Great article. Only issue I take with it as a female veteran of the tech industry (starting in the 90s) is the idea that they are shifting far right vs. having always been there and only pretending to be otherwise when it was politically expedient to do so. Many, many of us have tried to talk about sexism, racism, and other forms of bigotry in the leadership in these companies and VCs for a long time - remember what Facebook started out as - and got silenced with the ‘ol “you call everyone [bigots]” or crushed with the PR engine/NDAs. To me, the only silver lining of the whole Trump thing is that he made it fashionable to go full hood off, so now just like in They Live, y’all can see what they’ve been showing us minorities this entire time. It’s bad.
Love to see this, thank you. Looking forward to reading more.
One element central to all this seems to me to be the ability of networked technology to influence and shape society. It is a major reason why the autocrats and tech moguls seem to be converging. See Michael Flynn’s 5G warfare. Or Russia’s hybrid warfare. Same deal.
Online spaces are now legit battlefields for matters of global security. Propaganda has been normalized. The traditional gatekeepers no longer hold much sway.
Musk’s Twitter Files are an excellent demonstration. The Twitter Files bears all the hallmarks of a post-soviet style influence campaign. These follow the same patterns as Clinton’s emails and Hunter’s laptop, supposedly nefarious communications were captured and offloaded to a cutout who would be trusted by the target audience. The content is delivered piecemeal so as to boost its impact while also creating absurd narratives based in conspiracy theory. Upon closer examination in official forums, the narratives delivered fall apart though many of the facts they are built upon are true. The dispelling of the narratives in official forums reaches little of the target audience, so they become entrenched.
While the autocrats and oligarchs team up to capture power over us, the US and Western establishment seems trapped and frozen, unable to counter in this new information environment. It has been a core pillar of liberalism that government are supposed to shy away from censorship and speech restriction. Many like Musk are great at playing the refs using this as a central rallying cry — free speech absolutism! Because that is how you can maximally firehose influence in on-line platforms, by making sure there is no regulation of inauthentic speech and propaganda
As we approach US and UK elections, I've become increasingly aware of the influence of billionaire funding to political "thinktanks", various dark money groups and the media outlets that relay their "findings" (ie paid-for conservative propaganda). The Koch foundations, the Mercers, Peter Thiel, etc. I recall Dr Lakoff's warning, years ago, of the vastly greater sums of money poured into right-leaning "thinktanks" and how this impacts deep frames over years and decades. Now, unfortunately, it comes boosted by social media algorithms and increasingly sophisticated AI-driven psychological targeting.
But I think people are becoming increasingly aware of this, and are fighting back. Awareness of all this seems key, so thanks again to FrameLab for these commentaries, and keep up the great work!
Maybe I'm jumping the gun, but its obvious that all the "gray" stuff is pure bullshit. It's code for "libertarian" which is code for "right-wing asshole who likes drugs" or maybe "right-wing asshole who thinks he's smarter than the god-n-guns crowd". It's been the same sort of people doing the same sort of thing since Ayn Rand's heyday.
Gil: Just checking to see if you have checked on Musk’s use of the German meme, X-Tag (X-Day), in his youth. Might this idea have motivated his use of "X" in naming his companies? Should be an item of interest, if the answer is yes, in your biography of a Tech Titan who is deeply involved in national security.
Great article. Only issue I take with it as a female veteran of the tech industry (starting in the 90s) is the idea that they are shifting far right vs. having always been there and only pretending to be otherwise when it was politically expedient to do so. Many, many of us have tried to talk about sexism, racism, and other forms of bigotry in the leadership in these companies and VCs for a long time - remember what Facebook started out as - and got silenced with the ‘ol “you call everyone [bigots]” or crushed with the PR engine/NDAs. To me, the only silver lining of the whole Trump thing is that he made it fashionable to go full hood off, so now just like in They Live, y’all can see what they’ve been showing us minorities this entire time. It’s bad.
Love to see this, thank you. Looking forward to reading more.
One element central to all this seems to me to be the ability of networked technology to influence and shape society. It is a major reason why the autocrats and tech moguls seem to be converging. See Michael Flynn’s 5G warfare. Or Russia’s hybrid warfare. Same deal.
Online spaces are now legit battlefields for matters of global security. Propaganda has been normalized. The traditional gatekeepers no longer hold much sway.
Musk’s Twitter Files are an excellent demonstration. The Twitter Files bears all the hallmarks of a post-soviet style influence campaign. These follow the same patterns as Clinton’s emails and Hunter’s laptop, supposedly nefarious communications were captured and offloaded to a cutout who would be trusted by the target audience. The content is delivered piecemeal so as to boost its impact while also creating absurd narratives based in conspiracy theory. Upon closer examination in official forums, the narratives delivered fall apart though many of the facts they are built upon are true. The dispelling of the narratives in official forums reaches little of the target audience, so they become entrenched.
While the autocrats and oligarchs team up to capture power over us, the US and Western establishment seems trapped and frozen, unable to counter in this new information environment. It has been a core pillar of liberalism that government are supposed to shy away from censorship and speech restriction. Many like Musk are great at playing the refs using this as a central rallying cry — free speech absolutism! Because that is how you can maximally firehose influence in on-line platforms, by making sure there is no regulation of inauthentic speech and propaganda
Cheers!
I find this post fascinating, and it's the first I've heard of the "TESCREAL" phenomenon. Thank you for highlighting this. Émile Torres, who apparently coined the acronym, "identifies TESCREALism as a philosophical ‘bundle’ that, in a sense, trivializes the lives and sufferings of currently existing humans by finding a greater importance in the possibly trillions of posthumans..." (https://magazine.mindplex.ai/__tescrealism-has-the-silicon-valley-ruling-class-gone-to-crazy-town-emile-torres-in-conversation-with-r-u-sirius/)
As we approach US and UK elections, I've become increasingly aware of the influence of billionaire funding to political "thinktanks", various dark money groups and the media outlets that relay their "findings" (ie paid-for conservative propaganda). The Koch foundations, the Mercers, Peter Thiel, etc. I recall Dr Lakoff's warning, years ago, of the vastly greater sums of money poured into right-leaning "thinktanks" and how this impacts deep frames over years and decades. Now, unfortunately, it comes boosted by social media algorithms and increasingly sophisticated AI-driven psychological targeting.
But I think people are becoming increasingly aware of this, and are fighting back. Awareness of all this seems key, so thanks again to FrameLab for these commentaries, and keep up the great work!
Maybe I'm jumping the gun, but its obvious that all the "gray" stuff is pure bullshit. It's code for "libertarian" which is code for "right-wing asshole who likes drugs" or maybe "right-wing asshole who thinks he's smarter than the god-n-guns crowd". It's been the same sort of people doing the same sort of thing since Ayn Rand's heyday.
Liberals sense that their grip is slipping so we get propaganda like this about how everyone who favors free speech is a Nazi and needs to be erased.
You fucks had your time and you turned our country into an authoritarian shithole. Go fuck off and die somewhere else.
Gil: Just checking to see if you have checked on Musk’s use of the German meme, X-Tag (X-Day), in his youth. Might this idea have motivated his use of "X" in naming his companies? Should be an item of interest, if the answer is yes, in your biography of a Tech Titan who is deeply involved in national security.
Isn’t it always about money?
Musk isn't a "Silicon Valley titan".
He's a hustler from Africa. ✅