720: Sad Max Mode

This week’s episode started with the usual existential sigh before tumbling straight into the corporate bloodbath. Amazon chopped 14,000 jobs under the noble banner of “embracing AI,” which CEO Andy Jassy insists isn’t about money—despite swimming Scrooge McDuck–style in profit. GM’s cutting 1,700 workers, YouTube’s dangling “voluntary” buyouts, and economists can’t decide if AI is killing jobs or if the economy’s just trash. Microsoft’s winning either way, sitting pretty on OpenAI’s planned $1 trillion IPO, while Meta stock cratered because Zuckerberg’s still shoveling billions into the AI bonfire instead of quietly burying the metaverse. Meanwhile, Elon managed to cram a week’s worth of disasters into a single news cycle: Tesla’s being probed for its idiotic “Mad Max” mode, recalling thousands more Cybertrucks because they can’t figure out glue, launching Grokipedia (Wikipedia’s evil twin), and turning Truth Social into a crypto casino. Somewhere between the chaos, more people tuned into a fake NVIDIA livestream than the real one, and the only vaguely uplifting story was a grieving family using an AI chatbot to hack a $195K hospital bill down to $33K.

In media misery, we soothed our nuclear anxiety with A House of Dynamite, tolerated Welcome to Derry, rolled our eyes at Stranger Things 5, and confirmed Slow Horses still rules. Music listeners, please stop streaming fascism—cancel Spotify. On the tech toy front, Grammarly’s having an identity crisis as “Superhuman,” Affinity caved to the subscription gods, and Apple’s prepping to inject ads into Maps because the world wasn’t already annoying enough. The chaos didn’t stop there: a rogue Goodreads librarian rewrote Trump’s book listings to protest censorship, Cursor 2.0 actually impressed us with a working currency converter, and Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It turned out to be the perfect title for the entire digital era.

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Show notes at https://gog.show/720

FOLLOW UP

What both sides of America’s polarized divide share: Deep anxieties about the meaning of life and existence itself

720° © 1986 Atari Games.

IN THE NEWS

Amazon cuts its workforce by 14,000 in further embrace of AI

Is AI Leading to Layoffs or Does the Economy Just Suck?

Amazon CEO Now Says AI Is Not Responsible for Recent Layoffs

Amazon Accused of Trapping Drivers in AI Panopticon

GM lays off 1,700 workers making EVs and batteries in Michigan, Tennessee

Tesla Recalls Thousands More Cybertrucks, Is Bad at Gluing Things

YouTube is offering employees buyouts as part of an AI-focused reorganization

Everyone Is Laying People Off This Week. Researchers Say They’re Going to Regret It

OpenAI completes restructure, solidifying Microsoft as a major shareholder

OpenAI lays groundwork for juggernaut IPO at up to $1 trillion valuation

Meta Stock Plummets as Investors Horrified at How Much Zuckerberg Is Spending on Misfired AI

Federal investigators are looking into Tesla's Mad Max mode, which reportedly defies speed limits

Grokipedia Is the Antithesis of Everything That Makes Wikipedia Good, Useful, and Human

More people watched a fake NVIDIA livestream than the real thing

Trump’s Media Company Set To Roll Out Polymarket-Like Prediction Market on Truth Social

Surprising no one, researchers confirm that AI chatbots are incredibly sycophantic

Grieving family uses AI chatbot to cut hospital bill from $195,000 to $33,000 — family says Claude highlighted duplicative charges, improper coding, and other violations

MEDIA CANDY

A House of Dynamite

Welcome to Derry

Stranger Things 5 | Official Trailer | Netflix

Slow Horses

Don’t Stream Fascism: Cancel Spotify

APPS & DOODADS

Grammarly has rebranded to Superhuman

Affinity’s image-editing apps go “freemium” in first major post-Canva update

Apple is reportedly getting ready to introduce ads to its Maps app

Rogue Goodreads Librarian Edits Site to Expose 'Censorship in Favor of Trump Fascism’

Introducing Cursor 2.0 and Composer

Enshittification: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It by Cory Doctorow

The Disenshittify Project

Currency Converter

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