ReadFanon

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 2h ago

I mean, in some respects we are already seeing the early phases of this - textbooks are being partly or wholly generated by AI (there are examples of this online), marking and feedback is being done by AI more and more, lectures and reading are being summarized by AI, obviously assignments and lectures and lesson plans are being generated by AI too.

We are rapidly approaching that point predicted for AI more generally but it's happening in education right now - we have a recursive problem where AI is trained on education materials, it creates the textbooks, it creates the lecture materials and lesson plans, it assesses work and shapes what is deemed high quality and poor quality work, and then it is further trained on the material that is increasingly AI-produced which accelerates the recursive effect. Education was already crumbling in the US but this is gonna cause its collapse.

Imagine students learning from AI materials then using AI to produce work to meet the standards of AI and all of this feeds into AI models that are used to teach students. It's nightmarish.

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 2h ago

He was part of an old guard of capitalist managers. Think FDR style, the pre-neoliberal type that would do things like invest in infrastructure rather than reducing the tax on the rich.

I don't like LKW. But he had quite a far-reaching vision, as tends to come with the territory when there are long term limits or no term limits. I don't have much to praise him about aside from the fact that he wasn't most of the bad things that we see in today's western politicians, but that's like trying to sell a house based on the absence of murderers secretly living in the attic rather than having anything to say about why the house itself is good.

Speaking of housing, didn't he approach the housing market as a public good and less like an arena for speculation? That's the exact policy that makes him one of the old guard of capitalist managers who carefully tended to the economic system so that its excesses and contradictions wouldn't feed back on themselves and create rolling and cyclical economic crises.

Really the only good thing that LKW did was call Australia out for what it really is:

Yeah, it's classist because LKW is a capitalist through and through but he's not wrong about Australia being the poor white trash of Asia. I would have put it in different terms but where's the lie?

ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 3h ago

I'm getting HP Lovecraft's The Sorcerer vibes here, where the warlock issues a warning that the economy is now cursed and if anyone [does something the warlock specifically prohibits, like the release of the Eldritchstein Files] that it will bring about untold economic ruin but, in reality, the warlock's economic pact is structured in such a way that he can personally make the bubble pop at any point by a means that it makes it appear as though the bubble popped due to the curse and not because the warlock pressed the big red button to make it pop, so to speak.

Like if the warlock controls a supply of energy or food or something critical to the function of the economy then he can do something like appoint a fool whose management strategy would bring about disastrous effects in that one keystone industry, which the warlock is completely aware of, that would have ripple effects across the whole economy and the warlock can be like "Behold my powers!! (And don't peek behind the curtain because the power of the 'curse' was just me intentionally crashing the gold market at the right moment so that the central bank would no longer be able to issue currency and now the economy has gone to shit.)"

ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 3h ago

Is there a contradiction there though?

I'm not that finance minded but the current bubble is keeping the economy afloat yet it's inflationary and so if it pops, the economy is seriously fucked especially because you have Tesla exposed (itself its own bubble that apparently cannot build cars anymore) and Tesla is a big domino to fall in terms of the US economy, but to pull out of a bubble pop like this would basically require bailouts (because the only thing the US economy does during these cyclical crises is bailouts, eat hot chip and lie) except that the US debt is becoming unserviceable even under the current circumstances of relative stability. Feels like it's a choice between letting it pop and watching as so much comes tumbling down, which is gonna be catastrophic for whichever party is left holding the bag, or to bailout hard and fast to kick the can down the road especially in terms of debt servicing so that the next administration has to deal with it all blowing up in their faces. (Call me a cynic but it feels like if this shit doesn't pop very soon then whoever gets elected to the White House is gonna be handed a poisoned chalice, and maybe in pure political terms this would be the best outcome for the more extreme reactionary wing of the two right wings of the two party duopoly.)

There's a lot of moving parts so I get that it's a bit of a crystal ball case but also I don't understand all the moving parts nearly enough. Feels like bailouts would be a slightly delayed economic disaster and no bailouts would be a more immediate economic disaster yet I'm unsure if there's any viable off-ramp that the US government would be willing to take (obviously it's not gonna nationalize any industries so the more sensible and long-term responsible options seem off the table due to the prevailing economic orthodoxy.)

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 4h ago

If it's China then I am constitutionally bound to ask the question - but at what cost?

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 4h ago

That's a fair take. I'm less worried about an AI monopolization per se than I am about Alphabet swooping in and expanding their monopoly while gobbling up everything and sustaining AI demand by more or less forcibly and permanently embedding itself into government functions as a way of deepening neoliberalization to a lower level of hell. (Along with the wealth transfer stuff.) Maybe this is a tinfoil hat take but I feel like Elon Musk's real interest in his DOGE fiasco wasn't just to protect his own business interests with Tesla etc. but, if he wasn't so apt to stepping on his own dick, perhaps he was planning to strip back the functions of government so much that it would have become necessary to implement Grok or a sanitized, government-friendly Grok, into government functions so he could corner a market there.

I think nearly every tech-minded person is waiting with baited breath for the AI bubble to pop that will bring about a return to rationality but, in a bad case scenario, it feels like the bubble will pop and the aftermath will not be a return to normal but a readjustment that forces AI on everyone in a completely different, unavoidable, mandatory way while still trashing the market and bringing about bailouts that will only benefit the biggest players.

ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 4h ago

That's a good observation and if you look at the table, it's really wobbly every time it gets bumped. Typical Elon - "I want something to look fancy but I want every expense spared!!"

If it's that flimsy, I feel like the table would have done something more dramatic than wobble around if the bottle was burst open.

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 9h ago

The completely over the top jiggle physics always ruins my immersion with games and it's legitimely annoying. Maybe I'm aspec or something but it doesn't do anything for me except throw me out of the game.

I mean uhhhhhh...

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 9h ago

Are these melters approved for use on all forms of ice?

ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 9h ago

Ice on ice violence.

The very land itself rejects your presence.

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 9h ago

He can't even make cars anymore. You can't make this shit up!

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 9h ago

Okay buddy. Are you gonna clear up the misinformation that you have spread here by grossly and wilfully misinterpreting my words at every turn? No?

I doubt it. Accountability is tricky, no?

a simple "I fucked up, my bad" would have sufficed.

Okay, the guy who never apologizes is gonna lecture me on how to do an apology. Sure.

Did I not say "I get what you're saying now, my bad" or are you demanding that I must word things specifically to meet your satisfaction?

Not going to engage with the rest of your bait either.

Okay, settle down. If everything I've said is bait then you've done a bad job of not engaging with it and if I've approached this in good faith then this is just a cheap ploy to dodge and save face after I closed off the opportunity for you to abuse the disengage rule, as you are wont to do.

Just came here to call you out and clear things up.

Have you ever read the anarchist theorist Ivan Illich on the topic of counterproductivity? 🤭

ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 9h ago

I really like this and it's interesting because it's very similar to Mao's concept of the mass line, which I always find myself bringing myself back to when it comes to any sort of organizing work.

It's funny though, I wrote out a comment that completely contradicts your take here. Personally I switch between a mass line style of work when it comes to driving change within groups or orgs or workplaces etc. but in terms of engaging people generally, whether it's online or out in the wild, I tend to focus on agitation against capitalism to "bring up the intermediate" (to use Mao's framing) because it's not practical to do much more than that aside from isolating the backwards (e.g. calling out the person with the username EdgelordFourteenEightyEight and asking them what those numbers mean in their username so that people can be like "Whoa holy shit, there's a Nazi in our midst! I'm not taking anything they say on board wtf.")

I'm all about a diversity of tactics and I think an important aspect of avoiding feeling defeated is a clarity of purpose in what you're working towards - if it's getting the average Joe to internalize clear, accurate definitions of capitalism and communism and imperialism and colonialism then you're probably gonna set yourself up for disappointment in a lot of cases. But if your aim is to help them understand why capitalism sucks or how imperialism is fucking everyone over or to get them to join their union, you're probably gonna come out feeling like you've achieved something in the discussion.

ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 10h ago

I have a lot to say but suffice it to say that I gotta separate the art from the artist this time.

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 10h ago

Hahaha your first reply is worded terribly for implication. You basically implied that it was your account. If you had said "Are you implying that that is my account/alt?" it would have read completely differently. I get what you're saying now, my bad.

That was a peculiar way to word it though.

conflating someone with someone else, when that other character is bad, is a form of character assassination.

Ah, ableism is bad now. Got it. It's nice that you've arrived at a principled position on this matter at last.

Not to mention that it's a shitty practice to randomly accuse people of sockpuppetry just to hate on them.

You're weirdly defensive about it. If you had just said "That isn't my account, this is the moderator action that was taken in response to the ableism" it wouldn't have been a big deal.

It's not random though, we both know you have used variations on usernames with zero that use the numeral 0 in place of the o. It's been like two decades of it by this point. I'm not saying that it's definitely you but there's a pattern and that user matches it so you can see why that username would throw out a false positive.

Lol, OK, confusing me with ziq is just out of this world. It's even more egregious than just accusing me of being zr0 since I write nothing like ziq and have had public spats with ziq.

So? I'm not surprised that you have. ziq has spats with everyone, even just on their main accounts, but if it was a competition of who is more thin-skinned you'd give ziq a run for their money.

But I'm not confusing you with ziq, I'm saying that the both of you have more in common with each other than you'd like to admit. I know that you are different people, I never said you were the same. This is exactly what I'm saying about being thin-skinned though.

Very cool that you're pre-emptively denigrating your own instance rules. No comment.

No. I'm saying that you abuse that rule and you've even been in threads where you have done so multiple times and you've been called out for it by multiple users and yet, shockingly, you didn't demonstrate any accountability for it. Be serious.

What happened? You used to be cooler than this a long time ago.

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ReadFanon [any, any] @hexbear.net 11h ago

I... just admitted I made a mistake when you pointed it out though? What is going on with this reply??

Look, I get it - accountability is clearly not your strong suit and so your natural instinct is to cover your tracks and lie about things but that's not how I do it.

If it's character assassination, wanna explain how that works? Am I doing a character assassination by naming an account that is yours as being yours? Help me to connect the dots here because I literally cannot square the circle in a charitable way - the only way I can make sense of this is if you're trying to say that accusing a person of being you is such a heinous accusation to level at someone lmao.

I admit I did get you and ziq confused because you're both thin-skinned petty tyrants who exemplify the trope that some anarchists are opposed to hierarchy purely on the basis of knowing what they themselves act like when they command the tiniest bit of power. You're much more talented than ziq is though; ziq is the one who spends their time using dozens of sock puppet accounts whereas you spend your time coding. My bad.

The rest of the drivel you write is of course further lies.

You indict yourself with your own words. Anyone can read your comment and anyone can identify the ableism in it and how it violates your own code of conduct. You're not beating the allegations that you're allowed a little ableism and hypocrisy, as a treat, as long as it's justified by attacking the tankies.

With a response like this, is it any wonder you get accountability so twisted up?

Anyway, now that you've been backed into a corner yet-again it's your turn to reply with some insult or to dispute the contents of this comment before ending it with "disengage". That's the play here, isn't it?