Dwayne Monroe
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cloudquistador.bsky.social
Dwayne Monroe
@cloudquistador.bsky.social
4.8K followers 460 following 360 posts
Cybernetics • AI Resistance • Dialectics • Film Noir • https://monroelab.com • vdgasjournal.com
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cloudquistador.bsky.social
Dwayne Monroe @cloudquistador.bsky.social · Nov 9
At monroelab.com I write about the tech industry's political economy, informed by Marx and Raymond Chandler. In January, a new team effort, for writers who want to look at the world and report what they see:
youtu.be/Js0o6Lvx6S8?...
Verdigris: Critique for the Age of Decline
YouTube video by Film Conversations
youtu.be
cloudquistador.bsky.social
Once again for emphasis. This time, with a graphic borrowed from classic Trek and a diagram of factors I cooked up a few years ago
On the left side of the image, there's a still from classic Star Trek, showing Kirk firing a phaser rifle at a foe with no effect. This is captioned, Tech Industry Ideology vs the harsh, unforgiving facts of material reality. The right side of the image depicts the physical factors of the tech industry
November 10, 2025 at 8:17 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
Material reality strikes again.
carlquintanilla.bsky.social Carl Quintanilla @carlquintanilla.bsky.social · 23h
Data-center projects that “may sit empty for years because the local utility isn’t ready to supply electricity.”

@bloomberg.com @weisenthal.bsky.social $NVDA
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
November 10, 2025 at 7:36 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
This is receiving a bit of notice. I'll use that to expand the point. I propose that one forward moving way we should resist 'AI' propaganda is by showing people (young people especially) how it functions. Using small clusters comprised of retail compute and open models (ollama, for ex) is a path.
cloudquistador.bsky.social Dwayne Monroe @cloudquistador.bsky.social · 1d
Ahoy @olivia.science and @irisvanrooij.bsky.social - I'm researching local alternatives to 'cloud' based ML and 'AI' systems (e.g. Azure, AWS, GCP etc.) - for example, Mac Mini clusters. Has Radboud published anything about the infrastructure the Uni uses for computational modelling etc?
November 10, 2025 at 12:41 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
lorak.bsky.social
Read the letter:
“Dear President von der Leyen, We, experts in artificial intelligence (Al) and its societal impacts, are deeply concerned about your unscientific and inaccurate statement that Al is nearing human reasoning. You claimed in your budget speech in May "we thought Al would only approach human reasoning around 2050. Now we expect this to happen already next year." We understand from Commission disclosure, which followed a lengthy process to obtain this information, that you relied on the statements of Dario Amodei, Jensen Huang and Sam Altman as the basis for your statement about Al nearing human reasoning. These are marketing statements driven by profit-motive and ideology rather than empirical evidence and formal proof. In short, these tech CEOs claims concerning "superintelligence" and "AGI" are manifestly bound with their financial imperatives and not rigorous science. For the President of the European Commission to repeat the misleading marketing language of US technology firms without independent scientific verification undermines Europe's credibility as a reliable and trusted source of scientific knowledge. This is particularly so amidst a significant speculative bubble to which baseless Al hype is contributing. It also undermines the ability of Commission staff to evaluate the claims of Al vendors at a time when the Commission regulates them and procures Al services. The Commission has the duty to diligently assess claims made by industry and to determine with impartial and scholarly analysis where best the objectives of the Union should be pursued. The scientific development of any potentially useful Al is not served by amplifying the unscientific marketing claims of US tech firms. We call on you to: 1. retract your statement on Al approaching human reasoning next year; 2. diligently evaluate other such marketing claims about Al products; and 3. ensure you have the benefit of the necessary impartial scientific advice in future.”
November 10, 2025 at 10:57 AM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
@harrysimmons3578.bsky.social - the author of this op-ed published in the NYT ("always at the very heart of malice") is an academic philosopher.
bsky.app/profile/dave...
davekarpf.bsky.social Dave Karpf @davekarpf.bsky.social · 1d
Bahahahahaha The New York Times just printed an opinion piece declaring "AI is intelligent, so long as we redefine what intelligence means to include it. And soon AI will be conscious, because we'll just redefine consciousness too!"

Nothing means anything! Yay!

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/08/o...
Opinion | A.I. Is on Its Way to Something Even More Remarkable Than Intelligence
www.nytimes.com
November 9, 2025 at 3:41 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
davekarpf.bsky.social
Bahahahahaha The New York Times just printed an opinion piece declaring "AI is intelligent, so long as we redefine what intelligence means to include it. And soon AI will be conscious, because we'll just redefine consciousness too!"

Nothing means anything! Yay!

www.nytimes.com/2025/11/08/o...
Opinion | A.I. Is on Its Way to Something Even More Remarkable Than Intelligence
www.nytimes.com
November 9, 2025 at 3:02 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
Ahoy @olivia.science and @irisvanrooij.bsky.social - I'm researching local alternatives to 'cloud' based ML and 'AI' systems (e.g. Azure, AWS, GCP etc.) - for example, Mac Mini clusters. Has Radboud published anything about the infrastructure the Uni uses for computational modelling etc?
November 9, 2025 at 1:48 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
abeba.bsky.social
this
anarchygoose.bsky.social Anarchy Goose @anarchygoose.bsky.social · 2d
Altman has been quite clear about his strategy.

From the 2008 crash he learned that if you bind enough of the economy to your business you can do whatever you like; government will decide the rules no longer apply.

What he's selling is unaccountabilty.
aselrod.bsky.social Alan Elrod @aselrod.bsky.social · 2d
I honestly don’t get the value of this company. They hoover up energy and water. Their product constantly gets things wrong and, in extreme cases, coaches people into suicide.

And it’s all built on what seems to be malicious and vast intellectual property theft.

What does OpenAI offer the world?
November 9, 2025 at 9:52 AM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
biggerthanfrogs.bsky.social
"Given the major payouts at stake, the tides could be turning in favor of artists who had their lifework sucked up by AI models without permission, who could be looking at another consolation prize in the form of a settlement fee."
histoftech.bsky.social Gales of November ReMar-mbered @histoftech.bsky.social · 5d
“authors & publishers who filed a lawsuit against the Sam Altman-led firm have secured access to internal Slack messages… discussing the mass deletion of a pirated books dataset… A NY district court ordered OpenAI to hand over the communications regarding data deletion”
futurism.com/artificial-i...
OpenAI in Danger After Authors Suing It Gain Access to Its Internal Slack Messages
Authors and publishers, who are suing OpenAI, secured access to internal Slack messages and emails discussing the deletion of pirated books.
futurism.com
November 9, 2025 at 7:11 AM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
Analysis of the inherent security flaws of the LLMs and 'gen AI' systems sold by the tech majors: youtu.be/O7BI4jfEFwA?...
DEF CON 33 - Exploiting Shadow Data from AI Models and Embeddings - Patrick Walsh
YouTube video by DEFCONConference
youtu.be
November 8, 2025 at 9:48 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
@doughenwood.bsky.social - Lo and behold. If smarmy capitalists signaling a need for bailout (by another name) isn't a sign of a bubble on the verge, I don't know what is.
utopia-defer.red utopia deferred @utopia-defer.red · 3d
hey guys isn't it weird how they're all saying this at the same time? ignore the fact that this is now happening with Tyler Cowen, an economist who sits at the center of a sprawling system of think tanks and policy "influencers" who have been laundered into DC with both Koch and SV VC money
November 8, 2025 at 8:43 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
'Boomers don't understand tech' people say. 'Boomers' usually means my parents or grands. 'Tech' usually means, anything farted out by Silicon Valley. Unknown to app worshippers, there's a history of tech that staggers the imagination: youtu.be/V-8q8INxQEY?...
Declassified Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion Program: Manned Aircraft Progress Report 1956-1958
YouTube video by What is Nuclear?
youtu.be
November 8, 2025 at 8:22 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
olivia.science
for all the lil gremlins (affectionate) — but not the gremlins (derogatory) — you might like to hear it read out by a wonderful person who randomly just did this (if you read this: thank you!) www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJNO...
November 8, 2025 at 5:23 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
itsdrlittle.bsky.social
Gloria Richardson
Black and white photo of Gloria Richardson, a Black woman civil rights activist at a protest, placing her hand on a police officer's gun and staring at him as if to say "I'm not afraid of you"
November 8, 2025 at 1:50 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
This also should apply to film and literary reviews.
gershbrain.bsky.social Sam Gershman @gershbrain.bsky.social · 2d
My reviewing style has changed over time. Rather than litigate every little thing, and pushing my own ideas, I focus only on 2 things:
(1) Are the claims interesting/important?
(2) Does the evidence support the claims?

Most of my reviews these days are short and focused.
November 8, 2025 at 1:42 PM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
An excellent conversation that speaks to the hardware geek and data center veteran in me. In summary: massive data center buildouts for so-called 'AI' are stupid and unethical for all the reasons we routinely state and *also* idiotic from a purely technical perspective.
davidgerard.co.uk your #3 source for absurdist true crime 🔨 @davidgerard.co.uk · 3d
Nicholas Weaver: The futile future of the gigawatt datacenter

The edge is where it’s at

Blog post by @ncweaver.skerry-tech.com:
pivot-to-ai.com/2025/11/07/t...

Interview with Nick:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5rL... - video
pivottoai.libsyn.com/20251107-nic... - podcast

time: 26 min 53 sec
red haired woman with steampunk headset, looking at you with her right index finger in the air
November 7, 2025 at 3:13 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
apnews.com
OpenAI is facing seven lawsuits claiming ChatGPT drove people to suicide and harmful delusions even when they had no prior mental health issues.
OpenAI faces 7 lawsuits claiming ChatGPT drove people to suicide, delusions
OpenAI is facing seven lawsuits claiming ChatGPT drove people to suicide and harmful delusions even when they had no prior mental health issues.
bit.ly
November 7, 2025 at 8:30 AM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
Which brings to mind this essay I wrote several years ago. The argument: Star Trek, a pop sci-fi series, presented, decades ago, a more sensible view of advanced computation than the nonsense we contend with today: monroelab.com/2021/09/20/s...
November 7, 2025 at 7:21 AM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
irisvanrooij.bsky.social
“Flying pigs are also possible in principle; possible in principle bakes no bread.” — Jerry Fodor (2005, p. 27)

Screenshot from:

van Rooij, Guest, et al. (2024). 'Reclaiming AI as a Theoretical Tool for Cognitive Science’: link.springer.com/article/10.1...
Overview Flying pigs are also possible in principle; possible in principle bakes no bread. — Jerry Fodor (2005, p. 27) The remainder of this paper will be an argument in ‘two acts’. In ACT 1: Releasing the Grip, we present a formalisa- tion of the currently dominant approach to AI-as-engineering that claims that AGI is both inevitable and around the corner. We do this by introducing a thought experiment in which a fic- tive AI engineer, Dr. Ingenia, tries to construct an AGI under ideal conditions.7 For instance, Dr. Ingenia has perfect data, sampled from the true distribution, and they also have access to any conceivable ML method—including presently popular …
November 6, 2025 at 9:27 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
olivia.science
Science washing
davidgerard.co.uk your #3 source for absurdist true crime 🔨 @davidgerard.co.uk · 4d
Oxford pretends AI benchmarks are science, not marketing

How could all these benchmarks be fake, it’s a mystery

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcYZ... - video
pivottoai.libsyn.com/20251106-oxf... - podcast

time: 6 min 16 sec
scientist in lab coat with a clipboard, looking "hmm" at a robot
November 6, 2025 at 6:15 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
danmcquillan.bsky.social
I'll be giving a talk next Tuesday for the EUt+ webinar series on digital transformation:
"Not the digital transformation you planned for: AI accelerationism versus decomputing"
Free registration: forms.office.com/pages/respon...
The EU's dubious vision of economic growth that could be digitally decoupled from carbon emissions has resulted in a deeply reactionary technopolitics. While it was never really the case that innovative tech efficiencies would magic up unlimited growth without climate consequences, the mask has really slipped with the advent of AI. Massive institutional and financial buy-in is failing to conceal AI's character as an already-broken technology trying to fix a broken system. While AI's imaginaries are far-right-friendly and accelerationist, the material consequences include a re-centring of high energy consumption as a sign of progress. This talk will propose decomputing as an alternative form of digital transformation; one that centres social justice, aligns with degrowth and applies people-powered conviviality to the governance of tech for the common good.
November 6, 2025 at 4:17 PM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
danmcquillan.bsky.social
University finances are precarious, but leading institutions are swallowing the pedagogic promises of Anthropic & OpenAI just at the moment when the AI bubble looks ready to burst. Beyond fees and the attrition of skilled staff, will AI trigger the collapse of the entire sector?
November 6, 2025 at 9:06 AM
Reposted by Dwayne Monroe
harrysimmons3578.bsky.social
This makes me think of a very interesting essay on cognitive dissonance by the philosopher John Gray called ‘Humanism and flying saucers’ which discusses cognitive dissonance in a very interesting manner.

I referenced that essay in a piece I wrote awhile back:

vdgasjournal.com/2025/06/21/w...
November 6, 2025 at 7:50 AM
cloudquistador.bsky.social
The goal of vdgasjournal.com an evolving mag started with @harrysimmons3578.bsky.social and @ddclaxton.bsky.social is to combat the corp assault on culture via LLM by nurturing the essay form: youtu.be/Js0o6Lvx6S8?...
November 6, 2025 at 7:57 AM