TechTakes

Robert Evans on Ziz and Rationalism:

https://bsky.app/profile/iwriteok.bsky.social/post/3ljmhpfdoic2h

https://bsky.app/profile/iwriteok.bsky.social/post/3ljmkrpraxk2h

New piece from Techdirt: Why Techdirt Is Now A Democracy Blog (Whether We Like It Or Not)

Strongly recommended reading overall, and strongly recommended you check out Techdirt - they've been doing some pretty damn good reporting on the current shitshow we're living through.

New thread from Ed Zitron, focusing on the general trashfire that is CoreWeave. Jumping straight to the money-shot, he noted how the company is losing money selling shovels in the gold rush:

You want my off-the-cuff prediction, CoreWeave will probably be treated as the Leyman Brothers of the 2020s, an unofficial mascot of everything wrong with Wall Street (if not the world) during the AI bubble.

Recommending a piece I ran across: I Used to Teach Students. Now I Catch ChatGPT Cheats

So many projects and small websites I’m aware of are being overtaxed by shitty LLM scrapers these days, it feels like an intentional attack. I guess the idea of ai can’t fail, it can only be failed; and so its profiteers must sabotage anything that indicates it’s not beneficial/necessary.

New piece from Brian Merchant: So the LA Times replaced me with an AI that defends the KKK

ZITRON DROPPED

I didn't know a16z was so devoted to developing new hires! Don't you just love to see it.

got a question (brought on by this). anyone here know if zitron's talked about his history of how he got to where he is atm wrt tech companies?

there's something that's often bothered me about some of his commentary. an example I could point to: some of the things that he comments on and "doesn't seem to get" (and has stated so) are .... not quite mysteries of the universe, just some specifics in dysfunction in the industry. but those things one could understand by, y'know, asking around a bit. (so in this example, I dunno if that's on him not engaging far/deeply enough in research, or just me being too-fucking-aware of broken industry bullshit. hard to get a read on it)

but things like what's highlighted in thread do leave open the possibility of other nonsense too

This just hit my inbox (and spurred me to unsubscribe from future BuiltIn slop) and man, so tired of this sort of mindless drivel. Like companies still have trouble with basic application and management processes, but magic robot will fix? Fucking hell.