My latest, for @techpolicypress.bsky.social
When I read Alex Karp’s book last year, I thought it should’ve been a tweet. Now Palantir has turned it into a tweet-length manifesto, which could’ve just been a picture of a MAGA hat.
Karp is… not a subtle thinker.
www.techpolicy.press/palantirs-ma...
Anand when a Canadian woman is killed by a random gunman in Mexico: I will move mountains to discover everything related.
Anand when a Canadian man is killed by Israel in Lebanon: Damn this sucks. Let's make sure we all stay cool in the future.
"Users can choose between light, medium, and heavy sabotage modes depending on how closely their boss is observing the process, and the agent rewrites the material into generic, non-actionable language that would produce a less useful AI stand-in."
Heavy sabotage mode, let's go
Perplexity’s CEO is just the latest tech leader to tell the public their jobs will be sacrificed on the altar of the glorious AI future.
It’s a compelling narrative, but it distracts us from the real impact of AI: not to take the human out of the loop, but to take away their power and cut their pay
The Harpercollins cover for Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff's 'Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed.'
Quinn Slobodian and Ben Tarnoff's *Muskism: A Guide for the Perplexed* seeks to describe the ideology that gave rise to Elon Musk, the social forces that gave rise to that ideology, and the terrible future that ideology seeks to bring about:
www.harpercollins.com/products/mus...
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tired: its the Department of Defense (est. 1947)
hired: its the War Department (1789-1947)
wired: we're bringing back rum rations, handsaw amputations, trench foot, latrines made of pure cholera, and other manly things of that nature
Israeli soldiers and settlers kill 11 Palestinians across Gaza/West Bank
Israeli soldiers and settlers kill 11 Palestinians across Gaza/West Bank https://aje.news/ngyuez
Man, when you compare the bravery of every day Minnesotans to the overpaid cops it’s astounding
A clip from The New York Times reads: "But only the entities that officially paid the tariffs are eligible to recover that money. That means that the fuller universe of people affected by Mr. Trump’s policies — including millions of Americans who paid higher prices for the products they bought — are not able to apply for direct relief. The extent to which consumers realize any gain hinges on whether businesses share the proceeds, something that few have publicly committed to do. Some have started to band together in class-action lawsuits in the hopes of receiving a payout."
The average American family paid $1,700 in tariffs last year, according to the bipartisan Congressional Joint Economic Committee. Few will ever see any of that money back. The refunds will go to companies, if doled out at all. What a joke.
‘it’s not the fucking babadook’ well right because the babadook is just a made up person. the slimeball voice that lives in your computer and tells your kid the right way to tie a noose is unfortunately very real
"Elon Musk cooked his brain online. Marc Andreessen and others seemingly struggled with being in virtual spaces where their ideas and status were challenged, and rewired their political beliefs as a form of cope."
Good deep dive into tech broligarchy madness:
“Cultural genocide” is genocide.
Easy solution: Ban these gluttonous resource hogs.
Even during the "ceasefire", the Israelis are still demolishing entire villages in southern Lebanon with armored bulldozers. In fact, civilian contractors hired by the army receive pay which is based on the number of buildings destroyed.
Schumer voted against blocking the sale of these bulldozers.
A pregnant worker at Amazon was denied medically necessary accommodations, and then fired for being 90 minutes over her allowable absence time after leaving work in an ambulance
Schulman's compensation last year was $34 million. He believes 20-30% unemployment is almost at hand, and his solution is "more education and reskilling."
I don't think he understands what it would be like when a population armed to the teeth has 20-30% unemployment and no social safety net.
New, from me: Take the Palantir manifesto seriously, if not literally.
It reveals that our tech philosopher kings want public money, but without public accountability. This creates a dilemma for governments unaligned with its techno-fascist vision. 🧵
donmoynihan.substack.com/p/palantir-w...
this is awful for many reasons, but IHE's framing suggests a frictionless market for academic labor where tenured faculty who dislike the terms of their job can leave for "bluer pastures" anytime. This recodes a functionally collapsed market for humanistic expertise in terms of free market fantasy
As a former StoryCorps facilitator, this is fucking disgusting.
End the project already, Dave.
You created a good model: you encouraged people to sit and do oral history for 20 yrs.
Turning StoryCorps into a surveillance capitalism nightmare is not worth the money to keep the project going.
New from me: “When AI-driven algorithms are deployed to set prices “just for you” as a consumer or to determine the best wage “just for you” as a worker, the corporate objective is not your best interest. Not by a long shot.”
www.governing.com/workforce/ai...
A bust of Nanny of the Maroons
On this day in 1740, the British are forced to sign a treaty with Jamaican maroon leader Nanny.
anticolonialhistory.com/event/333/
British universities paid security firm to ‘spy’ on pro-Palestine students… Firm, has been paid at least 440,000 pounds ($594,000) by universities since 2022. www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/...
IDF commanders told Haaretz that southern Lebanon is being demolished “like Gaza.” The declared goal is to prevent civilians from being able to return.
Both are war crimes punishable under international law.
www.haaretz.com/israel-news/...
Extremely normal and fine for a company to put this in a public statement
This looks so good!
"A sweeping and revelatory history of the hidden tradition of Jewish thinkers who opposed Zionism, from Pulitzer Prize winner Benjamin Moser."
bookshop.org/p/books/anti...
April Wilkens has spent 27 years behind bars for killing her ex-fiancé — after years of abuse, stalking and calls to the police that went nowhere.
Her story underscores a legal experiment in Oklahoma, where a new law called the Oklahoma Survivors’ Act offers prisoners like her a chance at freedom.
literally every day my wife or I go outside with our daughter people go out of their way to be friendly, offer aid or a kind word, no matter where we've traveled. it's nice to remember that hostility as default mode of interaction is not destiny, much as it benefits some to pretend it is
some things about becoming a parent are radicalizing in ways I expected - e.g being reminded viscerally how screwed we'd all be if childcare and other care work disappeared. but other things are radicalizing in ways I didn't - like experiencing constant spontaneous solidarity in ways big and small
