Grow Digital Skills

12/09/2025

Both the unfathomable potential and profound danger are spot on.

12/09/2025

Now, that winter is real in Vermont 🥶, USCRI Vermont is looking for donations for our littlest clients. We are collecting gently used or new winter children's clothing and warm blankets.
Thank you for your support and helping us keep our clients warm!

12/07/2025

No social media included.

12/07/2025

Holiday prompt below 🎄🚂❄️

12/06/2025

🎯

Locking down your data isn’t as simple as deleting a few accounts. Our tech writer tried to wipe himself from the internet. Here are the data-removal services he recommends if you want to try it yourself. https://nyti.ms/4pF7mIy

12/05/2025

Please help our neighbors, and thank you to USCRI Vermont for your work in our community.

USCRI Vermont has a need for these donated items for families. We accept items that are in very good condition or new.
Feel free to drop items off at 462 Hegeman Avenue, Suite 101, Colchester.
If you have any questions or would like to schedule the drop off, contact us at 802-654-1704

Thank you for making a difference!

12/05/2025

🎯 Thank you, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders for elevating these very real threats and helping to protect us here in Vermont and everywhere else.

12/04/2025

A world of digital resources awaits online, ready to help you unlock your potential and navigate technology with ease. Visit our website at www.growdigitalskills.org to access tools and workshops designed for all skill levels.

12/02/2025

Poll finds Vermonters wary of artificial intelligence despite widespread use - https://www.wcax.com/2025/11/27/poll-finds-vermonters-wary-artificial-intelligence-despite-widespread-use/

11/25/2025

Our friends at Fletcher Free Library are offering more free computer classes to our community; register via the link in the post.

Unlock the Digital World! 🔑

Don't let technology hold you back! Our Basics for Beginners series is designed to give you the confidence you need to connect with family, find resources, and explore online. Whether you're a total beginner or just need a refresher, we're here to help you get comfortable with computers in a supportive, friendly environment.

Call 802.865.7217, or click the link below for full details and to reserve your FREE spot: https://fletcherfree.libcal.com/event/15632820

We can't wait to see you!

11/25/2025

Take note.

Senators cited Reuters reporting that Meta itself estimated its platforms were involved in a third of all scams in the US

11/25/2025

This topic, as morbid and uncomfortable as it is, is not discussed enough. It's good to see some more of it in the news.

End-of-life planning already requires a lot of tough considerations. AI is adding a new dilemma, Kate Lindsay reported in 2024: Do you want to live forever as a chatbot? https://theatln.tc/4omBNuMu

“Instead of grieving a loved one by listening to their voicemails on repeat, you can now upload them to an AI audio program and create a convincing voice clone,” Lindsay writes. “Train a chatbot off a dead person’s emails or texts, and you can forever message a digital approximation of them.”

Potential pitfalls with this kind of technology abound. A voice clone can be made to say whatever its creator wants it to, while a chatbot is essentially improvising on what the deceased said in life, “including, potentially, ideas they’d abandoned or biases they’d overcome,” Lindsay writes. “Grief, too, gets complicated. Deathbots can be an unhealthy coping mechanism for the bereaved—a way to never have to fully acknowledge the death of a loved one.”

“What makes all of this especially fraught is that the dead person may not have given consent,” Lindsay writes. Some existing AI companies that specialize in deathbots are “designed for you to submit your data before your death, which allows for some agency in the process. But these policies are not standard across the digital-afterlife industry,” Lindsay continues. “Just like other apps that pester you with push notifications, a deathbot could keep sending reminders to message the AI replica of your mom. Or a company could threaten to discontinue access to a deathbot unless you fork up more money.” And with current artificial-intelligence laws, there’s not much legal recourse for the harmful ways in which someone could interact with a deathbot.

“Older people who are getting their affairs in order today are caught in the tricky position of having to make decisions based on deathbot technology as it exists in the present, even though the ramifications might play out in a very different world,” Lindsay continues. “Even if they manage to account for all of their possessions and plan out every end-of-life decision—a monumental task in its own right—their digital remains still might linger forever.”

🎨: Daniel Zender