Follow up to the article from this morning.
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@tante this is the first time I've read your blog, and now I've read two in 30 minutes. I can't stress enough how wonderful both posts were -- incredible stuff.
@vksxypants don't get used to it, I am as much hit and miss as everyone else ;)
but thanks -
RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116102639569199871
Follow up to the article from this morning. In which I argue how @pluralistic was right in his article: https://tante.cc/2026/02/20/on-alliances/
@tante
Favorited the first article. Don’t think I “needed” the second one, but nonetheless favoriting it also, because I appreciate the move to preempt a possible degradation of the quality of discussion, as well as the focusing on the fights ahead. -
RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116102639569199871
Follow up to the article from this morning. In which I argue how @pluralistic was right in his article: https://tante.cc/2026/02/20/on-alliances/
> And if we demand perfect, flawless ideological congruence we will lose.
^ that tends to be a guiding theme for much of my writing. Thanks for the follow up!
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RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116102639569199871
Follow up to the article from this morning. In which I argue how @pluralistic was right in his article: https://tante.cc/2026/02/20/on-alliances/
@tante @pluralistic Great post. The whole thing about consumption purity is incredibly annoying and misguided.
The thing I rarely see pointed out, is how this usually stems from a place of powerlessness and complete alienation from every other aspect in life. The people demanding this are the ones who's identity is now defined entirely by their consumption habits and they are so lost that this is the only way they can imagine demanding any change, hoping to reclaim some autonomy in their life
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RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116102639569199871
Follow up to the article from this morning. In which I argue how @pluralistic was right in his article: https://tante.cc/2026/02/20/on-alliances/
Bigot Shockley's beliefs -- who if you recall was team manager that did little of the actual work yet took the credit -- those beliefs aren't embedded in the materials science that made a practical transistor. And Shockley ended up being a footnote in the industry, with his betting the house on four-layer diodes and other forgotten things. And in the ~70 years since, all of those earliest players have been subsumed into a nearly world-wide industry of a scale that dwarfs any imaginings of 1950.
The poisonous tree of so-called AI and LLMs is recent, fresh, much more intentional, guided, and virulent. The corporate proponents have demonstrable ill intent. They do harm, and seem to be inherently financial scams. None of this is an incidental side effect of bigoted personalities; the taint is built-in. Built into the methodologies of development and deployment, if not the design and goals. Personally I find it very difficult to isolate it from the work itself.
I'm not condemning Cory, but I find the arguments in favor of tolerating the associations with the code's developers difficult to accept. I'm wrong often.
But I've been fairly allergic to capitalist technologies for a long time, dropped out decades ago, so filter my words through that.
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@tante @pluralistic Great post. The whole thing about consumption purity is incredibly annoying and misguided.
The thing I rarely see pointed out, is how this usually stems from a place of powerlessness and complete alienation from every other aspect in life. The people demanding this are the ones who's identity is now defined entirely by their consumption habits and they are so lost that this is the only way they can imagine demanding any change, hoping to reclaim some autonomy in their life
@alatiera @tante @pluralistic agree it’s a great article and critique. The discussion about consumption purity was a good reminder to myself
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Bigot Shockley's beliefs -- who if you recall was team manager that did little of the actual work yet took the credit -- those beliefs aren't embedded in the materials science that made a practical transistor. And Shockley ended up being a footnote in the industry, with his betting the house on four-layer diodes and other forgotten things. And in the ~70 years since, all of those earliest players have been subsumed into a nearly world-wide industry of a scale that dwarfs any imaginings of 1950.
The poisonous tree of so-called AI and LLMs is recent, fresh, much more intentional, guided, and virulent. The corporate proponents have demonstrable ill intent. They do harm, and seem to be inherently financial scams. None of this is an incidental side effect of bigoted personalities; the taint is built-in. Built into the methodologies of development and deployment, if not the design and goals. Personally I find it very difficult to isolate it from the work itself.
I'm not condemning Cory, but I find the arguments in favor of tolerating the associations with the code's developers difficult to accept. I'm wrong often.
But I've been fairly allergic to capitalist technologies for a long time, dropped out decades ago, so filter my words through that.
@tomjennings @tante @pluralistic If we're comparing diodes to LLMs then the embedded politics is just so different. I can rely on a diode doing the same job for me as for a nazi. The same is not true of LLMs.
And that's true of any two use-cases, and I don't know if we even have an academic framework yet to figure out how to fix that "problem" (supposing for a moment that the billionaires even want it fixed).
Fundamentally: this tech is unnecessary, and it's boiling the planet. That's enough.
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@tante @pluralistic I agree with a lot of this but I think there is a larger pattern here some of us have been noticing about Cory for a while, namely that he's repeatedly promoted technologies that are harmful. I did not jump on him for his LLM article, I jumped on him because it's the latest in a long line of technologies he has attempted to normalize that are actively harmful to their users and in some cases society.
Kagi is the one I keep reminding people of that he also promotes.
@reflex @tante @pluralistic what's wrong with Kagi? Most people seem to love it.
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RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116102639569199871
Follow up to the article from this morning. In which I argue how @pluralistic was right in his article: https://tante.cc/2026/02/20/on-alliances/
@tante As I read @pluralistic, his goal is not to overcome capitalism but to reform it into a more "ethical, good version of capitalism". If one, however, actually fights to overcome capitalism there are significant differences between these struggles. To recognize that does not mean he wont' be an ally on the way but it also does not require calling him more than he is: A very smart writer who entertainingly hates of some symptoms of capitalism without questioning it fundamentally.
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@tante As I read @pluralistic, his goal is not to overcome capitalism but to reform it into a more "ethical, good version of capitalism". If one, however, actually fights to overcome capitalism there are significant differences between these struggles. To recognize that does not mean he wont' be an ally on the way but it also does not require calling him more than he is: A very smart writer who entertainingly hates of some symptoms of capitalism without questioning it fundamentally.
@malteengeler @tante that is a complete misreading of my work. I am by no means interested in preserving capitalism. I think markets can be useful allocation tools but as I have said multiple times in many ways markets are not the best or only way to do allocation.
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RE: https://tldr.nettime.org/@tante/116102639569199871
Follow up to the article from this morning. In which I argue how @pluralistic was right in his article: https://tante.cc/2026/02/20/on-alliances/
@tante I didn't read neither the post by @pluralistic nor your criticism of it, but I fully agree with your point that we need to be able to disagree now and then, as long as we agree on the overall issues.
@BrentToderian also put it well here: https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:ny5w2k6brb2kdubxnevke6li/post/3mezntfzlb22p
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