Notices by Ethan Marcotte (beep@follow.ethanmarcotte.com), page 2

“These cuts are just the most recent in a series of a sledgehammer approach to the critical US teams supporting IT infrastructure. […] We’re wrestling with what it will mean for ourselves and our families, as well as the impact on our partners and the American people.

“But we came to the government to fix things. And we’re not done with this work yet.”

https://18f.org/

”I lost all but a few loyal friends, my devoted family, and all but lost my newspaper but thank god I retained the pearl of great price—my self respect.”

Here’s @dansinker with a reminder that fascism always, always falls: https://dansinker.com/posts/2025-02-23-dale/

Needed to read this tonight; maybe you did too.

🦊

Friday was my last day working at 18F. It was a wonderful place to work, filled with extraordinary people, but a few things happened that made me realize I had to leave.

Everything happens so much these days, so I thought I’d write down for myself what happened, and how I made my decision:

https://ethanmarcotte.com/wrote/leaving-18f/

(FYI, this post gets into recent #uspol events. If that’s a stressor, or not interesting to you, I’d suggest skipping.)

You absolutely owe it to yourself to read @mia’s post on “artificial intelligence”, eugenics, and the tech industry’s push to ally itself to an explicitly fascist project: https://www.miriamsuzanne.com/2025/02/12/tech-ai-wtf/

the deep and abiding shame when i send a message long enough to trip signal’s “read more” link

you, sensibly: ethan, why are you like this

me: [unfurls the longest friggin scroll anyone has ever seen]

Hey, Apple users: if you install the latest iOS, iPadOS, or macOS updates, you’ll be automatically opted into “Apple Intelligence”. If you don’t want that running on your computer, you’ll need to go into Settings to disable it.

(this is far from the most pressing thing happening today, but just a heads-up)

🦊

Heck yeah, I love a good blogging challenge! Thanks so much to @jonhicks and @nazhamid for sending it my way! https://ethanmarcotte.com/wrote/blog-questions-challenge/

#blogging

me in my twenties: oh neat, a free program

me in my forties: oh neat, a free program, what horrors are concealed within

if you haven’t read @kissane’s latest, this is an especially good time to do so https://www.wrecka.ge/bad-shape/

“So sure: Protocols over platforms. Then we have to actually do the inelegant, un-heroic, expensive work of rebuilding the essential structures of human civilization on top of the protocols, because it turns out we just have the one world, online or off, no way out.” — @kissane, https://www.wrecka.ge/bad-shape/

@exchgr logo design firm: tell us about your brand

altman: our products enable the world to generate photos of people who inexplicably have extra fingers

logo design firm: say no more

@aud @sipi_xo I haven’t seen any calls from the workers for a boycott, myself. (Happy to be corrected on this, of course!) I *have* seen invitations to join a picket line if there’s one near you (https://www.tdu.org/amazon-teamsters-peak-season-strike-2024), and there’s a strike fund for the workers at JFK8 specifically (https://www.amazonlaborunion.org/strike-fundraising).

@jessamyn @lzg oh no jessamyn i love it

@jessamyn @lzg Jessamyn when i said https://follow.ethanmarcotte.com/@beep/113602323965090592

~i meant it~

(these photos are GIFTS thank you!!)

oh my yes https://detroithistorical.pastperfectonline.com/archive/DC6A8DF1-B6EB-4BFE-9CC7-774147737354#gallery

#labor #TechLabor #LaborHistory #1u

This is good:

“I think we should shed the idea that [‘artificial intelligence’] is a technological artifact with political features and recognize it as a political artifact through and through. AI is an ideological project to shift authority and autonomy away from individuals, towards centralized structures of power.”

https://ali-alkhatib.com/blog/defining-ai

This is, of course, something that workers across the labor movement have been *keenly* aware of since day one. (It’s even part of my book’s closing argument!) I just really loved the framing here, which I thought was VERY sharp.

@jessamyn @lzg LOVE

@lzg just a little guy!!!!