Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp

Venkatesh Rao ☀️

@vgr

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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
This is great. @timber has been firing on all cylinders lately https://open.substack.com/pub/protocolist/p/mold-rust-and-the-risk-society
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
All bad political thought begins with trying to institutionalize progress into an ism Accept it when it happens, keep trying to patiently provoke it when it doesn’t. That’s all you can do. Progress is content that breaks containers, not a containerization form factor.
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
There is no “progressivism” there are only spasmodic epochs of progress before the underlying forces get captured and domesticated or killed, with or without retention of the label
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
One reason I’m very bullish on Southeast Asia is that pluralism is existential there, not some sort of nice optional extra for good times. SEA doesn’t exist without pluralism. When it has abandoned pluralism, historically it has degenerated to absolutely dystopian bloodiness, not some sort of ethnonationalist rump state that at least the victors can pretend to enjoy if they squint. And it’s notable that in recent decades the region attracted both a cohort of ex-Soviets in the 90s and ex-Putin-Russians since 2020. It’s also where the Chinese have historically retreated when their state has turned against them. I suspect there will be a new wave of American expats in the region soon, very different from the Tim Ferriss vitamin selling nomad era.
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Note I posted on substack. Substack has turned into my default posting place now for broader topics. I still post here first for crypto and crypto adjacent stuff.
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Bullshit plus bullshit is always bullshit but bullshit minus bullshit is sometimes signal
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
You know how we’ve been in endless reboots and franchise/universe extensions of old tv and movies for a couple of decades now? What if AI is that but for all human thought 😬 What if we’re done thinking and this is all just endless recycling from here on out 😖🫣
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
How dare you. Go say thank you to J. D. Vance for America immediately. 😤🇺🇸
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Two visions of America: As a country that stands for certain values and as a country that expects people to be respectful and thankful to J. D. Vance. Now which one to support hmm 🤔
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Music people: Why have key changes declined in popular music? https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/z5dty1/oc_the_slow_decline_of_key_changes_in_popular/?rdt=55238
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
30y on I think the most iconic 90s show is X-files Not Seinfeld, Simpsons, or anything else. The show captured the pre-internet information environment with uncanny precision.
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
If you don’t have equally strong allergic reactions to the words woke and based, you’re part of the reason the culture war continues
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
SoP 2025 program is starting to come together in the background. Really fun to see the program design level up each year. This year's program has the most ambitious goals yet. Announcements coming in the next couple of weeks, stay tuned. Hint: If you are an educator or know innovative educators or want to help birth a whole new kind of science fiction, this year's program is for you.
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Guess the source of this quote: “There is an ancient Indian saying that something lives only as long as the last person who remembers it. My people have come to trust memory over history. Memory, like fire, is radiant and immutable while history serves only those who seek to control it, those who douse the flame of memory in order to put out the dangerous fire of truth. Beware these men for they are dangerous themselves and unwise. Their false history is written in the blood of those who might remember and of those who seek the truth..”
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Yikes https://x.com/hasufl/status/1894349686590296250?s=61&t=Z7ogL5oXQlE-zjAQ_mFVBw
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Okay added a second version generated by starting with analyzing and updating universe rules. This is fun.
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Asked ChatGPT o3-mini for an updated reboot idea for the X-files Not terrible but lacking in a certain je ne sais quoi of the og It didn’t quite have a good idea of how to update for an era of info ubiquity https://docs.google.com/document/d/138EZ6UjIMO9FHaL9WsYtaJ14W4vjH5wuL9qQ67O9Fb4/edit
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️ pfp
Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Good roundup of relevant facts tldr: The addressable spending for cuts is 14%, and within that it seems to be 100% targeting for the most dramatic show trials, not the boring work of systemic reform. The idea of slashing “inefficiency” is wildly popular from genpop to billionaires,so it provides easy cover to an entirely different program: To send a message to a class of people that the country “belongs” to a different class of people now. There is no meaningful intent to reform the executive branch, reconstruct it along different lines, or even shrink it. The intent is only to signal “this is our town now.” Even “DEI” is not really the target so much as the most politically convenient thing to make an example of in the show trials. https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-am-e8b777c0-f2f2-11ef-a174-cd57c8dcfa94.html
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
Mediocrity is kindness, hence the idiomatic expression, “cut them some slack” It’s a way of apportioning out benefit of doubt It’s also a model of kindness that’s about behavior rather than stuff, so more consequential, and a style of kindness that’s you must show yourself first Kindness that doesn’t begin with kindness to yourself usually degenerates fast to resentful martyrdom that reverses course with explosive violence
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Venkatesh Rao ☀️
@vgr
If something is worth doing it’s worth doing extremely poorly It may additionally be worth doing well. That’s what we in the mediocrity business call optional extras. So next time you feel purposeless and stick, ask yourself: What seems worth doing really poorly If the answer is is “nothing” you might be suffering from optimization mind virus
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