This Machine Kills

We talk about the booming market for – and community organizing against – landlord technologies that use invasive surveillance to terrorize tenants and automate evictions. In addition to discussing the broader political economy and social toxicity of this shit, we also introduce a new psycho into the canon. Some stuff we reference: ••• Automating gentrification: Landlord technologies and housing j...

We are joined by Dan McQuillan to discuss his great new book Resisting AI. As Jathan wrote in a blurb for the book: “With analytical and moral clarity, McQuillan makes the case for recognising the radical politics of AI and meeting its goose step march head-on.” We get deep into an excellent discussion spanning the political economy and political epistemology of artificial intelligence. Meanwhile,...

We dig deep into Effective Altruism and Longtermism, laying out the origins, beliefs, and actions of this ideological moral system and the networks of influence and wealth that it’s plugged into. Along the way we critique the extreme logical conclusions it leads to, the extremely simpleminded fairy tales it’s based on, and the extremist group of moral zealots, useful idiots, and cynical bullshiter...

[We are unlocking this episode to share the interview with the main feed. Apologies for the feedback from Noah's audio causing a slight digital buzz when he talks, Jereme cleaned it up as best he could.] Ed is joined by reporter Noah Lanard to talk about his recent profile of Peter Thiel’s apostle: Blake Masters. We track the origins and development of his ideology: from his childhood flirtation w...

We melt our brains discussing two reality tv shows that are taking copaganda to the next level. First up is Ring Nation, a new show produced by Amazon-owned MGM Studios that’s like America’s Funniest Home Videos for a ubiquitous surveillance society. Next is Hunted, a new Australian show based on a UK series that’s like a mix of The Amazing Race + Live PD + 24. I wish this was all fake. I wish thi...

Based on Amazon’s recent acquisitions of One Medical and iRobot—just the latest in a shopping spree of vertical integration—we analyze how these seemingly disparate things all plug into Amazon’s broader strategy for “ambient computing.” In which data from a vast variety of sources and streams are combined and integrated into a range of different services. In which we are always plugged into Amazon...

Ed is joined by reporter Noah Lanard to talk about his recent profile of Peter Thiel’s apostle: Blake Masters. We track the origins and development of his ideology: from his childhood flirtation with liberalism(?) to his college libertarianism and deeper integration into Thiel’s network of fascists eager to seize control of the GOP and Silicon Valley. Read the article: https://www.motherjones.com/...

We dig into a convoluted and confused scheme for people selling shares in their future to venture capitalists, which pushes logics of hyper-financialization in even more perverse directions—all proposed by two brothers who are the epitome of a dumb guy’s idea of smart guys. Article we discuss: ••• Is Selling Shares in Yourself the Way of the Future? https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/01/is...

At long last, we dive into the last chapter of The Dawn of Everything by Graeber and Wengrow. We reflect on this odyssey of a book, pulling out its major themes, discussing the baseline freedoms that are essential for society, considering the nihilistic contradictions inherent to the Enlightenment view of humanity, looking back on how we got stuck in static social relations and dead end political...

We are joined by Jörg Tittel, creator of the new video game The Last Worker, which is part social satire, part interactive narrative, part adventure game. We discuss the ideas, story, design, and production behind the game where players take on the role of the last human worker in an otherwise fully automated fulfillment center the size of Manhattan that is operated by Jüngle—a near future version...

Now it’s time to get into the real analysis of fintech as laid out by Saule Omarova’s work. We walk through the dominant regulatory approach to financial markets that came from the New Deal; how the 1980s is the true origin of the fintech revolution; how the secondary financial markets have taken over the whole system; how new technologies focused on making micro-level transactions faster, easier,...

We set up and begin discussing a paper that can be described as a Rosetta Stone for how to analyze the development, logics, mechanics, and impacts of fintech innovations from the 1980s onward — and the regulatory regime for financial markets that traces back to the New Deal. This paper is dense in the best way, so it demands (and deserves) a lot of focused time/attention. This episode establishes...

We dive back into chapter 11 – Full Circle – of The Dawn of Everything by Graeber and Wengrow. We revisit the Indigenous critique of how human civilization develops and where the political values underlying modern human societies originate. First outlined in the beginning of the book, we now further flesh out the Indigenous critique and drive home its key conclusions. Subscribe to hear more analys...

{For this week we're unlocking a classic episode} We talk about the absurdities of proptech – or the real estate technology sector – which is jam packed with out-of-control purchasing by house-flipping algorithms powered by automated valuation models that lead to balance sheets filled with liabilities and it’s all fuelled by way too much free-flowing capital. In other words, a classic recipe for d...

Paris Marx is back for part two of our discussion about their new book Road to Nowhere: What Silicon Valley Gets Wrong About the Future of Transportation. This time we dig deeper into the winding history of the electric vehicle and why today’s model of electrification without collectivization is not going to solve our problems—just cause new ones. ••• Road to Nowhere | Paris Marx: https://www.vers...

Dear friend of the show, Paris Marx, has an excellent new book just out from Verso called Road to Nowhere: What Silicon Valley Gets Wrong About the Future of Transportation. Paris is back on the show to dive into the book’s historical, grounded, critical analysis with us. This is part 1, with part 2 coming out on the patreon feed later this week. ••• Road to Nowhere | Paris Marx: https://www.verso...

In this real chill episode, the boys get loose, lay back, and just chat. We cover dental work, drug nerds, and oh yeah, that time Jereme got stabbed in Mississippi days after 9/11 for making a joke. Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our premium episodes every week! patreon.com/thismachinekills Grab fresh new TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/ Hosted by Jathan S...

We have a special investigation from Professor Ed, who takes us on a journey through the history and development of innovation policy and venture capital in China. We begin with the massive government Torch Program that, starting in the 1980s, set about engineering a national innovation sector on a scale never seen before. Then in the 1990s we see China begin liberalizing its markets, opening up f...

Jathan is back from Sweden where he was giving a keynote at a smart cities conference. For this episode, Jathan delivers his keynote here — “State-as-a-Platform” – Sovereignty and Capital in Smart Governance – which is followed by a rousing discussion about the relations between agency and structure, doom and hope, positioning and maneuvering. Subscribe to hear more analysis and commentary in our...

We are joined by David Gerard – longtime critic of blockchain, even before it was cool – to discuss the experience of staring into the crypto abyss and having it stare back into you. Follow, read, and support David here: ••• Twitter: https://twitter.com/davidgerard ••• Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/book/ ••• Libra Shrugged: https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockch...

We dive back into chapter 10 – Why the State Has No Origin – of The Dawn of Everything by Graeber and Wengrow. And finish up our discussion of how different forms of social power based on violence/sovereignty, information/administration, charisma/heroic politcs all come together in different combinations at different places and points, with some features exaggerated over others, to produce radical...

We’re joined by Olivier Jutel to talk about a fantastic paper he wrote on blockchain imperialism in the Pacific. We discuss how blockchain projects and crypto entrepreneurs are partnering with the US State Department and contributing to the geopolitical agenda of American hegemony. This is all part of the Pacific Ideology – a long history of treating the Pacific islands as a colonial frontier for...

We dive into chapter 10 – Why the State Has No Origin – of The Dawn of Everything by Graeber and Wengrow. This is a massive chapter that gets deep into analyzing the features of social power and development of state institutions. We see how control of violence, control of information, and control of charisma all come together in different combinations at different places and points, with some feat...

We’re joined by Ben Tarnoff—author of Internet for the People; co-founder of Logic Magazine—to do some historical materialism on the internet. Ben has a great new book coming out that traces the political economic development of the internet, from its origins as a military network to its privatization via wholesale handover to a telecom oligopoly to its existence today as an archipelago of shoppin...

We go from talking about how AI/ML research is dominated by the resources, interests, and tradeoffs of “top labs.” Then discuss how our algorithmic agents become active participants in human culture but in ways that can be unexpected and unknowable. Together these conditions are producing a world that is far more weird, bizarre and unsettling than anybody intended. Less George Orwell, more Phillip...