Pepper Culpepper
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pculpepper.bsky.social
Pepper Culpepper
@pculpepper.bsky.social

Professor of Government and Public Policy, University of Oxford; Co-author of Billionaire Backlash; prone to Sisyphean cycling follies

Pepper Dagenhart Culpepper is an American political scientist.

Source: Wikipedia
Political science 43%
Economics 30%

@chrismurphyct.bsky.social a one-man band right now trying to drag the quiet politics of the AI industry out into the light. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Please watch this.

The Senate killed a bill to ban state regulation of AI by a vote of 99-1 this spring. Now the industry - eager to stay unregulated - and Trump are scheming to shove the provision in the national defense bill.

You need to know this, so you can help stop it.

I’ve got a book recommendation for you guys (out January 29 in UK, March 17 in US)

💯 Have I got the book for you @karaswisher.bsky.social . Coming out 29 January.
Please watch this.

The Senate killed a bill to ban state regulation of AI by a vote of 99-1 this spring. Now the industry - eager to stay unregulated - and Trump are scheming to shove the provision in the national defense bill.

You need to know this, so you can help stop it.

Absolutely gross. @anandwrites.bsky.social nails the semiotics of intra-elite back scratching from the Epstein emails. “This is what these powerful people…were thinking and doing —taking care of one another instead of the general welfare — before it got really bad.”
Opinion | How the Elite Behave When No One Is Watching: Inside the Epstein Emails
www.nytimes.com

Priorities
On Facebook, you could sexually solicit minors 17 times before being kicked out... or you could just post a passage from Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams, describing Zuckerberg's obsequious conduct with Xi Jinping, and then get kicked out instantly. www.thedailybeast.com/lawsuit-alle...
Court Filings Allege Meta ‘Lied To Congress’ About Harms To Kids
New court filings also allege it would take a whopping 17 strikes for solicitation before an account was deleted.
www.thedailybeast.com
On Facebook, you could sexually solicit minors 17 times before being kicked out... or you could just post a passage from Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams, describing Zuckerberg's obsequious conduct with Xi Jinping, and then get kicked out instantly. www.thedailybeast.com/lawsuit-alle...
Court Filings Allege Meta ‘Lied To Congress’ About Harms To Kids
New court filings also allege it would take a whopping 17 strikes for solicitation before an account was deleted.
www.thedailybeast.com
Fun fact: November 28, 2001:

"ENRON, which had been a component of the S&P; 500, was removed at the end of trading Thursday and replaced by NVIDIA Corp., a Santa Clara, Calif.-based maker of computer-graphics chips."

A few vertically integrated giants controlling the AI stack. Think about all the circular AI deals in this context. What could possibly go wrong?
Google is the Apple of AI as they have a complete vertically integrated story. They make their own chips, own data centers, provide AI cloud services, build frontier models, have AI integrated business and consumer apps, a mobile OS platform, a browser and devices.

$1.4T isn’t enough to compete.😬
Altman Memo Forecasts ‘Rough Vibes’ Due to Resurgent Google
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told colleagues last month that Google’s recent progress in artificial intelligence could “create some temporary economic headwinds for our company,” though he added that OpenAI ...
www.theinformation.com
Google is the Apple of AI as they have a complete vertically integrated story. They make their own chips, own data centers, provide AI cloud services, build frontier models, have AI integrated business and consumer apps, a mobile OS platform, a browser and devices.

$1.4T isn’t enough to compete.😬
Altman Memo Forecasts ‘Rough Vibes’ Due to Resurgent Google
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told colleagues last month that Google’s recent progress in artificial intelligence could “create some temporary economic headwinds for our company,” though he added that OpenAI ...
www.theinformation.com

Looks like we’ve reached AGI.
Musk's ego was mortally wounded by Joyce Carol Oates and he's been on a narcissistic supply bender since

💯
"When private companies [OpenAI] can reach half-trillion-dollar valuations while remaining exempt from disclosure requirements designed to protect systemic stability, the public-private distinction no longer serves its intended function."

substack.com/inbox/post/1...
The Auditor Paradox: How OpenAI’s Governance Gap Exposes Silicon Valley’s Circular Capital Machine
A $500 billion company building artificial general intelligence relies on a twelve-person accounting firm.
substack.com
Musk's ego was mortally wounded by Joyce Carol Oates and he's been on a narcissistic supply bender since
"When private companies [OpenAI] can reach half-trillion-dollar valuations while remaining exempt from disclosure requirements designed to protect systemic stability, the public-private distinction no longer serves its intended function."

substack.com/inbox/post/1...
The Auditor Paradox: How OpenAI’s Governance Gap Exposes Silicon Valley’s Circular Capital Machine
A $500 billion company building artificial general intelligence relies on a twelve-person accounting firm.
substack.com
new paper by Sean Westwood:

With current technology, it is impossible to tell whether survey respondents are real or bots. Among other things, makes it easy for bad actors to manipulate outcomes. No good news here for the future of online-based survey research
My antitrust attitudes paper with Nick Short and Jacob Brown is out now @poppublicsphere.bsky.social

doi.org/10.1017/S153...

We find:
- voters are skeptical about M&A
- current law marginalizes important public concerns (layoffs, bailout risk, lobbying)
- expert/public cleavage > partisan diffs

There really is no word that says "strategic clarity" more than "smorgasbord".

@alphaville.ft.com for the win on memes of the AI bubble.
I feel seen.
Paper gets 2 positive reviews & 1 very critical one

Authors work very very hard on R&R

Journal sends it back to critical reviewer (only) and 1 new reviewer

Critical reviewer is quite positive about revision

New reviewer is negative

Editor sits on reviews for 1 month, then rejects

Authors sad
Quick thread on the BBC and the political and societal significance of recent developments:

One of the main reasons the UK has historically been so much less polarised than the US, is that Britain has a shared source of information, consumed and trusted by most people regardless of their politics.

New role playing game by Microsoft — Microsoft! — warns that ‘any similarities to real-world dystopian corporate branded hellscapes are purely coincidental.’
Crushed by capitalism? There’s a video game for that
‘The Outer Worlds 2’ is set in a galaxy ruled by greedy corporations — but can a game made by a Microsoft-owned studio critique the system effectively?
www.ft.com

Profound political economy insight from the Daily Show: observe behavior rather than cheap talk.
New York millionaires: threatening to flee the city since 2009
New York millionaires: threatening to flee the city since 2009

The Onion has trouble staying ahead of reality these days.
10% of Meta's 2024 ad revenue came from outright frauds and scams; the platform shows consumers 15 billion ads for fraud and scams every single day. This doesn't even include agitprop and AI slop.

the existential collapse of this monumental pile of shit company simply can't come quickly enough
Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads, documents show
Meta projected 10% of its 2024 revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods, and it internally estimates that its platforms show users 15 billion scam ads a day, company documents show.
www.reuters.com
The Nuffield PPRF is an amazing postdoc - a brilliant community, lovely college, and yes, great food. And, usually, also with a family of ducks.
We have just published the call for the Nuffield Postdoctoral Prize Research Fellowships in Politics. These are 3-year fully-funded postdocs that will allow you to focus on your research in a great academic environment. (And with excellent food)

www.nuffield.ox.ac.uk/the-college/...
Postdoctoral Prize Research Fellowships in Politics - Nuffield College Oxford University
www.nuffield.ox.ac.uk
10% of Meta's 2024 ad revenue came from outright frauds and scams; the platform shows consumers 15 billion ads for fraud and scams every single day. This doesn't even include agitprop and AI slop.

the existential collapse of this monumental pile of shit company simply can't come quickly enough
Meta is earning a fortune on a deluge of fraudulent ads, documents show
Meta projected 10% of its 2024 revenue would come from ads for scams and banned goods, and it internally estimates that its platforms show users 15 billion scam ads a day, company documents show.
www.reuters.com

Reposted by David Lazer

Should local officials in a democracy be allowed to sign NDAs?
How NDAs keep AI data center details hidden from Americans:

Big Tech companies use secrecy agreements with local governments to keep communities from knowing who is building in their backyards.

www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-ne...
How Big Tech uses NDAs to hide AI data center details from Americans
Big Tech companies use secrecy agreements with local governments to keep communities from knowing who is building in their backyards.
www.nbcnews.com