Brian Merchant reposted
“liz you can just use AI as a research tool, don’t be such a Luddite” www.nytimes.com/2026/05/19/b...
Who's Who of AI
Brian Merchant
author of Blood in the Machine, tech writer, luddite
newsletter: https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/
books: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/contributor/brian-merchant/
kofi link: https://ko-fi.com/brianmerchant
What they're sharing
Book on Truth in the Age of A.I. Contains Quotes Made Up by A.I. nytimes.com
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Hackers Simply Asked Meta AI to Give Them Access to High-Profile Instagram Accounts. It Worked 404media.co
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Even If You Hate AI, You Will Use Google AI Search | WIRED wired.com
'We Will Fight to Our Very Last Breath:' Township Leaders Vow to Fight Nuclear AI Data Center 404media.co
Anthropic Is Still at Odds With the White House Over Claude Fable 5 wired.com
npr.org
The AI Compass bambamramfan.github.io
bloodinthemachine.com
bloodinthemachine.com
bloodinthemachine.com
bloodinthemachine.com
Students Cheer Jeremy Scott for Ripping up His AI Commencement Speech - Business Insider businessinsider.com
Articles & links
Brian Merchant reposted
NEW: Hackers say that they used Meta’s AI support chatbot to break into a host of high-profile Instagram profiles by asking the support bot to change the email address associated with the target account.
Counterpoint: No I will not
I discuss the fiery opposition to an AI data center in Michigan, proposed to help train nuclear weapons, via @404media.co and @mjgault.bsky.social's reporting, in which a pastor's wife suggests brushing up on the OSS's Simple Sabotage Field Manual at a town hall meeting.
(from this WIRED writeup of the debacle) www.wired.com/story/anthro...
NPR has a 'Word of the Week' series, and this week it's LUDDITE I spoke with Emma Bowman about who they really were and about the new luddites organizing against big tech + AI A fun one and, since it's airing on All Things Considered, maybe the biggest-audience luddite rehabil…
deeply insulted that I didn't make the cut for even a derogatory archetype here bambamramfan.github.io/ai-compass/
Wrote about the college kids booing AI, and how, in a moment rife with economic precarity, affordability crises, and collapsing job prospects, AI has become a new avatar of American capitalism
Last week, IT employees at the University of California system across the state formed the largest tech worker union in the United States. This is how they now plan to confront tech industry layoffs, rein in AI, and push for tech for the common good:
Anthropic's Mythos campaign—it must be understood as a marketing campaign above all—was the ne plus ultra of AI doom marketing. It was instrumental in vaulting Anthropic to its latest valuation and status as the top AI startup. But as AI firms are increasingly finding, there a…
Anthropic went from a distant #2 in the AI startup race to winning news cycles, sharing the stage with the pope, eclipsing OpenAI's valuation and barreling towards an historic IPO, all in a matter of months. How did Anthropic pull it off? By doubling down on its key export: AI…
Brian Merchant reposted
It’s a whole trend.
AI Weekly's analysis
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- Jeremy Scott read an AI-generated speech aloud before destroying it on stage at the Kansas City Art Institute's 2026 commencement.
- His stunt is the third notable anti-AI commencement incident in 2026, following Eric Schmidt being booed and two AI name-reader failures.
- Scott explicitly argued AI cannot create original work, only replicate it, framing the issue as a threat to creative identity.
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Their own posts
Recent commentary
This Anthropic/White House spat is funny. Anthropic spent months declaring that its model is so powerful at finding bugs it threatens the world's digital infrastructure. The WH says OK it's banned then Now Anthropic and its allies have to say actually you know it isn't "uniquely good" at that stuff
My kingdom for a good, entirely AI-free web browser
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In Brian Merchant's orbit
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