Better Offline
Better Offline is a weekly show exploring the tech industry’s influence and manipulation of society - and interrogating the growth-at-all-costs future that tech’s elite wants to build. Combining narrative-form storytelling, one-on-one interviews and panel-based discussions, Better Offline cuts through the buzzwords and obfuscation of the tech industry, investigating and evaluating the schemes and scams of everyone from cryptocurrency scumbags to the greediest of the venture capital elite. Tech industry veteran Ed Zitron and a dynamic coterie of guests will help listeners understand the who, how and why of how tech’s most powerful players are changing the world - for better or for worse.
Episodes
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through the murky lawsuit between OpenAI’s soon-to-be-acquired hardware wing and Iyo, a company they met with multiple times that makes a similar-sounding product with a near-identical name.
Sam Altman tweets: https://x.com/sama/status/1937606794362388674
Jason Rugolo tweets: https://x.com/jasonRugolo/status/1936933761964511721
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by Steve Burke of GamersNexus to talk about NVIDIA’s approach to the media, AI pushing out real tech at Computex, and the weird world of consumer graphics.
Follow GamersNexus:
https://www.youtube.com/gamersnexus
https://gamersnexus.net/
https://bsky.app/profile/gamersnexus.bsky.social
https://x.com/GamersNexus
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cotton...
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through OpenAI’s desperate attempts to lean on Microsoft to change the terms of their agreement, and how the entire AI bubble may rest on this negotiation.
WSJ: OpenAI and Microsoft Tensions Are Reaching a Boiling Point https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/openai-and-microsoft-tensions-are-reaching-a-boiling-point-4981c44f
The Information: OpenAI Seeks New Financial Co...
Welcome to Radio Better Offline, a tech talk radio show recorded out of iHeartRadio's studio in New York city.
Ed Zitron is joined in studio by Pablo Torre of Pablo Torre Finds Out and David Roth of Defector to talk about independent media, what makes a compelling show, and what it’s like raising a turtle.
Pablo Torre Finds Out: https://www.youtube.com/@PabloTorreFindsOut
Investigating Belichick's Girlfriend...
In part three of this week's three-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how the era of the Business Idiot has led to a dramatic deceleration in innovation - and how the tech media must fight back against their ridiculous narratives to save Silicon Valley.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
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In part two of this week's three-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how Business Idiots demanded we all return to the office to hide their own lack of utility - and how this directly led to their desperation to adopt generative AI.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
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LINKS: https://www.tinyur...
In part one of this week's three-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how Business Idiots have captured our society, with middle management losers breeding out true meritocracy and value-creation in favor of symbolic growth and superficial intelligence.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
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In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through how the media is misleading you about AI job loss as a form of propaganda for OpenAI and Anthropic - and the Business Idiots behind it.
CNN - The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine - https://edition.cnn.com/2025/05/30/business/anthropic-amodei-ai-jobs-nightcap
Oxford Economics - Educated but unemployed, a rising reality for college g...
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by Carl Brown, a veteran software developer and host of The Internet of Bugs, to talk about the realities of software development, what coding LLMs can actually do, and how the media gets it wrong about software engineering at large.
https://www.youtube.com/@InternetOfBugs
New GitHub Copilot Research Finds 'Downward Pressure on Code Quality' - https://visualstudiomagazine.com/artic...
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through the awesome world of handheld gaming PCs - and why you should pick one up over a Nintendo Switch 2.
Rog Ally X: https://rog.asus.com/us/gaming-handhelds/rog-ally/rog-ally-x-2024/
Lenovo Legion Go S: https://amzn.to/4kgZCKD
MSI Claw: https://amzn.to/43PPNNG
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use c...
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by producer Sophie Lichterman to answer questions about life, technology, and Better Offline itself.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
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LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks
Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/
Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bett...
In this episode, Ed Zitron walks you through the ridiculousness of OpenAI acquiring Jony Ive’s pre-product hardware startup for $6.5bn in stock - and why it only proves how washed the company might be.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
WSJ: What Sam Altman Told OpenAI About the Secret Dev...
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by Dan Ryckert, Jeff Bakalar and Jeff Grubb, the new owners of gaming website Giant Bomb, to talk about the hopeful, independent future for games journalism - and media at large.
http://www.giantbomb.com/join
Dan Ryckert: https://bsky.app/profile/danryckert.com
Jeff Grubb: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:bdacp2cmuuyawx553cv2spdy
Jeff Bakalar: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc...
In this week's monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through the story of how writing The Man That Destroyed Google Search saved his life.
The Man That Destroyed Google Search: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-man-that-destroyed-google-search/id1730587238?i=1000653621646
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or...
Ed Zitron is joined by Karen Hao, author of the book Empire of AI, to talk about the confusing world of OpenAI and the associated mind-poison of artificial general intelligence.
Book link: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/743569/empire-of-ai-by-karen-hao/
(all the buy links are available there)
Karen’s website: https://karendhao.com/
Twitter: https://x.com/_karenhao
LinkedIn: htt...
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through World, Sam Altman’s meaningless new “World” startup that trades you cryptocurrency for a scan of your eyeballs, and how it proves something is deeply wrong with our society.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
You can also ord...
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by Steve Burke of GamersNexus to talk about how tariffs are throwing the PC gaming industry into disarray, and how the era of affordable computing is coming to an end.
GamersNexus:
The End Of Affordable Computing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1W_mSOS1Qts&t=2s&ab_channel=GamersNexus
https://www.youtube.com/gamersnexus
https://gamersnexus.net/
https://bsky.app/profi...
In this episode, Ed Zitron walks you through all the signs that the bubble is bursting, and how hysterical boosters continue to desperately keep it from doing so.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
You can also order a limited-edition Better Offline hat until 5/22/25! https://cottonbureau.com/p/CAGDW8/...
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through why better tech criticism will lead to a better tech industry - and a better society at large.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
You can also order a limited-edition Better Offline hat until 5/22/25! https://cottonbureau.com/p/CAGDW8/hat/bett...
In this episode, Ed Zitron walks you through why it’s so harmful that the media keeps taking OpenAI at its word - and responds to the most common critiques from AI boosters.
YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline and use code FREE99 for free shipping on orders of $99 or more.
You can also order a limited-edition Better Offline hat until 5/22/25! https://co...
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