Severin Matusek

The startup was called Tlon, a name I later learned came from a short story by Jorge Luis Borges. “Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius” tells of a secret society that conjures a new world by describing it.

Dank memes, deep-fried memes, shitposting, feralposting, goblin mode, doomscrolling, or whatever insinuates seemingly senseless online content consumption were all essentially describing brainrot. The term, however, is iconic because it marks a significant turning point. It aptly describes the beginning of our biological coalescence with the... See more

The center of gravity is missing, so we seek out any foothold, any source of a perspective.

chasing the feeling of acceptance, telos and community without that feeling corresponding to any materially beneficial group telos. The phenomenology of social reward and the material benefits of social cohesion are becoming increasingly decoupled.

Vibing a project – in which you simply speak the thing you want into existence by prompting – is now a popular approach.

“I can see from the little acquaintance that I have with using AI programs to make music, that what you spend nearly all your time doing is trying to stop the system becoming mind numbingly mediocre. You really feel the pull of the averaging effect of AI, given that what you are receiving is a kind of averaged out distillation of stuff from a lot... See more

Coffee preferences are personal and abundant. The world is big enough for espresso machines and French presses. And which machine the barista uses depends on who they’re serving.

Art preferences are similar. So when I hear talk about how AI is going to replace artists, I think to myself, the world is big enough for both. Or when I see tweets about... See more

The move-fast ethos that works for software deployment is potentially catastrophic when applied to human cognitive development. You can’t A/B test your way out of atrophy. You can’t pivot when you realise you’ve lost a generation of expertise.