Today's threads (a thread)
Inside: Bragging about replacing coders with AI is a sales-pitch; and more!
Archived at: https://pluralistic.net/2025/08/05/ex-princes-of-labor/
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Discussion
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@pluralistic
What’s funny to me is that the corner offices are probably the easiest employees to replace with an AI decision tree; just feed it MBA curricula.
@pluralistic
Much more honest way to frame #AI
"AI is only secondarily a technological phenomenon; it is primarily a financial phenomenon, hundreds of billions of dollars in investment capital in search of a return.
"The return on that capital only comes from one place: workers' wages."
Hey, German-speakers! Through a very weird set of circumstances, I ended up owning the rights to the German audiobook of my bestselling 2022 cryptocurrency heist technothriller Red Team Blues and now I'm selling DRM-free audio and ebooks, along with the paperback (all in German and English) on a Kickstarter that runs until August 11:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/red-team-blues-auf-deutsche-drm-freie
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Bragging about replacing coders with AI is a sales-pitch: The reality is more complex.
https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic/114976289268475221
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Hey look at this
* Xiaomi users stole their phones from the service center to unlock the bootloader https://xiaomitime.com/xiaomi-users-stole-their-phones-from-the-service-center-to-unlock-the-bootloader-58781/ (h/t Ishan)
* AI Agents have, so far, mostly been a dud https://garymarcus.substack.com/p/ai-agents-have-so-far-mostly-been (h/t Naked Capitalism)
* USAID Shield Shirts https://usaid-shirts.netlify.app/
* The Mothership Vortex: An Investigation Into the Firm at the Heart of the Democratic Spam Machine https://data4democracy.substack.com/p/the-mothership-vortex-an-investigation
* FULL HOPE SCHEDULE IS LIVE https://www.2600.com/content/full-hope-schedule-live
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#15yrsago Stuff: Oliver-Sacks-like account of pathological hoarders https://memex.craphound.com/2010/08/05/stuff-oliver-sacks-like-account-of-pathological-hoarders/
#10yrsago David Byrne explains the streaming music ripoff https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/02/opinion/sunday/open-the-music-industrys-black-box.html
#10yrsago The only furniture you need is a single smooth stone that reminds you of your mother https://web.archive.org/web/20150809132854/http://the-toast.net/2015/02/24/get-rid-clutter-live-abundantly/
#10yrsago WATCH: Elizabeth Warren rescues Planned Parenthood, excoriates misogynist GOP creeps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeilHs9kZ2g
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#10yrsago India’s porn ban collapses in less than 48 hours https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-33783539
#10yrsago Parenting and the Internet: the smarter, missing third way https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/aug/05/what-is-missing-from-the-kids-internet
#10yrsago Idaho court strikes down anti-whistleblower “ag-gag” law https://www.acluidaho.org/en/news/idaho-ag-gag-law-ruled-unconstitutional-federal-court
#10yrsago Actual questions from my Green Card questionnaire https://memex.craphound.com/2015/08/05/actual-questions-from-my-green-card-questionnaire/
#10yrsago Germany’s top prosecutor fired for bringing “treason” charge against Netzpolitik https://web.archive.org/web/20150807201032/https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/world/article/German-prosecutor-accuses-gov-t-of-meddling-in-6423563.php
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#5yrsago Qanon is magical thinking https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/05/behavioral-v-contextual/#magical-thinking
#5yrsago Trump wants to force you to invest in failing fossil fuel companies https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/05/behavioral-v-contextual/#crybabies
#5yrsago Cori Bush triumphs in Missouri https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/05/behavioral-v-contextual/#cori-bush
#5yrsago Qanon is an ARG https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/05/behavioral-v-contextual/#adrian-hon
#5yrsago GE's billion dollar tax-fraud https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/05/behavioral-v-contextual/#ge-fraud
#5yrsago Contextual ads can save media https://pluralistic.net/2020/08/05/behavioral-v-contextual/#contextual-ads
#1yrago Leveraged buyouts are not like mortgages https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/05/rugged-individuals/#misleading-by-analogy
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~8 more replies (not shown)
Yesterday's threads: AI software assistants make the hardest kinds of bugs to spot; and more!
https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic/114970954630564037
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My latest novel is "Picks and Shovels," a historical technothriller set in the Weird Era of the PC, about Ponzi schemes, techbros, and the dawn of enshittification:
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels
--
My next nonfiction book is "Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It," out from MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux on October 7:
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374619329/enshittification/
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My ebooks and audiobooks (from Tor Books, Head of Zeus, McSweeneys, Beacon, Verso and others) are for sale all over the net, but I sell 'em too, and when you buy 'em from me, I earn twice as much and you get books with no DRM and no license "agreements."
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