We discuss the supermarkets for data – giant grocery chains like Kroger have created powerful capacities for data extraction and monetization. This forces us to expand our analysis of data surveillance beyond the usual suspects in big tech and reckon with the fact that data capital is not a thing that can be excised from the political economic system, but is now an essential component of that whole system’s operations.

Stuff we reference:
••• Forget Milk and Eggs: Supermarkets Are Having a Fire Sale on Data About You https://themarkup.org/privacy/2023/02/16/forget-milk-and-eggs-supermarkets-are-having-a-fire-sale-on-data-about-you
••• “Out Of Control”: Dozens of Telehealth Startups Sent Sensitive Health Information to Big Tech Companies https://themarkup.org/pixel-hunt/2022/12/13/out-of-control-dozens-of-telehealth-startups-sent-sensitive-health-information-to-big-tech-companies
••• Now for sale: Data on your mental health https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/02/13/mental-health-data-brokers/
••• Senators Launch Inquiry into Telehealth Companies for Tracking and Monetizing Personal Data https://themarkup.org/pixel-hunt/2023/02/07/senators-launch-inquiry-into-telehealth-companies-for-tracking-and-monetizing-personal-data 

Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our premium episodes every week! https://www.patreon.com/thismachinekills   

Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (www.twitter.com/jathansadowski) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (www.twitter.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (www.twitter.com/braunestahl)

234. Supermarket Data Sweep!

We've unlocked this episode for the free feed.
It's been a long time since we’ve seen a good old fashioned bank run lead to the collapse of a venerable financial institution, but leave it to Silicon Valley to rediscover something old and call it new again. We are joined by Brian Merchant — LA Times tech columnist and author of Blood in the Machine — for a post-mortem on Silicon Valley Bank, breakdown its events and effects, and hold Ed to account for his incitements to violence against the most marginalized and traumatized people of them all: venture capitalists. 

••• Brian’s column: https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-03-12/column-silicon-valley-bank-is-broken-because-silicon-valley-is-broken
••• Brian’s book: https://www.littlebrown.com/titles/brian-merchant/blood-in-the-machine/9780316487740/
••• Brian’s twitter: https://twitter.com/bcmerchant

Some stuff we reference
••• The Incredible Tantrum Venture Capitalists Threw Over Silicon Valley Bank | Ed Ongweso Jr. https://slate.com/technology/2023/03/silicon-valley-bank-rescue-venture-capital-calacanis-sacks-ackman-tantrum.html
••• Silicon Valley Bank profit squeeze in tech downturn attracts short sellers https://www.ft.com/content/0387e331-61b4-4848-9e50-04775b4c3fa7
••• Startup Bank Had a Startup Bank Run https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2023-03-10/startup-bank-had-a-startup-bank-run
••• How Bad Was the Silicon Valley Bank Bailout? https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/14/opinion/silicon-valley-bank-bailout.html 

Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our premium episodes every week! https://www.patreon.com/thismachinekills   

Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (www.twitter.com/jathansadowski) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (www.twitter.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (www.twitter.com/braunestahl)

*Unlocked* – 241. Euthanasia of Silicon Valley Bank (ft. Brian Merchant)

Charles and Alex worry that A.I. listicles may threaten the integrity of Eric Alper's prompts. Plus there is news of an 8-year-old rap god emerging in Pakistan. Fortune Kit on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/fortunekit

154 - Eric Alper Cheat Sheet

"Unvaxxed sperm is the new bitcoin." A statement we couldn't help but look into. Are there online markets doubling as dating platforms to "exchange" unvaccinated sperm? Is one of them run by a dissident Chinese billionaire? Is another the scheme of an insanely racist guy called "Giorgio Della Pietra" living out of Thailand? Who can say. Except Liv, who went on an unadvised exploration.

Subscribe for $5 a month to get an extra episode of QAA every week + access to ongoing series like 'Manclan' and 'Trickle Down': http://www.patreon.com/QAnonAnonymous

Liv Agar: https://linktr.ee/livagar

Music by Pontus Berghe. Editing by Corey Klotz.

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Premium Episode 207: Unvaxxed Sperm (Sample)

It’s a fan cam episode for our favorite tech columnist, Brian Merchant, who had two pieces come out recently that are back-to-back bangers. First is about why all the people making and selling AI keep talking about being afraid of their own creations. It’s Frankenstein meets sorcerer's apprentice but as a marketing strategy for their own power (and their unique ability to control that power). Second is about what all these people should actually be afraid of. As history shows us, there is more than one way to crash a computer.

Article we discuss
••• Afraid of AI? The startups selling it want you to be | Brian Merchant https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-03-31/column-afraid-of-ai-the-startups-selling-it-want-you-to-be
••• Silicon Valley elites are afraid. History says they should be | Brian Merchant: https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-03-24/column-how-afraid-should-silicon-valley-be 

Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our premium episodes every week! https://www.patreon.com/thismachinekills   

Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (www.twitter.com/jathansadowski) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (www.twitter.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (www.twitter.com/braunestahl)

245. Shook Ones (Tech Style)

Matt Christman goes off live on http://www.twitch.tv/chapotraphouse
Topics: papal elections, Mormonism and frontier, anti-Masonic party, collective action, nuclear weapons

Grill Stream

244 - Always Rootin' Never Tootin' 03.31.23

We go in-depth on an article that has not received the attention it is due: an investigation into an automated welfare fraud system in the Netherlands, which is based on unprecedented access to the machine learning model, its training data, and operational handbooks. Through a deep analysis of the systems mechanics, this investigation goes beyond validating what we already know to be true about how such algorithms discriminate. It shows how these systems are complex and targeted in their discrimination, while also being simplistic and arbitrary in their decisions.

Articles we discuss 
••• Inside the Suspicion Machine https://www.wired.com/story/welfare-state-algorithms/ 
••• Welfare surveillance system violates human rights, Dutch court rules https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/feb/05/welfare-surveillance-system-violates-human-rights-dutch-court-rules 

Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our premium episodes every week! https://www.patreon.com/thismachinekills   

Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (www.twitter.com/jathansadowski) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (www.twitter.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (www.twitter.com/braunestahl)

247. Automated Welfare – the Simple Violence of Complex Machines

The Hunger Games Part 1 Chapters 4 and 5

We've made it to the Capitol! But first we've got to talk about something very important: The 7th Saga, a SNES RPG with barely any merch. We've also got our first Hunger Games listicle. Our chapters this week are full of dizzying ups and downs: brutally honest characterization and heartfelt drama alongside ridiculous action movie antics and some puzzling portrayals of a society so depraved it... wears a lot of makeup? Hmm. We chat through our feelings on whether or not the story is portraying cruel opinions a character has or simply espousing them itself, wonder aloud what synthetic fire is, and beg to know what the other costumes in the ceremony were.

SHHG! Episode 3: The Jay Gatsby Who Was On Fire

We get into Evgeny Morozov’s latest essay on the geopolitical interests and military neoliberalism that’s really driving the AI arms race. Morozov traces today’s developments back to the Cold War – not just as a metaphor, but by showing how many of the same people and institutions are still in positions of power. To understand the America vs China framing of technological competition, which is now so dominant and two-dimensional in the discourse about AI, we must see how it is stoked by people like Eric Schmidt and Gilman Louie and their  networks of influence, capital, and ideology.

Article we discuss:
••• AI: the key battleground for Cold War 2.0? | Evgeny Morozov https://mondediplo.com/2023/05/02china 

Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our premium episodes every week! https://www.patreon.com/thismachinekills   

Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (www.twitter.com/jathansadowski) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (www.twitter.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (www.twitter.com/braunestahl)

253. The Cold War Origins and Future of Today’s AI

This week we got bogged down in trying to answer some of the biggest ethical questions of our day

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Episode 292: Advice Column Filibuster

TRIGGER WARNING: BEASTIALITY, PEDOPHILIA

We discuss Cornel West's 2024 presidential campaign.

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Grimace's Birthday

A podcast about technology and political economy /// Agitprop against innovation and capital /// Hosted by Jathan Sadowski and Edward Ongweso Jr., Produced by Jereme Brown /// Hello friends and enemies

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247. Automated Welfare – the Simple Violence of Complex Machines

This Machine Kills