We hit a huge milestone! 🎉 Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 has reached half a million downloads, thanks to many of you. We’re out here popping all the hype 🎈📌 and having a lot of fun doing it!! We started as an accidental podcast in May 2022. Now, 500,000 downloads and a lot of Fresh Hell later, we're still at it. Here's to the next 500,000!
(w/ @emilymbender)
Hey cool! Buzzsprout is informing us that Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 has reached half a million downloads!
Pretty proud of our scrappy lil pod.
w/ @alex and producers Ozzy Llinas Goodman (present) and Christie Taylor (founding).
Find all of our episodes here:
https://dair-institute.org/maiht3k/
Some words on how to evaluate language technologies (and caution against using them to undermine others' work)
https://buttondown.com/maiht3k/archive/pangram-is-not-an-oracle/
Some words on how to evaluate language technologies (and caution against using them to undermine others' work)
https://buttondown.com/maiht3k/archive/pangram-is-not-an-oracle/
Hey cool! Buzzsprout is informing us that Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000 has reached half a million downloads!
Pretty proud of our scrappy lil pod.
w/ @alex and producers Ozzy Llinas Goodman (present) and Christie Taylor (founding).
Find all of our episodes here:
https://dair-institute.org/maiht3k/
Tech boss masks are off, and workers aren’t having it. We speak with Clarissa Redwine and JS Tan, co-authors of Against Tech Oligarchy: Worker Resistance in the World’s Most Powerful Industry. This clip is from Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000’s latest episode “My Tech Workers Have Unionized”!
(with @emilymbender)
Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000, Episode 87:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2126417/episodes/19956365-my-tech-workers-have-unionized-2026-10-05
in which JS Tan and Clarissa Redwine join me and @alex to talk about bosses' love for "AI" and tech worker power.
RE: https://dair-community.social/@emilymbender/117445297589471876
Also available as video on PeerTube:
https://peertube.dair-institute.org/w/13ZaD85ZNTUNEoyZ6kwyNq
Mystery AI Hype Theater 3000, Episode 87:
https://www.buzzsprout.com/2126417/episodes/19956365-my-tech-workers-have-unionized-2026-10-05
in which JS Tan and Clarissa Redwine join me and @alex to talk about bosses' love for "AI" and tech worker power.
"It's already here, what do you mean you think you can refuse?" is just another variation of the agency-stealing inevitability narrative. The future is not yet written, and we can shape it, starting with rejecting inevitability and claiming our agency.
/fin
To the second, I say not accepting it isn't the same as denying that people are using the janky tech sold as "AI", some by choice, others because it is forced on them in their job.
Not accepting it means not normalizing it, refusing everywhere I can refuse, pushing for holding the companies producing this accountable with existing & new regulation, working to protect the environment & important social infrastruture.
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To the first, I say: Fine, I don't want to go where that bandwagon is headed.
"Left behind" is an interesting phrase, it indexes a notion of a race towards a desirable/shining "future" that only some can access, and which we should all hope to participate in.
But the TESCREAList/tech bro future is not one I want any part in and in fact one that I actively resist --- and I hope others will too.
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One of the key messages I carry is that we don't have to accept any of this. Sometimes I see opposition in the form of "Get in loser, you'll be left behind" and other times it's in the form of "It's all over the place, what do you mean you think you can opt out?"
[Note to the mansplainers of Mastodon: This is a thread, meaning you should read the whole thing and then even still think twice before replying.]
>>
I jumped in with the first response and said, "It's a cult." Everyone laughed, and then I said, "I'm serious. It's actually a cult." and elaborated some on TESCEALists, their shared mythology, and how bananas it all is.
My co-panelist then picked up their mic and said, "It's a cult." ... and elaborated further.
>>
Did an event last night that was a discussion format with a moderator + one other panelist, with whom I had some points of agreement and some of disagreement.
Turns out, the disagreement was useful:
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It was actually very satisfying & I think effective to have our clear points of disagreement in the background when both pushing back so clearly on the TESCREAList nonsense.
I'm grateful to the organizers for not pairing me with someone who in fact is an adherent (though that population is less dense outside the US & UK, I think) and also to my co-panelist for also being willing to speak clearly on this point.
/fin
I jumped in with the first response and said, "It's a cult." Everyone laughed, and then I said, "I'm serious. It's actually a cult." and elaborated some on TESCEALists, their shared mythology, and how bananas it all is.
My co-panelist then picked up their mic and said, "It's a cult." ... and elaborated further.
>>
The asker elaborated to say he was wondering what was behind all of the Doomers, not just the CEOs who obviously profit from the existential risk narrative (as already discussed in the panel) but in particular the employees & self-styled "whistle-blowers" w/o the same apparent incentives.
>>
The topic of the discussion was "AI", narratives and the future of truth, and we hit on the themes you might expect.
The last ~15min were for audience questions, of which the last question was:
"What's up with California?"
>>
Did an event last night that was a discussion format with a moderator + one other panelist, with whom I had some points of agreement and some of disagreement.
Turns out, the disagreement was useful:
>>