Check out this @wortnews.bsky.social interview with @anniemcc.bsky.social, author of Beneath the Wage: Tips, Tasks, and Gigs in the Age of Service Work:

This thread compiles what happens to be some of the best Marxist cultural criticism of the year (including a few I'd missed!) by the inimitable @sarahbrouillette.bsky.social

first year without a Jclo top 10. I miss him all the time

I did a really engaging (for me) interview for a rad Wisconsin radio show!

Amazing expose, a must-read. "In any given work day, Asia would assume “three to five different personas” simultaneously...He was paid per message, a flat rate of $0.05 per...He also had to type at least 40 words a minute, and keep up with a dashboard displaying the total number of messages sent."

This is a wonderful list of great pieces!

Weird situation. AI adoption in the work world is stagnating, while higher-ed institutions are rushing to embrace it so that students will be prepared for…the work world?

Applications are open for MIR Summer Seminar 2026 on the theme of Marxist Internationalism! See the call for applications: docs.google.com/document/d/1.... Open to all non-faculty University of California affiliates (undergrads, grads, staff, lecturers). App deadline Jan. 16. Please share!

This book is so good and important. Currently reading “Ed-Tech” by Annie McClanahan & Louise McCune, who see in an anecdote of a dead professor’s course materials used for online teaching a symbol of the broad project of deskilling that’s only accelerated with AI 🔥 @anniemcc.bsky.social

everyone is talking about getting copies of University Keywords (or other JHU Press books) for all their friends, students, and comrades for the holidays, especially when it is 40% off with the code HHOL25.

LA Times asks "The UC faculty just won a big court victory over Trump. But why didn’t UC join their lawsuit?"--WHY INDEED? archive.is/P5zjD

Sarah Brouillette (@sarahbrouillette.bsky.social) reviews Madeline Lane-McKinley's (@lalouverouge.bsky.social) Solidarity With Children, from @haymarketbooks.org—a deft Marxist-feminist, abolitionist call to liberate children from the status of parental property. proteanmag.com/2025/11/19/h...

If an attractive young woman a third my age didn't want to date me, then why did she ask me for feedback on an economics paper? by Larry Summers

The UCFA/UCLAFA/AAUP victory is on the front page of today’s LA Times. (No leadership or administrators were harmed in actually standing up to the Feds. because they didn’t.)

Impt thread re: UC's ongoing efforts to persuade faculty that we are management

WHEN WE FIGHT, WE WIN!!!! www.nytimes.com/2025/11/14/u...

How does service work change how we build worker power? Check out this @truthout.org interview with @anniemcc.bsky.social, author of Beneath the Wage: Tips, Tasks, and Gigs in the Age of Service Work.

Interview with me about service sector stuff in advance of my book release next year! truthout.org/articles/imp...

The President's Postdoctoral Fellowship Program is one of the most coveted & prestigious positions for UC graduates. It gives a hiring incentive to campuses who hire recipients for a tenure track position. What a DAMN travesty. This is capitulation to Trump's demand letter & anti-diversity agenda.

This article presents the end of the PPFP as a done deal, but it’s not—until the chancellors’ meeting this afternoon.

Folks may remember the video of Dr. Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, arrested while protecting students from cops as the UCI Free Palestine encampment was raided. She is still fighting a legal battle and needs support--please donate if you can and spread the campaign! chuffed.org/project/1562...

Applications are open for MIR Summer Seminar 2026 on the theme of Marxist Internationalism! See the call for applications: docs.google.com/document/d/1.... Open to all non-faculty University of California affiliates (undergrads, grads, staff, lecturers). App deadline Jan. 16. Please share!

This is a great essay--a must-read for anyone concerned about the use of AI as deskilling, automation, labor techno-discipline, etc.

The entire AI industry is just GPU purchases and data center construction. That’s it. No productivity multipliers. No AGI. No singularity.

SO THRILLED TO FINALLY BE ABLE TO ANNOUNCE THIS!

Wall to wall action TOMORROW at UC Regents meeting!

Tomorrow the UC regents are meeting at UCSF to discuss Trump's extortion attempt. This is a defining moment for the UC system, for public education, and for the university as an institution. We demand no concession, no capitulation, no cuts.

We should be honest abut how "we should just kill them, can we not please just KILL them" lurks barely under the surface of so much respectable discourse on the homeless.

lol this is a throwback to the golden age of bad articles

not today, I guess, but Satan, please, tomorrow?

I have a book cover!

I keep saying this, but... ...punishing the homeless is how big-city and blue state liberals do fascism.

there is no question in my mind that rfk jr is the most dangerous person in this administration and that his eugenicist ideology threatens the lives of millions of people www.advocate.com/politics/dem...

Really fucking gross.

This is why you need a union. It doesn't matter if it's illegal if nobody is going to do anything about it. But trust me, if you have a union you ALL can do something about it.

Coalition of UC unions condemns Trump’s attacks on the UC and the California economy. @ucaft.bsky.social @afscme3299.bsky.social @uaw4811.bsky.social @aaup.org #HigherEd #AcademicFreedom #UnniversityofCalifornia #HoldTheLine #Trump #HandsOffHigherEd #StandUpUC

The coalition of UC unions condemns Trump’s attacks on the University of California. Read more: ucaft.org/news/the-coa... @calnurses.bsky.social @afscme3299.bsky.social @aaup.org @uaw4811.bsky.social @uptecwa.bsky.social @teamsterslocal2010.bsky.social @ucaftbayarea.bsky.social

So glad to see "deskilling" being used correctly here--this is a vital term for understanding what AI automation looks like!

Just a heads up. I was able to schedule my COVID vaccine appointment. Online it will ask “do you have a condition that puts you at high risk for severe outcomes from COVID-19 virus.” Click yes and it will allow you to schedule an appointment. No questions asked. No proof required. Pass it on.

This is a really powerful thread....

Strong agree. Among other excellent contributions, the chapter by @anniemcc.bsky.social & Louis McCune is the best intro to Ed Tech I have yet read.

We're not asking for much. We're just asking that you leave us the fuck alone. We're not asking for anything more than we had 10, 15, 20 years ago. Are you really going to tout your "harm reduction" as someone who is more hostile to my people than Ronald Reagan was? You've lost your marbles.

Yes, unemployment is growing faster among young men in the USA than young women. But @jburnmurdoch.ft.com argues that underneath the headlines is a story of men being less likely to work in education and healthcare, two industries where employment defies cyclical trends.

"what if there was a publication that was 4% more reactionary than the Atlantic but 6% less reactionary than the Free Press?" Wow how exciting, here is $8 per month

The bubble is popping. When we look back, I expect, we will say it has already popped. open.substack.com/pub/garymarc...

I'm insufferably, interminably on-record arguing that AGI discourse is alienating, historically untethered, and misleading (nymag.com/intelligence...). But now of its biggest boosters — and, as @himself.bsky.social points out, an influential figure in AI *and* foreign policy — says: ok, yeah

I've been shit-reposting AI stuff today so I'll mention that I'm giving a talk about AI (and about RL Kuang's _Babel_, and about That UCLA Comp Lit Class, and about the history of the teaching machine etc etc etc) at the EI at UCI in October. If you're near, come! www.eventbrite.com/e/the-englis...

Since 2023, translators and interpreters have seen work dry up, rates plummet and their jobs reduced to editing AI-generated output. Some are leaving the field, others are considering bankruptcy. All despite any major upgrade in translation quality. This is how AI is killing translation work: