Ben Tarnoff
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bentarnoff.com
Ben Tarnoff
@bentarnoff.com
sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof
I wrote a book with Quinn Slobodian called MUSKISM. It'll be published in the US in April 2026, and I hope you'll consider pre-ordering it.

The elevator pitch is: if Fordism defined the capitalism of the 20th century, Muskism may well define the capitalism of the 21st.
October 31, 2025 at 2:56 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Feels like this wouldn't happen even 20 years ago? Internal labor markets meant you cut your teeth reporting the facts on night court or whatever then eventually you get to interview the mayor. Now you go to an ivy, build a brand, maybe a podcast and take that brand between papers.
October 16, 2025 at 10:07 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
We have armed secret police kidnapping people off the street based on the color of their skin.

When we win: we will haul them before a Senate committee. The masks will come off. There will be consequences.
October 12, 2025 at 4:44 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
I do have a soft spot for computer programming books from the 1970s.
October 10, 2025 at 4:13 PM
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Boston area friends and colleagues! I will be at @brooklinebooksmith.bsky.social tomorrow (Wed 10/1) in conversation with @bentarnoff.com at 7 pm.

All info here: brooklinebooksmith.com/event/2025-1...
Thea Riofrancos with Ben Tarnoff: Extraction
brooklinebooksmith.com
September 30, 2025 at 8:32 PM
If you're in the Boston area, come see me quiz @triofrancos.bsky.social about her new book EXTRACTION in Brookline on Wednesday brooklinebooksmith.com/event/2025-1...
Thea Riofrancos with Ben Tarnoff: Extraction
brooklinebooksmith.com
September 29, 2025 at 12:59 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Morning walk
September 26, 2025 at 12:09 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Pretty sure the civil rights act of 1964 polls better than every single living democratic politician and some good dead ones. The idea that you’d give up that advantage, that you’d betray CENTURIES of work by a multiracial coalition of Americans, to prove how much you like Charlie Kirk, is insane.
September 18, 2025 at 10:00 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
The idea that “the civil rights act was a mistake” is a mainstream conservative position we can only tolerate but “defund the police” is a great cancer that must be excised from America for Democrats to win is the actual reason Democrats lose. Sorry.
September 18, 2025 at 9:59 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
September 17, 2025 at 7:31 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
'Welcome to my last four years.' A search for accountability and a full, detailed explanation for Martha's death . . . www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
Paul Laity · After Martha
For the hospital, and for the NHS, it was a closed case, another preventable death: medicine is imperfect, such things...
www.lrb.co.uk
September 17, 2025 at 12:33 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
woke up this morning thinking about this
September 9, 2025 at 3:00 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
EXTRACTION is hitting the road this fall. Thrilled to be in conversation with @dharna.bsky.social @bentarnoff.com @dwallacewells.bsky.social @earthworks.bsky.social and others.

Stay tuned for more events in the winter and spring! @wwnorton.com
September 8, 2025 at 2:56 PM
I could see "abolish the mobile web" as a demand that gets some traction over the next decade or so
things were better when the computer lived in its own specific room and you only went in there sometimes
August 24, 2025 at 2:46 PM
Every day offers further evidence for my pet theory that "AOL Anticipated Everything." Someday I will be permitted to write a book on this topic
Hundreds of billions of dollars to automate the experience of being groomed in an AOL chat room in 1998
New reporting from @jeffhorwitz.bsky.social, who got hold of internal standards for chatbot behavior at Meta.
August 14, 2025 at 3:09 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Happy Zero Cool Day to all who celebrate.
August 10, 2025 at 3:55 PM
Coming March 2026
August 6, 2025 at 2:16 PM
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I put my “dating historian” hat back on to write about a good movie about bad men, now out in a new edition from @criterion.bsky.social www.criterion.com/current/post...
July 22, 2025 at 5:32 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Very excited to share this workshop I'm helping to host on August 19: "From Tech Lash To Tech Fash: Strategic reflections on a decade of collective organizing in computing"
tech-organizing-reflections.github.io
July 23, 2025 at 3:21 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
The government of Israel is exterminating every man, woman and child in Gaza. And our governments, and most leaders of liberal institutions in "the West" - parties both left and right, the press, universities - are doing all they can to support this. This is the central political fact of our time.
July 24, 2025 at 2:35 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Exclusive: Harvard publisher cancels entire journal issue on Palestine shortly before publication.

My latest.
www.theguardian.com/education/20...
Revealed: Harvard publisher cancels entire journal issue on Palestine shortly before publication
As Harvard’s feud with Trump escalated, so did tensions over an ‘education and Palestine’ issue of a prestigious journal. Scholars blame the ‘Palestine exception’ to academic freedom
www.theguardian.com
July 22, 2025 at 11:17 AM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Alex de Waal has worked on humanitarian causes across the globe for over 40 years.

“There is no case, over those four decades, of such minutely engineered, closely monitored, precisely designed mass starvation of a population as is happening in Gaza today.”
July 21, 2025 at 1:56 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
Wow — New Gallup poll:

— Trump approval on immigration: 35-62 (!)

— Record high approval of immigration (79-17 overall)

— 78% of people support a pathway to citizenship (+8 from 2024); only 38% support mass deportation (-9 from 2024)

— 30% want a decrease in immigration (-25 from 2024)
July 11, 2025 at 12:48 PM
Reposted by Ben Tarnoff
🚨 My next book, EXTRACTION: THE FRONTIERS OF GREEN CAPITALISM is out 9/23 with @wwnorton.com

Today and tomorrow, you can pre-order it at 25% off 😊 Use code PREORDER25 at www.barnesandnoble.com/w/extraction...
July 10, 2025 at 6:57 PM