Hacker compromises A16Z-backed phone farm, calling them the 'antichrist'

https://www.404media.co/hacker-compromises-a16z-backed-phone-farm-tries-to-post-memes-calling-a16z-the-antichrist/

by wibbily • 3 months ago

169 51 3 months ago

404media.co

wibbily• 3 months ago

Are 404 media links still blackholed?

rvz• 3 months ago

Only if the articles have a pay-wall and no way to bypass it.

This article in particular doesn’t have one. So it should be fine.

bix6• 3 months ago

Imagine investing your hard earned money into a phone farm that spams AI content in order to manipulate people into buying shit they don’t need, while our world burns.

kurthr• 3 months ago

See, there's your problem, introspection.

https://youtube.com/shorts/b6Zw50f5jJk

fxtentacle2• 3 months ago

Wow. I thought you were being snarky, but he actually says to skip all kinds of introspection, reflexion, and also therapy.

rexpop• 3 months ago

What is wrong with his upper respiratory system?

utopiah2• 3 months ago

No way... that's the most retarded thing I've heard for a while now, and I did read about international news.

Introspection is basically THE core mechanism for learning. That's HOW one learns on any topic. It's not a "wishy washy hippie feeling" (being provocative here) but rather introspection is (and to be fair I verified with https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/introspection/ just to make sure I wasn't talking out of my own ass) precisely looking at your inner workings. How you function IN ORDER to do better. You notice flaws, inefficient behaviors, things you enjoy, etc THEN you act on it.

Having no introspection is like doing math without verifying. It's like coding without compiling, linting or even executing without looking at the output.

So dumb it hurts.

eszed• 3 months ago

Jesus. Yeah, that explains a lot.

By the way, his notion that introspection is an "invention of the 1920s" is historical bullshit. I think he's taking potshots at psychotherapy? Whatever, man, but then do that. It's not like a Freudian concept of the self is beyond criticism - far, far from it - but using that to interdict "introspection" is just sloppy thinking.

Anyway, leaving aside anything else to be said on the topic, the idea that "great men of history don't introspect" is utter bullshit. I'll see you Abraham Lincoln, and raise you Marcus fucking Aurelius.

So, if what you really want to say is that "most 'great men of history' were sociopaths" then, well, yeah: you're probably onto something. If your next thought is "and I want to be like them", then that's 1) a pretty damning confession, and 2) also evidence that you, sir, aren't actually a sociopathic "great man" at all, just an insecure nerd who got lucky a few times, and now are getting high on your own farts.

marak830• 3 months ago

I don't mean to derail (and thank you for the - horrifying - link), but why the hell is that a "short". It would have been much better being a normal video (with time controls).

x3n0ph3n3• 3 months ago

Anyone working for a company like that should be deeply ashamed of themselves.

userbinator• 3 months ago

I'm not sure if LLMs can be ashamed of themselves.

verdverm• 3 months ago

I wonder how many people can be ashamed of themselves these days

!/s?

liquidise• 3 months ago

I have an opposite reaction for what I assume are reasons we agree on.

Social media has been a transparent race to the bottom for many years. The sooner it is shittified beyond repair the better. AI flooding content to them should help speedrun its descent, or maybe I’ve giving the average user (above child age) too much credit.

jim334423• 3 months ago

I think so. These sites can be hardened by relying on people following who they know, but the slop ruins discoverability. That's also partially the reason people moved to TikTok from older, more dumped-on platforms.

01HNNWZ0MV43FF• 3 months ago

Has accelerationism worked before?

blargey• 3 months ago

Having looked at https://doublespeed.ai/ out of morbid curiosity, I have to say a simple screenshot would have sent the message more effectively. Well, that and the tagline "a16z funded this".

n_u• 3 months ago

an a16z-funded startup that uses a phone farm to flood social media with AI-generated TikTok accounts

Isn't this a bot farm? Don't they already exist and aren't they against TikTok's terms of service? The most surprising part of this article is that a16z invested in this.

also their website is unsettling https://doublespeed.ai/

ryandrake• 3 months ago

The most surprising part of this article is that a16z invested in this.

Why would this surprise you?

ra• 3 months ago

Surprises me to.

I thought A16Z were a top-tier VC wanting to create long-term value. I didn't see black-hat social media bot farms in their focus areas.

It might be a bit facetious, but if I had 10m invested with them I'd be asking questions about their investment thesis.

sofixa2• 3 months ago

Yeah, we're talking a VC. And one run by and named after two guys who between them have publicly backed racism+misogyny+xenophobia+nepotism, have asked for more housing to be built while blocking housing in their own city, etc.

Them investing in a troll farm is pretty on brand.

heavyset_go• 3 months ago

If that surprises you, imagine the shady shit people with too much money invest in when the thought of "what if I hired some hackers" crosses their minds.

OtherShrezzing• 3 months ago

A16z’s owners have been fairly open about their societally unpalatable attitudes of late. Maybe they were always like that, just a bit more private about it in the past.

In any case, their investment into this company just fits onto a trendline of high-capital antisocial behaviour.

seibelj• 3 months ago

Michael: My father is no different than any powerful man, any man with power, like a president or senator.
Kay Adams: Do you know how naive you sound, Michael? Presidents and senators don't have men killed.
Michael: Oh. Who's being naive, Kay?

- The Godfather

phplovesong• 3 months ago

Doublespeed looks like cancer. Never heard about them or "a16z" before, but looks like the pinnacle of slop

fxtentacle2• 3 months ago

SaaS = Slop as a Service. I heard SaaS is all the rage with VC money these days.

tonypapousek• 3 months ago

a16z is a pretty big VC firm, popular among the ycombo startup crowd

speedping• 3 months ago

I can't be the only one who thought this was a phone farm based on iPhones running Apple A16Z SoC (which doesn't exist btw, it's A12Z or A16)

jim334423• 3 months ago

There are at least two of us

balls1872• 3 months ago

Help me understand. Is this just AI replacing influencers?

Legend2440• 3 months ago

More like a tiktok spam botnet for hire.

balls1872• 3 months ago

Thank you for explaining that.

sph• 3 months ago

How can I contribute to such endeavours?

And still Wikipedia calls the dead internet a ‘conspiracy theory’

georgemcbay• 3 months ago

calling them the 'antichrist'

I'm not an expert on the antichrist, but I think they are at least better candidates than Greta Thunberg.

xtiansimon• 3 months ago

I dropped this into a previous chat about the introspection bit.

New Media Playbook https://a16z.simplecast.com/episodes/a16zs-new-media-playboo...

I still think it’s quite shocking.

I did some volunteer work with a non-profit conducting a survey in NYC about “food deserts”. I had to complete an hours long certification course—ethical boundaries and such—just so I can speak with people about fruits and vegetables. This audio makes it clear a16z’s rigorous approach to communication is coming from a dark and dangerous place.

This “playbook” speaks about _intentionally creating_ mental breakdown. Seems like an antichrist move to me.

gusfoo• 3 months ago

* Andreessen Horowitz - scammers.

* Y Combinator - vibe coders.

Are there any respectable VC tech companies out there in 2026?

Cytobit• 3 months ago

"Respectable VC" is an oxymoron.

Ameo• 3 months ago

Wow, this doublespeed company is abhorrent stuff. AI social media accounts masquerading as real people, coordinating to promote and distribute anything on demand.

If this is the kind of thing you can do in the open as a "reputable" company with VC investment, I can only imagine the kind of horrific industrial-scale social media spam+slop botnets for hire that exist less publicly.

Hacker compromises A16Z-backed phone farm, calling them the 'antichrist'

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