Tag Archives: Dean LaBerge

Communications

The Rise of AI Writing Tools – What Does This Mean For the Writing Industry?

By Dean LaBerge, the Grizzly Gazette, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

There has been a lot of discussion in the media and plenty of articles online about artificial intelligence (AI) writing tools over the last couple of months, sparked in large part by OpenAI’s release of ChatGPT on November 30, 2022. OpenAI is a non-profit company that researches AI based in San Francisco, California. Their latest offering, ChatGPT, is an AI tool that interacts with the user in a conversational way, meaning users can ask questions and make requests in regular, everyday English (and other languages) instead of requiring the use of special commands. 

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Animals

Monarch Butterflies Listed As Endangered

Editor’s note: According to a University of Victoria study, the Vancouver Island population has been considered highly vulnerable since 2014, when it was listed as ‘threatened’ by the British Columbia Species at Risk Act. Cortes Island naturalist Gorge Sirk added, “there are no Monarchs here.”

By Dean LaBerge, The Grizzly Gazette, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

For the first time ever, the migratory monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus plexippus) has been added to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) “red list”, categorized as endangered. The IUCN was created in 1948 and is now recognized as the world’s largest and most diverse environmental network, with more than 1,400 member organizations and 15,000 experts. According to the IUCN website, they are effectively known as “the global authority on the status of the natural world and the measures needed to safeguard it.”

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