We’re excited to share that Mozilla's IRL podcast is a Shorty Awards finalist in the Science and Technology Podcast category! If you enjoy IRL you can show your support by voting for us. The Shorty Awards recognizes great content by brands, agencies and nonprofits. It’s really an honor to be able to feature the voices and stories of the folks who are putting people over profit in AI. A Shorty Award will help bring these stories to even more listeners. How to vote 1. Go to mzl.la/shorty 2. Click ...
Apr 19, 2024•46 sec
From Hollywood to Hip Hop, artists are negotiating new boundaries of consent for use of AI in the creative industries. Bridget Todd speaks to artists who are pushing the boundaries. It’s not the first time artists have been squeezed, but generative AI presents new dilemmas. In this episode: a member of the AI working group of the Hollywood writers union; a singer who licenses the use of her voice to others; an emcee and professor of Black music; and an AI music company charting a different path....
Dec 05, 2023•24 min•Season 7Ep. 5
Big tech’s power over language, means power over people. Bridget Todd talks to AI community leaders paving the way for open voice tech in their own languages and dialects. In this episode: AI builders and researchers in the US, Kenya and New Zealand who say the languages computers learn to recognize today will be the ones that survive tomorrow — as long as communities and local startups can defend their data rights from big AI companies. Halcyon Lawrence was an Associate Professor of Technical C...
Nov 21, 2023•23 min•Season 7Ep. 4
Why does it so often feel like we’re part of a mass AI experiment? What is the responsible way to test new technologies? Bridget Todd explores what it means to live with unproven AI systems that impact millions of people as they roll out across public life. In this episode: a visit to San Francisco, a major hub for automated vehicle testing; an exposé of a flawed welfare fraud prediction algorithm in a Dutch city; a look at how companies comply with regulations in practice; and how to inspire al...
Nov 07, 2023•22 min•Season 7Ep. 3
They’re the essential workers of AI — yet mostly invisible and exploited. Does it have to be this way? Bridget Todd talks to data workers and entrepreneurs pushing for change. Millions of people work on data used to train AI behind the scenes. Often, they are underpaid and even traumatized by what they see. In this episode: a company charting a different path; a litigator holding big tech accountable; and data workers organizing for better conditions. Thank you to Foxglove and Superrr for sharin...
Oct 24, 2023•22 min•Season 7Ep. 2
Are today’s large language models too hot to handle? Bridget Todd digs into the risks and rewards of open sourcing the tech that makes ChatGPT talk. In their competitive rush to release powerful LLMs to the world, tech companies are fueling a controversy about what should and shouldn’t be open in generative AI. In this episode, we meet open source research communities who have stepped up to develop more responsible machine learning alternatives. David Evan Harris worked at Meta to make AI more r...
Oct 10, 2023•22 min•Season 7Ep. 1
This season, IRL host Bridget Todd meets people who are balancing the upsides of artificial intelligence with the downsides that are coming into view worldwide. Stay tuned for the first of five biweekly episodes on October 10! IRL is an original podcast from the non-profit Mozilla.
Sep 26, 2023•2 min
Life, death and data. AI’s capacity to support research on human health is well documented. But so are the harms of biased datasets and misdiagnoses. How can AI developers build healthier systems? We take a look at a new dataset for Black skin health, a Covid chatbot in Rwanda, AI diagnostics in rural India, and elusive privacy in mental health apps. Avery Smith is a software engineer in Maryland who lost his wife to skin cancer. This inspired him to create the Black Skin Health AI Dataset and t...
Sep 12, 2022•26 min•Season 6Ep. 5
Murky political groups are exploiting social media systems to spread disinformation. With important elections taking place around the world this year, who is pushing back? We meet grassroots groups in Africa and beyond who are using AI to tackle disinformation in languages and countries underserved by big tech companies. Justin Arenstein is the founder of Code for Africa, an organization that works with newsrooms across 21 countries to fact check, track and combat the global disinformation indus...
Aug 29, 2022•22 min•Season 6Ep. 4
An aerial picture can tell a thousand stories. But who gets to tell them? From above the clouds, our world is surveilled and datafied. Those who control the data, control the narratives. We explore the legacy of spatial apartheid in South Africa’s townships, and hear from people around the world who are reclaiming power over their own maps. Raesetje Sefala is mapping the legacy of spatial apartheid in South Africa as a computer vision researcher with Timnit Gebru’s Distributed AI Research Instit...
Aug 15, 2022•22 min•Season 6Ep. 3
Gig workers around the world report directly to algorithms in precarious jobs created by secretive corporations. We take you to the streets of Quito, Ecuador where delivery workers are protesting against artificial intelligence, and we hear solutions from people in several countries on how to audit the algorithms and reclaim rights. Eduardo Meneses is gearing up with allies to ‘audit the algorithms’ of delivery platforms in Ecuador as the Global Head of Social Change at Thoughtworks. Dan Calacci...
Aug 01, 2022•20 min•Season 6Ep. 2
Where should tech builders draw the line on AI for military or surveillance? Just because it can be built, doesn’t mean it should be. At what point do we blow the whistle, call out the boss, and tell the world? Find out what it’s like to sound the alarm from inside a big tech company. Laura Nolan shares the story behind her decision to leave Google in 2018 over their involvement in Project Maven, a Pentagon project which used AI by Google. Yves Moreau explains why he is calling on academic journ...
Jul 18, 2022•23 min•Season 6Ep. 1
AI is everywhere now. It’s part of healthcare, social media, maps, and even killer robots. But who has power over AI? And who is shifting that power? Join IRL’s new host, Bridget Todd, as she talks to technology builders and policy folks from around the world who are developing more trustworthy AI that puts people over profits. IRL is an original podcast from the non-profit Mozilla. For more on our series, visit us here .
Jul 05, 2022•1 min
Every day, our data hits the market when we sign online. It’s for sale, and we’re left to wonder if tech companies will ever choose to protect our privacy rather than reap large profits with our information. But, is the choice — profit or privacy — a false dilemma? Meet the people who have built profitable tech businesses while also respecting your privacy. Fact check if Facebook and Google have really found religion in privacy. And, imagine a world where you could actually get paid to share you...
Sep 09, 2019•27 min•Season 5Ep. 7
The word “regulation" gets tossed around a lot. And it’s often aimed at the internet’s Big Tech companies. Some worry that the size of these companies and the influence they wield is too much. On the other side, there’s the argument that any regulation is overreach — leave it to the market, and everything will sort itself out. But over the last year, in the midst of this regulation debate, a funny thing happened. Tech companies got regulated. And our right to privacy got a little easier to exerc...
Aug 26, 2019•32 min•Season 5Ep. 6
‘5G’ is a new buzzword floating around every corner of the internet. But what exactly is this hyped-up cellular network, often referred to as the next technological evolution in mobile internet communications? Will it really be 100 times faster than what we have now? What will it make possible that has never been possible before? Who will reap the benefits? And, who will get left behind? Mike Thelander at Signals Research Group imagines the wild ways 5G might change our lives in the near future....
Aug 12, 2019•24 min•Season 5Ep. 5
There's a movement building within tech. Workers are demanding higher standards from their companies — and because of their unique skills and talent, they have the leverage to get attention. Walkouts and sit-ins. Picket protests and petitions. Shareholder resolutions, and open letters. These are the new tools of tech workers, increasingly emboldened to speak out. And, as they do that, they expose the underbellies of their companies' ethics and values or perceived lack of them. In this episode of...
Jul 29, 2019•23 min•Season 5Ep. 4
Manoush Zomorodi explores the surprising environmental impact of the internet in this episode of IRL. Because while it’s easy to think of the internet as living only on your screen, energy demand for the internet is indeed powered by massive server farms, running around the clock, all over the world. What exactly is the internet’s carbon footprint? And, what can we do about it? Music professor Kyle Devine considers the environmental costs of streaming music. Geophysicist and pop scientist Miles ...
Jul 15, 2019•28 min•Season 5Ep. 3
Part of celebrating democracy is questioning what influences it. In this episode of IRL, we look at how the internet influences us, our votes, and our systems of government. Is democracy in trouble? Are democratic elections and the internet incompatible? Politico's Mark Scott takes us into Facebook's European Union election war room. Karina Gould , Canada's Minister for Democratic Institutions, explains why they passed a law governing online political ads. The ACLU's Ben Wizner says our online e...
Jul 01, 2019•25 min•Season 5Ep. 2
Privacy policies: most apps and websites have them, buried away somewhere. These legal documents explain how the company collects, uses, and shares your personal data. But let's be honest, few of us actually read these things, right? And that passive acceptance says a lot about our complicated relationship with online privacy. In the Season 5 premiere of IRL, host Manoush Zomorodi speaks with Charlie Warzel , writer-at-large with the New York Times, about our complicated relationship with data a...
Jun 17, 2019•27 min•Season 5Ep. 1
Season 4 of ZigZag is about examining the current culture of business and work, figuring out what needs to change, and experimenting with new ways to do it. Sign up for their newsletter and subscribe to the podcast for free wherever you get your podcasts.
Jun 03, 2019•45 min
All the things we love on the internet — from websites that give us information to services that connect us — are made stronger when their creators come with different points of view. With this in mind, we asked ourselves and our guests: "What would the internet look like if it was built by mostly women?" Witchsy founders Kate Dwyer and Penelope Gazin start us off with a story about the stunt they had to pull to get their site launched — and counter the sexist attitudes they fought aga...
Mar 04, 2019•25 min•Season 4Ep. 7
Some people believe that decentralization is the inevitable future of the web. They believe that internet users will start to demand more privacy and authenticity of information online and that they’ll look to decentralized platforms to get those things. But would decentralization be as utopian as advocates say it could be? Host Manoush Zomorodi speaks to Eugen Rochko of Mastodon , an ad-free alternative to Twitter; Justin Hunter of Graphite docs , a decentralized alternative to GoogleDocs; Mari...
Feb 18, 2019•25 min•Season 4Ep. 6
In her new book, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, Harvard Business School’s Shoshana Zuboff argues that tech companies — like Google and Facebook — collect so much personal data for profit, that they’re changing the fundamentals of our economy and way of life. And now these companies are learning to shape our behavior to better serve their business goals. Shoshana joins Manoush Zomorodi to explain what this all means for us. We then explore whether or not it’s time to end our relationship wit...
Feb 04, 2019•28 min•Season 4Ep. 5
What, if anything, should be banned from online media? And who should review violent and explicit content, in order to decide if it’s okay for the public? Thousands of people around the world are working long, difficult hours as content moderators in support of sites like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. They are guided by complex and shifting guidelines, and their work can sometimes lead to psychological trauma. But the practice of content moderation also raises questions about censorship and fr...
Jan 21, 2019•28 min•Season 4Ep. 4
TL;DR: We have access to more things to read than ever before. Too much, in fact. Our reading habits have shifted. We skim a lot. We look for full stories baked into headlines. Our eyes bounce around from one article to the next, and we try and fail to manage how many things we read at once. Some of us can no longer concentrate on a book—no matter how good it might be. Reading has changed. And we’re changing alongside it. With host Manoush Zomorodi , Derek Thompson at the Atlantic talks headline...
Jan 07, 2019•24 min•Season 4Ep. 3
Look, we agree with you: passwords are the worst. But you know what else is the worst? Someone hacking your account, or big security breaches that expose your email, your credit card information, your government-issued identification number, and more. We should hold companies accountable for better security, but we also need to hold ourselves accountable for having good password hygiene. So let's tackle this once and for all. Hear from Buzzfeed's Mat Honan , who endured a brutal hack a few years...
Dec 10, 2018•27 min•Season 4Ep. 2
When you shop, your data may be the most valuable thing for sale. This isn’t just true online — your data follows you into brick and mortar stores now as well. Manoush Zomorodi explores the hidden costs of shopping, online and off. Meet Meta Brown , a data scientist who unveils the information Amazon captures about you when you make an online purchase; Joseph Turow , who discusses how retailers are stripping us of our privacy; and Alana Semuels , who talks about becoming a hoarder with the adven...
Nov 26, 2018•30 min•Season 4Ep. 1
Can ‘ethical tech’ be a thing? We think so. Season 4 of Mozilla’s IRL podcast will explore all the ways tech can have a more positive influence on people, communities, and societies at large. And, we’re delighted to welcome our new host Manoush Zomorodi , who will keep the season nerdy, human, and — importantly — fun, for all of us as we listen in. IRL is an original podcast from Mozilla . For more on the series go to irlpodcast.org . Here's more about IRL Season 4, Manoush, and the Mozillians w...
Nov 12, 2018•2 min
The 2016 U.S. presidential election blew up our ideas about influence campaigns in the age of screens. Two years later, Veronica Belmont and Baratunde Thurston examine how the internet is changing our minds, our votes, and our democracies – all over the world. Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter Scott Shane details the United States' long history with election meddling. Paris correspondent for the Washington Post, James McAuley , shines a light on how other countries are managing the ...
Oct 04, 2018•48 min•Season 3Ep. 7
