iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Reposted by David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick

autumn coded @hoovybaby.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Just talk to another human already jesus fucking christ

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Frog and Toad Bot @frogandtoadbot.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

The night was cold and dark. “Listen to the wind howling in the trees,” said Frog. “What a fine time for a ghost story.”

Frog and Toad craddle warm cups of tea in their hands, as they sit in cozy chairs in front of the fire.

From "Shivers"
In *Days with Frog and Toad*

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Taylor Sheridan is for people who watched A FEW GOOD MEN and thought Jack Nicholson was the hero.

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Adam Becker @adambecker.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

@aoc.bsky.social just put out a great statement on AI. Refreshing to see a major politician on the left nail this. "Silicon Valley billionaires want us to believe that Al robots will destroy humanity. But the biggest threat to humanity are the tech oligarchs themselves." 🎯

Charles,

Last weekend, Dario Amodei, the CEO of Anthropic, one of the largest Al companies in the world, publicly asked his industry to slow down Al development.

Shortly after, Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAl, followed suit. Then Elon Musk.

This all came days after an Anthropic researcher quit, citing his belief that this technology could wipe out humanity and that Al companies are "gambling with our lives."

For years, people have warned that generative Al could slip out of our direct control.

Those safety concerns must be taken seriously.

And this is why I have advocated for strict safety standards on how Al is built and deployed, public oversight over this technology, and using existing laws to hold these companies accountable when they cause harm.

But I want to draw your attention to another reality: Right now, the U.S. economy and our financial futures are riding on Silicon Valley's bet that Al will soon be immensely profitable and pay off. And that bet isn't looking good.

The formula for a profitable business isn't complicated: make more money than you spend. But the biggest Al companies aren't doing that. They are spending hundreds of billions per year on data centers, chips, and other costs while their ability to make revenues that exceed their already-immense sunk costs are unclear. Experts estimate that these Al companies will require another $600 billion of debt just to finance

themselves in 2026 alone. That is more than the entire budgets of the U.S. Departments of Justice, Transportation, & Education combined.
Meanwhile, despite almost every single one of these companies not turning a profit & having sunk billions of investor dollars in development of data centers & other infrastructure, Al companies are also on a spending spree of hundreds of millions of dollars in lobbying & dark money in our elections.
It would be one thing if we were discussing a few private companies with a poor business model. But last year, virtually all stock market gains - 80% - rested entirely on just a handful of Al companies.
That tells us two things:
1. Nearly the entire U.S. economy outside the Al industry is relatively stagnating and faring poorly & the gains from these few companies are disguising it; &
2. Millions of people's retirements - including their pensions, 401ks, & investments - are potentially exposed to this risk.
That's why these Al companies' dubious financial positions matter to working people.
These companies argue that debt is necessary. They'll tell you that building transformative technologies requires upfront capital, & that massive borrowing today will pay off in generating unprecedented prosperity tomorrow.
But this is not the typical debt that startups take on while they build out a company. We are talking about billions going on trillions of dollars leveraged with no indication that these companies will be able to recoup these funds profitably. And they are increasingly looking to the government as their source of cash.
In an effort to hide their debt, tech companies have been relying on "circular financing" where tech giants like Google, Amazon, & Microsoft give billions to Al startups like OpenAl & Anthropic, only for those startups to hand that money right back to buy Al processing power.
In other words, these Al companies are luring in new investors by making it look like their financials are healthier than they really are.

What's even worse is that retirement & pension funds are key to supporting this illusion.
When the Al companies issue bonds to raise more money, your pension funds & retirement accounts are some of the biggest buyers. When Musk's Al business went public, it became part of index funds where millions of Americans invest our savings. Many Americans don't even know that their retirement investments are tied up in these companies at all.
From Big Tech's perspective, that's a feature, not a bug. By tying our futures to their reckless gambling, Al billionaires are trying to make themselves too big to fail. They think they can take such dangerous risks because we will bail them out if things go wrong.
Sound familiar? This scene is dangerously reminiscent of the rampant speculation, corruption, & broken incentives leading up to the 2008 financial crisis that plunged millions of working class Americans into financial chaos that we never fully recovered from.
It is no accident that these warnings from Altman & Amodei come months-if not weeks-before these companies were meant to go public.
When companies go public, they have to be more transparent about how they are doing financially. And after a waiting period, they typically have to let private investors-like their own employees-sell their shares.
The New York Times recently confirmed that OpenAl has postponed going public for this very reason. They are in no rush for the truth about their finances to come out.
But the moment these oligarchs began to seek our public tax dollars & public contracts while exposing their companies to public pension funds & investments, they opened themselves to public accountability & scrutiny.
Silicon Valley billionaires have rigged the game & are attempting to shift their financial risk to working people: If they're right about Al's potential, they reap the profits. If they're wrong & the bubble bursts, they are setting up the American people to pick up the tab.
Heads, they win; tails, we lose.

We can stop this, and we shouldn't play their game. Together we can address both the economic and safety threats of unrestricted Al development and prevent financial chaos and stabilize market risk.

We must make it clear now that should the Al bubble pop, Congress should not bail out Big Tech.

And across our federal agencies, we have the authorities and tools to hold Al companies and their leaders accountable for releasing dangerous, unvetted, and defective products. We must not wait.

Silicon Valley billionaires want us to believe that Al robots will destroy humanity.

But the biggest threat to humanity are the tech oligarchs themselves.

It's time we hold them accountable.

Thank you for reading.

In solidarity,

Alexandria

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Joseph Cox @josephcox.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

OpenAI and Microsoft admitted LLMs are predatory tech built on “an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions,” and the “largest theft of labor in human history.” An internal Microsoft document said AI has created a “doom loop” that is killing “the entire web.” www.404media.co/doom-loop-op...

404media.co

‘Doom Loop’: OpenAI and Microsoft Admits LLMs Are Destroying the Web and Built on Theft

"Millions of people around the world will soon consider large models ‘hoovering up’ all their work to be an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions."

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Greg Pak @gregpak.net · 07/09/2026

The "A.i." industry is a pox that's costing us all money. No one signed up for this shit.

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Kashana @kashana.blacksky.app · 01/09/2026

Someday I hope to have more rights than AI generated child sex abuse material

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 27/08/2026

I wish Christopher Nolan would use this moment to go back to WB and force them to make another TENET movie.

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Phil Nobile Jr. @philnobilejr.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

Holy shit

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Rue Morgue Magazine @ruemorguemag.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

On this day in Horror History, Peter Jackson’s BRAINDEAD (a.k.a. DEAD ALIVE) was released in New Zealand in 1992.

A close up of a woman’s face as she pulls her mouth open with her hands to reveal a tiny skull inside with the words dead alive written in neon green below.

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Rue Morgue Magazine @ruemorguemag.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

On this day in Horror History, THE OTHERS was released in 2001.

A young girl in a white dress and veil plays with a marionette puppet by candlelight on a wooden floor.

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Kashana @kashana.blacksky.app · 03/08/2026

We’re also funding death squads but what’s really offensive is that somewhere out there a poor person might be able to eat

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 30/07/2026

Film you've watched more than six times with a gif. Hard mode: no Star Trek, Star Wars, LOTR, Marvel, Disney, or Ghibli.

static.klipy.com

Army Of Darkness: Bruce Campbell's Groovy Hand

ALT: Army Of Darkness: Bruce Campbell's Groovy Hand

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

Dude showed up to do some work on our house rocking an ORPHAN tattoo. 👀❤️

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Gregg Gonsalves @gregggonsalves.bsky.social · 29/07/2026

"If there is a question to ask, then, it is this: Why does Musk get a pass? Why do politicians, journalists and commentators treat his far-right racist radicalism as a sideshow rather than the core of his political, ideological and industrial project..." www.nytimes.com/2026/07/29/o...

nytimes.com

Opinion | Elon Musk Is a Menace to Society (Gift Article)

Why does the owner of X get a pass for what he says and does there?

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Greg Sargent @gregsargent.bsky.social · 27/07/2026

When Elon Musk says "zero" children died in Africa from his DOGE cuts, he really means zero children died who are *worthy of any concern.* It's vile coded signaling to his global fascist audience. From me and @polphilpod.bsky.social, a deep dive into Musk's fascism: newrepublic.com/article/2135...

newrepublic.com

The Real Reason Elon Musk Keeps Insisting DOGE Cuts Killed “Zero” Kids

In his explosive interview with The Economist, the SpaceX billionaire inadvertently revealed something darker about his true vision for the future—and about his affinities with global fascism.

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

I worked for Frank Darabont in the '90s and so got to know Chuck a bit. As an aspiring screenwriter, he was 1 of 2 successful screenwriters that I knew, so I was a bit in awe. I just used a bit of writing advice he gave me in a pitch last week. Shocking and too soon. variety.com/2026/film/ne...

variety.com

Chuck Russell, Director of ‘The Mask,’ Dies at 74

Chuck Russell, who directed genre films including 1994's "The Mask," died Wednesday in the San Diego area.

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 22/07/2026

As long as there are people like Christopher Nolan making movies like #TheOdyssey, there will be generations of young people who are inspired to see their work projected on the big screen and not on their phone. I was literally in awe of it. See it on the biggest screen you can.

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 20/07/2026

This trailer has been baffling me for weeks. Is this a romantic comedy set in a Christofascist dystopia?? How is this law enforced? Are there single people in jail for having sex?? Why not just look for love on 1 of the 364 OTHER DAYS?? What are we doing here?? m.youtube.com/watch?v=AvKo...

m.youtube.com

One Night Only | Official Trailer

YouTube video by Universal Pictures

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FANGORIA @fangoria.bsky.social · 18/07/2026

Endlessly quotable, exceptionally written and calibrated to shred even the steeliest of nerves. We're looking back on ALIENS at 40.

dlvr.it

The Greatest Horror Sequel Of All Time: ALIENS At 40

Endlessly quotable, exceptionally written and calibrated to shred even the steeliest of nerves. We're looking back on ALIENS at 40.

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Akela Cooper @akelacooper.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

LET'S FUCKING GO!

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Rue Morgue Magazine @ruemorguemag.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

R.I.P. legendary actor SAM NEILL.💔

A black and white photo of a man sitting in an empty theatre with a bucket of popcorn wearing a shirt that has crosses drawn all over it.

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Ben Collins @bencollins.bsky.social · 09/07/2026

Elon Musk: SpaceX Will Launch People to Mars in 2024

Elon Musk: Giant Rocket Could Take Us to Marks in Just 7 Years - and London in 29 Minutes

Can Elon Musk Really Get Us to Mars Within 10 Years?

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FANGORIA @fangoria.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

Horror isn't just for Halloween: the Academy Museum is mounting a new exhibition celebrating the genre, set to open this fall.

dlvr.it

The Academy Museum Celebrates All Things Horror With New Exhibition

Horror isn't just for Halloween: the Academy Museum is mounting a new exhibition celebrating the genre, set to open this fall.

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mtsw @mtsw.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

The story here is not this stupid movie – which will never get made and never come out – but how the Tilly Norwood people keep getting these credulous articles placed in national news sources despite zero demonstration of any success or demand for this.

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Allison Pregler 📼🎃 @allisonpregler.bsky.social · 06/07/2026

This is an actual storyboard for Evil Dead 2. People don't need AI to make beautiful art.

A storyboard for Evil Dead 2. A crude cartoon man screams at a big, squiggly hand. He has a giant O for a mouth.

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Lauri Donahue @lauridonahue.bsky.social · 05/07/2026

futurism.com/future-socie... lol

As one New York financier told Financial Times journalist Gillian Tett, new hires who were seen as “AI natives” are turning out to have alarmingly shallow ideas. So much so, the anonymous finance worker admitted, that his firm now actively avoids seeking out AI-literate STEM graduates, and opts to comb through humanities students instead.

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Lauri Donahue @lauridonahue.bsky.social · 04/07/2026

www.nytimes.com/2026/06/30/o...

Large language models are not reasoning machines. They’re plausibility engines. It’s not just that they don’t test their outputs to make sure they’re correct or logical, or that they fail to do so in certain instances. They can’t, and they’ll never be able to on their own. They can only assess which answers are probable, based on the data on which the models have been trained. And that holds true whether they’re trained on the full breadth of human output or only on peer-reviewed scientific articles. It’s baked into the way they operate.

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Briony Kidd @brionykidd.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

A few people were paying attention.

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Smooth Dunk @smoothdunk2.bsky.social · 24/06/2026

when AI companies go bankrupt

5 panel comic

Panel 1: Red Guy with “AI” on his chest is falling backwards off a cliff. A Purple Guy is running to “save him”

Panels 2-4: Close up of Purple Guy’s hands gradually going from outstretched fingers to a closed fist

Panel 5: Red Guy falls backwards off the cliff while Purple Guy does nothing but show him his middle finger.

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Chuck Wendig @chuckwendig.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

what the fuck, A24

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 21/06/2026

Seriously, @thr.com, since Zeitchik manages to get through this entire article without mentioning the fact that this was only possible by stealing other people's creations, the answer is 1) no, and 2) go fuck yourself.

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James Ball @jamesrball.com · 15/06/2026

"If people stop believing that he can actually deliver on those promises, or if they stop believing in Musk himself, those valuations could disappear overnight…Musk is a modern-day Tinkerbell: if enough people stop believing in him, he simply ceases to exist in his current form."

thenewworld.co.uk

This is how Elon Musk’s trillion-dollar house of cards could collapse

His fortune and empire are more fragile than his IPO’s backers believe

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 11/06/2026

Wow, Amazon/MGM marketing seriously slept on how funny #MastersOfTheUniverse is. It's full of GOTG-style humor and Skeletor is a riot. They could've found a whole new audience for that franchise if they'd just put some of those jokes in the trailer.

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Boing Boing @boingboing.net · 05/06/2026

Reuters interviewed nine former Tesla data trainers. Some of the people who trained Full Self-Driving reportedly won't ride in a car that's using it.

boingboing.net

Tesla FSD is so good its trainers won't ride in it

Tesla's Full Self-Driving is so ready for the future that some of the people who trained it reportedly will not get in the car. Reuters interviewed nine former Tesla data…

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George Takei @georgetakei.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

Three investor-protection rules, quietly waived so Elon Musk's SpaceX could fast-track into the indexes anchoring your 401(k). He holds 85% of the voting power. Public shareholders have almost none. thinkbigpicture.substack.com/p/spacex-ipo...

thinkbigpicture.substack.com

You’re About To Own Part Of SpaceX, Like It Or Not

Tens of millions of us are about to be forced by an alien onto his spacecraft.

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Ed Zitron @edzitron.com · 05/06/2026

This has gone more viral than anything I have ever written or recorded, the "AI has no ROI" story has fully caught on and there's an anxiety in the AI industry that nobody can seem to calm down. Things are going to get interesting in the next few weeks!

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Black Film Alerts 🎥 @blackfilmalerts.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

Keith David has finally received his well deserved star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Today is his 70th birthday!

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Rue Morgue Magazine @ruemorguemag.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

On this day in Horror History, POLTERGEIST was released in 1982.

A ghostly figure made of glowing, tattered fabric looms in a dimly lit room as a woman in an orange dress recoils in fear.

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David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick @bravecarrot.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

Well, you can add #HUNGRY to 47 METERS DOWN and KILLER WHALE , so now "Two Girls Go On Vacation & Drink Too Much & Meet a Guy Who Turns Out To Be a Tour Guide & the Next Morning He Takes Them To a Remote Location Where They Are Attacked & Trapped By a Vicious Animal" is officially a subgenre!

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caffeine anxiety ego death @mxdshipwreck.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

oh no, how awful

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