Media. Hello, and welcome to this week's Better Offline Monologue. I am your host ed Zeitron, of course, So if you're listening to this as the episode's are, you're in the middle of a two part episode about the systemic risk caused by Open Ai, a company that's always been unsustainable and is ultimately rigged for collapse. But today I wanted to turn to a question I've been asked a few times, what are the ways the media can avoid doing this in the future, and what are the things that they could have done differently? Well, it starts pretty simple. I don't believe the media, and this partly falls upon the people running media outlets actually knows enough about the subject matter, be it the technical side of the financial side of these companies. If you've ever read an article about tech that just didn't seem to make sense, like say about an AI company, like an obtuse series of sentences that sounds rational, but when you really think about it doesn't explain what it does. It's because the writer doesn't actually understand what this saying. And that's because they're really given the time or incentivized in any way for knowing what it is they're talking about they're just there to kind of get it out the door, and well that an unalarming amount of tech writers are edited by editors that don't know a fucking thing. When chat GPT launched, the press absolutely lost their shit, despite nobody being able to describe what it actually did and why it was the future other than they could create an image or a block of text based on a prompt, and this was about the level of nuance that we'd see applied to open AI for pretty much the rest of history. Egregious to extrapolations were made in part because the media was far too willing to just copypaste or quote whatever Sam Altman said. When interviewed on stage at the Wall Street Journals Tech Live event in October twenty twenty three, a reporter allowed Sam Moltman to say that chat GPT and I quote has this laval reasoning capacity that's going to get better and better, and this was a great moment to say, I'm sorry, Sam, what the fuck are you talking about? And to be clear, this was October twenty twenty three. It would be just under a year later that they would release an actual reasoning product. No one's bothered to return to that of course, I realize I sound like I'm being nasty or facetious. But here, right, here was an opportunity to push back on the narrative, in part because the narrative was a guy will say fucking anything and anybody will print him. The question, of course, would have been can you explain what this means? And once he mumbles out some nonsense, say I'm still not sure I understand. I genuinely believe that there are some reporters who don't want to push against the grain, but I think that there are plenty more that are scared of being wrong. Well, you're still wrong if you allow a man to lie. Sam Mortman became a billionaire because he was able to blather on nonsensically about whatever he wanted, knowing that the crowd of Gordoner's business types would rather say, Wow, he's so smart, I asked the future, than admit that they have no idea what he fucking meant. Really, fixing these problems starts with making people like Sam Mortman of Open AI and Dario Amadeo of Anthropic actually explain themselves and holding their feet to the fire even lightly on their promises, and the economics underlying their companies. You can beat this shit, you can do it. And early on Sam Mortman actually been pushed back on. He would not have been able to do this. And indeed, had everyone not just copypasted, anytime Sam Mortman said anything about, oh, I don't know this chat GPT will eventually be an intelligent friend and knows everything about you, I believe he said that, or he just said AI will be These are the times to say I don't know print it in say Sam Mortman lies. Sam Morman made something up. I realized the media writ large is very bad at this, but it's so much easier in tech. The fact that both Open AI and Anthropic burned over five billion dollars in twenty twenty four is abominable and any and all interviews should have brought this up and doggedly demanded a timeline for profitability and not accepted vagueness or dodging. And I just want to be clear, I know that this if you remember the media listening to so like, I won't get Sam Mormon again, I won't get I won't get dariy Amaday, who fucking cares? These interviews suck every I think I've listened to or watched every Sam Mortman interview that's online, and they're boring. They're like eating cardboard. He's not an endearing speaker. Warrio Ama days even worse that bloviating fuck where wah blah Blind twenty twenty seven. The computer is going to be my best friend and my girlfriend. Well he's married. I'm not saying Dario's anyway. Daria's not going to fuck the computer. You've got me on the record. The boint is you're afraid of losing access, but you're also afraid of having a hostile interview. First of all, skill issue. Second of all, why are you afraid? Why would you possibly be afraid? These men are far from invincible. Sam Wrtman is a solid conn artist, stand a carnival barker, but when faced with blunt questions and even the slightest hint of memory about what he just said, he'd crumble. All of them would honestly Imdia train people for a living, these people a week. They're poorly trained and speciously informed and have no idea what to do. If you just refuse to black like you just sit on a question, if you're just like no, I'm not happy with your answer, I don't understand that doesn't make sense, or even hey, why won't you give me a straight answer? Crazy crazy question? You could just ask any of them there, You could do it today now. The other problem is the journalists too regularly find ways to ask these obtuse, muddied questions, in part because they want to find a way to sound like they're being aggressive to their readers without ever really showing any real aggression. And let me give you one of my favorite examples. In May twenty twenty four, Neelai Patel of The Verge, a man who has never met an executive outside of into it that he didn't want to let ramble, interviewed sund up As Shy, the CEO of Google, and gave one of the single worst interviews I've seen in my life. Neili Patel, as a lawyer, as the editor in chief of The Virgin, a reporter with over a decade of experience possibly more, asked multiple questions of over a hundred words objection compound question which may seem like he's being thoughtful, but is actually what I like to call the buffet, an attempt to give the illusion of nuanced analysis and conversation where you're actually giving the person you're interviewing the opportunity to answer the question they'd like to. Sometimes these points are more like rambling statements, which again may seem harmless, like Neelai is trying to have a conversation, but this is the CEO of fucking Google. You're interviewing him, not up. At one point, Nelai spends one hundred and fifty nine words asking Sun dar Pashai whether he expected publishers to act negatively to AI powered search results, but he did so in such a cludgy way that Sun Dapashai is able to wave it off, at which point Neeli commits the ultimate sin one very common in the tech media, where he doesn't listen to Peshai's answer and immediately asks another question based on some theory he has called Google zero, whether traffic from Google it ends, which was already happening. Neelike, you talk to one of the many talented people you're fucking outlet. This, by the way, is the real fundamental flaw of American journalism, where an interviewer asks the question, doesn't listen to the answer, then asks another I cannot express enough how many times this happens with tech CEOs, how much advantage they take of it and how quickly they collapse. If you listen to their answer, and I don't know, ask the follow up question relevant to it. Nelai's interview could have been far more direct. Hey, why does Google search suck? Now? I've got eight different examples of it sucking? Why are they so bad? Neeli does have an example searching for best chromebook, and he has this clumsy, mumbling, meandering bullshit thing about how in the query, well, the query in there. I didn't say what is the best chromebook? I did this and that, and he just like fumbles around with it and then allows allows some doctor to just kind of ramble him. Neli, you could just ask a simple fucking question. You're a lawyer, man, I don't know. I don't know, man. Maybe you're more concerned being fucking famous. The reason I'm so angry is that the AI bubble was inflated on interviews like these. I realized Neeli Patel wants to continue getting access to the executives, But how do he directly said search is bad, here's the proof it's bad, and AI results are worse, and refuse to back off of it. That would have had a meaningful effect on Google's willingness to push this shit. It would have shown other journalist's solidarity that they too could step up and spit in the face of these people. And I know some of you are going to say, heed, you can't spit in the face of them. I only feel like that because they want to run away so bad, because they don't want to have a real interview, because they don't have anything to say, they don't want to say it. And the same goes for Samultman or Warrio Dario ama Day or any other AI executive. They've garnered thousands of headlines and billions of dollars of funding by making shit up, or using lives of emission, or just being very vague and allowing people to fill in the gaps for them, which then gets published in the media, which then gets pushed to investors who then line up to invest in shit that doesn't work, or does not exist or can never exist. I even believe that access journalism can continue. We just need to show that there's a deep intolerance across the industry for marketing bullshit. A brick wall in front of anyone who would bullshit and an interest in having actual conversations versus regurgitated talking points and nodding to an audience of half conscious patagonia gargoyles. And I want to bring something up. I run a PR firm, immedia trained people. This is actually how fucking startups are talked to by journalists. You're a seed startup or a series A. You get asked these fucking questions all the time. You get grilled, you get absolutely beaten to shit. But once you reach a certain scale, once you're worth i don't know, some three hundred billion theoretical dollars that you fit into a narrative, suddenly the gloves are off and that's when the jerkins starts. I realized that was quite gross. But look, if you're listening to this as a member of the media and think I'm being mean to these executives, there's absolutely nothing stopping you from having fun, interesting conversations about the shit you love. There's nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing wrong with knowing subjects deeply and finding reasons to be excited. But please, fuck actually learn what you're talking about and be excited about something that's actually happening. But I think that that might be the problem deep down. That's the art and more problem with the tech media. I don't think enough people writing about technology actually know or give a shit about technology, or at least know enough to do their jobs. They see these executives as their sports teams factions to ally behind, only learning enough about the take to be able to write embargoed articles about whatever the next thing that open aiye does, even if they don't really understand or care readers. Listners deserved better, and when all of this shit collapses, I believe they'll start treating some of the members of the tech media with well deserved scorn.

Media. Hello, and welcome to this week's Better Offline Monologue. I am your host ed Zeitron, of course, So if you're listening to this as the episode's are, you're in the middle of a two part episode about the systemic risk caused by Open Ai, a company that's always been unsustainable and is ultimately rigged for collapse. But today I wanted to turn to a question I've been asked a few times, what are the ways the media can avoid doing this in the future, and what are the things that they could have done differently? Well, it starts pretty simple. I don't believe the media, and this partly falls upon the people running media outlets actually knows enough about the subject matter, be it the technical side of the financial side of these companies. If you've ever read an article about tech that just didn't seem to make sense, like say about an AI company, like an obtuse series of sentences that sounds rational, but when you really think about it doesn't explain what it does. It's because the writer doesn't actually understand what this saying. And that's because they're really given the time or incentivized in any way for knowing what it is they're talking about they're just there to kind of get it out the door, and well that an unalarming amount of tech writers are edited by editors that don't know a fucking thing. When chat GPT launched, the press absolutely lost their shit, despite nobody being able to describe what it actually did and why it was the future other than they could create an image or a block of text based on a prompt, and this was about the level of nuance that we'd see applied to open AI for pretty much the rest of history. Egregious to extrapolations were made in part because the media was far too willing to just copypaste or quote whatever Sam Altman said. When interviewed on stage at the Wall Street Journals Tech Live event in October twenty twenty three, a reporter allowed Sam Moltman to say that chat GPT and I quote has this laval reasoning capacity that's going to get better and better, and this was a great moment to say, I'm sorry, Sam, what the fuck are you talking about? And to be clear, this was October twenty twenty three. It would be just under a year later that they would release an actual reasoning product. No one's bothered to return to that of course, I realize I sound like I'm being nasty or facetious. But here, right, here was an opportunity to push back on the narrative, in part because the narrative was a guy will say fucking anything and anybody will print him. The question, of course, would have been can you explain what this means? And once he mumbles out some nonsense, say I'm still not sure I understand. I genuinely believe that there are some reporters who don't want to push against the grain, but I think that there are plenty more that are scared of being wrong. Well, you're still wrong if you allow a man to lie. Sam Mortman became a billionaire because he was able to blather on nonsensically about whatever he wanted, knowing that the crowd of Gordoner's business types would rather say, Wow, he's so smart, I asked the future, than admit that they have no idea what he fucking meant. Really, fixing these problems starts with making people like Sam Mortman of Open AI and Dario Amadeo of Anthropic actually explain themselves and holding their feet to the fire even lightly on their promises, and the economics underlying their companies. You can beat this shit, you can do it. And early on Sam Mortman actually been pushed back on. He would not have been able to do this. And indeed, had everyone not just copypasted, anytime Sam Mortman said anything about, oh, I don't know this chat GPT will eventually be an intelligent friend and knows everything about you, I believe he said that, or he just said AI will be These are the times to say I don't know print it in say Sam Mortman lies. Sam Morman made something up. I realized the media writ large is very bad at this, but it's so much easier in tech. The fact that both Open AI and Anthropic burned over five billion dollars in twenty twenty four is abominable and any and all interviews should have brought this up and doggedly demanded a timeline for profitability and not accepted vagueness or dodging. And I just want to be clear, I know that this if you remember the media listening to so like, I won't get Sam Mormon again, I won't get I won't get dariy Amaday, who fucking cares? These interviews suck every I think I've listened to or watched every Sam Mortman interview that's online, and they're boring. They're like eating cardboard. He's not an endearing speaker. Warrio Ama days even worse that bloviating fuck where wah blah Blind twenty twenty seven. The computer is going to be my best friend and my girlfriend. Well he's married. I'm not saying Dario's anyway. Daria's not going to fuck the computer. You've got me on the record. The boint is you're afraid of losing access, but you're also afraid of having a hostile interview. First of all, skill issue. Second of all, why are you afraid? Why would you possibly be afraid? These men are far from invincible. Sam Wrtman is a solid conn artist, stand a carnival barker, but when faced with blunt questions and even the slightest hint of memory about what he just said, he'd crumble. All of them would honestly Imdia train people for a living, these people a week. They're poorly trained and speciously informed and have no idea what to do. If you just refuse to black like you just sit on a question, if you're just like no, I'm not happy with your answer, I don't understand that doesn't make sense, or even hey, why won't you give me a straight answer? Crazy crazy question? You could just ask any of them there, You could do it today now. The other problem is the journalists too regularly find ways to ask these obtuse, muddied questions, in part because they want to find a way to sound like they're being aggressive to their readers without ever really showing any real aggression. And let me give you one of my favorite examples. In May twenty twenty four, Neelai Patel of The Verge, a man who has never met an executive outside of into it that he didn't want to let ramble, interviewed sund up As Shy, the CEO of Google, and gave one of the single worst interviews I've seen in my life. Neili Patel, as a lawyer, as the editor in chief of The Virgin, a reporter with over a decade of experience possibly more, asked multiple questions of over a hundred words objection compound question which may seem like he's being thoughtful, but is actually what I like to call the buffet, an attempt to give the illusion of nuanced analysis and conversation where you're actually giving the person you're interviewing the opportunity to answer the question they'd like to. Sometimes these points are more like rambling statements, which again may seem harmless, like Neelai is trying to have a conversation, but this is the CEO of fucking Google. You're interviewing him, not up. At one point, Nelai spends one hundred and fifty nine words asking Sun dar Pashai whether he expected publishers to act negatively to AI powered search results, but he did so in such a cludgy way that Sun Dapashai is able to wave it off, at which point Neeli commits the ultimate sin one very common in the tech media, where he doesn't listen to Peshai's answer and immediately asks another question based on some theory he has called Google zero, whether traffic from Google it ends, which was already happening. Neelike, you talk to one of the many talented people you're fucking outlet. This, by the way, is the real fundamental flaw of American journalism, where an interviewer asks the question, doesn't listen to the answer, then asks another I cannot express enough how many times this happens with tech CEOs, how much advantage they take of it and how quickly they collapse. If you listen to their answer, and I don't know, ask the follow up question relevant to it. Nelai's interview could have been far more direct. Hey, why does Google search suck? Now? I've got eight different examples of it sucking? Why are they so bad? Neeli does have an example searching for best chromebook, and he has this clumsy, mumbling, meandering bullshit thing about how in the query, well, the query in there. I didn't say what is the best chromebook? I did this and that, and he just like fumbles around with it and then allows allows some doctor to just kind of ramble him. Neli, you could just ask a simple fucking question. You're a lawyer, man, I don't know. I don't know, man. Maybe you're more concerned being fucking famous. The reason I'm so angry is that the AI bubble was inflated on interviews like these. I realized Neeli Patel wants to continue getting access to the executives, But how do he directly said search is bad, here's the proof it's bad, and AI results are worse, and refuse to back off of it. That would have had a meaningful effect on Google's willingness to push this shit. It would have shown other journalist's solidarity that they too could step up and spit in the face of these people. And I know some of you are going to say, heed, you can't spit in the face of them. I only feel like that because they want to run away so bad, because they don't want to have a real interview, because they don't have anything to say, they don't want to say it. And the same goes for Samultman or Warrio Dario ama Day or any other AI executive. They've garnered thousands of headlines and billions of dollars of funding by making shit up, or using lives of emission, or just being very vague and allowing people to fill in the gaps for them, which then gets published in the media, which then gets pushed to investors who then line up to invest in shit that doesn't work, or does not exist or can never exist. I even believe that access journalism can continue. We just need to show that there's a deep intolerance across the industry for marketing bullshit. A brick wall in front of anyone who would bullshit and an interest in having actual conversations versus regurgitated talking points and nodding to an audience of half conscious patagonia gargoyles. And I want to bring something up. I run a PR firm, immedia trained people. This is actually how fucking startups are talked to by journalists. You're a seed startup or a series A. You get asked these fucking questions all the time. You get grilled, you get absolutely beaten to shit. But once you reach a certain scale, once you're worth i don't know, some three hundred billion theoretical dollars that you fit into a narrative, suddenly the gloves are off and that's when the jerkins starts. I realized that was quite gross. But look, if you're listening to this as a member of the media and think I'm being mean to these executives, there's absolutely nothing stopping you from having fun, interesting conversations about the shit you love. There's nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing wrong with knowing subjects deeply and finding reasons to be excited. But please, fuck actually learn what you're talking about and be excited about something that's actually happening. But I think that that might be the problem deep down. That's the art and more problem with the tech media. I don't think enough people writing about technology actually know or give a shit about technology, or at least know enough to do their jobs. They see these executives as their sports teams factions to ally behind, only learning enough about the take to be able to write embargoed articles about whatever the next thing that open aiye does, even if they don't really understand or care readers. Listners deserved better, and when all of this shit collapses, I believe they'll start treating some of the members of the tech media with well deserved scorn.