Tag: All-In Podcast

The All-In Tech Bro Podcast Can Be Trying

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

On a good day, I’m not “mid.” But I do have value as a human being and two ears, so I still have the right to have an opinion on the besties of the All-In podcast.

Uh oh.

I’m only listening to the All-In podcast because I’m obsessed with AI at the moment and they have some thought provoking ideas. But they can also come across as tone-deaf fascist dicks. They seem to think that some very complex cultural questions that require nuance can simply be “reasoned” into a solution, when sometimes…lulz.

The human experience is subtle and complex and sometimes requires the type of creative thinking that can not be solved by “learning to code.”

Take, for instance, the latest All-In hobby horse — the apparent DEI abuses found with the Gemini image generation. The issue for me is not so much that Gemini is too “woke” to give us accurate depictions of the Founding Fathers — on that, I agree with them on that — it’s that we need SOME guardrails when it comes to general images generation.

In other words — I’m more worried about Gemini churning out millions of Nazi oriented images used for propaganda than I am woke images of Founding Fathers. But here we are, with some people wanting absolutely no guard rails on AI — for any reason.

The All-In Podcast Guys Can Be Full of Shit

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

In an effort to puncture my own center-Left media narrative bubble, I have come to at least try to listen to the All-In Podcast. And I will admit that I like how they challenge some things that I take for granted. But sometimes, oh boy, do they really know how to fling shit.

According to the All-In geniuses, the evil overlords of the Biden Administration are out to get Space Karen Elon Musk because he’s allowing fucking Nazis to take over Twitter in the name of “free speech.” Or something like that. Some sort of fucking bullshit.

Meanwhile, they grate on my nerves by so brazenly sucking their own cocks about this or that act of conspicuous consumption they have done together since the last pod. I mean, ok, I get it, guys, you’re rich as fuck and you don’t give a shit about us Poors.

Makes me mumble “eat the rich” under my breath.

Anyway, I guess listening to the All-In Podcast serves the purpose I wanted it to when I started listening to it.

An Unabashed Mid’s Hot Take On The All-In Podcast

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Let’s talk about two people featured on the Tech Bro podcast “All-In.”

Chamath Palihapitiya
They say you can’t argue with success and, as such, I really don’t have much room to talk when it comes to this guy. He’s very, very successful. But I still have a hot take on him, and that hot take is he’s a huge fucking asshole. I say this as broke-ass “creative type” who likes to think I have enough of a something akin a secular “soul” that I can appreciate that sometimes humans create for the sake of creation. Palihapitiya’s views on Hollywood — that the entire industry is just a Tech Bro rounding error — are enraging. I mean, come the fuck on. Yeah, so you’re a master of the universe, Hollywood is still very powerful. To use a strict monetary metric on Hollywood totally misses the point — Hollywood fucking creates reality! It’s all very frustrating.

David Sacks
Sacks is a prime example of a person who is a fascist, but their self-perception is such that they can’t bring themselves to admit it. Sacks’ politics are identical to a relative of mine’s. I love my relative dearly, but sometimes their arguments are just stunning in their conflated cluelessness. Sacks wants an autocratic white Christian enthostate (or thereabouts) but knows its not good politics to admit it, so he blabs about how rational he is, yadda, yadda. Fuck that. And fuck him. But, again, he’s very successful and so you can actively ignore me.

The other guys on the podcast are interesting. Maybe a little too close to Space Karen Elon Musk, but I got no problems with them. And, in general, I find the All-In podcast very interesting and enjoyable because it’s thought provoking. But I have to admit that whenever I listen to it I do a lot of yelling and eye rolling at some of the bullshit I hear.

Jason Calacanis Is Way Too Sanguine About The Future Of Work In The Post-AI World

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I generally like Jason Calacanis and his array of tech-themed podcasts. I blanched when the All-In podcast had kook Robert Kennedy Jr. on, but I’m willing to forgive such a dumb mistake.

Anyway, the point of this post is to address how Calacanis’ seems to have a rainbows and unicorns take on AI and the future of work. As the on-going Writers’ Strike indicates — AI isn’t going to make people more productive, it’s simply going to transform the economy to the point that a lot of people simply won’t have a job anymore.

Now, I’m a strong believer in the notion that technology generally generates more jobs than it destroys. But the reason why I fear the AI revolution may be different is it’s all happening so fast that this process won’t have time to happen.

As such, I keep hearing Calacanis talk about how it’s going to make people more productive, and yet, he doesn’t seem willing to admit that lulz, if that productivity happens overnight that the capitalist imperative would be to simply restructure businesses so they have less workers.

And the way I could see this happening very, very rapidly is in the context of, say, a debt default by the Federal government leading to a Second Great Recession which, in turn, would cause a lot of businesses to look for ways to get rid of workers. All these people lose their jobs virtually overnight as a part of some sort of Petite Singularity…and those jobs just never come back. But we wouldn’t realize what was happening until the recession was over.

Anyway. I’m wrong all the time and maybe I’m just being hysterical. That is known to happen.

What Is The Deal With Tech Bro David Sacks?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I really enjoy listening to the All-In podcast because it challenges me, forces me to listen to people I generally don’t agree with politically. They are interesting, intelligent people who just so happen to find fascism way, way, too palatable. When your metrics for assessing something miss the issue of what is morally right, your politics are all fucked up.

Because, literally, the exact same reasoning that several people on the All-In podcast give for various degrees of support for Trump and MAGA could have been used by German industrialists in the 1930s.

But it’s David Sacks who shocks me with his consistently bad hot takes. His politics are identical to a relative of mine and so it is useful to listen to his bullshit for the next time I find myself debating politics with said relative. Sacks is “all in” with being a fifth columnist who supports Russia over Ukraine and the United States.

He is very intense and seems to have a huge fucking chip on his shoulder. It’s all very weird. But he’s cogent enough in his terrible hot takes that you find yourself listening to him and weighing different counter-arguments you might use to point out his hypocrisy.

Anyway, the point is — I’m growing very alarmed at the recent shift in politics among Tech Bros. They are very receptive to America’s new brand of fascism and, in the end, when we maybe need their support to stop the last seizure of power by fascists, they won’t be there for us.