Content Farms and Critical Mass

Last night, as Netflix autoplayed the third episode in a row of a show we were ostensibly watching -- Department Q, for what it's worth -- it struck me how much "content" the average viewer must consume every day. No wonder media corporations are interested in generative AI and this promise to magically create "content" without having to hire any workers to write or film or edit or act. I mean, capitalism is inextricable from this mechanization of labor -- the demands for ever-increasing profits are going to prompt capitalists to cut costs wherever they can, and so replacing humans with machines always feels like a great deal as one is an expense (i.e. wages) and the other is capital.

Kin and I listen to books most evenings, but we do watch TV for a couple of hours on the weekends. And even that limited amount of screen time takes us through movies and and TV shows at a rapid clip. We just discovered Natasha Lyonne's excellent Pokerface a few weeks ago, but had finished watching all the available shows by Saturday night. We're watching Murderbot -- I have not decided yet if I hate it. I think I hate it -- but the episodes are released one a week and are only 20 minutes long and whoosh, it's over and time to find something else to watch. And that's just to fill a couple of hours -- say, from 7 'til 9pm -- a couple of nights a week. Most people are watching more hours every night.

(Hell, I am inclined to argue that what most people are doing on their phones is actually watching TV, despite all the arguments that the Internet and mobile devices were going to unlock some sort of utopia of the read-write Web. And I'd add too that, for most people, a second screen is really just an answer machine for trivia about the TV they're watching on their primary screen. People aren't exactly doing deep research online -- whether they're using AI or not; they're just googling a list of what other movies that one actress appeared in.)

On Friday, Kin and Poppy attended a Critical Mass to protest the police department's targeting of cyclists: issuing criminal citations rather than writing traffic tickets. Not only does this make the punishment for traffic violations more serious, more expensive for cyclists than for drivers, it puts at grave risk the immigrant population in the city -- which includes the majority of bike delivery workers -- initiating a chain of proceedings that, under Trump certainly, will mean deportation.

This was Poppy's first protest, which she found quite overwhelming, I gather. I'm glad Kin and Poppy went nonetheless, as biking together has become an everyday activity for the two of them -- a way to really ground themselves in the community, in the city.

I often think of Werner Herzog's statement "the world reveals itself to those who walk," and I've written before about the ways in which the pace of walking allows for a different way of seeing, thinking, and being in a place. And while, to be fair, the pace of walking is far slower than the pace of cycling, even with a 100-pound Rottweiler in your side-car, there is something too about moving through the city on a bike that offers a radical shift in perspective -- recognizing your vulnerability, in part, to the absolute insensitivity and madness of the automobile and its driver and the infrastructure we've built to support the car.

I think there's a connection to be made about this insensitivity and madness of the Internet, of AI too -- this way in which many of us are moving around in an infrastructure designed with a purpose that is actually quite contrary to the "revealing" that Herzog (and Heidegger) venerates. But surrounded by the metal and plastic -- isolated and comfortable, with a route and routine that we insist is "individualized" -- we simply cannot believe that those moving through the world in other ways are anything other than in our way.

I see more and more runners opting to use Runna, an app that says it uses "AI" to generate personalized training plans. (Do I bitch about this every week? Maybe?) I decided this week to actually go in the other direction, and I signed up for a running coach to train for the NYC Marathon. It's a program run through the NY Flyers, my run club, so we'll see how that goes. It'll be 18 weeks of training, so I have the rest of June to "take it easy" (hahahaha) before I ramp up the running again.

This past week looked something like this:

• Monday: Swimming and Lifting (Deadlifts and stuff)

• Tuesday: Running (Speed workout)

• Wednesday: Swimming and Lifting (Squats and stuff)

• Friday: Running (Hill repeats) and Dancing (Absolute Beginner Ballet)

• Saturday: Running (Easy)

• Sunday: Running (Long run)

A total of ~30 miles running, which isn't too shabby on just four days of running. The swimming is getting easier, and I've worked up to 40 minute-long sessions. Monday -- Memorial Day -- was a clusterfuck in the pool, however, and I was forced to "circle swim" which if you swim laps, you know is hell. It's at once too slow and too fast, and a woman in our lane was doggy-paddling, which COME ON.

Work stuff: I published two Second Breakfast newsletters (today and Friday). I had a call with journalist working on a story on Unbound Academy, the online charter school that says it uses AI to teach kids in just two hours a day. Jathan Sadowski was the guest speaker in the "Fighting the Broligarchy" class (I was tasked with the opening and closing of the session). I had a "Lamplighters" meeting.

Food stuff: It was sort of a disastrous week of eating and cooking -- one of those weeks when nothing I made turned out quite right. I tried a new recipe -- tempeh meatballs -- and while not awful, it wasn't something I'll make again. I made Kung Pao cauliflower, which I've made before, but the Szechuan peppercorns were a no-go for Kin. I bought a variety of chocolate candies -- knock-offs of name brand candy bars like Snickers and M&Ms but supposedly "healthier" or something. Ugh, I think the chemicals and food coloring are a necessary ingredient here. I bought a loaf of seeded bread from Amy's Bread to go with the pasta on Saturday night, but it had caraway seeds in it, also on Kin's "will not eat" list. We ordered a bunch of empanadas from Empanada Mamas last night, and thankfully this place can do no wrong, so at least the week ended on a good note.

Non-food stuff: Poppy caught a squirrel on Sunday morning. I don’t know if she killed it — we yelled at her, she dropped it, and the squirrel escaped up a tree. But it clawed her nose pretty good, and noses sure do bleed.

Reading stuff: I'm reading Geraldine Brooks's Memorial Days. I finished Andrew Pickering's The Cybernetic Brain and started Eden Medina's Cybernetic Revolutionaries. We're still reading Luis Elizondo's Imminent -- I'm hoping to write a bit about aliens and AI and how batshit crazy some people seem to have become for Friday's Second Breakfast newsletter.

Home stuff: I finally repotted the monstera, splitting it into two plants (so hopefully that doesn't mean I've killed two rather than just one big plant).

Away stuff: I made hotel reservations and Kin rented a car so that we can head up to Maine later this month. This reminds me: I need to ask him if he rented a car or a truck, because I bet he wants to bring the bike and sidecar...

Instead of sporadically posting on my website (i.e. blogging) and instead of incessantly posting on social media, I’m just jotting a bunch of thoughts and events down in an email — something like those annoying holiday newsletters, but this one comes weekly. I should say more about why I think the letter, the epistle, the email is more interesting to me than blogging right now, but I’ll save that for next week…