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—pr...
Sep 15, 2021•1 hr 15 min
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...
Sep 11, 2021•10 min
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 somethi...
Sep 08, 2021•1 hr 33 min
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/2021-0...
Sep 04, 2021•9 min
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 m...
Sep 01, 2021•1 hr 8 min
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 ...
Sep 01, 2021•10 min
Intro: Contra – This Machine Kills (remixed) https://contra805.bandcamp.com/track/this-machine-kills We’re joined by two of the sharpest minds on the politics of AI and data governance—Meredith Whittaker and Salomé Viljoen—to chat about the relationship between corporate gatekeepers and academic research, the construction and infrastructure of data, AI as a universal hammer for all nails, how the state enforces Silicon Valley’s power, and what it would take to seize the data pipeline from privat...
Aug 25, 2021•1 hr 31 min
Outro: Processory - Take Me To Your Leader https://sugars.bandcamp.com/track/take-me-to-your-leader 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...
Aug 21, 2021•9 min
We’re joined by Taylor Lorenz – business reporter at the New York Times, twitter.com/TaylorLorenz – for an excellent discussion about the evolution and rapid growth of the creator economy, the working conditions of content creators across social media platforms, the predatory system of management, marketing, and investment, and the venture capitalists who only saw this labor as valid once they could exploit it. Some of Taylor’s work we reference: • Hello, Content Creators. Silicon Valley’s Inves...
Aug 18, 2021•1 hr 12 min
It’s the final chapter of Autonomous Technology: “Frankenstein’s Problem.” We talk for a while about the story of Frankenstein as an allegory for responsibility, neglect, and care for our creations. We then get into Winner’s core ideas of “technology as legislation” and “Luddism as epistemology” before providing some general synthesis of the book as a whole. You can find a free pdf of the whole book here: https://www.ratical.org/ratville/AoS/AutonomousTechnology.pdf Article we reference Revoluti...
Aug 14, 2021•9 min
We’re delighted to be joined by Chris Gilliard (twitter.com/hypervisible) – one of the best experts on privacy and surveillance around – for a fantastic discussion laying out his incisive analysis of “luxury surveillance” and “imposed surveillance.” To quote Chris: “Luxury surveillance is expensive, voluntary, and sleek. Imposed surveillance is involuntary, overt, clunky, and meant to stand out.” It’s not (just) the operations of technology that distinguish these two forms of surveillance, but t...
Aug 11, 2021•1 hr 32 min
Outro: Mr. Suit by New Bomb Turks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VraBz96VbLA We get deeper into the political economy of precision agriculture and how these “innovating” are iterating on traditional forms of enclosure and dispossession, how they operationalize older corporate management philosophies and strategies, and how they plug into the global system of extraction and accumulation. We end the episode on high note by talking about the new right to repair rules being enforced by the FTC. St...
Aug 08, 2021•9 min
Outro: St. Lorelei - https://stlorelei.bandcamp.com/track/outside-the-green We kick things off with an announcement about TMK sweeps month. Then we get into a discussion of data politics based on the recent investigation into how ShotSpotter – the “AI-powered” gunshot detector sensors – is being used by police to fabricate fake data for evidence. We wrap up by providing an intro to the political economy of “data grabbing” and precision agriculture – a topic we’ll dive much deeper into on the pre...
Aug 04, 2021•1 hr 26 min
We discuss Chapter 7 of Autonomous Technology: “Complexity and the Loss of Agency.” Ed couldn’t be here for this episode, so we’re joined again by David Banks, who really stepped up to provide some great insights into understanding our socio-political relationship to complex technical systems designed to keep us in the dark about how and why the things we rely on actually work—and who they work for. We explore the dialectic between increasing complexity and diminishing agency, the poverty to cul...
Jul 31, 2021•10 min
We're taking a week off recording so we're unlocking one of our favorite episodes from the Patreon feed for you to enjoy. Cold open: Ghost in the Shell. There is a long list of services that purport to be powered by sophisticated software, but actually rely on humans acting like robots. We discuss a critical concept—whether we call it Potemkin AI, fauxtomation, or ghost work—for understanding how so much so-called artificial intelligence is just a spectacle, a simulation, designed to mystify the...
Jul 27, 2021•1 hr 8 min
After way too long, we finally got our friend and comrade Paris Marx—host of the excellent podcast Tech Won’t Save Us—on TMK for a great conversation ranging from the politics of Bitcoin and Tesla to the current state of tech media/criticism and need for counter-propaganda against Silicon Valley. Paris is always in the interviewer seat on TWSU, so we turn things around on him and also ask how he got into leftist analysis of tech and his forthcoming book on the techno-politics of transportation. ...
Jul 21, 2021•1 hr 47 min
For a blockbuster of a book club episode, we’re joined by friend of the show David Banks to discuss Chapter 6 of Autonomous Technology: “Technological Politics.” We get into an analysis of reverse adaptation in large-scale socio-technical systems, the ways in which human ends become subjugated to technological means, and the relationship between the imperatives of the technological order and the state. Plus, what Marxist-Leninism could learn from a theory of technological politics—and vice versa...
Jul 17, 2021•11 min
We do a deep dive into the ideas of Lina Khan, the newly confirmed chair of the Federal Trade Commission. We discuss her large body of scholarship—digging up some of her lesser known, but arguably more important work—which provides sharp, critical, complex analysis of the political economy of platforms and seeks to revive antitrust regulation as a tool for tackling structural problems of corporate dominance. We also talk about how Khan, in her new position of regulatory authority, could actually...
Jul 14, 2021•1 hr 38 min
Rather than our usual doompilled analysis, we take a big dose of dumbpill as we spend the whole episode on a reading series of the stupidest article we have come across in a long time. Malcolm Gladwell – a man whose career is built on being an insanely incurious idiot – got to ride in a Waymo autonomous vehicle. He then wrote about it for Facebook’s newsletter Bulletin. Sorry in advance. Have we misunderstood the future of the automobile? | Malcolm Gladwell | Facebook Bulletin: https://malcolmgl...
Jul 11, 2021•8 min
It’s the tech news roundup, yeehaw! We look at a few recent stories in techno-politics worth discussing. First, businesses are blaming Amazon for draining the labor pool, not being exploitative enough, and making workers think they deserve higher expectations. Second, Didi, the largest ride-hailing app in China, has been banned from mobile app stores just days after it’s massive $4.4 billion IPO after an investigation by Chinese antitrust regulators into dubious data collection and cybersecurity...
Jul 07, 2021•1 hr 5 min
We discuss the second half of Chapter 5 of Autonomous Technology: “Artifice and Order” — diving deeper into the social philosophy and political theory of technology. You can find a free pdf of the whole book here: https://www.ratical.org/ratville/AoS/AutonomousTechnology.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/jathans...
Jul 03, 2021•10 min
Further notes toward a ruthless criticism of digital capitalism — we lay out how the inherent contradictions of the “gig economy” are starting to slip into crisis, the need to recognize and reject the propaganda that has been embedded in our everyday way of thinking and talking about these companies, and the creative accounting practices they use to cover up the absence of value and instances of death. 200 years ago, the Luddites smashed the gig mills used by capital to rob them of autonomy. The...
Jun 30, 2021•1 hr 18 min
We discuss the first half of Chapter 5 of Autonomous Technology: “Artifice and Order.” This is a really juicy chapter where Winner is really laying out fundamentals for his own theory of technological politics by asking the question of not just “Who governs?” but also “What governs?” So while we set out to get through the whole thing in one episode, to do the discussion and rumination of this analysis the justice it deserves, we decided to break it up into two episodes. We’re doing anti-efficien...
Jun 26, 2021•5 min
As an antidote to the constant glowing profiles of tech executives and venture capitalists, TMK is starting an ongoing, occasional series where we highlight the stories and experiences of radical tech workers: people who are disaffected by the industry, discontented with its broken promises, and committed to working towards different models of funding, building, and using technology for a truly better world. To kick us off we are very pleased to be joined by (returning champion) Wendy Liu and Ja...
Jun 23, 2021•1 hr 46 min
In an action packed episode continuing our updates on ongoing topics of TMK interest, we deconstruct the political economy of massive health data sharing in the US and UK as hospitals seek to capitalize on data and develop AI health applications by signing lucrative deals with tech companies. We then jump over to discuss the Cold War 2.0 that’s heating up between the US/EU and China, with tech policy as a major front in the battle over who will “prevail technologically in the geopolitical great ...
Jun 19, 2021•8 min
This week we bring y’all some updates on ongoing topics of TMK interest: things we’ve done whole episodes on in the past but keep rearing the ugly heads in new and horrible ways. First we start by talking about the weird liberal trick of “limitarianism” and the latest bird-brained simping for billionaires. Then we get into a profile of the populist king of spacs, the memelord of investing, Chamath Palihipitiya—and the ongoing financial absurdism that distracts us from actual analysis of more pre...
Jun 16, 2021•1 hr 18 min
We discuss Chapter 4 of Autonomous Technology: “Technocracy.” We get into different historical ideas of technocracy – from Francis Bacon to Thorstein Veblen – before digging into the political theory of technocracy – the form of its power, the source of its authority, the methods of its legitimation – and then finally relating it to the ascendant (wannabe) God-Engineers of today. You can find a free pdf of the whole book here: https://www.ratical.org/ratville/AoS/AutonomousTechnology.pdf Subscri...
Jun 12, 2021•6 min
We discuss how the failed promises of smart city megaprojects around the world – really honing in on Africa and a case study of Konza City in Kenya – perfectly encapsulate the brand of colonialism propagated by consultants like McKinsey. The “visions” and “strategies” they sell as ways of achieving prosperity, progress, and prestige are based on a dual ideology of technological and developmental determinism. While these smart cities never materialize in the way their marketing brochures and thou...
Jun 09, 2021•1 hr 24 min
(Jathan's mic is busted for this episode – sorry!) We hit y’all with a double header about what happens when the cop in our mind is allowed to thrive. First is the psychodrama and that led to a successful member of the liberal professoriate to become a cop just to sate her curiosity and stick it to her mom. Second is the entrepreneurs who prey on the social anxiety and paranoia to whip people into frenzy as a way to sell their technologies of private policing. Some stuff we reference: The Profes...
Jun 05, 2021•8 min
In our mission to analyse capitalism and technology from the experiences of workers, we would be remiss if we ignored a crucial form of labor that people – across the political and social spectrum – too often pretend does not exists unless they want to condem it: sex work. We’re happy to be joined by Liara Roux – sex worker, activist, and author of the new book Whore of New York: Confessions of a Sinful Woman – to talk about her time working with clients in Silicon Valley and the broader politic...
Jun 04, 2021•1 hr 15 min
