big…

  • Banning Social Media?

    Some Friday morning thoughts on banning social media for under-16s. I absolutely think we have a problem, and it is not just about under-16s. But I wonder if the mainstream media debate is in the wrong place. The government’s consultation is looking more broadly, which feels like the right thing to do, even though it…

  • Ofcomm’s Online Nation

    A report I missed at the end of last year, but well worth reading: Ofcom’s Online Nation Report 2025. It is a long read, with a lot of detailed data on internet use in the UK, including a stark reminder of the near-total dominance of Meta and Alphabet, and the power this gives them. There…

  • End of year reflections

    First, full disclosure – I started writing this for our Jisc AI team blog, but I ran out of time to get my colleagues’ input before the Christmas break! So I’m reviving my Substack for this one, as it’s purely my thoughts and reflections. As we approach the end of 2025, I thought I’d look…

  • Grok says … Elon Musk is the best.

    Something more light-hearted this Friday. You might have heard the reports that Grok on X was claiming Elon Musk is the best at everything – sport, romance, drinking etc. The reports say this was just the X version of Grok, and xAI claimed it was due to adverse prompting. So… I thought I’d give it…

  • Introversion and Energy

    A bit of a more personal Friday post from me on introversion and managing energy in a busy week. I originally posted this on LinkedIn – ’m not sure LinkedIn was necessarily the place for this – the running jokes about everyone being permanently excited and energised by their last or next event seem grounded…

  • Google’s new AI and the Future of Learning document.

    Some brief thoughts on Google’s new AI and the Future of Learning document. It doesn’t say much that we don’t know already, and of the major LLM developers, Google seem to be the ones making the most effort to create a model specifically focused on learning, with LearnLM. What I still don’t quite get is…

  • Marketing AI

    I’ve been thinking a lot about why I, and others who have been involved with AI for a long time, are often the ones questioning whether AI is really appropriate or useful for a given activity. On panels and in discussions, we can sometimes seem like the sceptics, while others are chomping at the bit…

  • Will any AI-generated music still be listened to decades from now

    Another Friday random thought post, this time on AI and creativity, and music specifically. This weekend is a far too infrequent music-playing one (geography gets in the way). We’re bringing together a few friends who have been making music together for over three decades. With one band, we’ll be playing our first album, released about…