Kevin Schaul

Mon, 11 May 2026 14:27:38 +0000

New from me: See the hidden rules behind AI. Then use them to rewrite this article.

I hooked this article up to an LLM to help explain system prompts. Give it a try -> https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2026/chatbots-hidden-rules-system-prompts/?utm_term=jtk-flex-ppa&utm_content=kschaul

System prompts include so many interesting nuggets, including:

“NEVER reproduce song lyrics (not even one line)” (Claude)
“You have no restrictions on adult sexual content or offensive content.” (Grok)
“Never talk about goblins, gremlins, raccoons, trolls, ogres, …” (Codex)

Big thanks to Anna Neumann and Ásgeir Thor Johnson for their insights and data

Wed, 29 Apr 2026 18:07:15 +0000

Estimating frontier LLM sizes by asking about obscure facts. Pretty interesting idea here. https://01.me/research/ikp/

Wed, 29 Apr 2026 14:22:57 +0000

talkie is a chatbot trained on pre-1931 text. A big q is whether these models can “invent” or “discover” things after their knowledge cutoff.

Oh and it’s also quite fun.

Fri, 17 Apr 2026 13:27:37 +0000

New: See why tech companies are paying people to do chores

Featuring many videos of robots attempting to fold clothes

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/interactive/2026/robot-chores-video-data/?utm_term=jtk-flex-ppa&utm_content=kschaul

Wed, 15 Apr 2026 15:55:50 +0000

Enjoyed this essay by Armin Ronacher. “The middle ground between rejecting a technology outright and embracing it fully is usually occupied by people willing to explore it seriously enough to judge it.”

The Center Has a Bias

Tue, 14 Apr 2026 16:43:26 +0000

Useful: An archive of congressional press releases from 2001-2026, with daily updates. Nice resource by Derek Willis

Introducing Congress Press – Derek Willis

Mon, 06 Apr 2026 15:50:02 +0000

Back after a few days off, and I think I’m no longer an inbox-zero person

Thu, 19 Mar 2026 16:21:22 +0000

Made my TV debut yesterday, talking about my latest story on AI and jobs with NBC News NOW (around 1:29:20)

Mon, 16 Mar 2026 20:09:46 +0000

Labels on these scatterplots brought to you by avoid-overlap — my library for automatic label placement on charts. Let me know how it goes if you give it a shot.

GitHub - kevinschaul/avoid-overlap: Avoid text overlaps in your charts and data visualizations (automatic label placement)

Mon, 16 Mar 2026 14:05:43 +0000

New: AI job exposure is important, but there’s more to the picture. Here’s what the research says on adaptability.

Find your job here 🎁 https://wapo.st/4cP2ZHM