iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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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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Erin Reed @erininthemorning.com · 26/08/2026

In Tabor, Iowa, a school board erupted for what would otherwise be a routine vote to hire a slate of new teachers. Why? Because a teacher was trans. The school board decided after hearing comments not to hire him, even though he already set up his classroom. Subscribe to support our journalism.

erininthemorning.com

After Anti-Trans Uproar At School Board Meeting, Iowa School District Rejects Trans Band Teacher

An Iowa school district chose to start the school year without the new band teacher instead of allowing a trans educator to take on the role he was offered, following protests from parents.

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bort @crushbort.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

when people talk about the ai community they mean guys who look like background extras from blade doing hours long youtube videos about fake hiking deaths

some sickly looking youtuber with an ill-considered necklace

The WORST Karen Hiking Deaths Ever
Recorded!

The Worst HIKING Influencer Deaths Ever :
Recorded..

Hiking Deaths That Deserve Darwin
Awards

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Team Talarico @teamtalaricohq.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

NEW AD: 14 years ago today, Ken Paxton stole someone's $1,000 pen. Today, Ken Paxton’s pen victim is endorsing James Talarico.

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Jesse Thorn @jessethorn.bsky.social · 13/08/2026

M. Gessen has written a truly extraordinary piece about the "soft fascism" faced by transgender people in America, and by trans people in Kansas particularly. Beautifully written and reported, deeply humane. I really hope you'll read it. www.nytimes.com/2026/08/13/o...

nytimes.com

Opinion | What’s Happening in Kansas Should Alarm Us All (Gift Article)

Is Kansas just the beginning?

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By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 06/08/2026

I'm sure that working in social media - dealing with people as mass statistical abstractions - is a cognitohazard, the sort of thing that could make anyone a little solipsistic, convinced that everyone else is a kind of stimulus-responding automaton lacking the interiority that you experience. 1/

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InfoWars @realinfowars.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

Breathe easy, InfoWarriors! Sen. Mitch McConnell just called in with a reassuring update from the space between life and death!

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Mark Jacob @markjacob.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

This New York Times article, which ran a week before Christmas last year, didn’t get the attention it deserved. It detailed Trump and Epstein's predatory behavior toward women – “a game of ego and dominance” in which “female bodies were currency.” Here’s a gift link and a thread. 1/6🧵

nytimes.com

‘Don’s Best Friend’: How Epstein and Trump Bonded Over the Pursuit of Women (Gift Article)

The president has tried to minimize their friendship, but documents and interviews reveal an intense and complicated relationship. Chasing women was a game of ego and dominance. Female bodies were cur...

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Ron Filipkowski @ronfilipkowski.bsky.social · 31/07/2026

So many sneering elitist journalists with snarky posts over the past months that the Reflecting Pool story was trivial. It was so trivial that the DC US Attny presented false evidence to a grand jury to indict an innocent man to please the President while they both lied about it.

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Michael J. Stern @michaeljstern.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

I'm never going to get over the fact that the president of the United States paid a woman more than $5 million after a jury found him liable for raping her. And he's still president. And people still support him. Never. Get. Over. It.

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Governor Tim Walz @governorwalz.mn.gov · 06/07/2026

The President of the United States is attacking a group of kindergarteners because of the clothes they wore to school.

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Peter @notalawyer.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

this wouldn’t work legally because a President has no authority to remove a Supreme Court justice. however the President could instead simply drone strike them. it sounds like i’m being snarky but as a result of the immunity decision this is the actual law.

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Ed Zitron @edzitron.com · 16/06/2026

Exclusive: I have seen OpenAI's audited financials for 2024 and 2025. In 2025, OpenAI had $13.07 billion in revenue and $34 billion in costs. $867 million of its revenue came from SoftBank, and $303 million came from Microsoft. www.wheresyoured.at/exclusive-op...

wheresyoured.at

Exclusive: OpenAI Losses Increased Nearly 8X in 2025, With Spending Hitting $34 Billion

Soundtrack: In Flames - Colony To further support my independent journalism, please subscribe to my premium newsletter. It’s $7 a month or $70 a year. If you’re subscribed to the free newsletter and ...

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Governor JB Pritzker @govpritzker.illinois.gov · 07/06/2026

More than half of the publicly identified donors to Trump’s golden ballroom have won new or expanded federal contracts worth more than $50 billion. Corruption at its finest.

Washington Post Article: Ballroom donors won $50B in contracts after giving to Trump project, watchdog group finds

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The Atlantic @theatlantic.com · 05/06/2026

If we confuse generative AI’s ability to produce text with consciousness, we risk assigning moral responsibility to chatbots—and not to their makers, Ted Chiang argues.

bit.ly

No, Artificial Intelligence Is Not Conscious

Taken to its logical conclusion, this line of thinking is absurd—and damning.

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John Scalzi @scalzi.com · 11/04/2026

I don't know how to explain to the people who pop up when creatives complain about "AI" to say there are legit uses for it just how much they sound like someone saying "Well actually fire is used to make bread" when people are talking about an organized arson ring burning down their fucking houses

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By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C) @doctorow.pluralistic.net · 03/06/2026

"The values described in Claude’s constitution sound very nice, but that hardly matters; it’s dishonest to suggest that Claude is capable of moral reasoning, because it’s not." -Ted Chiang, No, Artificial Intelligence Is Not Conscious www.theatlantic.com/philosophy/2...

theatlantic.com

No, Artificial Intelligence Is Not Conscious

Taken to its logical conclusion, this line of thinking is absurd—and damning.

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Joel S. @joelhs.bsky.social · 28/05/2026

E. Jean Carroll didn't just "accuse" Trump of sexual assault. She won a civil lawsuit against Trump for sexual assault. A jury found that Trump sexually assaulted her. She deserves for us to call it what it is.

"Justice Dept. Is Said to Open Criminal Inquiry of E. Jean Carroll Over Trump Lawsuits
The investigation is said to center on whether Ms. Carroll committed perjury in civil lawsuits against Donald J. Trump, whom she accused of sexual assault."

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lauren @lauren.rotatingsandwiches.com · 27/05/2026

objectively very funny that all the republicans crying about talarico eating a potato and egg breakfast taco have already pledged their undying loyalty to an enfeebled new yorker who survives on diet coke and the phantom of the opera soundtrack. not that it matters. not that anything at all matters

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Aysha U. Farah @ayshaufarah.bsky.social · 02/05/2026

Idk man I feel like even if AI scraped from 100% ethical sources, had zero impact on the environment, and produced gorgeous work, I’d still think you were a bitch for using it

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Popehat @kenwhite.bsky.social · 22/04/2026

The message of the Right reacting to Virginia is the same as the message of "2020 was rigged": no victory by anyone but us is ever legitimate. We are the only ones allowed to win. These people are cartoon villains entitled to no respect and no trust. Rabid dogs.

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Gil Durán @gilduran.com · 20/04/2026

The CEO of Palantir posted a fascist manifesto on X. I pointed out that it was fascist—which resulted in a permanent suspension from X (my second time!). So, when you hear the tweeters complaining that BlueSky is intolerant, remember why many of us came here in the first place.

Gil Duran tweet: TLDR: Fascism

in response to Palantir's long fascists screed on X.

"Your Account is Suspended" Message on X

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Adam Keiper @adamkeiper.com · 14/04/2026

"Supposing we hit the body with a tremendous—whether it's ultraviolet or just very powerful light....Supposing you brought the light inside the body, which you can do either through the skin or in some other way....And then I see the disinfectant...by injection inside or almost a cleaning."

The creepy Trump-as-Jesus picture Trump posted to Truth Social on 12 April 2026.

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Kevin Collins @kwcollins.bsky.social · 11/04/2026

An mRNA treatment for PANCREATIC CANCER was in trials, among many other uses. Choosing to end this research is choosing to sentence millions to an early, painful death

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derek guy @dieworkwear.bsky.social · 10/04/2026

saw someone use grok today to correct the pope

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Chris Kluwe @chriswarcraft.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

This is just so corrupt on every conceivable level. There is no excusing it. These people are The Shittiest Gangsters and we need to throw them in jail for the rest of their lives.

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Aaron Rupar @atrupar.com · 08/04/2026

Trump went from making insane genocidal threats this morning to hyping the “golden age” of Iran hours later, and he received no concessions in between. He’s an absolute basket case who needs to be removed from power before he follows through on one of his mass murder fantasies.

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Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

I think people are allowed to draw conclusions about the American people based on their decision to put this man in office bsky.app/profile/pear...

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Kelly @broadwaybabyto.bsky.social · 04/04/2026

ICE has kept a disabled double amputee prisoner for over 14 months. Rodney Taylor has been denied access to his prosthetic legs. Forced to crawl across dirty floors to access food. Placed in solitary. Denied medical accommodations. They’re killing him & he needs the community to make noise!

theguardian.com

Her husband is a double amputee in ICE prison. She confronted Kristi Noem over its cruel conditions: ‘I have a fire inside’

Mildred Danis-Taylor dropped everything to advocate for the release of her husband, Rodney Taylor. A brutal year of legal and health challenges led her to Capitol Hill

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Chris Murphy @chrismurphyct.bsky.social · 30/03/2026

I mean there it is.

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Garrett M. Graff @vermontgmg.bsky.social · 27/03/2026

This should be an impeachable offense. I understand that we’re way past any of that, but that shouldn’t stop us from naming it.

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Bryce Covert @brycecovert.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

Oudone Lothirath missed four out of five chemotherapy appointments while in ICE detention and received no medical care there. Now he will likely die in a matter of days. www.startribune.com/how-ice-deta...

startribune.com

Detained by ICE, he missed multiple cancer treatments. Now he’s in hospice.

Some immigrants with chronic health problems were swept up by ICE in Minnesota, leading to missed medications and, for one man, missed chemotherapy sessions.

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Ed Zitron @edzitron.com · 24/03/2026

Free newsletter: The AI industry is lying to you about progress. Only 5GW of data centers are under construction, it takes 6 months to bring online a single quarter's worth of NVIDIA GPU sales, and LLM code is actively breaking big tech. www.wheresyoured.at/the-ai-industry-is-lying-to-you/

wheresyoured.at

The AI Industry Is Lying To You

Hi! If you like this piece and want to support my independent reporting and analysis, why not subscribe to my premium newsletter? It’s $70 a year, or $7 a month, and in return you get a weekly newslet...

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Senate Judiciary Democrats 🇺🇸 @judiciarydems.senate.gov · 02/03/2026

BREAKING: Credible whistleblower discloses that FBI forensic experts were ordered to stand down from processing the scene where Renee Good was killed, because Kash Patel did not want Good referenced as a “victim” in the warrant.

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Ben Collins @bencollins.bsky.social · 24/03/2026

An unaccounted for part of the economy is how much young people virulently hate AI, despite how aggressively it's being forced on them. They realize it's making their friends dumber and ruining the world and they want nothing to do with it. From the Penn student paper: www.thedp.com/article/2026...

Goldman Sachs reports that 300 million full-time jobs could be replaced by AI by 2030. Labor turnover is high and hiring has slowed. 71% of Americans worry that AI will cause permanent job loss. As young people about to enter the workforce for the first time, the fear of unemployment is understandable, but we cannot save ourselves with the very tool that is putting us at risk.

The irony is that as Penn pours endless money and energy into AI advancement in its attempt to get ahead, the University is only quickening its own demise. AI cannot coexist with education — it can only degrade it. As technology advances and workers are replaced by machines, schools are some of the only places we have left to explore and wrestle with human thought. With our own university leading the charge, AI is now corrupting those few sacred spaces and leaving us with nowhere to engage in true scholarship.

Editorials represent the majority view of members of The Daily Pennsylvanian Editorial Board who meet regularly to discuss issues relevant to the Penn community. This body is led by Editorial Board Chair Jack Lakis and is entirely separate from the newsroom. Questions or comments should be directed to letters@thedp.com.

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Senator Chris Van Hollen @vanhollen.senate.gov · 19/03/2026

Last August, Trump Jr.'s fund invested in Vulcan Elements, a start-up valued at ~$200M. In December, Vulcan got a $620M taxpayer funded loan from the fed gov. Now, Vulcan is worth ~$2 BILLION, ~10x what it was when Trump Jr.'s fund first invested. Stinks to high heaven.

US Taxpayers and Trump’s Son Are Backing the Same Rare-Earth Startup
The investments are transforming Vulcan Elements. But some Republicans are uncomfortable with state-sponsored capitalism.

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Andrew Lawrence @ndrew.bsky.social · 12/03/2026

im just really fucking sick of spending my entire adult life lurching from one worldwide economic disaster to another all because people pretend republicans arent dumb as dog shit morons completely detached from reality

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Steven Beschloss @stevenbeschloss.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

We are a nation of 349M, yet one man decided to launch our nation into a reckless, illegal war without congressional authorization or counsel or the support of the American people. He didn’t think he had any duty to sell it or serve the people’s interests. This is why despotic rule is so dangerous.

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Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 08/03/2026

maybe I'm focusing on the wrong thing here but this is the wildest shit I've ever heard a white South African say and I study racism for a living

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Peter Gleick @petergleick.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

Multiple news outlets are reporting a US attack on an Iranian #desalination plant. If verified, this violates international law protecting #water systems during wars, and it sets a dangerous precedent, given intense dependence of Gulf countries on desalination. timesofoman.com/article/1691...

timesofoman.com

Iran's FM condemns US attack on Qeshm's freshwater desalination plant, warns of grave consequences

US President Donald Trump announced that Iran promised not to attack its neighbours anymore

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Kelly @broadwaybabyto.bsky.social · 07/03/2026

ICE deported a 6 year old deaf child with severe disabilities to Columbia. Before deporting him, they dragged him from camp to camp without providing his assistive hearing devices or a translator. This innocent child had no way to communicate or understand what was being done to him:

latimes.com

Deaf 6-year-old boy is deported to Colombia without his medical devices, attorney says

A Hayward woman and her two young children were detained and deported to Colombia after they showed up earlier this week for an asylum appointment in San Francisco, her attorney said.

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Mother Jones @motherjones.com · 07/03/2026

Staff at the nation’s largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility have placed bets on which detainee will be the next to die by suicide, according to new reporting from the Associated Press based on 911 calls and detainee accounts.

motherjones.com

At Largest ICE Detention Camp, Staff Bet on Detainee Suicides, AP Reports

Camp East Montana has received several 911 calls in the span of five months about immigrants trying to harm themselves.

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Senator Sheldon Whitehouse @whitehouse.senate.gov · 07/03/2026

White House: the witness’s allegations are “completely baseless” and “backed by zero credible evidence.” Fact: FBI found her credible enough to interview repeatedly, and she received a financial settlement from the Epstein estate.

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