This Machine Kills

It’s TMK Live in Vegas! Well, in real life recording live to tape in the same room for the first time ever. We talk about our adventures in Las Vegas. A city that is constituted by many forms of totally controlled, perfectly designed prisons. A city that is representative of the many forms of surplus in capitalism: of luxury and money, of misery and people.

Some stuff we reference

••• Addiction by Design: Machine Gambling in Las Vegas https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691160887/addiction-by-design

••• A Nation of the Walking Dead https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-nation-of-the-walking-dead/

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

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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)

We are joined by Cory Doctorow and Rebecca Giblin – authors of the excellent new book Chokepoint Capitalism – to discuss how creative labor markets are tightly squeezed on all sides by massive monopolies / monopsonies that create chokepoints to trap suppliers, trap consumers, and trap all the profits in markets for books, music, movies, and every other artistic endeavour. Cory and Rebecca then detail a long list of tactics and solutions for breaking the capitalist stranglehold over cultural production.

••• Follow Cory: https://twitter.com/doctorow

••• Follow Rebecca: https://twitter.com/rgibli

••• Buy the book: http://www.beacon.org/Chokepoint-Capitalism-P1856.aspx

••• Support the kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/chokepoint-capitalism-an-audiobook-amazon-wont-sell

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

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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)

We cruise through recent stories about how our surveillance society continues developing. We’ve got biometric fingerprint scanners to enter the bathrooms at a high school ••• police have decided the heat on facial recognition has finally died down and have begun lifting moratoriums and expanding its usage ••• an insurance company and tech company buy large stakes in a home security company, in the prologue to every anarcho-capitalist sci-fi story ••• and powerful, price, geolocation trackers have become cheap, plentiful, and small, much to the totally predictable detriment of stalking and abuse victims.

Some stuff we reference:

••• Sydney high school uses fingerprint technology to stop vandalism in toilets https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-09-06/moorebank-high-school-fingerprints-students-going-to-toilet/101410544

••• First, they banned facial recognition. Now they're not so sure https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/05/tech/facial-recognition-bans-reversed/index.html

••• Ring the Alarm https://www.coverager.com/ring-the-alarm-2022

••• ‘I was just really scared’: Apple AirTags lead to stalking complaints https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/jan/20/apple-airtags-stalking-complaints-technology

••• ‘I didn’t want it anywhere near me’: how the Apple AirTag became a gift to stalkers https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/sep/05/i-didnt-want-it-anywhere-near-me-how-the-apple-airtag-became-a-gift-to-stalkers

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

Grab TMK gear: www.bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast

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)

We are joined by Justin Roczniak—of the excellent engineering disasters podcast, Well There’s Your Problem—to talk about the potential freight rail strike that has been brewing for a long time and near-future scenarios for the supply chain. We discuss the horrid labor conditions in the industry and the scourge of Precision Scheduled Railroading, a system of management that has transformed the entire railroad sector so it serves one god: The Operating Ratio.

follow Justin: https://twitter.com/who_shot_jgr

Well There’s Your Problem: https://linktr.ee/wtyppod

Some stuff we reference:

••• SMART-TD, BLET joint statement on rail embargo https://smart-union.org/smart-td-blet-joint-statement-on-rail-embargo/

••• A Nationwide Freight Railroad Shutdown Could Cost $2 Billion a Day https://www.aar.org/economic-impact-of-railroad-shutdown#

••• ‘It’s Going to End Up Like Boeing’: How Freight Rail Is Courting Catastrophe https://www.vice.com/en/article/3angy3/freight-rail-train-disaster-avoidable-boeing

••• Rail Strike Threatens to Slow US Supply-Chain Recovery https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2022-09-12/supply-chain-latest-us-railroad-strike-threatens-supply-chain-recovery

••• Rail Unions Are Bargaining Over a Good Job Made Miserable https://www.labornotes.org/2022/02/rail-negotiations-are-about-good-job-made-miserable

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

Grab TMK gear: www.bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast

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)

We discuss a powerful new essay on the multiple violences – domestic, data, administrative, racial – wrought by the state family police, aka “child protective services,” which uses an array of tools to terrorize and tear apart families, particularly targeting those that are Black and Brown. But first, we pour one out for Real Life Magazine and reflect on its importance – and the huge loss – for the tech media landscape.

Some stuff we reference:

••• Birthing Predictions of Premature Death | J. Khadijah Abdurahman https://logicmag.io/home/birthing-predictions-of-premature-death/

••• The Time Tax https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2021/07/how-government-learned-waste-your-time-tax/619568/

••• I Have Studied Child Protective Services for Decades. It Needs to Be Abolished. https://www.motherjones.com/crime-justice/2022/04/abolish-child-protective-services-torn-apart-dorothy-roberts-book-excerpt/

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

Grab TMK gear: www.bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast

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)

We get an update on Jathan’s journey into the heart of darkness as he returns to suburban America after a four years absence – a stranger in a strange homeland. Riffs and distractions ensue until we end by talking about Mark Zuckerberg going on the Joe Rogan Experience, Meta’s pivot to Alpha Male Mindset, and the rise of Dark Zuck.

Some stuff we reference:

••• Mark Zuckerberg’s Metaverse Pitch Is Falling Flat https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-31/mark-zuckerberg-s-metaverse-flails-on-joe-rogan-podcast

••• The Continued Unraveling of Mark Zuckerberg’s Malicious Metaverse https://www.coindesk.com/layer2/2022/09/02/the-continued-unraveling-of-mark-zuckerbergs-malicious-metaverse/

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

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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

We discuss a great new essay from Noah Kulwin that situates the modern crypto grift economy as a reincarnation of the Savings and Loans Crisis of the 80s – as a way of arguing for a longer view of the historical materialist context of these larger dynamics. New body, old engine.

Some stuff we reference:

••• Tales from the Thrifts https://thebaffler.com/salvos/tales-from-the-thrifts-kulwin

••• Would You Take Out a Loan to Buy This Week’s Groceries? https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/29/dining/buy-now-pay-later-loans-groceries.html

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

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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

We discuss a new startup doing the rounds called Sanas that uses AI “accent translation” to make "non-white" call center workers speak English with a white American accent. This is some real retro throwback tech solutionism / startup utopianism with a very quotable founder at the helm. While Sanas claims it's all about worker empowerment and global equity, we here at TMKonsulting show how Sanas is likely to be used as a tool of exploitation. Plus contribute to broader shifts in the role of large language models for the political economy of AI. We then end with a shout out to FN Meka.

Some stuff we reference:

••• Sansa https://www.sanas.ai/

••• Sanas, the buzzy Bay Area startup that wants to make the world sound whiter https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/sanas-startup-creates-american-voice-17382771.php

••• This Startup Is Selling Tech to Make Call Center Workers Sound Like White Americans https://www.vice.com/en/article/akek7g/this-startup-is-selling-tech-to-make-call-center-workers-sound-like-white-americans

••• Virtual rapper FN Meka underscores how AI perpetuates racial stereotyping https://mashable.com/article/fn-meka-record-deal-racial-stereotyping

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

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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

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 justice organizing in New York City homes https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/02637758221088868

••• Automated landlord: Digital technologies and post-crisis financial accumulation https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0308518X19846514

••• Electronic Fortification in Phoenix: Surveillance Technologies and Social Regulation in Residential Communities https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1078087406292845

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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

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, Ed is trapped in Pittsburgh where he is now forced to live as a worker in a defunct steel factory.

••• Follow Dan on Twitter https://twitter.com/danmcquillan

••• Resisting AI: An Anti-fascist Approach to Artificial Intelligence https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/resisting-ai

••• Data Science as Machinic Neoplatonism https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13347-017-0273-3

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

Grab TMK gear: bonfire.com/store/this-machine-kills-podcast/

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