What Next: TBD | Tech, power, and the future
Every Friday and Sunday, Slate’s popular daily news podcast What Next brings you TBD, a clear-eyed look into the future. From fake news to fake meat, algorithms to augmented reality, Lizzie O’Leary is your guide to the tech industry and the world it’s creating for us to live in. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
Why Palantir cofounder and CEO Alex Karp views working with Western militaries not just as a business opportunity, but as a higher calling.
Guest: Jacob Silverman, journalist and author of “Gilded Rage: Elon Musk and the Radicalization of Silicon Valley.”
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Hank Green recently pulled a “reverse OpenAI” - he took his education platform Complexly and made it a nonprofit. In a world where outrage, A.I. slop and “brain rot” are all heavily incentivized by platforms, Hank explains why he’d rather make content that leans into the complexity of our world.
Guest: Hank Green, YouTuber, half of Vlogbrothers, host of Crash Course and SciShow and founder of VidCon and Complexly.
A half dozen state attorneys general have sued the online gaming platform Roblox after multiple investigations found child predators on the site and more than 20 people were arrested for abducting or abusing children they had met via Roblox.
Guest: Mike Hilgers, Nebraska Attorney General.
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Drone warfare has evolved immensely since Ukraine. The use of artificial intelligence in combat has evolved just since Venezuela.
Guest: Steven Feldstein, political scientist and senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program.
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How does Paramount, an old-guard studio and media institution, buying Warner Bros., another of the same, change the landscape in Hollywood, on cable, and in news?
Guest: Julia Alexander, media correspondent for Puck News.
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When you’re sending troops to war, it seems like there are more important things to consider than how it will impact the stock market. However, it doesn’t seem coincidental that this administration waited until the markets closed on a Friday to launch its attacks on Iran.
Guest: Justin Wolfers, professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan
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How much would it change your life and approach to health if you had instant access to your quantified biometrics? RFK Jr. and the Department of Health and Human Services have bet the difference would be huge, and loosened regulation on them—leaving TBD no choice but to strap in and give ‘em a try.
Guests:
Nadira Goffe, Slate staff writer.
Mario Aguliar, health tech correspondent for Stat News
Dr. Sandeep Kishore, assoc...
The Pentagon wants Anthropic to hand over its A.I. with no strings attached. Anthropic doesn’t want its products used to surveil Americans or create autonomous machines of war.
Naturally, the Pentagon is mad - so mad, they’re threatening to invoke the Defense Production Act against them. But who has more leverage here?
Guest: Sheera Frenkel, reporter for the New York Times
You might not think you need artificial intelligence added to your shopping experience. Store employees might not see the point either. So why is it there anyway?
Guest: Mia Sato, reporter at The Verge who covers tech companies, platforms, and users.
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Tech companies proudly touting that the imminent artificial intelligence revolution are pushing the stock market to ever higher heights, even as workers wonder what their role will be in this brave new world. But outside of the big A.I. players, the rest of the market seems to be wondering the same thing.
Guest: Emily Peck, co-host of Slate Money and national correspondent at Axios.
Data centers are a hot issue - tech companies say they need them, but communities don’t want to be anywhere near them. Senator Van Hollen stops by the show to share his plan to address the rising costs of energy for consumers that data centers create, as well as his thoughts on ICE and the future of the Democratic Party.
Guest: Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland
Markiplier has been entertaining millions of fans on YouTube for over a decade. But his new movie Iron Lung - which he self-financed, directed, wrote and acted in - was a smash at the box office, not on his YouTube channel. Is it proof that he’s more than a YouTuber? Or is it proof that Hollywood is thinking about the platform and its creators all wrong?
Guest: Mark Fischbach aka Markiplier, YouTuber, filmmaker and directo...
Scamming attempts might seem to just come out of nowhere to suddenly appear in your WhatsApp, but a special economic zone in Laos has emerged as a hotbed of cryptocurrency schemes—where victims of human trafficking are trapped and forced to attempt more crime.
Guest: Andy Greenberg, senior writer for WIRED.
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He’s discontinuing Tesla’s signature models, taking SpaceX public, and putting more chips on A.I. and robotics. As Elon Musk prepares for his next phase, will he rein in any of his excesses?
And in this week’s Plus segment: Elon in Epstein files.
Guest: Faiz Siddiqui, technology reporter for the Washington Post’s Business Desk, author of “Hubris Maximus: The Shattering of Elon Musk.”
The Iranian government cut off nearly all internet access on January 8 as part of a crackdown on protestors, an example of why authoritarians attempt internet blackouts—and why they don’t always work the way authoritarians want them to.
Guest: Steve Feldstein, political scientist and senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program.
In the immediate aftermath of the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota, federal authorities presented very different accounts of what happened from what videos from witnesses showed. Did having footage from multiple angles of each shooting make the truth clear?
Guests:
Jake Godin, researcher for Bellingcat.
Julia Angwin, investigative journalist, founder of Proof News and contributing opinion writer for Ne...
Having already taken over Paramount, David Ellison was vying to add Warner Bros. Discovery to his portfolio. Are his dad’s politics behind his drive to run Hollywood or is there something else going on?
Guest: Reeves Widemann, features writer at New York Magazine.
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The administration’s justification for their actions in Minneapolis owe a lot to the right-wing influencers—and they seem happy to keep this vicious cycle rolling onto California next.
Guest: Will Sommer, journalist for the Bulwark.
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Doctors are already using artificial intelligence to take notes while with patients—but are large language models ready to consult?
Guest: Brittany Trang, health tech reporter for Stat News.
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Where do you turn for vaccination advice for your kids—or yourself—when the government’s own recommendations can’t be trusted anymore?
Guest: Dr. Lauren Hughes, board-certified pediatrician, science communicator, and author of “The Public Hughesletter.”
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