‘Uncanny Valley’: Iran War in the AI Era, Prediction Market Ethics, and Paramount Beats Netflix
Zoe Schiffer: Emil Michael, you should turn off your views on LinkedIn because people can see it when they look at your phone.
Brian Barrett: Yeah, that’s advice for Emil Michael if you’re listening. And then, if you listen Uncanny Valleywhat you should.
Léa Feiger: And it’s really the Trump official who is sort of waging the war against Anthropic here. He has deep ties to the tech world and is the Pentagon’s public enemy number one of anyone who tries to cross the Pentagon. So the fact that, first of all, it may not have the best operational security in the world? But secondly, being comfortable making it such a public battle is something to take into account because it’s not just a message to Anthropic in my mind. This is a message to anyone who would dare to question these policies.
Brian Barrett: I want to talk about something that is close to my heart. Have you all checked your Kalshi or Polymarket wallets recently? How are we doing?
Léa Feiger: Well, I haven’t invested in our yet Survivor winners, but soon, soon.
Brian Barrett: No, when it comes to things that are surprising but shouldn’t be anymore, prediction markets have obviously kind of taken over a lot of our lives in a lot of ways by – I mean “our” in general, not the three of us.
Léa Feiger: In fact, the three of us text every morning and say, “What did you do to Kalshi last night?”
Brian Barrett: Yeah. But it’s surprising, not surprising, that there are so many bets around the Iran war to continue this thread. Right now, one of the top bets on Polymarket is “Will the Iranian regime fall by June 30?” » Total is betting around $7 million on this market alone.
Léa Feiger: This is so upsetting, Brian.
Brian Barrett: Yeah.
Léa Feiger: It’s people’s lives. I don’t know. I understand that a lot of this has become a gamified version of itself. I understand the stock market and how we do it all, but it seems very playful to me.
Brian Barrett: Well, and in terms of people’s lives, I mean, there was a big controversy just earlier this week about how Kalshi settled a bet or resolved a deal. There was a $54 million deal on the fate of Iran’s supreme leader. I think they phrased it – Leah, correct me if I’m wrong – they phrased it like this: he will lose power.
Léa Feiger: This is exactly what happened.
Brian Barrett: And then it was blown up by a missile.
Léa Feiger: So technically out of power, but that wasn’t the bet.
Brian Barrett: Because you can’t bet, and they say, “We don’t allow you to bet on dead guys here.” » So he no longer has power, but no. So they invariably bet on people dying, just find ways around it, and then have trouble solving these markets, so that’s a problem. The fact that there was a $54 million bounty on this guy from punters, including a user called MAGAMyMan, who had won $553,000 at the opportune time. It’s scandalous. And I think whether or not it’s insider trading, it’s grotesque.
