#AcademicRunPlaylist - 8/30/24

It was another nice day in Boston, and while I had a bunch of meetings today I was still able to fit in a talk and a book for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was a great talk by Shayne Longpre on the rapid decline of the AI data commons at PLAMADISO – Platforms, Markets, and the Digital Society. Longpre discusses the longitudinal changes in robots.txt files over time, showing that websites have rapidly changed to forbit crawling of sites for AI training purposes, and that this is similarly mirrored in ToS changes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0iGBl-zoAs

Last was the incredible book "Coffeeland" by Augustine Sedgewick, which unsurprisingly covers the growth and development of the coffee industry. Using the development of El Salvador's coffee industry as a jumping off point, Sedgewick convincingly demonstrates how coffee production is inextricably linked to colonialism, technological development, and accidents of history. Sedgewick brings deep research and a holistic approach to this instructive topic, and his extremely engaging writing style makes the entire book that much more enjoyable.

The importance of scientific advances in the mid-1800s was particularly interesting to me, with the discovery of the law of thermodynamics and the fascination with measurement spilling over to the workplace and society more broadly. The examination of its role in facilitating the expansion of scientific management and caloric expenditure measurement, first in the lab and then put in practice on plantations through an elaborate cafeteria and food production system, echoes even today in free corporate lunches. The importance of the human choices made during this period that dramatically shaped working conditions for plantation workers and the growth of the coffee industry was shocking and incredible.

Overall, this book not only highlights the genesis of the industry that produces a staple of the global diet. It also underlines how economic demand and concern for profit alone can create horrible societal outcomes that are hidden from consumer markets. There is so much more covered in this essential book, I can't highly recommend it enough. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/316748/coffeeland-by-augustine-sedgewick/