Sayash Kapoor (Princeton) discusses the incoherence of precise p(doom) predictions and the pervasiveness of AI “snake oil.” Check out his and Arvind Narayanan’s new book, AI Snake Oil: What Artificial Intelligence Can Do, What It Can’t, and How to Tell the Difference . Topics include: What’s a prediction, really? p(doom): your guess is as good as anyone’s Freakishly chaotic creatures (us, that is) AI can’t predict the impact of AI Gaming AI with invisible ink Life is luck—let’s act like it Super...
Sep 23, 2024•54 min•Ep. 385
Geoff Manne (International Center for Law & Economics) and Corbin Barthold (TechFreedom) discuss the many, many flaws in the FTC’s antitrust lawsuit against Meta (Facebook). A crossover episode with the Washington Legal Foundation / TechFreedom Tech in the Courts series. Topics include: - The ontology of Facebook - Social networking: it’s not 2008 anymore - The FTC’s made-up market - The WhatsApp Catch-22 - Has Facebook been enshittified? - Product design by government: bad idea! - Growing s...
Sep 09, 2024•54 min•Ep. 384
TechFreedom’s Corbin Barthold, Ari Cohn, and Santana Boulton partake in a summer doldrums bitchfest about recent and upcoming Supreme Court internet speech cases. Topics include: SCOTUS ducks in Moody v. NetChoice Hey, let’s *not * reward bad-faith legislating Justice Kagan: progressive traitor (and we love it) Justice Alito is mad What’s next for online speech? SCOTUS ducks in Murthy v. Missouri Judge Terry Doughty: incompetent boob The censorship industrial complex that wasn’t SCOTUS takes up ...
Aug 27, 2024•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 383
Is AI a miracle? A threat? Will it free us? Enslave us? Both? Neither? What’s the future of AI and governance? AI and art? AI and elections? AI and social media? AI and the economy? AI and the world? Welcome to the Tech Policy Podcast: AI and Everything. On this special episode, we present highlights from more than a year of conversations with leading experts on the state of the AI revolution. Featuring Adam Thierer, Samuel Hammond, Liza Lin, Arnold Kling, Brian Frye, Joseph Tainter, James Petho...
Aug 13, 2024•52 min•Ep. 382
Noah Smith (Noahpinion Substack) discusses techno-industrial competition with China and Russia. Topics include: American industry: we’re #2 :( Allies: no longer a luxury NEPA sucks A brief lesson about nickel The death of state capacity: greatly exaggerated? Will information destroy liberalism? Clowns to the left, clowns to the right Hey, let’s *not* be divided and poor Links: Noahpinion (Substack) People are realizing that the Arsenal of Democracy is gone Happy fun Cold War 2 update Three holes...
Aug 01, 2024•59 min•Ep. 381
Brandon Kirk Williams (Lawrence Livermore) discusses quantum computing—the science behind it, its potential applications, the geopolitics surrounding it, and more. Links: The U.S. Must Win the Quantum Computing Race. History Shows How to Do It The U.S. Needs a Strategy for the Second Quantum Revolution...
Jul 22, 2024•52 min•Ep. 380
Alice Marwick (UNC-Chapel Hill) discusses her new paper, “Child Online Safety Legislation: A Primer.” If you’re wondering, the article Corbin quotes at the top of the show is Zephyr Teachout, Ending Big Tech’s Child Exploitation (Compact Magazine). Topics include: Moral panic in the technical sense The Kids Online Safety Act: not about kids, not about safety Once more, with feeling: correlation is not causation “Harmful content”: no one knows what it means, but it’s provocative Care about kids? ...
Jul 10, 2024•46 min•Ep. 379
Berin Szóka (TechFreedom) and James Dunstan (TechFreedom) discuss the FCC’s recent orders on Title II common-carrier regulation and digital discrimination. Topics include: A hundred years of telecom law in four minutes The craziest story in the history of federal regulation FCC: Huzzah for crappy Internet (like in Europe)! SCOTUS: Congress must tackle major questions! Disparate treatment vs. disparate impact The FCC crams an elephant in a mousehole Links: Zombie FCC vs. Schoolhouse-Rock Supreme ...
Jul 01, 2024•58 min•Ep. 378
Arnold Kling discusses his recent article in Reason magazine, “Not Even Artificial Intelligence Can Make Central Planning Work.” Topics include: Why central planning is impossible The importance of prices What is AI good for? Will AI know us better than we know ourselves? What markets will AI disrupt? Social media and tribal gang-sign flashing The myopia of the revanchist right Links: Not Even Artificial Intelligence Can Make Central Planning Work David Brin’s Transparent Society Revisited Mir M...
Jun 21, 2024•56 min•Ep. 377
Renée DiResta (Stanford Internet Observatory) discusses her new book, Invisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies into Reality . Topics include: Social media influencers: the new media elite How do ideas take root? Influencers as exploiters of asymmetries Bullshit: an investigation Could platforms have stopped Stop the Steal? Fixing the expert class Chomsky’s Manufacturing Consent The future of social media Links: Invisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies into Reality Influencers, Bullshitters, ...
Jun 11, 2024•1 hr•Ep. 376
From January 10, 2022 (Episode 309): Joseph Uscinski (University of Miami) argues that the internet is not increasing the prevalence of conspiracy theories. Links: Don’t Blame Social Media for Conspiracy Theories—They Would Still Flourish Without It
May 30, 2024•55 min
Robert Atkinson is president of the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation. He joins the show to discuss his new book, Technology Fears and Scapegoats: 40 Myths About Privacy, Jobs, AI, and Today’s Innovation Economy , co-authored with David Moschella. Topics include: Tech panic: speeding-uppers vs. slowing-downers Tech and privacy: try living in an analogue village! The wicked problem of content moderation Is tech progress bad for the middle class? Is tech driving market concentrati...
May 20, 2024•58 min•Ep. 375
Richard Morrison (Competitive Enterprise Institute) joins the show, in a crossover episode with the Free the Economy podcast. Topics include: The history of podcasts The rise of micro media (find a thousand true fans!) Performative tech doomerism The idleness of romanticizing the past The quest for online community Conservatives in the Technium Links: Free the Economy Why Conservatism Failed The Quest for a Better Online “Community”...
May 09, 2024•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 374
It’s the episode you’ve been waiting for: TechFreedom’s Corbin Barthold and Ari Cohn talk about pornography and free expression. Topics include: The Founding Fathers: epic porn fiends (j/k) Obscenity law, a brief history Do conservatives still want to ban James Joyce? “I know it when I see it”—Worst. Legal standard. Ever. Is there a moral case against porn? (Spoiler alert: No) The Fifth Circuit botches internet speech law Links: Tech Policy Podcast #360: Red States vs. Every SCOTUS Internet Prec...
Apr 25, 2024•54 min•Ep. 373
Ryan Scirocco is the spacesuit business development lead at Collins Aerospace. Collins, an RTX business, is, along with its partners ILC Dover and Oceaneering, developing a new generation of spacesuits for NASA. Ryan discusses everything that goes into keeping people alive in a freezing zero-gravity vacuum far outside the biosphere. Topics include: A spacesuit is a mini-spaceship Space: it wants to kill you Spacesuit history What’s new? No more mirrors! Testing spacesuits on the vomit comet The ...
Apr 11, 2024•36 min•Ep. 372
Corbin Barthold (TechFreedom) discusses, in exquisite detail, the First Amendment problems with H.R. 7521, the House bill to ban TikTok. Topics include: Your First Amendment right to read crazy shit TikTok ban bros: throwing spaghetti at the wall Foreign broadcast-ownership rules: so passé “iT’S nOT sPEech, It’S CoNDuCt” H.R. 7521: Least. Tailored. Law. Ever. Banning media: it’s what the other guys do McCarthyism: so hot right now Links: A Breakdown of the Bizarre Factions Fighting Over the TikT...
Apr 01, 2024•44 min•Ep. 371
Daphne Keller (Stanford Cyber Policy Center) and Corbin Barthold (TechFreedom) discuss the Supreme Court oral argument in Murthy v. Missouri (government jawboning of social media platforms) and the NetChoice cases (state content moderation laws). Links: Six Things About Jawboning The Lies the 5th Circuit Told You About the Government ‘Pressuring Social Media to Censor’ Tech Policy Podcast #350: When the Government Yells at Social Media FAQs About the NetChoice Cases at the Supreme Court, Part 1 ...
Mar 25, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 370
Samuel Hammond (Foundation for American Innovation) discusses his essays on “AI and Leviathan.” Can government institutions cope with the coming technological disruption of AI? Topics include: - AI’s trajectory - New Deal agencies in an AI world - Public Choice Theory vs. the AI juggernaut - Uber and micro-regime changes - Government as a network of smart contracts - Techno-totalitarianism vs. techno-feudalism - AI Renaissance city states? - Collapse as a feature, not a bug - A techno-optimist’s...
Mar 13, 2024•51 min•Ep. 369
Byron Tau (NOTUS) discusses his new book Means of Control: How the Hidden Alliance of Tech and Government Is Creating a New American Surveillance State . Topics include: Some history: four generations of data brokers The continuing evolution of data collection and technological surveillance The great danger: data fusion / comprehensive data profiles Why won’t Congress regulate government data use? National security vs. privacy Should we fear a social credit system? Links: Means of Control NOTUS ...
Mar 04, 2024•39 min•Ep. 368
Brandon Gorrell (Pirate Wires) joins the show to discuss The White Pill , his optimistic (and mind-blowing) newsletter covering “the frontiers of tech, science, space, and more.” Topics include: Combatting the overwhelming negativity on social media. Lasers are amazing. Why space exploration? Did the Big Bang really happen? The Pirate Wires brand — beautiful vibe! Breaking the New York Times / NPR decel monoculture. Advances in IVF. Links: The White Pill...
Feb 22, 2024•55 min•Ep. 367
It’s a big picture episode! One day (soon?), technology will enable convenient, low-cost gender transition. What does that say about human “nature”? What are the implications for society? What are (some) people getting so upset about? Jason Kuznicki (TechFreedom) joins the show to discuss. Gender as Essence and as Economic Choice Cosmos + Taxis issue on gender (including articles by Nathan P. Goodman and by Akiva Malamet and Mikayla Novak) Pacification (Jason’s Substack) Tech Policy Podcast #327...
Feb 14, 2024•52 min•Ep. 366
Mike Masnick (Techdirt) and Leigh Beadon (Techdirt) join the show to discuss their new report on the Internet’s (beneficial!) effect on art, entertainment, and culture. The Sky Is Rising: 2024 Edition Rather than Destroying Culture, the Internet Has Saved the Content Industries Filterworld Is a Confused Critique of Algorithms...
Feb 05, 2024•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 365
Liza Goitein (Brennan Center) joins the show to discuss the FISA Section 702 surveillance program. Why is it so contentious? Why is it such a hot topic now? Why and how should it be changed? And what does the Fourth Amendment have to say about it? Liza explains! Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA): A Resource Page How Congress Learned to Live with Warrantless Surveillance (for Now) Tech Policy Podcast #339: Will Tech Swallow the Fourth Amendment?...
Jan 24, 2024•46 min•Ep. 364
TechFreedom’s Ari Cohn and Corbin Barthold discuss whether AI is going to spark an “infocalypse,” bring about the “collapse of reality,” and destroy our elections. Is AI about to “flood” our “screens” with “misinformation” that’s “dangerous to democracy”? Notwithstanding these quotes from recent press stories, the answer is probably no. Ari’s Senate testimony What the Doomsayers Get Wrong About Deepfakes Scott Brennen + Matt Perault paper Tech Policy Podcast #358: Information Animals Fighting In...
Jan 11, 2024•46 min•Ep. 363
From February 16, 2021 (Episode 284): Martin Gurri (Mercatus Center) discusses his book The Revolt of the Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium . The Revolt of the Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium Reality Comes Knocking
Dec 28, 2023•42 min
From March 2, 2022 (Episode 313): Robert Atkinson (Information Technology and Innovation Foundation) discusses the leftwing push to turn broadband into a heavily regulated utility. Anticorporate Broadband Populists’ Real Agenda: Destroy the Current Private-Sector System FCC Revives Common Carriage for the Internet Zombie FCC vs. Schoolhouse-Rock Supreme Court A Thankfully Doomed Mistake The Elephant in the Ethernet Port...
Dec 19, 2023•1 hr 1 min
Blake Reid (Colorado Law) and Berin Szóka (TechFreedom) join the show to discuss the constitutional and policy implications of applying common carrier rules at different layers of the “tech stack.” Should broadband providers be forced to carry content? Should social media platforms? How about both? Or neither? Maybe the former, but not the latter? How about the latter, but not the former? . . . Wait, stop. That last one is nonsense. Tune in to find out why. The Greatest Internet Law Chart Ever U...
Dec 11, 2023•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 362
Brian Frye (Kentucky Law) joins the show to say bananas stuff about artificial intelligence, the history of authorship, the economics of copyright, why we’re all misunderstanding plagiarism, the mysteries of free will, and more. Apologia Pro Plagio Suo Should Using an AI Text Generator to Produce Academic Writing Be Plagiarism? Plagiarize This Paper How About Using AI To Determine Whether Or Not Something Is Creative Enough To Get Copyright Protection AI and the Nature of Literary Creativity...
Nov 29, 2023•55 min•Ep. 361
Host Corbin Barthold discusses the campaign by states like Arkansas, Texas, and Utah to age-gate the Internet. As Corbin explains, these states are taking aim at a number of recent Supreme Court decisions, including Reno v. ACLU (1997), Ashcroft v. ACLU (2004), Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association (2011), and even (!?) 303 Creative v. Elenis (2023). Corbin on the importance of Reno v. ACLU Paul Matzko on the notorious “fairness doctrine” Scholarly criticism of the “scarcity rationale” Co...
Nov 17, 2023•57 min•Ep. 360
Jeff Kosseff (Naval Academy) joins the show to discuss his new book Liar in a Crowded Theater , a defense of your First Amendment right to speak falsely (sometimes!). Liar in a Crowded Theater: Freedom of Speech in a World of Misinformation The Twenty-Six Words That Created the Internet The United States of Anonymous: How the First Amendment Shaped Online Speech Tech Policy Podcast #350: When the Government Yells at Social Media...
Nov 09, 2023•50 min•Ep. 359
