







SPECIAL REPORT Last month, Alpha School invited people to follow student social media accounts "if curious about life in our high schools." I accepted their offer. What I've found shocks me. Forget the AI and ask instead: Is Alpha Schools a cult? Follow along for a summary of my findings.
SPECIAL REPORT: My So-Called Alpha School
buildcognitiveresonance.substack.comSep 8, 2026 at 10:52 AM
'Students Are Being Treated Like Guinea Pigs:' Inside an AI-Powered Private School
Leaked documents reveal the inner workings of Alpha School, which both the press and the Trump administration have applauded. The documents show Alpha School's AI is generating faulty lessons that sometimes do "more harm than good."
'Students Are Being Treated Like Guinea Pigs:' Inside an AI-Powered Private School
Leaked documents reveal the inner workings of Alpha School, which both the press and the Trump administration have applauded. The documents show Alpha School's AI is generating faulty lessons that sometimes do "more harm than good."
Dear Alpha School: I Hope You’re Right
An open letter to the founder and principal of Alpha School

Dear Alpha School: I Hope You’re Right
An open letter to the founder and principal of Alpha School

FOURTH REPORT: Former Alpha School students speak out
“A science experiment that’s been framed as a school” - “pretty much a concentration camp” - “cool the first few months and then it just becomes shit”

FOLLOW-UP REPORT: Alpha School Speaks!
Citizen journalism in action

The AI doomsday cult recruits social media influencers
I got a great pitch email for Pivot to AI last week: [Mastodon] I am Shriya, reaching out on behalf of Frame Fellowship, a 10-week residential program in San Francisco, US for creators who want to …

SPECIAL REPORT: My So-Called Alpha School
What is it like to be a student in Alpha School’s high school boot camp?

Thread by @AustenAllred: "This is a tweetstorm about things that have surprised me having started a school, coming from a non-educational background 1. Students’ brai […]"
Thread by @AustenAllred: "This is a tweetstorm about things that have surprised me having started a school, coming from a non-educational bacents’ brains are broken by our existing system. We’ve been reworked purely for extrinsic reward and forgotten […]"

Part One: How AI Chatbots Became Cult Leaders - Behind the Bastards | iHeart
<p>Over the last year or so a series of news articles have sounded warnings about AI psychosis, and now an AI-generated cult, the Spiralists. Robert sits down with Blake Wexler to answer an important question: can a chatbot become a cult leader?</p><p>See <a href='https://omnystudio.com/listener'>omnystudio.com/listener</a> for privacy information.</p>
On Merveilles
When old friends ask what I’ve been up to lately, I usually start by saying “Well, I joined a cult.” Which is a satisfying thing to utter in the moment because, objectively, it’s a more interesting answer than an asker of this mundane question has a right to expect. There is an additional layer of surprise involved for those who know me well, since I’m an inveterate non-joiner. But as a secret admirer of actual weird cults, it is on some level what I have longed to be able to say since I was audited with an actual e-meter in a Scientology tent.
EXO Labs on Twitter / X
We had to update our site to make what we're working on more clear.You can now find our Discord, we will be running a weekly community education session starting the 24th of May!https://t.co/m11qBvE2hc pic.twitter.com/GpDibkZ6JH— EXO Labs (@exolabs) May 12, 2026

(PDF) Facebook confessions: Corporate abdication and Silicon Valley dystopianism
PDF | This article investigates the public confessions of a small group of ex-Facebook employees, investors, and founders who express regret helping to... | Find, read and cite all the research you need on ResearchGate
Alex Veremeyenko on Twitter / X
MIT published a brutally honest report on what AI is doing to students.A committee of professors and students spent five months studying how AI changed learning on campus, and the findings read like a warning to every university on the planet.Study groups are disappearing.… pic.twitter.com/kSxKk4h06o— Alex Veremeyenko (@alex_verem) September 12, 2026
Facebook’s Attack on Research is Everyone's Problem
Facebook recently banned the accounts of several New York University (NYU) researchers who run Ad Observer, an accountability project that tracks paid disinformation, from its platform. This has

Doing some investigation into news data on atproto via @sill.social's appview. The most popular news orgs that don't have an account tied to their domain are: ABC, BBC, CBC. Broadcasting companies hate atproto, you heard it here first.