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Good morning and goodbye, October,
which looked mostly like this:
Last week, I did a deep dive into the mysterious backstory of the business influencer Alex Hormozi (“Are You READY TO SCALE?”), after a matinee viewing of You Can See Everything inspired an LSD trip through the YouTube looking glass. After it was published, I received a text from a beloved colleague in the “financial independence” world. They told me they had asked ChatGPT a few months ago why “the math didn’t seem to math” in the Hormoziverse. Its response, which they shared with me, mirrored my thesis to a spooky degree, which I guess is proof that I’m soon going to be replaced by AI:
What I find particularly interesting about your observation is that you’re describing something more sophisticated than an ordinary scam. The initial claim may be exaggerated or even fabricated, but the success that follows can become entirely real. Eventually, the original claim barely matters anymore because the individual has accumulated enough real-world success to make questioning their origins seem almost absurd.
And on that note: I didn’t foresee getting choked up during a podcast episode about artificial intelligence, but the poignancy of this interview with a mathematician caught me off guard. It’s somehow at once heartening and depressing and made me love humans even more. It’s called “When A.I. Comes for Your Purpose in Life.” (The New York Times)
Also maybe related: Microsoft, a company that clocked more than $100 billion in profit last year, just offered a voluntary separation package to 60,000 of its employees, or 27% of its workforce. While not technically a layoff, I think this sort of move has a similarly destabilizing effect on morale, because it’s a signal of what’s coming. (Wall Street Journal)
This news makes me feel like we need to smash the “circle back” button on this Business Insider headline from a few weeks ago:
This story exists at the precise intersection of my interests: The Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders are unionizing. I’m fighting the urge to belabor the point that you shouldn’t have to be the subjects of a popular Netflix docuseries to exercise your basic labor rights. Instead, I’ll take this opportunity to point out a pattern in reporting about labor action that you’ll never be able to unsee: how the language subtly implies the reader’s interests are aligned with those of the conglomerate, rather than the workers. (ESPN)
The workers (labor) are always “making demands” (connotation: petulant, undeserving), while the bosses (capital) are always “making offers” (connotation: generous, conciliatory). This observation comes to you courtesy of Michael Parenti’s Land of Idols: Political Mythology in America (1993).
Labor action is frequently framed in terms of how it will “threaten the economy” or “raise costs,” but neglects to calculate or even mention the society-wide costs of chronic low pay or undignified conditions. One easy question to ask yourself when you see headlines about “the economy”: Whose economy?
Economics commentator Kyla Scanlon just launched a career-advice podcast with Vox called “Best of Luck,” premised on the angle that most career advice is geared toward an economy “that no longer exists.” One of her first episodes features my friend and former Morning Brew coworker, the absurdly talented Dan Toomey. (Vox)
Oh, good, another celebrity beauty brand! There’s virtually nothing that Jennifer Lawrence could do that I would find less interesting than “turning her Hollywood hair story” into a product line. (Fortune)