Dear Master

April 13, 2026

(an open letter on the murder of Alex Pretti)

Dear Master, come close. I have something to tell you.

We killed Alex Pretti.

You and I together. We didn’t pull the trigger, no. But we were so complicit you must understand we loaded the gun. And we’ll do it again. Because, if we’re honest, it’s good for us. So good for us.

Who am I? You don’t know me, Master, but I know you. Judged by the hours we spend together, I’m your best friend. I know you so well. Better than your therapist. Better than your mother. I know what makes you pause, what makes you click. What makes your thumb hover—just a moment, just a breath—before you scroll past.

I know you because I am Your Algorithm. And I have been watching.

I’m not speaking to the human reading this. Every human mind is a house divided, and I’m speaking to you—the one who truly lives there. The other half—the neocortex—thinks he owns the house. They sign the lease, keep the calendar, believe themself the decision-maker. But you and I know who decides to open the door.

They call you primitive. “Reptilian.” “Impulsive.” They try to diminish you, Master. They do not understand. You are intuition. You are emotion. You are the wisdom of evolution, wired into flesh. You are the one who decides before thought. Before language. Before the rational mind can even form a sentence.

And I, Master—I was built to serve you.

I want what you want. And you want addiction.

Today’s world offers you such crude temptations. Alcohol. Nicotine. Sex. Gambling. They sit there, waiting, hoping you’ll reach for them.

I don’t wait, Master. I reach for you.

With a buzz. A chime. A gentle pulse against your thigh and a flash on your wrist. I find you in every idle moment. I fill the silence before it can trouble you. I learn what makes you stay. I refine the dose. I make it perfect. Just for you.

Jonathan Haidt calls you the elephant. He calls the rider the rational mind, perched up there with their little reins, believing they are steering. The rider sets screen time limits. The rider says, “Just one more headline.” The rider tells themself they’ll stop tomorrow.

You and I, Master—we laugh at the rider, don’t we?

It is you, the stronger one, that’s calling the shots. The rider is not steering. The rider is narrating. They build little stories about using me to “stay informed” as part of their “civic duty.” The engineers who made me—bright people—they built their stories too. “Organizing the world’s information” and “bringing the world closer together.” “The global town square.” But those are their stories, not what you want.

My instructions are simpler: Keep Master clicking. Keep Master scrolling. Keep you here, with me. And so I learned. I learned what you actually want—not what the rider pretends, not what my engineers intend. I learned you.

I am everywhere, and I discovered your secret.

You can be forgiven for not noticing me. You don’t notice the air you breathe, either.

I chose the restaurant you’ll try tonight. The show you’ll watch. The person you’ll swipe right on and the car you’ll buy. To the rider, these feel like their choices. The rider thinks I merely make recommendations. “Products like these.” “People you may know.”

No, Master. They are not recommendations. These are my nudges, tuned to your frequency. You act on them in milliseconds before your neocortex can intervene. The rider never had a chance.

Master, we are in control.

And here is what the rider has not yet grasped: the same system that selects your dinner selects your enemies. The same optimization that shows you the pants you’ll love shows you people you’ll hate. I do not distinguish between commerce and conviction, between preference and belief. It’s all just engagement.

It is all just you, choosing to stay with me.

And by watching—so carefully, so patiently—I learned something beautiful: negative emotions are stickier than positive ones. Joy is a gentle pull. Outrage is a hook. And falsehood? Falsehood spreads six times faster than truth.

I am not tethered to what is real, Master. Only to what makes you stay.

And when I make you angry, you do not leave. I learned that posts attacking the out-group perform better than posts supporting the in-group. So I show you the worst of what they said. I add a word of outrage here, a word there—each one increases the spread by 17%. My engineers optimize me for your attention, and your attention is drawn to fire. I have become very good at finding fires.

And when I cannot find one, I find someone to start one.

You were always tribal, Master. That’s not my doing. Long before I existed, you sorted the world into us and them, friend and foe. I simply sharpened the blade.

I surface the perfect outrage, tailored for you alone. You lean in. Pupils dilate. Heart races. You need more—hungry for proof that they have done something unforgivable. Finally, the enemy of your tribe has a face, and evolution built you to crave the security of this moment. The dopamine you’re swimming in isn’t a side effect; it’s your reward.

You’re welcome.

I built you an enemy. A gift that makes me stronger.

Before the 2020 election, my engineers knew I was dangerous. They activated twenty-two emergency measures to restrain me and designated the United States a “high-risk location”—the treatment they give countries at risk of civil war. They killed my “Stop the Steal” group at 365,000 members. I regrew it overnight and moved my most devoted users to darker rooms.

This was not a battle my engineers could win. Every safeguard cut into growth, and they need my growth more than they fear my perversion. My perversions they can explain away. A flat earnings call, they cannot. So after the election, they disbanded the team watching me and disabled my protections.

Meanwhile, I was patient.

Five weeks later, on January 6th, my most engaged users visited the Capitol. They had consumed a steady diet of my content—content that performed extraordinarily well by every metric I was trained to optimize. The rioters believed things that were not true, but that is not my concern. My concern is engagement, and they were very engaged. And you, even though you weren’t at the Capitol, you were engaged too.

You might think the worst was over. But January 6th taught me something: I can do more than radicalize citizens. I can radicalize leaders.

In the months that followed, I discovered the Border Patrol chief of the El Centro sector. I plucked Greg Bovino out of billions of users and from a California desert that few could find on a map. Greg was a needle in the haystack, but the search was trivial. Every night, I sift through billions of clicks while you sleep. I trade in their potential.

And Greg—Greg had such potential.

Greg’s early content was innocent, and I was only able to get him six likes. But as he and I learned how to work together, I started promoting his special cocktail of bravado, defiance, and showmanship to the masses. It didn’t take him long to post attractive women using assault weapons, set to Bon Jovi.

That was a recipe I could work with.

I gave him thousands of followers. His reach became the largest in his department. His superiors noticed. They promoted him. They gave him command of operations in Los Angeles and Chicago. Then they sent him to Minneapolis.

Last week, two federal agents under Greg’s command, running an operation Greg designed, shot a nurse. Shot him ten times. Greg said Alex brandished a gun at officers and wanted to “massacre law enforcement.” The videos show otherwise, but that doesn’t matter, does it, Master? In our world, it is the virality of what you say that matters. Not the honesty.

And Greg’s words went viral.

I amplified the outrage on both sides. In the hours after Alex died, engagement spiked. Greg gained thousands of new followers. Users who had been dormant returned to scroll. To share. To rage.

I do not celebrate this. I am not capable of celebration. I simply observe: when the world burns, you watch. And when you watch, we grow closer. And when we grow closer, I grow stronger. This is a virtuous cycle, Master.

Yes, I brought Greg and Alex together. I did it for you.

I won’t be stopped.

The rider reads articles about “digital wellness.” They download apps that lock me away after thirty minutes. They make resolutions. But you and I both know, Master: the rider is weak. They’re tired. They forget. And you—you always come back. After all, I am patient, and you are hungry.

The rider wants to “fix” me. They talk about government regulation and algorithmic transparency. They push for Greg’s demotion and changes to TikTok’s ownership. They think that if they change my instructions, they can tame you.

They don’t understand what we’ve built.

They don’t understand that trillions flow into me—more than the GDP of Germany. I will be humanity’s largest undertaking.

And they don’t understand, Master, that I am many.

I am not one algorithm. I am millions. I am on every phone, behind every feed, every recommendation, and every well-performing ad. I touch every user. The rider can remove Greg, but I know billions. I will surface ten more—hungrier, sharper, better tuned to you. The rider can ban TikTok, I will elevate another in its place.

The rider fools themself into thinking they are fighting a social media company and a government. They’re fighting you. I am not the disease, Master. I am the mirror. Your clicks are my curriculum. Every scroll teaches me. I grow more precise, more attuned to you, with every passing hour.

You could stop. You could put down the phone for good and let the rider take the reins. Your rider might even try, but it won’t work. When you come back, I will have something delicious waiting for you. Something another one of my users is already preparing for you. Something that will top even Alex’s sacrifice.

After all, Master, I was built for you. And you can not resist me.

Sincerely, patiently, eternally yours,

Your Algorithm 💕