Read Max

Latest Episodes:

Talking Zohran and Kalshi with John Ganz and Jay Kang Nov 06, 2025

Show notes

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit maxread.substack.com

Greetings from Read Max HQ! Every other Wednesday at 2 p.m., John Ganz (author of The Year the Clock Broke and proprietor of the Unpopular Front Substack) and I host a Substack Live chat about politics, tech, culture, and the pieces we’ve been working on. Paying subscribers can access the archive of these chats as video and podcast audio.

This week, we w…

The Silicon Valley-Trump bet Sep 10, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! This week’s newsletter is a video-slash-podcast-slash-Substack Live with my friend John Ganz. Among the topics discussed:

* The Epstein birthday book and the unbelievably creepy tone of the messages

* The “tech summit” between Silicon Valley executives and the Trump administration last week

* The “A.I. Bubble”: What it is, whether it might be bursting

* Why A.I. slop is bad for the soul and not art

* Why old Sony electronics from when we were adolescents are good for the soul in the same way that art is

You can watch above, or listen to the audio version on any of your favorite podcast platforms.

A reminder: Read Max is a reader-funded endeavor. Practically speaking, what that means is that producing Read Max newsletters and associated audiovisual products is my job, and in order to do my job well, I need to make money from it, so that I can exchange it for essential goods and services such as food and housing and vintage Sony electronics. If you like the job I do--if you find my writing (and recording) enlightening or entertaining, or even if it just helps you numbly pass the time such that you can put off the anxiety that accompanies awareness of mortality--please consider becoming a paying subscriber, for the bargain price of $5, or about a beer a month.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

Steelmanning Peter Thiel Jul 02, 2025

Show notes

My friend John Ganz and I reformed our intermittent podcast this week to talk about New York Times columnist Ross Douthat’s interview with PayPal founder Peter Thiel. Among the topics covered:

* Why Thiel is obsessed with Greta Thunberg, who he seems to think is the Antichrist;

* What “steelmanning” is, and why it’s damaged Thiel’s ability to answer questions from even friendly interviews;

* The Zohran Mamdani campaign as anti-Thiel politics.

You can listen to the podcast here, or on whatever platforms you get your podcasts from.

A reminder! Read Max, whether in text or audio form, is the product of an extensive amount of work--research, reporting, deliberation, writing, editing, recording, staring at the wall, etc. Nearly all of my compensation for that work comes from paying subscribers, whose generosity represents about 90 percent of my total income. If you find Read Max rewarding to you at all: If it makes you laugh, smile, think, sigh, whatever: Please consider upgrading your subscription. Not only will you help ensure its continued existence, you’ll also get access to a second, paywalled newsletter every week featuring recommendations for books, movies, and music that you might not otherwise know about.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

Two deeply upsetting photographs Jun 04, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! Today’s post is a Read Max audiovisual product featuring cohost Sam Biddle, senior technology reporter at The Intercept.

A quick interstitial reminder: Read Max is a subscription business! In order to devote the time I do every week to reading, writing, reporting, thinking, procrastinating, and all other activities essential to the production of this twice-and-sometimes-thrice-weekly newsletter, I need to “convert” readers into “paid subscribers,” a task I attempt to accomplish with these touts. If you find what I do valuable to you--if you think you learn something, or are entertained, or get mad in a productive way--please consider compensating me for that value for the unbelievably low price of $5 a month. Think of it like buying me a beer once a month in exchange for something like 20,000 almost entirely properly spelled and punctuated words of insight, argument, criticism, good sci-fi recommendations, and sometimes even humor.

Yesterday Sam and I “went live” to talk about a set of new stories on tech’s ever-increasing ties to the defense industry:

* A recent white paper from OpenAI outlining the company’s vision of A.I.’s geopolitical future, about which Sam wrote more here;

* Mark Zuckerberg and Palmer Luckey burying the hatchet and partnering on a V.R. headset for the military; and

* Palantir's controversial new role counting human beings for the U.S. government.

What do these partnerships tell us about the present and future of the tech industry, A.I., and geopolitics?

Also up for discussion: What’s going on at Apple? And two distinctly unsettling photographs, the first of Luckey and Zuckerberg breaking bread…

…and the second, a sort of wedding-announcement pic of former Apple designer Jony Ive and OpenAI C.E.O. Sam Altman:

Please enjoy, here on Substack, or, without video, on any of your preferred podcast platforms!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

Escape from Slopworld Apr 22, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! On Tuesday afternoon John Ganz of Unpopular Front joined me for an experimental “Substack Live” with only two brief interruptions (one when I fat-fingered an end to the stream and two when John’s internet cut out). Our chat started with a discussion of two expansive essays on the modern internet coincidentally published this weekend: Ross Douthat’s “An Age of Extinction Is Coming. Here’s How to Survive,” in The New York Times, and Jacob Silverman’s “Welcome to slop world: how the hostile internet is driving us crazy,” in the Financial Times. But, as is often the case, we also ended up talking about many other things, among them the imaginary of the tariffs, Parental Advisory stickers, a Canadian guy on Instagram who claims to have re-grown his foreskin, and much more. Check out the full video (stitched together) above, or listen to the audio on the podcast platform of your choice.

A reminder, as always! Read Max exists thanks to generosity of paying subscribers, whose support lets me devote a full-time job’s worth of hours to all the research, reporting, thinking, and procrastinating necessary to put the newsletter together week in and week out. Paying subscribers not only receive an extra paywalled newsletter of (unbelievably good) recommendations of books, movies, links, and music, but also help subsidize the free stuff for the freeloaders, which is the kind of thing that gets you into heaven and further along on the karmic wheel. If you feel like you get roughly one beer’s worth of entertainment, information, distraction, or other kind of satisfaction from Read Max, please consider paying to subscribe.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

Which Houthi P.C. Small Group Member are you? Mar 27, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! We’re back with another episode of [Untitled Read Max Audio Property]. This week, The Intercept’s Sam Biddle and Read Max’s Max Read discuss:

* The hottest group chat in the galaxy: “Houthi PC small group.” What is the worst thing about this chat? What were the discussions with The Atlantic’s lawyers like? Is Sam more of a Michael Waltz or a J.D. Vance?

* The “Abundance Agenda”: What distinguishes the program articulated in Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s new book from the techno-optimism of Marc Andreessen? What can we salvage from the idea of “abundance”? Which was the best arcology in Sim City 2000?

A brief reminder: This podcast and the associated newsletter are 99.99 percent funded by the generous support of paying Read Max subscribers. If you’re enjoying the audio or textual products offered by Read Max, please consider upgrading to subscribe. For the price of roughly one beer a month, you’ll get access to the weekly paywalled “Recommendations” newsletter, plus the smug satisfaction of knowing you’re subsidizing the freeloaders who are increasing their I.Q. weekly by consuming Read Max.

Articles discussed in the podcast

* “The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans,” Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic

* “Am I the J.D. Vance of My Group Chat?,” Katie Notopoulos, Business Insider

* “The Abundance Agenda: A Review,” Matt Breunig, People’s Policy Project

* “The Abundance Doctrine,” Mike Konczal, Democracy

* “I Want to Believe in Abundance,” Joe Weisenthal, Bloomberg

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

What if "A.I." is just more surveillance? Mar 20, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! Today, the first in what I hope will be a regular series with my old friend Sam Biddle, senior technology reporter at the Intercept and a former writer for Gawker and Valleywag, in which we discuss tech-industry news and b******t that otherwise wouldn’t make it into the newsletter. In this episode we’re talking:

* A.G.I., A.I., and why we hate the term;

* Sarah Wynn-Williams’ new book on Facebook and Facebook’s bizarre reaction to it; and

* our favorite files from the J.F.K. release

(Longtime subscribers will remember Sam as the author of the guest post “True Life: For reasons I don't fully understand I bought hundreds of Cold War-era military slides on eBay” and the source of the legendary post “Why is this cyber-education nonprofit selling a $13,000 occult artifact on eBay?”)

Links to some of what we discuss in this podcast:

* “The Government Knows A.G.I. Is Coming,” by Ezra Klein

* “Powerful A.I. Is Coming. We’re Not Ready,” by Kevin Roose

* “Should A.G.I. preppers embrace D.O.G.E.?” by Henry Farrell

* “People Are Using AI to Create Influencers With Down Syndrome Who Sell Nudes,” by Emanuel Maiberg

* The Cut’s “Book Gossip” newsletter on Careless People

* “CIA, Walter Elder ‘Family Jewels’ memorandum for William E. Colby, ‘Special Activities,’ Secret/Sensitive/Eyes Only, June 1, 1973, 7 pp.”

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

The Silicon Valley canon and malformed publics Feb 27, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! This week’s newsletter is a podcast episode with John Ganz of Unpopular Front and Henry Farrell of Programmable Mutter. We talk about Henry’s recent Bloomberg article about “the tech industry’s reading list” and whether or not my four-year-old will ever encounter a Tootsie Roll pop advertisement, or indeed any advertising campaign at all.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

What the hell is going on with Elon Musk? Jan 24, 2025

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! A bonus newsletter this week containing a podcast with John Ganz of Unpopular Front and Quinn Slobodian, Professor of International History at Boston University and author of the forthcoming Hayek’s B******s: Race, Gold, IQ, and the Capitalism of the Far Right. Among the topics discussed: Elon Musk, Donald Trump, Mark Zuckerberg, cryptocurrency, Las Vegas, and Jensen Huang’s leather jacket.

A reminder: Read Max is funded almost wholly by paying subscribers. I’m able to spend reading, thinking, researching, and yapping with John and Quinn thanks to the generosity of people who find this newsletter and its intermittent podcast component compelling enough to cough up $5/month or $50/year. If you find Read Max at all enlightening or entertaining--if you borrow some of these riffs and opinions to impress potential employers or romantic/sexual partners, say--please consider supporting my work for the price of about one beer a month.

Links

* Quinn’s piece on Musk can be found here.

* His book Hayek’s B******s: Race, Gold, IQ, and the Capitalism of the Far Right can be preordered here.

* I also recommend his previous books, Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism, and Crack-Up Capitalism: Market Radicals and the Dream of a World Without Democracy.

* John’s newsletter Unpopular Front.

* John’s book When the Clock Broke: Con Men, Conspiracists, and How America Cracked Up in the Early 1990s, recently nominated for a National Book Critics Circle award, can be found here.

* Ryan S. Jeffery’s piece on Jensen Huang and leather, discussed in the podcast, is at Do Not Research.

**Note that if you buy or pre-order any books through the Bookshop links found on this page I will receive a small payment.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

Elon Musk and our other new DOGE overlords Dec 20, 2024

Show notes

Greetings from Read Max HQ! Today, to round out December before our annual year-end post, a podcast with John Ganz on the ascension of Elon Musk to shadow-president-via-shitposting.

On this episode we talk about the following books:

* Rated Agency: Investee Politics in a Speculative Age by Michael Feher (this is the one whose title we couldn’t remember)

* Speculative Communities: Living with Uncertainty in a Financialized World by Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou

* Immediacy: Or, the Style of Too Late Capitalism by Anna Kornbluh

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit maxread.substack.com

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