This Machine Kills

We take a hard look at Netradyne, the latest piece of shitty surveillance tech already forced on Amazon delivery drivers—and perhaps coming soon to your car. First we look at Lauren Kaori Gurley’s reporting on how these AI cameras are extremely error prone—but weirdly never in ways that benefit, rather than punish, workers—and then take a deeper dive into how Netradyne is pitching its product to insurance companies.

Some stuff we reference:

• Amazon Delivery Drivers Forced to Sign ‘Biometric Consent’ Form or Lose Job | Lauren Kaori Gurley https://www.vice.com/en/article/dy8n3j/amazon-delivery-drivers-forced-to-sign-biometric-consent-form-or-lose-job

• Amazon’s AI Cameras Are Punishing Drivers for Mistakes They Didn’t Make | Lauren Kaori Gurley https://www.vice.com/en/article/88npjv/amazons-ai-cameras-are-punishing-drivers-for-mistakes-they-didnt-make

• How Insurers Are Adopting Transportation Safety Technology | Netradyne https://www.netradyne.com/how-insurers-are-adopting-transportation-safety-technology/

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

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

To quote the headline for Ed’s article, “Ok, what the fuck is Evergrande and is it going to blow up the global economy?” First question: Evergrande is the second largest real estate developer in China. Its business model is premised on infinite growth, it’s massively indebted to everybody, and it is finally collapsing. Second question: Maybe! We lay out the dynamics leading up to, and unfolding now during, Evergrande’s collapse and discuss the potential consequences of yet another “too big to fail” financial institution doing what they do best: failing.

Some stuff we reference:

• OK, WTF Is Evergrande and Is It Going to Blow Up the Global Economy? | https://www.vice.com/en/article/wx5mqm/ok-wtf-is-evergrande-and-is-it-going-to-blow-up-the-global-economy

• Citron Research / Andrew Left 2012 short seller report on Evergrande | https://www.slideshare.net/dingli8888/citron-research

• Evergrande Gave Workers a Choice: Loan Us Cash or Lose Your Bonus | https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/19/business/china-evergrande-debt-protests.html

• Evergrande used retail financial investments to plug funding gaps | https://www.ft.com/content/0b03d4de-1662-4d30-bcfd-c9bae24fa9cc

• China’s Nightmare Evergrande Scenario Is an Uncontrolled Crash | https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-09-16/china-s-nightmare-evergrande-scenario-is-an-uncontrolled-crash

• The Asset Economy: Property Ownership and the New Logic of Inequality | Lisa Adkins, Melinda Cooper, Martijn Konings https://au1lib.org/book/14728397/9acae0

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

Grab your 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)

outro: https://youtu.be/JanZSDIWpmg

We start with a quick moratorium on self-deprecating apologia for doompill. Confronting, with sober senses and ruthless analysis, the material conditions of the world is not always a joyful thing. But, importantly, it is not one that calls for nihilism, fatalism, or doom. We then discuss a long excerpt from an upcoming biography of Peter Thiel and finally give this (self-admittedly) evil man the attention he deserves. Not only is Thiel driven by venal desires of power and wealth, he is also consumed with paranoia that one day the taxman will make him pay his fair share. Thiel is a ludicrous caricature of the Randian superhero.

Some stuff we discuss

• Peter Thiel Gamed Silicon Valley, Donald Trump, and Democracy to Make Billions, Tax-Free | Max Chafkin: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-09-15/peter-thiel-gamed-silicon-valley-tech-trump-taxes-and-politics

• Lord of the Roths | Justin Elliott, Patricia Callahan, James Bandler: https://www.propublica.org/article/lord-of-the-roths-how-tech-mogul-peter-thiel-turned-a-retirement-account-for-the-middle-class-into-a-5-billion-dollar-tax-free-piggy-bank

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

Grab your 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)

Intro: https://youtu.be/7YynqVvgZYI

We spend the first half finishing our discussion of David Graeber and David Wengrow’s essay. Then, in the second half, we switch gears and talk about the video of a Tesla trying to mow down pedestrians, the cultural logics of speed, worlds built for objects over people, and the relations between automation, authority and anarchy.

Some stuff we discuss:

• How to change the course of human history | David Graeber and David Wengrow https://www.eurozine.com/change-course-human-history/#

• Error | Endnotes 5 https://libcom.org/files/Endnotes%205.pdf

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

Grab your 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 go back in time—with the help of groundbreaking work by anthropologist David Graeber and archaeologist David Wengrow—to examine what the history of social inequality can teach us about the political developments of today and the course we can plot for tomorrow. Along the way, with the help of the two Davids, we deploy the sharpest tools of historical materialism to debunk, dismiss, and dunk on the big idea bozos like Jared Diamond and Francis Fukuyama who make sweeping—and sweepingly wrong—proclamations about the essence of human nature and the naturalization of capitalist society.

Essay we discuss:

How to change the course of human history | David Graeber and David Wengrow https://www.eurozine.com/change-course-human-history/#

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

Grab your 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)

It’s part two of the Never Forget Extravaganza! We’re joined again by military tech journalist Kelsey D. Atherton to explore the deep and decades long entanglement between Silicon Valley and the Pentagon—from the early days of the semiconductors industry being born in the cradle of military contracts to the contemporary period of, as one Pentagon startup calls it, “the new Manhattan Project” of artificial intelligence. We wrap up by considering what the next phase of the forever war machine will bring.

Follow Kelsey on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AthertonKD

Subscribe to Kelsey on Substack: https://athertonkd.substack.com/

Some stuff we reference:

• Silicon Valley Giants—Not Start-Ups—Dominate DoD Tech $$ | Kelsey D. Atheron: https://breakingdefense.com/2020/07/silicon-valley-giants-not-start-ups-dominate-dod-tech/

• Reports of a Silicon Valley/Military Divide Have Been Greatly Exaggerated | Jack Poulson: https://techinquiry.org/SiliconValley-Military/

• Silicon Valley Takes the Battlespace | Jonathan Guyer: https://prospect.org/power/silicon-valley-takes-battlespace-eric-schmidt-rebellion/

• Project Maven: Amazon And Microsoft Scored $50 Million In Pentagon Surveillance Contracts After Google Quit | Thomas Brewster: https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2021/09/08/project-maven-amazon-and-microsoft-get-50-million-in-pentagon-drone-surveillance-contracts-after-google/?sh=40ebfa5e6f1e

• Silicon Valley Mystery House | Langdon Winner: https://bibliodarq.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/sorkin-m-ed-variations-on-a-theme-park.pdf

• Cold War Armory: Military Contracting in Silicon Valley | Thomas Heinrich: https://faculty.fiu.edu/~revellk/pad2011/heinrich.pdf

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

Grab your 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)

It’s the Never Forget Extravaganza! We’re joined by military tech journalist Kelsey D. Atherton to breach the memory hole of forever war and consider the invasions and occupations, technologies and tactics, abroad and at home, that have defined the post-9/11 era. This is part one of our conversation with Kelsey. Part two – and TMK’s 100th episode – will drop on the Patreon feed on 9/11.

We set the scene by casting our minds back to the beginning of the Global War on Terror – then provide something like a bestiary of vehicles, weapons, and surveillance systems – then explore the deep and decades long entanglement between Silicon Valley and the Pentagon, along with all the demonic initials like the CIA, FBI, NSA, DHS, ICE – then wrap it up with a broader analysis of the forever war machine: how we got here, why it was overdetermined, and what comes next.

Follow Kelsey on Twitter: https://twitter.com/AthertonKD

Subscribe to Kelsey on Substack: https://athertonkd.substack.com/

Some stuff we reference:

• These machines were supposed to help win the war in Afghanistan. What happened? | Kelsey D. Atherton: popsci.com/technology/timeline-us-airborne-tools-of-war-afghanistan/

• This is the real story of the Afghan biometric databases abandoned to the Taliban | Eileen Guo and Hikmat Noori: technologyreview.com/2021/08/30/1033941/afghanistan-biometric-databases-us-military-40-data-points/

• The Global Garage | Will Meyer: thebaffler.com/latest/the-global-garage-meyer

• The MRAP Story: Learning from History | Stephen W. Miller: asianmilitaryreview.com/2018/10/the-mrap-story-learning-from-history/

• Algorithmic War: Everyday Geographies of the War on Terror | Louise Amoore: sci-hub.mksa.top/10.1111/j.1467-8330.2008.00655.x

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

Grab your 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)

outro: Funeral Candies – You're Dead https://youtu.be/TjvQPijYEZ8

We start with discussing an investigation into the harrowing—and fatal—working conditions of delivery drivers in South Korea and the human tragedy at the heart of ecommerce. Moving on to lighter fare—by comparison—we talk through a report on the massive tax breaks and anonymous shell companies supporting the spread of data centres across the US.

Some stuff we reference:

• Dead on Arrival | Carrington Clarke: abc.net.au/news/2021-08-26/south-korea-delivery-drivers-working-theselves-to-death/100380322

• Data In The Dark: How Big Tech Secretly Secured $800 Million In Tax Breaks For Data Centers | David Jeans: forbes.com/sites/davidjeans/2021/08/19/data-in-the-dark-how-big-tech-secretly-secured-800-million-in-tax-breaks-for-data-centers/?sh=1458f2006b43

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

Grab your 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're unlocking a premium episode for the main feed this week. We talk about insurance technology as Jathan gives the lowdown on a big grant he just received to do a multi-year project investigating the political economy of the insurtech sector. We then discuss the FIRE sector more generally and look at recent reporting on how property tech companies are buying up homes.

Some stuff we reference:

• Draining the Risk Pools | Jathan Sadowski: https://reallifemag.com/draining-the-risk-pool/

• Data machine: the insurers using AI to reshape the industry | Ian Smith: https://www.ft.com/content/d3bd46cb-75d4-40ff-a0cd-6d7f33d58d7f

• The personalisation of insurance: Data, behaviour and innovation | Liz McFall, Gert Meyers, Ine Van Hoyweghen: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/2053951720973707

• Zillow, Other Tech Firms Are in an ‘Arms Race’ To Buy Up American Homes | Maxwell Strachan: https://www.vice.com/en/article/93ymxz/zillow-other-tech-firms-are-in-an-arms-race-to-buy-up-american-homes

• The attachments of ‘autonomous’ vehicles | Chris Tennant, Jack Stilgoe: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/03063127211038752

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

Grab your 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 geopolitics of microchip manufacturing, the complex factors causing the current global shortage of semiconductors, the centrality of industrial policy and intellectual property to the trade wars between Western and Eastern countries, the competition over securing leadership in strategic technology like artificial intelligence, and the consequences of changing modes of production. In other words, just another day at TMK.

Some stuff we reference:

• Chips with Everything | Evgeny Morozov: mondediplo.com/2021/08/03morozov

• From Automobile Capitalism to Platform Capitalism: Toyotism as a prehistory of digital platforms | Marc Steinberg: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/01708406211030681

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

Grab your 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)