EdTechSR Ep 352: AI Slop Tsunami

What this episode covers

Welcome to episode 352 (“AI Slop Tsunami”) of the EdTech Situation Room from May 22, 2025, where technology news meets educational analysis. This week, Dr. Jason Neiffer (aicentrist.com) and Dr. Wesley Fryer (wesfryer.com) unpack the rising tide of low-quality, AI-generated content flooding social feeds and classrooms—and share practical media-literacy moves educators can use right now (think SIFT-style verification, lateral reading, and modeling professional skepticism). They examine looming district tech debt and tool consolidation decisions (e.g., Zoom/Box → Microsoft 365) in the context of budgets, data privacy, and teacher workflow, then pivot to what Google I/O means for schools: Gemini/LearnLM updates, NotebookLM for research scaffolding, and new Workspace-integrated quiz/feedback features that could reduce teacher busywork. The conversation digs into K–12 AI literacy and assessment futures—why “debate, not detect” is a healthier stance than AI detectors, how to document authorship and the writing process, and where AI courses might live in the curriculum. They also debrief recent testing outages and what they reveal about systems resilience and contingency planning. Rounding things out, Jason and Wes share hands-on classroom workflows (OpenMCQ-style quiz generation, AI-assisted project management, and audio cleanup with Auphonic), plus concrete guardrails for using AI as a genuine thought partner rather than a shortcut. Our show was live-streamed and archived on YouTube Live via StreamYard.com and auto-archived to YouTube. We are now publishing from Substack too! Subscribe to us with your favorite podcast listening app, or directly on or https://www.youtube.com/@edtechSR. Follow our EdTechSR page on Facebook, mastodon.education/@edtechsr on Mastodon for updates, and join LIVE on Wednesday nights if you can. All show notes are available at edtechSR.com/links. 🔗 Links We Discussed * Meta Battles an ‘Epidemic of Scams’ as Criminals Flood Instagram and Facebook (WSJ, 15 May 2025) archive.ph link * Google NotebookLM made by Google describing all of the new released by Google at Google I/O * OpenAI and Jony Ive Open io * SIFT Prompt (via Mike Caufield) * PISA 2029 Media and Artificial Intelligence Literacy * Dear College Board: a note from K-12 Technology Leaders * Trimming the Edtech Fat: How Districts Are Streamlining Their Digital Ecosystems (EdSurge; 16 May 2025) * Authorship technologies: * Cursive cursivetechnology.com/ * www.scribbleai.com/ * Geeks of the Week: * Wes: Better Video Audio with Auphonic and Study Hall and [VIDEO] The “vibe coding” mind virus explained… (Fireship) * Jason: https://github.com/theJayTea/WritingTools 🧭 Links We Did NOT Discuss * Everything Google announced at I/O 2025: Gemini, Search, Android, and more (9 to 5 Google; 21 May 2025) * What are the Gemini app’s free, AI Pro, and AI Ultra limits (9 to 5 Google; 21 May 2025) * Project Starline becomes Google Beam, debuts real-time translation (9 to 5 Google; 20 May 2025) * So Many GSuite AI Stuff: Gmail getting personalized smart replies as Google Vids adds AI avatars (9 to 5 Google; 20 MAy 2025) * Google’s NotebookLM is getting Video Overviews (TechCrunch; 20 May 2025) * Future ChatGPT Could Store and Analyze Your Entire Digital Life (Digital Information World; 16 May 2025) * UT Unveils Proposed Guidelines for Responsible Use of AI in Teaching and Learning (UT News; 20 May 2025) * “AI First” * Duolingo will replace contract workers with AI (The Verge; 28 April 2025) * Going ‘AI first’ appears to be backfiring on Klarna and Duolingo (Fast Company; 12 May 2025) * A4L: A4L: An Architecture for AI-Augmented Learning (Arxiv; 8 May 2025) * Accessibility: AI for Accessible Education: Personalized Audio-Based Learning for Blind Students (Arxiv; 23 April 2025) * White House Issues Executive Order to Advance AI Education for American Youth (National Law Review: 5 May 2025) * CEOs of Microsoft, Salesforce, and Hundreds More Push for AI Training in High School (INC. Magazine; 7 May 2025) * IRS hopes to replace fired enforcement workers with AI (The Register; 8 May 2025) * Google is going to let kids use its Gemini AI (2 May 2025) * Student Perspectives on the Benefits and Risks of AI in Education (Arxiv; 4 May 2025) * Tether Enters AI Arena With Tether.AI (CoinDesk; 5 May 2025) * Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) Reportedly Changing Its Deal With ChatGPT (Yahoo Finance, 13 May 2025) * We need to prepare for ‘addictive intelligence’ (MIT Tech Review, 8 Aug 2024) * Stuff to Try: * Qwen Deep Research * LegoGPT | Article * Ideogram 3.0 * Microsoft launches Phi-4-Reasoning-Plus, a small, powerful, open weights reasoning model! (Future Beat; 1 May 2025) | Free Access via OpenRouter * Someone got an LLM running on a Commodore 64 from 1982, and it runs as well as you’d imagine (XDA; 4 May 2025) * Hugging Face releases a free Operator-like agentic AI tool (TechCrunch; 6 May 2025) Episode 352 is also available on YouTube. 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