File another one under “what could possibly go wrong”. From the article:

“Statewatch says data from people not convicted of any criminal offence will be used as part of the project, including personal information about self-harm and details relating to domestic abuse. Officials strongly deny this, insisting only data about people with at least one criminal conviction has been used.”

It will be interesting to watch the gymnastics to try to get the in compliance with the EU AI Act that comes into force in August. The act specifically deals with safety and potential harm through the risks of AI.

I’ve been friends with Ash Hynie for over 10 years ever since we started hanging out in NYC working in QA engineering and developer advocacy. She has since gone on to greatness through various consulting gigs and heading up the DEI program at Credit Karma to now founding CountrPT, an AI powered career management platform.

Check out our chat about career development, performative DEI, being a good manager, and a lot about how to look out for yourself in today’s job market…enjoy!

On the Dangers of Stochastic Parrots: Can Language Models Be Too Big? Timnit Gebru Emily Bender Culture is More Than a Mindset Agile Testing Days Ministry of Testing Angela Davis

A quick message for those struggling with the mudslide of artificial intelligence mania and feeling like they are missing out or question the validity of claims being made by AI fanboys.

It is entirely possible to view AI in software testing critically and not have some form of syndrome the AI fanboy club would suggest is wrong with you. In fact, it is absolutely a requirement of the testing community to look at any claim with scepticism, as IME that is a large part of our job as testers.

Yes, things feel like they are moving very fast right now but I can assure you, no serious person in the software testing industry is dismissing the impact or implications of AI in testing.  And for some practical advice to let you know you’re not crazy, here are some serious folks I am following closely on the frontlines: Dagmar Monett, Timnit Gebru, and Ed Zitron who recently wrote this in his great piece “The Phony Comforts of AI Optimism”:

“Criticism — skepticism — takes a certain degree of bravery, or at least it does so when you make fully-formed arguments.”

It’s getting wild out there, folks! I thought we had some way to go before the AI LinkedIn lunatics completely lost the plot, but I read a post today that left me feeling like John Oliver trying to describe the political climate, “Do you see that? Way up there? Way up there above the clouds? That’s ROCK BOTTOM! And we are currently way down here…”

It’s 2025, and I just had a conversation with a global financial services company where we discussed software testing in terms of <gasp> checking and testing, tacit and explicit knowledge, test automation in testing, and the “Weinberg-ian” (is that thing??) principle of human-centric testing…

Guess what? They loved it and said it put testing and what it can (and cannot do), in a perspective they’ve never had before. Go figure…

“Learn from the mistakes of others. You can never live long enough to make them all yourself.” – Groucho Marx

A mistake I see a lot of new (and not so new) managers make is worrying about their team members looking for new work or actively/passively interviewing. IME people leave organisations mostly because of bad management (lack of integrity, abuse, no transparency, low trust), but it’s also really hard to know exactly why they are leaving.

Obviously someone actively looking for a new job is a pretty good heuristic that it’s time to review your operation, but it’s not always a bad thing for either you or the person considering leaving.

I have never been threatened by people testing the market or actively looking for new work, in fact I encourage it – here’s why:

This is exactly the type of abuse of untested technology that is virtually impossible to unwind once it’s been deployed.

The knock on effect will be felt in communities and systems far beyond its intended use, because if you think this won’t target the most vulnerable and be expanded well beyond this initial brief, you haven’t been paying attention.

From the article: “The effort — which includes AI-assisted reviews of tens of thousands of student visa holders’ social media accounts — marks a dramatic escalation in the U.S. government’s policing of foreign nationals’ conduct and speech.”

Special thanks to all the AI in testing fanboy enablers who equate critical thinking and valid concerns about safety or harm with being a luddite. This is about to get a lot worse…

A couple of weeks ago on my podcast, I was talking to James Bach and we were discussing the language of testing and what I refer to as “word policing”. Well, I think I might have caused some confusion based on the feedback and comments I’ve been getting, so I wanted to state my view.

To be clear, I think imprecision in the language we use to talk about testing is a BIG problem in our industry, and I am completely aligned on this with James (and the CDT/RST community). Where we might have a potential difference in opinion is WHEN to tackle this problem with clients.

As part of my effort to publish my back catalogue of recordings on the software testing business, I’ve added to the QR Podcast some old stuff including roundtables, conference talks, and guest spots on the odd testing show. It’s been pretty interesting listening to them and hearing how much some of my opinions/approaches have changed and what’s stayed the same. Enjoy!

Note: The quality of the audio on some of these was pretty sketchy, and I’ve tried to fix the sound and limit the background noise as much as possible as the content and participants are extremely good and worth a listen…

As a regular consumer of everything “testing industry”, I’m always sceptical when something new comes out, but I’m really enjoying the Engineering Quality Podcast . I’ve known Alessandra Moreira for years and she’s an expert at this (Royalee Martin and Veronika Pliusnina co-host), so would recommend checking them out.