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A discussion of the forthcoming book "Muskism: A Guild For The Perplexed" with its authors. Topics includes Muskism as the antidote to Musk Fatique, methods of historical research under threat of enshittification, the cultural imaginary of Elon Musk and Grok, satellite data centers, and more.
Date Recorded: April 1, 2026
Music: Redd Holt & The Heptet
Featured Guests
Quinn Slobodian is Professor of International History at Boston University and the co-author of Muskism (Harper, 2026), as well as the author of Hayek’s Bastards (Zone Books, 2025), Crack-Up Capitalism (Metropolitan, 2023), and Globalists (Harvard UP, 2018).
Ben Tarnoff is the co-author of Muskism (Harper, 2026). He is also the co-founder of Logic(s) magazine and the author of Internet For The People (Verso, 2022), The Bohemians (Penguin, 2014), and several other books about technology and finance in the United States.
Matt Seybold is Associate Professor of American Literature & Mark Twain Studies at Elmira College, as well as resident scholar at the Center For Mark Twain Studies and executive producer of The American Vandal Podcast.
Episode Bibliography
Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy (1979)
Paul Thomas Anderson, One Battle After Another (Warner Bros., 2025)
Adam Becker, More Everything Forever: AI Overlords, Space Empires, & Silicon Valley’s Crusade To Control The Fate of Humanity (Basic Books, 2025)
Nick Bostrum, Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies (Oxford UP, 2014)
Mark Carney, “Special Address” World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2026
Jordon S. Carroll, Speculative Whiteness: Science Fiction & The Alt-Right (U Minnesota P, 2024)
Gil Duran, The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism & The War On Democracy (Simon & Schuster, 2026)
Stuart Hall, “Signification, Representation, Ideology: Althusser & The Post-Structuralist Debates” Critical Studies In Mass Communication (June 1985)
Alexander Karp & Nicholas W. Zamiska, The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, & the Future of the West (Penguin, 2025)
Jill Lepore, X Man: The Elon Musk Origin Story (BBC/Pushkin, 2025)
Matt Seybold et al. “The Gilded Network” The American Vandal (March 21, 2025)
Matt Seybold et al. “The Mutational Romances of Silicon Valley Speculation” The American Vandal (June 9, 2025)
Quinn Slobodian, Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals & The Dream of A World Without Democracy (Metropolitan, 2023)
Quinn Slobodian, Hayek’s Bastards: Race, Gold, IQ, & the Capitalism of The Far Right (Zone Books, 2025)
Quinn Slobodian, Globalists: The End of Empire & The Birth of Neoliberalism (Harvard UP, 2018)
Quinn Slobodian, “Post-Neoliberalism Is The New Centrism” LPE Project (December 19, 2025)
Quinn Slobodian & Gil Duran, “You Don’t Need Democracy If You Don’t Have People: Quinn Slobodian’s Warning” The Nerd Reich Podcast (February 10, 2026)
Quinn Slobodian & Ben Tarnoff, Muskism: A Guide For The Perplexed (Harper, 2026)
Nick Srnicek, Silicon Empires: The Fight For The Future of AI (Polity, 2026)
Neil Stephenson, Snow Crash (Bantam, 1992)
Ben Tarnoff, Internet For The People: The Fight For Our Digital Future (Verso, 2022)
Ben Tarnoff, The Bohemians: Mark Twain & The San Francisco Writers Who Reinvented American Literature (Penguin, 2014)
