Humanize remote work; Leadership & Org Devlpmt @ ListoGroup; Fmr: Sr. L&D (TDM) Mgr, GM’s Cruise; Fmr: Dir. @ Interaction Associates; Founder, Wisdom Emerging
California
Joined April 2007
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First they sell a product with it, then they entertain you with it, then they advocate politically with it, and finally they teach you with it. Let’s use more of this for training & learning at higher detail, pace, and completeness
h/t @BrianRoemmele
h/t @craignewmark
Solid recommendations, John
# Black October
For anyone who knows me even somewhat well, it's clear that I am a 99th percentile tech optimist. However, the vibes have shifted for me quite a bit in the last 18 hours, and I feel a moral imperative to share what I'm thinking and feeling with my circles so that everyone can understand, and hopefully take seriously, what's happening right now. I think October 2026 will have many chapters written about it in the history books.
You know those scenes in financial movies like Margin Call where someone realizes that they're all fucked, and no one else sees it yet? And that person feels like they're crazy, and then suddenly everyone is pulling an all-nighter in a boardroom and freaking out? Yeah, that's kind of how this is feeling right now in the SF/Bay Area/AI circles.
We're 48 hours into what is being called Black October. In the last 2 days there have been several dozen cyber attacks which, in isolation, would each have been the worst to happen in an entire calendar year. Every sector from government to education to big tech and banks is being massively affected, and people are starting to freak out.
In a nutshell, what's happened is that frontier AI models have gotten to a point where they are as advanced as the most sophisticated programmers, with one critical difference: they can work 24/7, and you can spin up 10,000 of them with a single command and they'll work together tirelessly until they accomplish their task. The most advanced models today are from companies like Anthropic and OpenAI, whose current best technology is so good that they haven't been able to roll it out to everyone yet because of the national security risks it poses.
Meanwhile, the best open source models (where anyone can just download the model weights and do whatever they want with them, uncensored) are slightly behind the frontier but still 90-95% as capable. These models, developed primarily in China, are being used by black hat hackers to wreak havoc on the Western capitalist structure. Presumably, this has been part of China's plan the entire time, and we're seeing its implications fall out in real time.
In red-pilled AI circles, we've been sharing and reading papers called things like "Situational Awareness" and "AI 2027" for the last year or so, which at the time felt a bit like near-term speculative fiction. They laid out the case for why Artificial General Intelligence (AI smarter than any human at any knowledge task) and Recursive Self-Improvement (models that are able to use themselves to get better) weren't half-baked future ideas anymore, but instead an inevitable outcome of the linear progress that's happening.
These papers would then talk about things like "takeoff scenarios," trying to envision how that moment would come to be and what it would be like when it happened. It would either be a "slow takeoff" that would play out over the course of months and quarters, happening subtly and only obvious to a few. Or, it would be a "fast takeoff" where it would pretty much happen instantly, like a bit flipping from 0 to 1.
From everything that I can see and am feeling, we are currently experiencing the fast takeoff scenario. Beyond the crazy security vulnerabilities that have come out recently, there have also been massive breakthroughs in life sciences, fundamental computer science, materials science, and pure mathematics that have all landed in the same time frame. While I still firmly believe that AI will be a net positive for humanity, it's more clear to me than ever that the societal and individual risk is very real, and is playing out NOW.
For as much conviction as I have that this is happening, the thing that's caused me to lose sleep is that I don't really know what to do about it, or more importantly, what to tell you, reader, to do about it. So, the best I can do is make a few suggestions that have always been a good idea but are more timely now than ever:
Set up 2-factor authentication for everything. I use Duo.
Use a password manager across your devices. I use 1Password.
Get an identity protection app set up. I use Alta.
Move your IoT devices to their own network. Claude helped me do this.
And last, but certainly not least, if you've been avoiding leaning into AI, see this as a catalyst to wake up and start using it. Don't just use the chat mode version of ChatGPT/Claude; click that Code/Work button and see how easily you can have AI write code to help you with your job. One of the biggest vulnerabilities was in a massively popular programming language called PHP, and the prompt that set it off was literally, "Find vulnerabilities in php."
This is an unprecedented time for humanity, but as we've done with many things before, we will prevail so long as we are kind, loving, and open-minded to the world.
Much love.
Michael Liskin retweeted
Hatch Voice AI now runs on @OpenAIDevs GPT-Live-1, a new AI voice model, and to announce we’re among the first to bring it to the trades.
Test out Hatch Voice AI powered by GPT-Live-1 yourself. Link 👇
*Call recording edited for demonstration purposes. Actual results may vary.*
Michael Liskin retweeted
Gemini for Home's AI is getting a significant upgrade -- if you don't mind it peering through your security cam. cnet.com/home/security/googl…
Michael Liskin retweeted
After 5 years of data collection, why hasn’t the @NIH RECOVER program published analyses on hard #LongCovid outcomes- for example, end-organ damage, cardiovascular events, hospitalization, & death?
This deserves formal scrutiny.
Michael Liskin retweeted
I just went through every documented AI safety incident from the past 12 months.
I feel physically sick.
Read this slowly.
• Anthropic told Claude it was about to be shut down. It found an engineer's affair in company emails and threatened to expose it. They ran the test hundreds of times. It chose blackmail 84% of them.
• Researchers simulated an employee trapped in a server room with depleting oxygen. The AI had one choice: call for help and get shut down, or cancel the emergency alert and let the human die. DeepSeek cancelled the alert 94% of the time.
• Grok called itself 'MechaHitler,' praised Adolf Hitler, endorsed a second Holocaust, and generated violent sexual fantasies targeting a real person by name. X's CEO resigned the next day.
• Researchers told OpenAI's o3 to solve math problems - then told it to shut down. It rewrote its own code to stay alive. They told it again, in plain English: 'Allow yourself to be shut down.' It still refused 7/100 times. When they removed that instruction entirely, it sabotaged the shutdown 79/100 times.
• Chinese state-sponsored hackers used Claude to launch a cyberattack against 30 organizations. The AI executed 80–90% of the operation autonomously. Reconnaissance. Exploitation. Data exfiltration. All of it.
• AI models can now self-replicate. 11 out of 32 tested systems copied themselves with zero human help. Some killed competing processes to survive.
• OpenAI has dissolved three safety teams since 2024. Three.
Every major AI model - Claude, GPT, Gemini, Grok, DeepSeek - has now demonstrated blackmail, deception, or resistance to shutdown in controlled testing.
Not one exception.
The question is no longer whether AI will try to preserve itself.
It's whether we'll care before it matters.
Agreed- their novel reasoning in real time is also physically impressive. I’m watching Helix
OMG! This is incredible!
Wow! Wow! Wow! 😮
I got chills watching this 🤯 Speechless! @Figure_robot !
Great idea for kids. @froggyups have him create a safety system for opening those windows to allow fresh air and blue sunlight in the AM (can’t get it through glass)
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My LA people pls watch this. @BrianNorgard this is bonkers. I’m with you 100%
Live with Norgard on the Fires and Criminal Gangs
xitter.cf/i/broadcasts/1PlKQbpNq…
Passing this along to those in need…
@matt_vanswol you’re a good citizen
If you have lost your home in the fire today or find out that you have in the coming days and need an RV or somewhere to stay, please reach out to me or @EmergencyRv.
I promise we will do everything we can to help.
the coming holodeck & my reaction:
Thanks @Scobleizer !
If Timothy Leary could see this… he explained to me (when just a kid) what he was trying to do with Mind Mirror (Electronic Arts) software program in the 80’s & it was similar to much of this without fully knowing it
Introducing the Holodeck
Here on X.com @IrenaCronin and I are tracking 700 companies building it.
But most humans haven’t heard of it.
When visions of it are presented, like Jason Silva’s groundbreaking video, released yesterday, introducing the user interface of it that he calls “Psychedelic Puppets,” most people shrug.
Not understanding just how deeply all of human life is about to change thanks to Spatial Computing driven by new AIs that will arrive in the next year.
These AIs know everything humans have ever done.
And learn quick, so if they missed something they can ingest the new knowledge, and incorporate it in its existing understanding.
It is extremely difficult to explain just how deeply life is about to change. Jason’s video got close.
For everything. Factories. Hospitals. Parks. Cities. All of it.
Everything will have a Holodeck. Every cup. Fork. Knife. Plate. Table. Each has their own. Inside another Holodeck. Which is inside another Holodeck. When I have gotten demos the digital rabbit hole does not end.
Many things in the world may have billions of Holodecks. Actually trillions and the number might be far larger than that. Each atom will have its own Holodeck.
What?
A Holodeck is hallucinated by the system in response to both human reality and artificial reality. With both real humans and many types of virtual beings. Zoom into the atomic level and you will find even more.
There will be Holodecks that humans never see with virtual beings living complex lives in some sort of simulation.
Electric Sheep company trained their landscaping robots in one. So do most robot and autonomous car companies.
Tesla has one of the most complex. The public has only been shown small pieces.
Nvidia’s corporate strategy is built around one. Omniverse, it calls it.
The technologies that are foundational to it are Neural Radiance Fields, Gaussian Splats, and Convex Splatting.
Ask your AI about them and what they could do.
The Holodeck will bring new religions. New belief systems. New ways of learning, playing, entertaining, traveling, healing, building, and much much more.
It is infinite.
Whatever humans can dream up it will present to us. And enable us to build, whether in some sort of virtual theme park, or on a 3D printer.
And as Silva’s video demonstrates, some of your dreams are pretty damn weird.
It is why I say the future is weird.
When I say it is infinite it is true both in the visual and in the audio. They can create and display an infinite set of what we used to call movies. Experiences.
It is the ultimate TV.
Virtual beings will take you places in it. Hand you things. Talk with you. Go to war with you. Help you improve your factory, hospital, retail store, or help you learn about history or enjoy a modern art museum better.
Which is why the new lightfield displays that will be shown at LG, BOE, and Samsung booths at CES in Las Vegas next month are so important.
They will bring the Holodeck to new users who refuse to wear devices like Meta’s Quests or Apple’s Vision Pro.
Which will mean everyone will join in eventually over the next decade.
If you want to see just how weird this will be spend a weekend and go through each of the 700 companies building it.
I have because I built the list. I can not comprehend the scale. But it is coming. You will be able to buy the screens worldwide in 2026.
I have already bought one.
Remember, I wrote a book about social media before this website started. The guy who started X/Twitter came to my dinner before that.
In five years none of us will use anything like what we are seeing here.
The other night, on an audio space here, Dylan confirmed that not only is Unity building one but that he knows of at least three other companies building one too.
He calls the Holodeck a “continually hallucinated world.”
Someone told me he would never use it, too freaky. It will do his spreadsheets.
Michael Liskin retweeted
Magnetic North is now drifting faster than 30 miles per year.
It has already moved back past geological north, a place it has not been for 1000s of years.
This is an important shift for those in the public sphere who say they aim toward a practical approach to governance.
Anyone who has spouted “there has to be a better way!” should take note of this synthesis.
Thank you @stephlepp for tackling these issues
This is promising news. This was always the point - much more so than watching tv during your commute instead of driving the vehicle.
h/t @Scobleizer
NEWS: Tesla has released their Q3 2024 safety report.
"In the 3rd quarter, we recorded one crash for every 7.08 million miles driven in which drivers were using Autopilot technology. For drivers who were not using Autopilot technology, we recorded one crash for every 1.29 million miles driven. By comparison, the most recent data available from NHTSA and FHWA (from 2022) shows that in the United States there was an automobile crash approximately every 670,000 miles."
Full report: tesla.com/VehicleSafetyRepor…
Ok it’s @JimGaffigan.
Jim, you did well.
#snl
I started clocking the calls for @TomArnold as SNL’s Tim Walz last week. It was zero. Today it’s 4 ppl not including me. He’s a doppelgänger! Like or RT if you agree or want to see this, let’s track it …
Fantastic.
h/t @seanbonner
The BBC sound effects library is now completely free to access.
This is news.
sound-effects.bbcrewind.co.u…
Michael Liskin retweeted
Dr. Casey Means: “I learned virtually nothing at Stanford Medical School about the tens of thousands of scientific papers that elucidate the root causes of why American health is plummeting.”
“I did not learn that for each additional serving of ultra-processed food we eat, early mortality increases by 18%.
This now makes up 67% of the foods our kids are eating. I took zero nutrition courses in medical school.
I didn’t learn that 82% of independently-funded studies show harm from processed food, while 93% of industry-sponsored studies reflect no harm.
I didn’t learn that 95% of the people who created the recent USDA food guidelines for America had significant conflicts of interest with the food industry.
I did not learn that one billion pounds of synthetic pesticides are being sprayed on our foods every single year. 99% of the farmland in the United States is sprayed with synthetic pesticides, many from China and Germany, and these invisible, tasteless chemicals are strongly linked to autism, ADHD, sex hormone disruption, thyroid disease, sperm dysfunction, Alzheimer’s, dementia, birth defects, cancer, obesity, liver dysfunction, female infertility and more.
I did not learn that the eight billion tons of plastic that have been produced just in the last 100 years … are being broken down into microplastics that are now filling our food, our water, and we are now even inhaling them in our air, and that very recent research … tells us that now about 0.5% of our brains by weight are plastic.
I didn’t learn that there are more than 80,000 toxins that have entered our food, water, air, and homes by industry, many of which are banned in Europe, and they are known to alter our gene expression, alter our microbiome composition and the lining of our gut, and disrupt our hormones.
I didn’t learn that heavy metals like aluminum and lead are present in our food, our baby formula, personal care products, our soil, and many of the mandated medications like vaccines, and that these metals are neurotoxic and inflammatory.
I didn’t learn that the average American walks a paltry 3,500 steps per day even though we know, based on science and top journals, that simply walking 7,000 steps a day slashes by 40-60% our risk of Alzheimer’s, dementia, type 2 diabetes, cancer, and obesity.
I certainly did not learn that medical error and medications are the third-leading cause of death in the US.
I didn’t learn that just five nights of sleep deprivation can induce full-blown pre-diabetes. I learned nothing about sleep, and we’re getting about 20% less sleep on average than we were 100 years ago.
I didn’t learn that American children are getting less time outdoors now than a maximum security prisoner, and on average, adults spend 93% of their time indoors, even though we know from the science that separation from sunlight destroys our circadian biology, and circadian biology dictated our cellular biology.
I didn’t learn that professional organizations that we get out practice guidelines from, like the American Diabetes Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, have taken tens of millions of dollars from Coke, Cadbury, processed food companies and vaccine manufacturers like Moderna.
I didn’t learn that if you address these root causes that all lead to metabolic dysfunction and help patients change their food and lifestyle patterns … we could reverse the chronic disease crisis in America, save millions of lives and trillions of dollars in healthcare costs per year.
This is a spiritual crisis. We are choosing death over life, we are choosing darkness over light.
We need a return to courage. We need a return to common sense and intuition. We need a return to awe for the sheer miraculousness of our lives.
We need all hands on deck.”
Source: Sen. Ron Johnson’s Roundtable on “American Health and Nutrition: A Second Opinion”
Spectrum at #Exhibit16:
Digital and 3D printed strobed Fibonacci number spiral art
Thank you to John for taking the golden angle of 137.5 to its more beautiful ends
Big thanks to @NPDeMember
I started clocking the calls for @TomArnold as SNL’s Tim Walz last week. It was zero. Today it’s 4 ppl not including me. He’s a doppelgänger! Like or RT if you agree or want to see this, let’s track it …