MySociety asks Robots and councils: how is AI being used by local government – and what can we find out about it? Artificial Intelligence, as we know, is everywhere. For governments and public bodies, the possibilities for policy-making seem endless.…

An open working masterclass from Cumberland Council: Running a show and tell? ✅ Recording it so others can watch it? ✅ Publishing it on your intranet? ✅ The area of the intranet that anyone on the web can access? ✅…

Tom Loosemore – Prompt injection and the perils of leaving it to AI to handle AI: A petition filed to a Brazilian labour court contained hidden instructions for any AI used by the court to contest the petition only superficially,…

A new book from Public Digital: The Intelligence Era Organisation – Creating the Conditions to Thrive in the Age of AI. If you are a senior leader responsible for transformation and AI adoption in an established organisation, you’ll undoubtedly recognise…

The National Audit Office have published a Good practice guide for organisations using AI: This guide highlights key considerations for audit and risk assurance committees when overseeing the planning, deployment and scaling of artificial intelligence (AI) within public sector organisations.…

Following my linkage yesterday to the AI innovation in planning, Tom Loosemore weighs in on the unintended consequences: One worry? Were I to put my mind to the grift, I could easily build a subscription service that would allow anyone…

The BBC reports on Dorset Council testing AI to speed up planning applications: Artificial intelligence (AI) agents are being trialled in Dorset to help combat planning application delays. The team of agents is helping Dorset Council planning officers with minor…

ERP in local government

There is a lot of ERP talk at the moment, particularly in the light of LGR, and so I thought I would ask one of my robot friends to do some research into the state of things at the moment…

Jerry Fishenden shares a useful batch of thinking about AI, etc.

Tom Loosemore updates his classic definition of digital: The digital revolution is still made of 1s and 0s, but plenty has happened in the decade since 2016. Eras are defined by what’s emergent; the big new thing that’s being folded…

Thoughtful long read from Rachel Coldicutt: Perhaps this collective hangover will be the thing that makes the AI bubble burst – or at least, start it rolling slowly off the peak of inflated expectations. Lord knows, there is no form…

Jason Snell on the proliferation of vibe-coded Mac apps, and his experience of making one himself: The process of building the app reinforced something I’ve been thinking about for quite a while: coding is a specific skill, but it’s only…

Steph Gray on how he leant into using AI tools on a recent web build: It’s been the first project on which I’ve used significant amounts of AI support with the build. For me, for this kind of work, using…

Huh, this “using GenAI checklist” is pretty brutal, but thought-provoking: By using GenAI: ☐ I accept the models were trained on stolen data. ☐ I accept that the data was labeled by exploited workers. ☐ I accept the environmental costs…

Uber president and chief operating officer Andrew Macdonald, quoted in The Verge: We’re going to have to start talking about token consumption and the associated cost versus headcount,” said Macdonald. “So if you’re not actually able to draw a direct…

Some terrifying numbers in Ed Zitron’s post AI Is Too Expensive: But LLMs are too expensive! They cost too much to run, and said costs appear to increase linearly with revenues. The more a user uses a product, the more…

New guidance published on GOV.UK – AI, open code and vulnerability risk in the public sector: User research suggests that the primary driver of exploitation risk is the presence of weaknesses in systems – including unpatched vulnerabilities, insecure implementation, and…

Although much of what I post about ‘AI’ is sceptical, I am in fact a daily user. Whether it is for helping with technical matters, or sorting out my thinking on some topic or other, I find Google’s Gemini particularly…

LOTI’s Eddie Copeland – Putting in place the enabling conditions for AI: Many organisations seem to be falling for the same mistake we’ve been trying to undo with digital government for the past 15 years: thinking that this is just…

Kristin at Newark and Sherwood District Council shares Discussing Practical AI for Projects: The effectiveness of AI ultimately depends on the quality of data and the proficiency of its users. It was a valuable opportunity to exchange perspectives, and many…