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.
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In part one of this week’s four-part case against generative AI, Ed Zitron walks you through how generative AI is sold through a complete misunderstanding of the concept of labor - and myth-building by companies like NVIDIA and OpenAI. Latest Premium Newsletter: OpenAI Needs A Trillion Dollars In The Next Four Years: https://www.wheresyoured.at/openai-onetrillion/ YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline use free99 for free shipping on orders of ...
In this week’s Better Offline monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through NVIDIA and OpenAI’s nonsense deal, and how OpenAI now needs $600 billion in the next four years to survive. OpenAI and NVIDIA Announce Strategic Partnership to Deploy 10 Gigawatts of NVIDIA Systems https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/openai-and-nvidia-announce-strategic-partnership-to-deploy-10gw-of-nvidia-systems New York Times - OpenAI to Join Tech Giants in Building 5 New Data Centers in U.S. https://archive.is/vUf0t The Info...
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 astrophysicist Adam Becker to talk about his new book More Everything Forever, the BS AGI story, why Eliezer Yudkowsky should never be taken seriously, and why billionaires love LLMs. https://bsky.app/profile/adambecker.bsky.social https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/adam-becker/more-everything-forever/9781541619593/ YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE M...
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by software engineer Colt Voege to talk about how AI isn’t 10xing the productivity of software engineering, the truth about coding LLMs, and what we can actually expect AI to do for software in the future. 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. BUY A LIMITED EDITION BETTER OFFLINE CHALLENGE COIN! https://cottonbureau.com/p/XSH74N/challenge-coin/...
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 Allison Morrow of CNN, Ed Ongweso Jr. of the Tech Bubble newsletter to talk about the AI vibe shift, OpenAI’s burn rate, what will finally burst the bubble, and something called “Critterz.” Allison Morrow https://www.cnn.com/profiles/allison-morrow https://bsky.app/profile/amorrow.bsky.social Ed Ongweso Jr. https://thetechbubble.substack.com/ https://bsk...
In the final part of this week's three-part Better Offline Guide To Arguing With AI Boosters, Ed Zitron walks you through why generative AI is nothing like Amazon Web Services, how the media misled the public about ChatGPT, and why ChatGPT’s popularity does not mean it’s a mass-market product. Latest Premium Newsletter: Why Everybody Is Losing Money On Generative AI: https://www.wheresyoured.at/why-everybody-is-losing-money-on-ai/ YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau....
In part two of this week's three-part Better Offline Guide To Arguing With AI Boosters, Ed Zitron walks you through why the AI bubble is nothing like the dot-com bubble, how the cost of inference is actually going up, and why OpenAI’s massive burnrate is nothing like Uber’s. Latest Premium Newsletter: Why Everybody Is Losing Money On Generative AI: https://www.wheresyoured.at/why-everybody-is-losing-money-on-ai/ YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-o...
In part one of this week's three-part Better Offline Guide To Arguing With AI Boosters, Ed Zitron walks you through why AI is nothing like the early days of the internet, why it isn’t the early days of the AI industry, and why every booster argues in the future tense. Latest Premium Newsletter: Why Everybody Is Losing Money On Generative AI: https://www.wheresyoured.at/why-everybody-is-losing-money-on-ai/ YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go to https://cottonbureau.com/people/better-offline ...
In this week’s Better Offline monologue, Ed walks you through how tech and business skepticism has begun to go mainstream, and how it can be the force to push back against the Rot Economy. Ed On CNN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGVKZQQSJkg&t=2s Ed On BBC (July): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AxrpXF7MWw&t=1s Ed On BBC (August): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CI9cjWDpmSY Ed On Bloomberg’s Everybody’s Business Podcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2F4heaeJIE Ed On Newcomer Podca...
In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by Steve Burke of GamersNexus to talk about the black market for AI GPUs in China - and how Bloomberg suspiciously forced YouTube to take his video down. Premium Newsletter: AI Bubble 2027 - https://www.wheresyoured.at/ai-bubble-2027 GamersNexus: Our Channel Could Be Deleted (GamersNexus) https://youtu.be/tUnRWh4xOCY?si=AD2hyE6z5-ZiyInW Mirror of NVIDIA AI GPU Black Market Story - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyWelvEP_CQ https://www.youtube.com/gamersnexus...
In this week’s Better Offline monologue, Ed considers what would happen if he’s right about the AI bubble bursting - and the consequences of three years of myth-peddling journalism and markets addicted to growth at all costs. FT: Microsoft talks set to push OpenAI’s restructure into next year https://www.ft.com/content/b81d5fb6-26e9-417a-a0cc-6b6689b70c98 Sherwood: Nvidia, the asset manager, had a massive Q2 thanks to CoreWeave’s rally https://sherwood.news/markets/nvidia-the-asset-manager-had-a...
Welcome to Radio Better Offline, a tech talk radio show recorded out of one of iHeartRadio's satellite studios in New York city. Ed is joined by Kyle Barr of Gizmodo, freelance writer Alex Cranz and content creator Michael Fisher (AKA Mr. Mobile) to talk about the weird and fun gadgets that are still getting made, both in the US and abroad. Latest newsletter: How To Argue With An AI Booster - https://www.wheresyoured.at/how-to-argue-with-an-ai-booster/ Latest premium newsletter: How Does GPT-5 W...
In a bonus third episode, Ed Zitron reports exclusively on how OpenAI’s new "router-based" ChatGPT-5 makes it impossible for the company to cache the static prompt for any model or tool it uses every single prompt, doubling token burn for mediocre gains. Better Offline listener deal: Get $15 Off Where's Your Ed At Premium! Deal goes until the end of August. https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/better-offline-discount YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! G...
In part two of this week's two-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how America’s economic growth has become dependent on Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Meta’s AI capital expenditures - and how this inevitably harms both the economy and our markets. Better Offline listener deal: Get $15 Off Where's Your Ed At Premium! Deal goes until the end of August. https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/better-offline-discount YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE ME...
In part one of this week's two-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how AI startups’ overstuffed valuations make them impossible targets for acquisition or IPO - and how this may cause lasting harm to Silicon Valley when the bubble bursts. Better Offline listener deal: Get $15 Off Where's Your Ed At Premium! Deal goes until the end of August. https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/better-offline-discount YOU CAN NOW BUY BETTER OFFLINE MERCH! Go t...
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks through the rough launch of GPT-5, and how ChatGPT’s fandom-like following has become a huge problem for OpenAI. The Enshittification of Generative AI: https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-enshittification-of-generative-ai/ The Wall Street Journal - The Next Great Leap in AI Is Behind Schedule and Crazy Expensive: https://www.wsj.com/tech/ai/openai-gpt5-orion-delays-639e7693?ref=wheresyoured.at Live service game post: https://bsky.app/profile/catharsis23.bsky...
In a paper released earlier this year, three academics from the University of Glasgow classified ChatGPT's outputs not as "lies," but as "BS" - as defined by philosopher Harry G. Frankfurt in "on BS" (and yes I'm censoring that) - and created one of the most enjoyable and prescient papers ever written. In this episode, Ed Zitron is joined by academics Michael Townsen Hicks, James Humphries and Joe Slater in a free-wheeling conversation about ChatGPT's mediocrity - and how it's not built to repre...
In this week’s Better Offline monologue, Ed talks about Anker’s Nebula X1, an expensive, excellent-looking and adaptable projector that can work just about anywhere. Better Offline listener deal: Get $15 Off Where's Your Ed At Premium! Deal goes until the end of August. https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/better-offline-discount Nebula X1 Projector: https://amzn.to/45645dR Nebula Wireless Satellite Speakers: https://amzn.to/45E2EmZ Nebula gimbal stand for...
In this episode, Ed is joined by writer and critic Molly White to talk about how RSS can purify your news experience, the challenge of the newsletter economy, and what gives her optimism for the future. Citation Needed Newsletter: https://www.citationneeded.news Molly on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/molly.wiki Better Offline listener deal: Get $15 Off Where's Your Ed At Premium! Deal goes until the end of August. https://edzitronswheresyouredatghostio.outpost.pub/public/promo-subscription/b...
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through how and why OpenAI and Anthropic use “annualized revenues” to hide that they’re nowhere near their yearly revenue projections. https://www.theinformation.com/articles/anthropic-revenue-hits-4-billion-annual-pace-competition-cursor-intensifies?rc=kz8jh3 www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-hits-12-billion-annualized-revenue-breaks-700-million-chatgpt-weekly-active-users?rc=kz8jh3 Episode note: I say “$5.5 billion” for OpenAI’s potential reve...
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 Mia Sato of The Verge and Dave Lee of Bloomberg to talk how companies like TikTok and Google change the web with their incentives, the nihilism of Pop Mart's viral Labubus, and why people are more game to pay independent writers. Mia Sato, The Verge https://www.theverge.com/authors/mia-sato https://bsky.app/profile/miasato.bsky.social https://www.instagr...
In part three of this week's three-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how AI agents don’t really exist, how deceitful AI marketing has become, and why everything is brittle as a result. 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. --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ Di...
In part two of this week's three-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron walks you through how little money there is in generative AI, how Anthropic and OpenAI are killing their own customers, and why there may never be a profitable LLM company. 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. --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https...
Host Ed Zitron critically examines the AI bubble, asserting its instability stems from massive capital expenditures by the "Magnificent Seven" on NVIDIA GPUs, yielding negligible real revenue. He details how Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Meta, Tesla, and Apple's AI efforts are largely unprofitable, and systematically debunks the common comparison to Amazon Web Services' early growth, revealing it as a distinct and more financially sound venture. The episode warns of the broader economic risks as the US stock market's health becomes increasingly dependent on this "fragile" AI trade.
In this week’s monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through the pale horses of the AIpocalypse - and how the AI bubble’s deepest weakness is that it’s almost entirely based on vibes. Anthropic’s new data center in Indiana: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/24/technology/amazon-ai-data-centers.html 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. --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks ...
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 actor, writer and producer Brian Koppelman, Engadget Managing Editor Cherlynn Low and comedian Mike Drucker to talk about the current state of the tech industry, what AI can actually do, and what the tech industry looks like in the next year. Anthropic and OpenAI Have Begun The Subprime AI Crisis https://www.wheresyoured.at/anthropic-and-openai-have-begu...
In part two of this week's two-part Better Offline, Ed Zitron makes a plea to the tech media - to stop automatically accepting what the tech executives have to say, and to admit that these people sound really, really stupid, even if they use long words. 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. --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured....
In this monologue, Ed Zitron examines the sudden and confusing price changes implemented by AI coding environment Cursor, including the introduction of expensive new tiers and rate limits, potentially degrading their service. He argues this is a form of 'chain enshittification' driven by upstream AI model providers like Anthropic and OpenAI drastically increasing their own costs and implementing new pricing structures like prompt caching taxes and priority tiers. Zitron revisits his 'Subprime AI Crisis' thesis, suggesting these changes across the industry indicate unsustainable business models and impending trouble for AI startups.
This episode of Better Offline critiques the speaking style and perceived intelligence of prominent tech CEOs like Sam Altman and Satya Nadella, arguing their public statements are often vague, nonsensical, and unchallenged by the media. Host Ed Zitron contends these leaders are not technological geniuses but rather business figures whose companies ship increasingly poor products. He advocates for reporters to stop coddling the powerful, openly mock their absurd statements, and focus on the real-world problems with modern technology, like broken software and intrusive notifications.
Ed Zitron discusses his personal journey getting into vinyl records as a way to relax and change his music listening habits in the digital age. He covers the basics of how record players function, the equipment he chose, and the process of buying and listening to records, highlighting the unique sound and ritual compared to digital audio.
