Grok Release, Alex Jones Returns, Ivy League Presidents, Elon & Disney

The People's News for the People's Coin 12/6-12/12

CryptoDogDivine

and

It's ALL Risky

Dec 13, 2023

Hey everyone,

This news digest covers the following stories from last week:

1. Grok’s Release

2. Alex Jones’s return to 𝕏

3. Ivy League Presidents and Anti-Semitism

4. Elon’s War on Disney

5. Top Videos

Don’t miss memes and news bites at the end!

Thank you for reading The People’s News for the People’s Coin, 𝕏’s first open-source newspaper.

Are you hearing about Elon Musk a lot these days?

My 𝕏 subscribers and I are reading Walter Isaacson's new biography about Elon Musk to demystify the man behind the Mars mission.

Subscribe via my profile to join our Group Read!

Grok

Thursday, Grok AI chatbot rolled out 𝕏 Premium users.

Throughout its testing phase of the past few weeks, Grok gained a reputation for its “fun mode” and willingness to give vulgar answers.

Grok’s persona is modeled on Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, a novel which Elon credits with helping him resolve an existential crisis. Grok’s name derives from another sci-fi novel, Robert Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land.

Throughout the week, screenshots of Grok’s answers flooded feeds on 𝕏. Early results made it clear that Grok does not shy away from controversy.

Grok is distinguished among AI chatbots for having live access to 𝕏’s data. One of its cooler features is that it cites posts used to draw its conclusions.

The goal of Grok is to create an AI that seeks truth above political correctness. By comparison, ChatGPT refuses to answer questions or praise public figures deemed out of bounds by woke politics.

On Friday, one political compass test found that Grok is actually farther left than ChatGPT. Elon said X.ai planned to address the issue while disputing the test’s validity.

For Premium users, access to Grok is now built directly into 𝕏’s app and web interface. The cost of 𝕏 Premium+ is $16/month, undercutting ChatGPT’s $20 monthly fee for access to its GPT4 model.

Grok is expected to evolve rapidly alongside 𝕏: last week Elon teased a button that summons Grok to interpret any post on the platform. No other social media site features inbuilt AI, putting 𝕏 in a class of its own.

Grok isn’t the only area where Elon’s AI ventures are blazing a new trail. Last night, Tesla released a stunning new video of its Optimus robot. Optimus has been making breakneck progress and can now dance!

Have you tried Grok yet? Do you plan to? Are you excited for Grok consciousness hosted in an Optimus robot?

Alex Jones Returns to 𝕏

Alex Jones’s suspension from 𝕏 has been lifted.

The sequence of events that led to Jones’s reinstatement started last Tuesday, when Tucker Carlson teased an interview with Jones by releasing a short video showing Jones predicting 9/11 several months before it happened.

The possibility of Jones returning to the platform instantly became a hot topic.

In the buildup to the interview’s release, Elon acknowledged the clamor to let Jones back on the platform, and proposed running a poll.

On Wednesday, the 90-minute interview dropped. Tucker introduced Jones by highlighting instances where he accurately forecasted major historical events months ahead of their occurrence, including 9/11, the Iraq war, and the Ukraine war.

A Friday poll of 58k 𝕏 users had 92% of respondents calling for Jones’s return.

That was enough for Elon to launch his own poll on Saturday morning. He explained his thinking about Jones’s suspension in terms of the First Amendment.

The poll went live around noon on Saturday, and Jones jumped out to an early lead. Just before midnight, the poll closed with over 70% of nearly two million respondents favoring his reinstatement.

Throughout the day, accounts hyped Jones’s impending return by posting clips of his particular brand of oratorical performance art.

Here he is comparing Justin Bieber to Magellan…

…arguing in 2002 that oligarchs were planning to open borders, release pandemics, and usher in digital currencies…

…and explaining his troubles with substance abuse and his spirituality…

Sunday afternoon, with his account restored, Jones appeared for a live discussion on Spaces.

Elon, Vivek, Andrew Tate, Jason Calacanis, Michael Flynn, Patrick Bet-David and others joined the fray.

There is no way to capture the insanity of the event, which produced several memorable moments (not least of which was Ramaswamy urinating on a hot mic).

As of yesterday morning, the live stream had been listened to 15 million times.

Jones return to the digital town square is symbolically significant.

The name Alex Jones has long been synonymous with the idea of a “conspiracy theorist.” In many ways his coordinated de-platforming by big tech in 2018 kicked off the current era of censorship.

Jones’s removal marked the beginning of a process in which social media companies normalized denying someone the right to speak for having incorrect or “dangerous” opinions. Prior his cancellation, the Internet tolerated a wide range of speech, but over the last five years, it has transformed into a collection of strictly policed walled gardens.

Importantly—and contrary to public perception—the official reason for Jones’s removal from Twitter was not that he questioned the Sandy Hook shooting, but for confronting CNN reporter Oliver Darcy outside a Congressional hearing about free speech. The point of contention was Darcy’s attempts to have Jones censored.

When Elon first bought Twitter, he announced that he would keep Jones suspended based on Jones’s Sandy Hook comments, a decision Jones said he understood. Elon’s change could be a sign he is going all-in on free speech, advertising dollars be damned.

Over the last year, Jones has been rehabilitating his image. This summer, he appeared on the PBD Podcast for a three-hour interview during which he appeared notably level-headed.

Not everyone was convinced. In the leadup to Jones’s 𝕏 reinstatement, Jason Calacanis of the All-In Podcast said Jones is “pure evil” and should not be allowed back on the platform. Calacanis later posted a Media Matters video of Jones talking about Sandy Hook.

Personally, I’ve always had a tough time vibing with Jones’s angry-guy schtick. His act seemed like the exact opposite approach required to be a emissary to the general public from the netherworld of conspiracy, which calls for an air of cool rationality.

His fulminations were a vector of attack that allowed doubters to dismiss his ideas—which are fundamentally libertarian and freedom-promoting—without actually engaging them. Jones 1.0 was fantastically succesful within his niche, but the same qualities that made him appealing to his fans limited his reach.

In short, Jones’s persona as a messenger got in the way of his message.

Somewhat ironically, a popular theory about Jones is that he is (or was) “controlled opposition”. The idea is that Jones was deliberately inserted into public discourse in order to allow more mainstream outlets to dismiss his libertarian ideas by tying them to his raving persona.

A related, zanier theory is that Jones is actually deceased comedian Bill Hicks. Jones, of course, has denied this claim.

Whoever Jones was or is, it’s hard to dismiss his track record entirely.

His thesis—global elites are planning to use a series of crises to usher in a totalitarian one-world government—has become more compelling as governments have used crises to justify abridging citizens’ rights.

It may be the case that recent events have made the public more receptive to his message than when he was banned in 2018. It’ll be interesting to watch if his persona evolves in his return to 𝕏.

Sunday’s Spaces discussion demonstrated that Elon and Jones are closely aligned on one particular issue: the battle between humanists (who think there should be more humans) and extinctionists (who think there should be less).

Yesterday, Jones posted a clip from the event of Elon arguing that people should be more optimistic about humanity’s future.

Beneath the video, Jones associate Blake Habyan posted a clip of David Rockefeller advocating for depopulation. Elon responded with a double exclamation mark, marking the first 𝕏 exchange between him and Jones.

Last night, Jones announced he was launching a new show exclusive to 𝕏, modeled on Tucker Carlson’s show, which he described as “Alex Jones 2.0.”

What do you think: Was Elon right to bring Alex Jones back? Are his ideas about one-world government more credible now the they were in 2018?

Anti-Semitism and the Ivy League

The public debate around anti-Semitism continues to evolve in unexpected directions.

Last week’s instigating event took place on Wednesday, when Presidents from Harvard, UPenn, and MIT appeared before Congress to answer questions about anti-Semitism.

Speaking under oath, the three Presidents were asked by representative Elise Stefanik if calling for genocide of Jews violates the schools’ code of conduct regarding bullying or harassment.

All of the Presidents said some variation of, “it depends on the context.” Their testimony went viral.

After the testimony, the Presidents faced pressure to resign from donor groups. On 𝕏, Billionaire hedge fund manager and Harvard alum Bill Ackman led the campaign against them.

On the All-In Podcast, David Sacks said that Jewish donors who’d previously supported woke university politics under the assumption that Jews were oppressed victims, were now realizing that Jews are classified as white oppressors.

Sacks went on to suggest that this realization is driving some Jews toward more centrist and right political views:

“[Jews] thought that, if we’re going to be defining identity groups in this woke ways, Jews obviously should be one of these victim groups. But they’re waking up to the fact that Jews are not. In the minds of woke ideology, Jews are just white people…Succesful white people with a Jewish background. And, as a result, they’re part of an oppressor class. And I think that for a lot of Jewish people who are waking up to this, they’re realizing, wait a second, this is actually a very destructive ideology, and it makes us the bad guys.”

On Saturday, UPenn President Liz McGill resigned, while Ackman continued to crank up the pressure against Harvard and MIT.

Yesterday morning, Harvard issued a statement that they would not fire President Claudine Gay, despite pressure from donors and a growing plagiarism scandal.

The episode represents an inflection point for Americans’ loss of faith in the university system.

Increasingly, colleges have abandoned meritocratic principles and embraced ideological intolerance. A recent survey found Harvard was the least tolerant college for free speech in the country.

Ironically, the universities’ attempted to defend their Presidents’ statements on the grounds of free speech.

However, because they have spent the last several decades growing more and more intolerant of any speech that contravenes woke orthodoxy, their defense rang hollow.

While the Ivy League scandal is probably a blow to this particular regime of woke censorship, it is not necessarily a victory for free speech.

The next stop in the debate is whether colleges should ratchet up protections for Jewish students with even more censorious speech codes, or return to the basic principles of free expression as articulated in the Bill of Rights.

Of course, the latter option seems more logical, but the combination of universities’ abysmal track record on free speech and the pressure exerted by the cohort of influential donors make it more likely they’ll double down on censorship. We’ll see.

While the Ivy League debacle was playing out, a parallel debate emerged about permissible speech within Congress.

It started last week, when representative Thomas Massie posted a meme critical of US foreign policy toward Israel.

Massie is the only conservative in all of Congress to oppose US foreign aid to Israel. Predictably, the meme was widely criticized.

Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer accused Massie of anti-Semitism and called on him to remove his post.

Schumer, a Democrat, was joined by conservative publication Breitbart in calling the meme anti-Semitic.

Last Tuesday, the House of Representatives passed a resolution claiming that anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism. Massie was the only conservative member of the House to vote against the resolution.

After the vote, Massie went on Tucker Carlson’s show to criticize the war in Ukraine and corruption within the beef industry.

For whatever reason, he avoided talking about Israel, but later in the week told Glenn Greenwald he believed lobbyists from Israel’s AIPAC should be required to register as foreign agents.

A third interesting development was the release of an article by independent journalist Lee Fang about “heightened coordination among pro-Israel forces in Silicon Valley and the global tech sector.”

Fang’s article used private chat logs and video calls obtained from within a U.S.-Israeli investment fund called J-Ventures. Fang argued the logs show how “a loose network of pro-Israel investors, tech executives, activists, and Israeli government officials have stepped up their efforts to combat the slightest deviations from the pro-Israel script.”

The article describes group chat called “J-Ventures Global Kibbutz Group” in which employees coordinated to get journalists fired, punish activists, and cancel protest events for expressing pro-Palestine views.

The term used to describe this cancel campaign is “hasbara”—an Israeli word describing either pro-Israel public relations or propaganda, depending on how charitably you view the cause of Zionism.

Investor and entrepreneur Paul Graham, who was target by the op, highlighted a section of Fang’s article.

While these debates were playing out, on Friday the US blocked a ceasefire resolution from the UN Security Council.

Yesterday, the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly passed a ceasefire resolution, with 153 countries in favor, 23 abstaining, and 10 against, including the US.

As the war enters its third month, it remains challenging to gauge its true impact.

The original attack by Hamas was said to have resulted in the death of a thousand Israelis. A common estimate circulating on 𝕏 was that between 16,000 and 20,000 Palestinians have been killed, and over a million displaced.

The statistics have been disputed on both sides. However, the imbalance between the two tallies has meant that, among the American public, Israel is losing the PR war, an inescapable reality that both Joe Biden acknowledged yesterday.

How public opinion on this question translates to the broader cultural issue of anti-Semitism remains to be seen. It feels like something big is changing, but it’s hard to know how until everything shakes out.

What do you think: Should the Ivy League Presidents resign? Was Massie’s meme anti-Semitic? Are American Jews moving rightward?

Elon-Disney Battle

In the aftermath of his epic “GFY heard ‘round the world”, Elon continued to voice strong criticism of Disney, repeatedly calling out its CEO Bob Eiger for hypocrisy of its ad boycott against 𝕏.

Disney and Eiger have become a target for Elon because they represent a larger movement within American corporations toward censorship and political correctness, which have been disproportionately weaponized against moderates and conservatives.

Disney’s moral stance against 𝕏 makes it an easy target because the company doesn’t appear concerned about advertising on other platforms which tolerate sexual exploitation of children.

In particular, Elon highlighted an ongoing lawsuit by the state of New Mexico accusing Facebook and Instagram of enabling child abuse and trafficking.

At one point, Elon wrote, “Bob Eiger thinks it’s cool to advertise next to child exploitation material. Real stand up guy.”

Elon’s post caused others to dig into the lawsuit, where they discovered alarming material.

Elon’s attack on Disney also touches on a larger issue: many conservatives have long had an adversarial relationship with Disney, which has been accused of hiding lewd and satanic images in kids’ films.

A related claim is that Disney-owned ABC spiked a journalistic investigation into Jeffrey’s Epstein’s relationships with other powerful people, according to former ABC news anchor Amy Robach. That claim resurfaced this week as Elon’s attacks intensified.

Other more circumstantial evidence routinely pops up on 𝕏 linking Disney to Epstein, but no documents have ever emerged to cement the connection. According to Grok, there is no conclusive evidence that Disney had any relationship with Epstein.

Still, the link is strong enough that Elon’s attacks on Disney caused “Epstein Island” to trend at the end of last week.

As Epstein Island trended, Elon highlighted a post linking Bill Gates to Epstein.

A few hours later, he clarified that no documentation exists that Gates ever visited the island. When asked, Grok acknowledged that Gates did meet with Epstein and flew on his plane.

The episode is another example of Elon’s surgical use of his platform to spotlight controversial topics, giving them legitimacy even as he corrects some of the more outlandish claims.

What do you think: Is there something weird about Disney? Should X launch a competitor?

Dogey Treats: News Bites

𝕏

Linda Yaccarino said 10 million new users signed up for 𝕏 so far in December. Elon said, “We are seeing rapid growth.”

Tucker Carlson launched his own news channel, TCN.

Elon highlighted a post predicting that AGI is 10-20 months away. In response to an article that X.ai is seeking to raise capital, Elon wrote, “We are not raising money right now.”

South Carolina divested Disney from its state pension fund under the rationale that the company abandoned its fiduciary duty by boycotting 𝕏.

Elon said bookmarks will soon have a search function added.

Texas AG Ken Paxton announced a lawsuit against the US State Department over First Amendment violations Missouri launched an investigation into Media Matters for fraud.

TikTok banned Glenn Greenwald’s System Update without explanation.

Elon wrote a post about the CIA’s MK Ultra mind-control program.

Elon’s legal team filed to undo a settlement that requires another person to approve his posts about Tesla.

Ilya Sutskever has reportedly hired a lawyer and vanished from OpenAI’s offices.

𝕏 is reported to be discussing an advertising partnership with Amazon.

US Politics

Former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy announced his retirement from the House.

Hunter Biden criticized Elon Musk for promoting misinformation. Elon wrote, Exactly what “misinformation” is he talking about? The dude made so many videos of himself doing crime that he should get an award for cinematography!”

Grok said that the US government has been caught spying on citizens without a warrant.

FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr accused the Biden administration of weaponizing government agencies against Elon, citing the FCC’s attempt to take back a grant from Starlink. Elon said, “Doesn’t make sense. Starlink is the only company actually solving rural broadband at scale! They should arguably dissolve the program and return funds to taxpayers, but definitely not send it those who aren’t getting the job done. What actually happened is that the companies that lobbied for this massive earmark (not us) thought they would win, but instead were outperformed by Starlink, so now they’re changing the rules to prevent SpaceX from competing.”

Joe Biden urged Congress to pass another Ukraine aid package and floated the idea of sending American troops to fight Russia. Senate Republicans blocked a new bill that would provide $111B to Ukraine over lack of funding for the US border.

During the 4th GOP Presidential debate, Vivek said the Deep State is our greatest enemy, that January 6th looks like an inside job, that the official narrative of 9/11 is bunk, and that the 2020 election was stolen.

RFK Jr explained his presence on Jeffrey Epstein’s private jet: “Yes, I was on #JeffreyEpstein’s plane twice, in the early 90s. Each time with my wife and kids. Neither time to his infamous island. All Epstein & Maxwell flight logs and client lists should be released. I’m not hiding anything, but they are! #EpsteinClientList”

Elon highlighted an episode by Tucker Carlson about US Youtuber/journalist Gonzalo Lira, who is being held without trial in Ukraine. Elon called on Joe Biden to address the situation, and his post was community noted. Elon responded to the note: “Interesting. This Note is being gamed by state actors. Will be helpful in figuring who they are. Thanks for jumping in the honey pot, guys lmao!” David Sacks said, “Community Notes is generally an excellent system, but the Ukrainian info war op figured out how to game it awhile ago.”

Dave Stockman explains how the American middle class has been destroyed: “the U.S. economy desperately needs far less speculation on Wall Street and far more productive investment on Main Street—when, in fact, the opposite has been happening during the past two decades.”

O’Keefe Media Group shared internal video of IBM’s CEO admitting to firing people who would not discriminate in hiring practices.

Donald Trump released another NFT project, this one based on his mugshot.

Global Financial System

Vladimir Putin said, “The Western financial system is clearly becoming obsolete from a technological perspective. It has remained so complacent for so long and has become used to its monopoly and exceptionalist nature and that there were no alternatives that it has grown used to keeping everything as it is. This made it obsolete, or at least it is about to become archaic and obsolete…What we want is to create a new model, a truly democratic model where honest competition between all economic players will dominate. This change in the global economic landscape and the rise of new leaders are an objective and to a large degree predictable process.” Russian minister Sergey Lavrov declared the end of 500 years of Western hegemony.

Turkish President Erdogan said, “A just world is actually possible - but not with America."

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said the government should shut down crypto. Elizabeth Warren introduced a bill to crack down on crypto. The bill would extend the Bank Secrecy Act to crypto software by requiring wallet providers, miners, and validators to include Know Your Customer checks in their software.

Robinhood launched crypto trading in the EU.

Israle-Palestine

Bernie Sanders said US aid to Israel should be condition on progress toward a two-state solution. Vladimir Putin called for a Palestinian state.

The narrative that Israel had some level of foreknowledge about 10/7 persisted.

The US vetoed a UN humanitarian ceasefire resolution for Israel/Palestine. The US was the lone “No”, with one country abstaining (the UK) and 13 voting “Yes.”

Health

A systemic review of studies in a BMJ journal found that mask mandates have no clear benefits and cause harm for children.

A new study asserted a correlation between cat ownership, parasitosis, and schizophrenia.

Misc

Tesla obtained permits to begin construction on its Mexico Gigafactory.

Memes of the Week

Elon’s Memes

Thank You!

Thanks for reading! Consider sending a tip or Subscribing on 𝕏 to help keep the newsletter going!

DJ2zTEdHBD3guHLfVaNBaypr6bHFG5Nwfw

Tipping is really appreciated! Thank you!!

It's ALL Risky!

Thank you, kind reader, for reading and subscribing to this newsletter. I really appreciate it!

If you haven’t already, please sign up to this email newsletter for more weekly articles like this one. Also, please share it with a friend or on twitter if you enjoyed this article.

What do you think? What was the biggest story of the week? Let me know!

Remember, Dogecoin is risky. But then again, it’s all risky!

Follow on twitter at @itsALLrisky

Send an email to itsALLrisky@gmail.com

Send a Doge tip: DJ2zTEdHBD3guHLfVaNBaypr6bHFG5Nwfw

This article was written in collaboration with @CryptoDogDivine, give them a follow!

Don't forget to subscribe to this newsletter!

Subscribed

Disclaimer: This is not financial advice and I am not a financial advisor. The article above references an opinion for entertainment purposes only and it is not investment advice. Always assume that the author of the article is actively trading and that the opinions expressed may be biased towards the author’s holdings. Do your own research and consult with a licensed financial adviser before making any investment decision. Do not treat any opinion expressed in this newsletter as a specific inducement to make a particular investment. Content, news, research, tools, and securities symbols are for educational and illustrative purposes only and do not imply a recommendation or solicitation to buy or sell a particular security or cryptocurrency or to engage in any particular investment strategy. The information provided is not warranted as to completeness or accuracy and is subject to change without notice. The projections or other information regarding the likelihood of various investment outcomes are hypothetical in nature, are not guaranteed for accuracy or completeness, do not reflect actual investment results and are not guarantees of future results. All investments involve risk, losses may exceed the principal invested, and the past performance of a security, industry, sector, market, cryptocurrency, or financial product does not guarantee future results or returns. Dogecoin is a speculative and highly volatile asset susceptible to pump-and-dump schemes.

At the time of publication, Dogecoin is around $0.09 per coin.

Risky Reads

Discussion about this post