Sharing a great new paper on VC from David Kampmann, LSE really leading the way on the new critical scholarship on VC @jathansadowski.com @mrshoward.bsky.social @edwardongwesojr.com @parismarx.com @profhilaryallen.bsky.social @jacobsilverman.com academic.oup.com/ser/advance-...

Seen at an AI investment summit hosted by UC Berkeley today. We need to stop being so overly deperndent on AI folks.

The second (excellent) article from Distinktion’s special issue on Silicon Valley imaginaries is now available. Check it out below.

A recording of my seminar "A Critical Theory of VC" www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhJy...

Check out my new article published @distinktionjournal.bsky.social on contrarianism as a cultural practice enabled by the institutional logic of Silicon Valley VC. Read it here (open access): www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Having Jaron Lanier visit my Ethics and Technology class today to talk to my students was a real treat. Generous, thoughtful, and refreshingly optimistic - the class and I feel so very lucky to have had this opportunity.

What a time to be alive.

Hey folks — my friend Randy is running for congress in a Republican-held district and needs support. Randy is running a grassroots campaign but the Democratic establishment wants someone who will take corporate money. Please, if you’re able, consider chipping in: secure.actblue.com/donate/callt...

I am very happy that my program is hosting @mrshoward.bsky.social in two weeks for a discussion of the role of contrarianism in the Silicon Valley founder/VC mythos. QR code for Zoom Deets

And so the FTC’s careers page has seemingly been deleted. That didn’t take long. It seems Silicon Valley’s cozying up to the incoming administration is already paying dividends. Prepare yourself for unprecedented monopolization and market manipulation.

One of my greatest dislikes about being an academic/writer is my ability to come up with perfect sentences (and sometimes even paragraphs) in the shower that I am somehow incapable of writing coherently 5 minutes later. Sigh.

Oh my. This is how a republic dies. There will no longer be any accountability or consequences for political actors. Even if Biden doesn’t do it, Pandora’s box is now open. www.nytimes.com/2024/12/05/u...

Apparently Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI argues that latter violated antitrust law by asking investors not to back competitors. If he wins, this could all but make illegal a basic principle of VC investment: don’t spread your bets; monopoly FTW.

1/4. Excited to share our new article, "Alternative Archives: Researching Politics with Chunks of Reality". @polstudiesassoc.bsky.social @luciavitale.bsky.social @henrymclaughlin.bsky.social @mrshoward.bsky.social #SAGE Check it out here: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

New open access article on generating insights from social science research failures. Written by myself and several excellent colleagues at UCSC. Check it out here: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Axios reporting a second order boom in nuclear fusion tech investment to support the AI acceleration. No Roko’s basilisk for these VCs. Skynet thanks you.

We tried to warn. And yet the press “fact checked” anyone who dared to say Trump was going to implement Project 2025—because he said he wouldn’t. Insane.

Silicon Valley is seizing the levers of power, but we’re here to help you chart a course through the madness. I’m thrilled to announce SYSTEM CRASH, a new podcast I’ll be cohosting with my pal @bcmerchant.bsky.social. Join us as we dissect the tech dystopia. Starts Friday!

Myself and @garethbryant.bsky.social have been editing the blog @ppesydney.bsky.social for 10 years now addressing the worldliness of critical political economy issues. So here's a thread celebrating its practical and theoretical diversity #HappyBirthdayPPE www.ppesydney.net

It’s still not clear to me who’s smarter, Musk or the AI. Guess It depends on whether X’s algorithm drives the man, or the man drives the algorithm.. fortune.com/2024/11/14/g...

And so OpenAI is set to become the next Google. I wonder if it will take the US DoJ 27 years to figure out it’s a monopoly as well. www.linkedin.com/news/story/o...

Map of undersea internet cables. Wow.

UC Santa Cruz right now

TiL that you can buy ETFs tracking US congressional members’ stock trades. The democrat ETF is called “NANC” and the Republican one “KRUZ” 🤔 — both outperform the S&P 500 by a LOT. 🤔💡

What's cool about looking back at the history of college protests is that 19 year old students have been right about every single American war, and the esteemed Harvard educated opinion writers at the New York Times have been wrong about every single American war.