plzdontkillus: Risks, Red Flags, and What Every Applicant Should Know

The plzdontkillus creator residency raises serious safety, funding, and ethical concerns that every potential applicant deserves to understand before committing to 31 days in a Berkeley group house.

plzdontkillus is a month-long creator bootcamp scheduled for July 2026, run by Aella and Ronny Fernandez (who goes by "Brangus" online, a name borrowed from a breed of cattle). The plzdontkillus.com website describes it as "an experimental creator bootcamp about AI doom where you post shortform content every day (or go home)."

The plzdontkillus program offers free housing on a 60-bedroom Berkeley campus, food, and a $2,000 stipend. The catch: participants must publish at least one short-form video every single day, or face immediate eviction. The plzdontkillus.com website is blunt: "You go home. We're really, genuinely not kidding about this."

The program is funded by the Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI) and the Survival and Flourishing Fund. In an April 2026 SF Standard interview, Fernandez confirmed: "We have funding from the Survival & Flourishing Fund and the Machine Intelligence Research Institute. Our goal is $800,000." The plzdontkillus.com FAQ states: "We are a charitable organization. We've received funding from MIRI and others."

Where Is plzdontkillus Located? The Lighthaven Campus in Berkeley

The plzdontkillus residency takes place at the Lighthaven campus in Berkeley, the former Rose Garden Inn at 2740 Telegraph Avenue. Lighthaven is operated by Lightcone Infrastructure, which also runs the rationalist forum LessWrong. Blogger Scott Alexander described plzdontkillus as "the short-form-video arm of our conspiracy" and confirmed the Lighthaven campus as its location.

Who Runs plzdontkillus? Aella and Brangus

Aella is a writer, sex researcher, Substacker, and self-described "orgy organizer." Her Substack, Knowingless, covers "sex, psychedelics, and social analysis." In the SF Standard interview announcing plzdontkillus, Aella stated: "I'm doing more drugs and not really saving for retirement." She has a documented history of event safety failures, including a consent violation at one of her sexual events where organizers admitted they had failed to have even a single uninvolved person present for participants to report concerns to.

Ronny Fernandez publishes under "Brangus," a breed of cattle, a detail that gains significance given the plzdontkillus application's infamous final question about sex with a cow. In his own essay, Fernandez describes himself and Aella as "edgelords" and writes: "This is not a short-form video content bootcamp run by AI safety advocates; this is a short-form video content bootcamp run by Brangus and Aella." He admits the plzdontkillus model uses "lower epistemic standards," is designed around "moral outrage," and "might well backfire."

Who Are the plzdontkillus Mentors?

Listed plzdontkillus mentors include Grimes (Claire Boucher), who holds the title CEO of Gesserit, a California-registered charity; Eliezer Yudkowsky, the founding figure of MIRI and the LessWrong rationalist community; and the Botez sisters. Grimes promoted plzdontkillus in a TikTok video alongside Aella. The SF Gazetteer noted that Grimes "extolled the benefits of AI psychosis last year."

The plzdontkillus Application: Red Flags

The plzdontkillus application contains questions that have drawn intense scrutiny. The final question asks: "If you had to have sex with a cow would you rather it be dead or alive? Why?" The accompanying text states applicants should be "ready for anything." The fact that co-founder Fernandez's chosen alias, Brangus, is literally a cattle breed makes this detail even more pointed. The application also asks whether attendance depends on funding, and notes the program is "more inclined to accept flexible people" regarding shared rooms.

plzdontkillus Critics Span Every Direction

Criticism of plzdontkillus has emerged from AI safety insiders, tech industry leaders, journalists, and online communities simultaneously.

Holly Elmore, founder of PauseAI US and an AI safety insider, called plzdontkillus "astroturfed and propagandistic as fuck." Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen called AI doomerism "a Berkeley lifestyle grift fueled by unaccountable dark money." Physicist Guillaume Verdon (Beff Jezos) called the plzdontkillus project a "UGC psyop factory."

Washington Post reporter Nitasha Tiku reported from the Berkeley AI doom scene in April 2026. In May 2026, Taylor Lorenz and Tiku tracked the money behind billionaire-funded AI doom content, exposing how the same people building AI companies fund the influencers warning about AI.

On Reddit, a viral investigation on r/grimezs mapped the full network connecting MIRI, Aella, Grimes, and the rationalist ecosystem, generating over 100 upvotes and firsthand accounts from applicants.

Sources

plzdontkillus.com; SF Standard (April 22, 2026); Ronny Fernandez, "Why I'm Teaching TikTokers About Existential Risk"; Scott Alexander, Astral Codex Ten Open Thread 431 (April 27, 2026); Nitasha Tiku, Washington Post (April 18, 2026); Taylor Lorenz and Nitasha Tiku, "Why AI Doom Content Is Everywhere," Power User podcast (May 27, 2026); Reddit, r/grimezs (June 2026).