Forget AI. The Real Game Is Control by Tech Wizards
October 6, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
The weird orange newspaper ran an opinion-news story titled “How Tech Lords and Populists Changed the Rules of Power.” The author is Giuliano da Empoli. Now he writes. He has worked in the Italian government. He was the Deputy Mayor for Culture in the city of Florence. Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527) lived in Florence. That Florentine’s ideas may have influenced Giuliano.
What are the tech bros doing? M. da Empoli writes:
The new technological elites, the Musks, Mark Zuckerbergs and Sam Altmans of this world, have nothing in common with the technocrats of Davos. Their philosophy of life is not based on the competent management of the existing order but, on the contrary, on an irrepressible desire to throw everything up in the air. Order, prudence and respect for the rules are anathema to those who have made a name for themselves by moving fast and breaking things, in accordance with Facebook’s famous first motto. In this context, Musk’s words are just the tip of the iceberg and reveal something much deeper: a battle between power elites for control of the future.
In the US, the current pride of tech lions have revealed their agenda and their battle steed, Donald J. Trump. The “governing elite” are on their collective back feet. M. da Empoli points the finger at social media and online services as the magic carpet the tech elites ride even though these look like private jets. In the online world, M. da Empoli says:
On the internet, a campaign of aggression or disinformation costs nothing, while defending against it is almost impossible. As a result, our republics, our large and small liberal democracies, risk being swept away like the tiny Italian republics of the early 16th century. And taking center stage are characters who seem to have stepped out of Machiavelli’s The Prince to follow his teachings. In a situation of uncertainty, when the legitimacy of power is precarious and can be called into question at any moment, those who fail to act can be certain that changes will occur to their disadvantage.
What’s the end game? M. da Empoli asserts:
Together, political predators and digital conquistadors have decided to wipe out the old elites and their rules. If they succeed in achieving this goal, it will not only be the parties of lawyers and technocrats that will be swept away, but also liberal democracy as we have known it until today.
Several observations:
- The tech elites are in a race which they have to win. Dumb phones and GenAI limiting their online activities are two indications that in the US some behavioral changes can be identified. Will the “spirit of log off” spread?
- The tech elites want AI to win. The reason is that control of information streams translates into power. With power comes opportunities to increase the wealth of those who manage the AI systems. A government cannot do this, but the tech elites can. If AI doesn’t work, lots of money evaporates. The tech elites do not want that to happen.
- Online tears down and leads inevitably to monopolistic or oligopolistic control of markets. The end game does not interest the tech elite. Power and money do.
Net net: What’s the fix? M. da Empoli does not say. He knows what’s coming is bad. What happens to those who deliver bad news? Clever people like Machiavelli write leadership how-to books.
Stephen E Arnold, October 6, 2025
What a Hoot? First, Snow White and Now This
October 3, 2025
![green-dino_thumb_thumb[3]](https://www.arnoldit.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/green-dino_thumb_thumb3.gif "green-dino_thumb_thumb[3]")
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
I read “Disney+ Cancellation Page Crashes As Customers Rush to Quit after Kimmel Suspension.” I don’t think too much about Disney, the cost of going to a theme park, or the allegedly chill Walt Disney. Now it is Disney, Disney, Disney. The chant is almost displacing Epstein, Epstein, Epstein.
Somehow the Disney company muffed the bunny with Snow White. I think the film hit my radar when certain short human actors were going to be in a remake of the 1930s’ cartoon “Snow White.” Then then I noted some stories about a new president and an old president who wanted to be the president again or whatever. Most recently, Disney hit the pause button for a late night comedy show. Some people were not happy.
The write up informed me:
With cancellations surging, many subscribers reported technical issues. On Reddit’s r/Fauxmoi, one post read, “The page to cancel your Hulu/Disney+ subscription keeps crashing.”
As a practical matter, the way to stop cancellations is to dial back the resources available to the Web site. Presto. No more cancellations until the server is slowly restored to functionality so it can fall over again.
I am pragmatic. I don’t like to think that information technology professionals (either full time “cast” or part-timers) can’t keep a Web site online. It is 2025. A phone call to a service provider can solve most reliability problems as quickly as the data can be copied to a different data center.
Let me step back. I see several signals in what I will call the cartoon collapse.
- The leadership of Disney cannot rely on the people in the company; for example, the new Snow White and the Web server fell over.
- The judgment of those involved in specific decisions seems to be out of sync with the customers and the stakeholders in the company. Walt had Mickey Mouse aligned with what movie goers wanted to see and what stakeholders expected the enterprise to deliver.
- The technical infrastructure seems flawed. Well, not “seems.” The cancellation server failed.
Disney is an example of what happens when “leadership” has not set up an organization to succeed. Furthermore, the Disney case raises this question, “How many other big, well-known companies will follow this Disney trajectory?” My thought is that the disconnect between “management” staff, customers, stakeholders, and technology is similar to Disney in a number of outfits.
What will be these firms’ Snow White and late night comedian moment?
Stephen E Arnold, October 3, 2025
PS. Disney appears to have raised prices and then offered my wife a $2.99 per month “deal.” Slick stuff.
Musky Odor? Get Rid of Stinkies
September 29, 2025
Elon Musk cleaned house at xAI, the parent company of Grok. He fired five hundred employees followed by another hundred. That’s not the only thing he according to Futurism’s article, “Elon Musk Fires 500 Staff At xAI, Puts College Kid In Charge of Training Grok.” The biggest change Musk made to xAI was placing a kid who graduated high school in 2023 in charge of Grok. Grok is the AI chatbot and gets its name from Robert A. Heinlein’s book, Stranger in a Strange Land. Grok that, humanoid!
The name of the kid is Diego Pasini, who is currently a college student as well as Grok’s new leadership icon. Grok is currently going through a training period of data annotation, where humans manually go in and correct information in the AI’s LLMs. Grok is a wild card when it comes to the wild world of smart software. In addition to hallucinations, AI systems burn money like coal going into the Union Pacific’s Big Boy. The write up says:
“And the AI model in question in this case is Grok, which is integrated into X-formerly-Twitter, where its users frequently summon the chatbot to explain current events. Grok has a history of wildly going off the rails, including espousing claims of “white genocide” in unrelated discussions, and in one of the most spectacular meltdowns in the AI industry, going around styling itself as “MechaHitler.” Meanwhile, its creator Musk has repeatedly spoken about “fixing” Grok after instances of the AI citing sources that contradict his worldview.”
Musk is surrounding himself with young-at-heart wizards yes-men and will defend his companies as well as follow his informed vision which converts ordinary Teslas into self-driving vehicles and smart software into clay for the wizardish Diego Pasini. Mr. Musk wants to enter a building and not be distracted by those who do not give off the sweet scent of true believers. Thus, Musky Management means using the same outstanding methods he deployed when improving government effciency. (How is that working out for Health, Education, and Welfare and the Department of Labor?)
Mr. Musk appears to embrace meritocracy, not age, experience, or academic credentials. Will Grok grow? Yes, it will manifest just as self-driving Teslas have. Ah, the sweet smell of success.
Whitney Grace, September 29, 2025
Telegram Does Content. OpenAI Plants a Grove
September 25, 2025
Written by an unteachable dinobaby. Live with it.
Telegram uses contests to identify smart people who are into Telegram apps. For the last decade, Telegram’s approach has worked reasonably well. The method eliminates much of the bureaucracy and cost of a traditional human resources operation.
OpenAI has a different approach. “OpenAI Announces Grove, a Cohort for ‘Pre-Idea Individuals’ to Build in AI” reports:
OpenAI announced a new program called Grove on September 12, which is aimed at assisting technical talent at the very start of their journey in building startups and companies. The ChatGPT maker says that it isn’t a traditional startup accelerator program, and offers ‘pre-idea’ individuals access to a dense talent network, which includes OpenAI’s researchers, and other resources to build their ideas in the AI space.
OpenAI’s big dog is not emulating the YCombinator approach, nor is he knocking off a copy of the Telegram contests. He is looking for talented people who can create viable applications.
The approach, according to the cited article, is:
The program will begin with five weeks of content hosted in OpenAI’s headquarters in San Francisco, United States. This includes in-person workshops, weekly office hours, and mentorship with OpenAI’s leaders. The first Grove cohort will consist of approximately 15 participants, and OpenAI is recommending individuals from all domains and disciplines across various experience levels.
Will the approach work? Who knows. Telegram’s approach casts a wide net, and it is supported by the evangelism with cash approach of Telegram’s proxy, the TON Foundation. OpenAI is starting small. Telegram reviews “solutions” to coding problems. OpenAI’s Grove is more like a window box with some petunias and maybe a periwinkle or two.
The Telegram and OpenAI approaches illustrate how some high profile organizations are trying to arrive at personnel and partner solutions in a way different from that taken by Salesforce or similar quasi-new era outfits.
What other ideas will Mr. Altman implement? Is Telegram a source of inspiration to him?
Stephen E Arnold, September 25, 2025
Modern Management Method and Modern Pricing Plan
September 25, 2025
Sadly I am a dinobaby and too old and stupid to use smart software to create really wonderful short blog posts.
Despite the sudden drop in quantity and quality in my newsfeed outputs, one of my team spotted a blog post titled “Slack Is Extorting Us with a $195K/Year Bill Increase.” Slack is, I believe, a unit of Salesforce. That firm is in the digital Rolodex business. Over the years, Salesforce has dabbled with software to help sales professionals focus. The effort was part of Salesforce’s attention retention push. Now Salesforce is into collaborative tools for professionals engaged in other organizational functions. The pointy end of the “force” is smart software. The leadership of Salesforce has spoken about the importance of AI and suggested that other firms’ collaboration software is not keeping up with Slack.
A forward-leaning team of deciders reaches agreement about pricing. The alpha dog is thrilled with the idea of a price hike. The beta buddies are less enthusiastic. But it is accounting job to collect on booked but unpaid revenue. The AI system called Venice produced this illustration.
The write up says:
For nearly 11 years, Hack Club – a nonprofit that provides coding education and community to teenagers worldwide – has used Slack as the tool for communication. We weren’t freeloaders. A few years ago, when Slack transitioned us from their free nonprofit plan to a $5,000/year arrangement, we happily paid. It was reasonable, and we valued the service they provided to our community.
The “attention” grabber in this blog post is this paragraph:
However, two days ago, Slack reached out to us and said that if we don’t agree to pay an extra $50k this week and $200k a year, they’ll deactivate our Slack workspace and delete all of our message history.
I think there is a hint of a threat to the Salesforce customer. I am probably incorrect. Salesforce is popular, and it is owned by a high profile outfit embracing attention and AI. Assume that the cited passage reflects how the customer understood the invoice and its 3,000 percent plus increase and the possible threat. My question is, “What type of management process is at work at Salesforce / Slack?”
Here are my thoughts. Please, remember that I am a dinobaby and generally clueless about modern management methods used to establish pricing.
- Salesforce has put pressure on Slack to improve its revenue quickly. The Slack professionals knee jerked and boosted bills to outfits likely to pay up and keep quiet. Thus, the Hack Club received a big bill. Do this enough times and you can demonstrate more revenue, even though it may be unpaid. Let the bean counters work to get the money. I wonder if this is passive resistance from Slack toward Salesforce’s leadership? Oh, of course not.
- Salesforce’s pushes for attention and AI are not pumping the big bucks Salesforce needs to avoid the negative consequences of missing financial projections. Bad things happen when this occurs.
- Salesforce / Slack are operating in a fog of unknowing. The hope for big payoffs from attention and AI are slow to materialize. The spreadsheet fever that justifies massive investments in AI is yielding to some basic financial realities: Customers are buying. Sticking AI into communications is not a home run for Slack users, and it may not be for the lucky bean counters who have to collect on the invoices for booked but unpaid revenue.
The write up states:
Anyway, we’re moving to Mattermost. This experience has taught us that owning your data is incredibly important, and if you’re a small business especially, then I’d advise you move away too.
Salesforce / Slack loses a customer and the costs associated with handling data for what appears to be a lower priority and lower value customer.
Modern management methods are logical and effective. Never has a dinobaby learned so much about today’s corporate tactics than I have from my reading about outfits like Salesforce / and Slack.
Stephen E Arnold, September 25, 2025
Can Meta Buy AI Innovation and Functioning Demos?
September 22, 2025
This essay is the work of a dumb dinobaby. No smart software required.
That “move fast and break things” has done a bang up job. Mark Zuckerberg, famed for making friends in Hawaii, demonstrated how “think and it becomes real” works in the real world. “Bad Luck for Zuckerberg: Why Meta Connect’s Live Demos Flopped” reported
two of Meta’s live demos epically failed. (A third live demo took some time but eventually worked.) During the event, CEO Mark Zuckerberg blamed it on the Wi-Fi connection.
Yep, blame the Wi-Fi. Bad Wi-Fi, not bad management or bad planning or bad prepping or bad decision making. No, it is bad Wi-Fi. Okay, I understand: A modern management method in action at Meta, Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram. Or, bad luck. No, bad Wi-Fi.
Thanks Venice.ai. You captured the baffled look on the innovator’s face when I asked Ron K., “Where did you get the idea for the hair dryer, the paper bag, and popcorn?”
Let’s think about another management decision. Navigate to the weirdly named write up “Meta Gave Millions to New AI Project Poaches, Now It Has a Problem.” That write up reports that Meta has paid some employees as much as $300 million to work on AI. The write up adds:
Such disparities appear to have unsettled longer-serving Meta staff. Employees were said to be lobbying for higher pay or transfers into the prized AI lab. One individual, despite receiving a grant worth millions, reportedly quit after concluding that newcomers were earning multiples more…
My recollection that there is some research that suggests pay is important, but other factors enter into a decision to go to work for a particular organization. I left the blue chip consulting game decades ago, but I recall my boss (Dr. William P. Sommers) explaining to me that pay and innovation are hoped for but not guaranteed. I saw that first hand when I visited the firm’s research and development unit in a rust belt city.
This outfit was cranking out innovations still able to wow people. A good example is the hot air pop corn pumper. Let that puppy produce popcorn for a group of six-year-olds at a birthday party, and I know it will attract some attention.
Here’s the point of the story. The fellow who came up with the idea for this innovation was an engineer, but not a top dog at the time. His wife organized a birthday party for a dozen six and seven year olds to celebrate their daughter’s birthday. But just as the girls arrived, the wife had to leave for a family emergency. As his wife swept out the door, she said, “Find some way to keep them entertained.”
The hapless engineer looked at the group of young girls and his daughter asked, “Daddy, will you make some popcorn?” Stress overwhelmed the pragmatic engineer. He mumbled, “Okay.” He went into the kitchen and found the popcorn. Despite his engineering degree, he did not know where the popcorn pan was. The noise from the girls rose a notch.
He poked his head from the kitchen and said, “Open your gifts. Be there in a minute.”
Adrenaline pumping, he grabbed the bag of popcorn, took a brown paper sack from the counter, and dashed into the bathroom. He poked a hole in the paper bag. He dumped in a handful of popcorn. He stuck the nozzle of the hair dryer through the hole and turned it on. Ninety seconds later, the kernels began popping.
He went into the family room and said, “Let’s make popcorn in the kitchen. He turned on the hair dryer and popped corn. The kids were enthralled. He let his daughter handle the hair dryer. The other kids scooped out the popcorn and added more kernels. Soon popcorn was every where.
The party was a success even though his wife was annoyed at the mess he and the girls made.
I asked the engineer, “Where did you get the idea to use a hair dryer and a paper bag?”
He looked at me and said, “I have no idea.”
That idea became a multi-million dollar product.
Money would not have caused the engineer to “innovate.”
Maybe Mr. Zuckerberg, once he has resolved his demo problems to think about the assumption that paying a person to innovate is an example of “just think it and it will happen” generates digital baloney?
Stephen E Arnold, September 22, 2025
Google Emits a Tiny Signal: Is It Stress or Just a Brilliant Management Move?
September 22, 2025
Sadly I am a dinobaby and too old and stupid to use smart software to create really wonderful short blog posts.
Google is chock full of technical and management wizards. Anything the firm does is a peak action. With the Google doing so many forward leaning things each day, it is possible for certain staggering insightful moments to be lost in the blitz of scintillating breakthroughs.
Tom’s Hardware spotted one sparkling decider diamond. “Google Terminates 200 AI Contractors — Ramp-Down Blamed, But Workers Claim Questions Over Pay and Job Insecurity Are the Real Reason Behind Layoffs” says:
Some believe they were let go because of complaints over working conditions and compensation.
Goes Google have a cancel culture?
The write up notes:
For the first half of 2025, AI growth was everywhere, and all the major companies were spending big to try to get ahead. Meta was offering individuals hundreds of millions to join its ranks … But while announcements of enormous industry deals continue, there’s also a lot of talk of contraction, particularly when it comes to lower-level positions like data annotation and AI response rating.
The individuals who are now free to find their future elsewhere have some ideas about why they were deleted from Google and promoted to Xooglers (former Google employees). The write up reports:
… many of them [the terminated with extreme Googliness] believe that it is their complaints over compensation that lead to them being laid off…. [Some] workers “attempted to unionize” earlier in the year to no avail. According to the report, “they [the future finders] allege that the company has retaliated against them.” … For its part, Google said in a statement that GlobalLogic is responsible for the working conditions of its employees.
See the brilliance of the management move. Google blames another outfit. Google reduces costs. Google makes it clear that grousing is not an path to the Google leadership enclave. Google AI is unscathed.
Google is A Number One in management in my opinion.
Stephen E Arnold, September 22, 2025
Who Needs Middle Managers? AI Outfits. MBAs Rejoice
September 16, 2025
No smart software involved. Just a dinobaby’s work.
I enjoy learning about new management trends. In most cases, these hip approaches to reaching a goal using people are better than old Saturday Night Live skits with John Belushi dressed as a bee. Here’s a good one if you enjoy the blindingly obvious insights of modern management thinkers.
Navigate to “Middle Managers Are Essential for AI Success.” That’s a title for you!
The write up reports without a trace of SNL snarkiness:
31% of employees say they’re actively working against their company’s AI initiatives. Middle managers can bridge the gap.
Whoa, Nellie. I thought companies were pushing forward with AI because, AI is everywhere. Microsoft Word, Google “search” (I use the term as a reminder that relevance is long gone), and from cloud providers like Salesforce.com. (Yeah, I know Salesforce is working hard to get the AI thing to go, and it is doing what big companies like to do: Cut costs by terminating humanoids.)
But the guts of the modern management method is a list (possibly assisted by AI?) The article explains without a bit of tongue in cheek élan “ways managers can turn anxious employees into AI champions.”
Here’s the list:
- Communicate the AI vision. [My observation: Isn’t that what AI is supposed to deliver? Fewer employees, no health care costs, no retirement costs, and no excess personnel because AI is so darned effective?”]
- Say, “I understand” and “Let’s talk about it.” [My observation: How long does psychological- and attitudinal-centric interactions take when there are fires to put out about an unhappy really big customer’s complaint about your firm’s product or service?]
- Explain to the employee how AI will pay off for the employee who fears AI won’t work or will cost the person his/her job? [My observation: A middle manager can definitely talk around, rationalize, and lie to make the person’s fear go away. Then the middle manager will write up the issue and forward it to HR or a superior. We don’t need a weak person on our team, right?]
- “Walk the talk.” [My observation: That’s a variant of fake it until you make it. The modern middle manager will use AI, probably realize that an AI system can output a good enough response so the “walk the talk” person can do the “walk the walk” to the parking lot to drive home after being replaced by an AI agent.]
- Give employees training and a test. [My observation: Adults love going to online training sessions and filling in the on-screen form to capture trainee responses. Get the answers wrong, and there is an automated agent pounding emails to the failing employee to report to security, turn in his/her badge, and get escorted out of the building.]
These five modern management tips or insights are LinkedIn-grade output. Who will be the first to implement these at an AI company or a firm working hard to AI-ify its operations. Millions I would wager.
Stephen E Arnold, September 16, 2025
Common Sense Returns for Coinbase Global
September 5, 2025
No AI. Just a dinobaby working the old-fashioned way.
Just a quick dino tail slap for Coinbase. I read “Coinbase Reverses Remote Policy over North Korean Hacker Threats.” The write up says:
Coinbase has reversed its remote-first policy due to North Korean hackers exploiting fake remote job applications for infiltration. The company now mandates in-person orientations and U.S. citizenship for sensitive roles. This shift highlights the crypto industry’s need to balance flexible work with robust cybersecurity.
I strongly disagree with the cyber security angle. I think it is a return (hopefully) to common sense, not the mindless pursuit of cheap technical work and lousy management methods. Sure, cyber security is at risk when an organization hires people to do work from a far off land. The easy access to voice and image synthesis tools means that some outfits are hiring people who aren’t the people the really busy, super professional human resources person thinks was hired.
The write up points out:
North Korean hackers have stolen an estimated $1.6 billion from cryptocurrency platforms in 2025 alone, as detailed in a recent analysis by Ainvest. Their methods have evolved from direct cyberattacks to more insidious social engineering, including fake job applications enhanced by deepfakes and AI-generated profiles. Coinbase’s CEO, Brian Armstrong, highlighted these concerns during an appearance on the Cheeky Pint podcast, as covered by The Verge, emphasizing how remote-first policies inadvertently create vulnerabilities.
Close but the North Korean angle is akin to Microsoft saying, “1,000 Russian hackers did this.” Baloney. My view is that the organized hacking operations blend smoothly with the North Korean government’s desire for free cash and the large Chinese criminal organizations operating money laundering operations from that garden spot, the Golden Triangle.
Stealing crypto is one thing. Coordinating attacks on organizations to exfiltrate high value information is a second thing. A third thing is to perform actions that meet the needs and business methods of large-scale money laundering, phishing, and financial scamming operations.
Looking at these events from the point of view of a single company, it is easy to see that cost reduction and low cost technical expertise motivated some managers, maybe those at Coinbase. But now that more information is penetrating the MBA fog that envelopes many organizations, common sense may become more popular. Management gurus and blue chip consulting firms are not proponents of common sense in my experience. Coinbase may have seen the light.
Stephen E Arnold, September 5, 2025
More Innovative Google Management: Hit Delete for Middle Managers
August 28, 2025
This blog post is the work of an authentic dinobaby. Sorry. No smart software can help this reptilian thinker.
I remember a teacher lecturing about the Great Chain of Being. The idea was interesting. The Big Guy at the top, then not-so-important people, and at the bottom amoebae. Google, if the information in “Google Has Eliminated 35% of Managers Overseeing Small Teams in Past Year, Exec Says,” is on the money has embraced the Great Chain of Being.
The write up says:
Google has eliminated more than one-third of its managers overseeing small teams, an executive told employees last week, as the company continues its focus on efficiencies across the organization. “Right now, we have 35% fewer managers, with fewer direct reports” than at this time a year ago, said Brian Welle, vice president of people analytics and performance ….“So a lot of fast progress there.”
Yep, efficiency. Quicker decisions. No bureaucracy.
The write up includes this statement from the person at the top of the Great Chain of Being:
Google CEO Sundar Pichai weighed in at the meeting, reiterating the need for the company “to be more efficient as we scale up so we don’t solve everything with headcount.”
Will Google continue to trim out the irrelevant parts of the Great Chain of Being? Absolutely. Why not? The company has a VEP or a Voluntary Exit Program. From Googler to Xoogler in a flash and with benefits.
Several observations:
- Google continues to work hard to cope with the costs of its infrastructure
- Google has to find ways to offset the costs of that $0.47 per employee deal for US government entities
- Google must expand its ability to extract more cash from [a] advertisers and [b] users without making life too easy for competitors like Meta and lurkers waiting for a chance to tap into the online revenue from surveillance, subscriptions, and data licensing.
Logic suggests that the Great Chain of Being will evolve, chopping out layers between the Big Guy at the top and the amoebae at the bottom. What’s in the middle? AI powered systems. Management innovation speeds forward at the ageing Google.
Fear, confusion, and chaos appear to be safely firewalled with this new approach.
Stephen E Arnold, August 28, 2025
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