Today, I’m talking to Google CEO Sundar Pichai, who joined the show the day after the big Google I/O developer conference. Google’s focus during the conference was on how it’s building AI into virtually all of its products. If you’re a Decoder listener, you’ve heard me talk about this idea a lot over the past year: I call it “Google Zero,” and I’ve been asking a lot of web and media CEOs what would happen to their businesses if their Google traffic were to go to zero. In a world where AI powers search with overviews and summaries, that’s a real possibility. What then happens to the web?  I’ve talked to Sundar quite a bit over the past few years, and this was the most fired up I’ve ever seen him. I think you can really tell that there is a deep tension between the vision Google has for the future — where AI magically makes us smarter, more productive, more artistic — and the very real fears and anxieties creators and website owners are feeling right now about how search has changed and how AI might swallow the internet forever, and that he’s wrestling with that tension. Links:  Google and OpenAI are racing to rewire the internet — Command Line Google I/O 2024: everything announced — The Verge Google is redesigning its search engine, and it’s AI all the way down — The Verge Project Astra is the future of AI at Google — The Verge Did SEO experts ruin the internet or did Google? — The Verge YouTube is going to start cracking down on AI clones of musicians — The Verge AI is killing the old web, and the new web struggles to be born — The Verge How Google is killing independent sites like ours — HouseFresh Inside the First 'SEO Heist' of the AI Era — Business Insider Google’s Sundar Pichai talks Search, AI, and dancing with Microsoft — Decoder Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23922415 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Last week, TikTok filed a lawsuit against the US government claiming the divest-or-ban law is unconstitutional — a case it needs to win in order to keep operating under Bytedance’s ownership. There’s a lot of back and forth between the facts and the law here: Some of the legal claims are complex and sit in tension with a long history of prior attempts to regulate speech and the internet, while the simple facts of what TikTok has already promised to do around the world contradict some its arguments. Verge editors Sarah Jeong and Alex Heath join me to explain what it all means. Links:  TikTok and Bytedance v Merrick Garland (PDF) TikTok sues the US government over ban | The Verge Senate passes TikTok ban bill, sending it to President Biden’s desk | The Verge The legal challenges that lie ahead for TikTok — in both the US and China | The Verge Why the TikTok ban won’t solve the US’s online privacy problems. | Decoder  Biden signs TikTok ‘ban’ bill into law, starting the clock for ByteDance to divest it | The Verge Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen has been at the top of my list of people I’ve wanted to talk to for the show since we first launched — he’s led Adobe for nearly 17 years now, but he doesn’t do too many wide-ranging interviews. I’ve always thought Adobe was an underappreciated company — its tools sit at the center of nearly every major creative workflow you can think of — and with generative AI poised to change the very nature of creative software, it seemed particularly important to talk with Shantanu now. Adobe sits right at the center of the whole web of tensions, especially as the company has evolved its business and business model over time. And now, AI really changes what it means to make and distribute creative work. Not many people are seeing revenue returns on it just yet and there are the fundamental philosophical challenges of adding AI to photo and video tools. What does it mean when a company like Adobe, which makes the tools so many people use to make their art, sees the creative process as a step in a marketing chain, instead of a goal in and of itself? Links:  How Adobe is managing the AI copyright dilemma, with general counsel Dana Rao  Adobe Launches Creative Cloud (2012) What was Photoshop like in 1994?  Photoshop’s Generative Fill tool turns vacation photos into nightmares - The Verge New York Daily News, Chicago Tribune, and others sue OpenAI and Microsoft - The Verge The FAIR Act: A New Right to Protect Artists in the Age of AI | Adobe Blog Adobe’s Firefly generative AI tools are now generally available - The Verge This Wacom AI debacle has certainly taken a turn. - The Verge Transcript:  https://www.theverge.com/e/23917997 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, we’re going to talk about the smart home — one of the oldest, most important, and most challenging dreams in the history of the tech industry. The idea of your house responding to you and your family, and generally being as automated and as smart as your phone or your laptop, has inspired generations of technologists. But after decades of promises, it’s all still pretty messy. Because the big problem with the smart home has been blindingly obvious for a very long time: interoperability.  Yet there are some promising developments out there that might make it a little better. To help sort it all out, I invited Verge smart home reviewer Jen Tuohy, who is one of the most influential reporters on the smart home beat today. Jen and I break down how Matter, the open source standard, is trying to fix these issues, but there is still a lot of work to do.  Links:  Matter is now racing ahead, but the platforms are holding it back — The Verge 2023 in the smart home: Matter’s broken promises — The Verge Smart home hubs: what they are and why you need one — The Verge My smart kitchen: the good, the bad, and the future — The Verge How bad business broke the smart home — The Verge The smart home is finally getting out of your phone and into your home — The Verge Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath, whom I first interviewed on the show back in 2021. Those were heady days — especially for upstart EV companies like Polestar, which all seemed poised to capture what felt like infinite demand for electric cars. Now, in 2024, the market looks a lot different, and so does Polestar, which is no longer majority-owned by Volvo. Instead, Volvo is now a more independent sister company, and both Volvo and Polestar fall under Chinese parent company Geely.  You know I love a structure shuffle, so Thomas and I really got into it: what does it mean for Volvo to have stepped back, and how much can Polestar take from Geely’s various platforms while still remaining distinct from the other brands in the portfolio? We also talked about the upcoming Polestar 3 SUV and Polestar 4 crossover, and I asked Thomas what he thinks of the Cybertruck. Links:  Can Polestar design a new kind of car company? — Decoder The Polestar 3 isn’t out yet, and it’s already getting a big price cut — The Verge The Polestar 4 gets an official price ahead of its debut — The Verge Polestar makes the rear window obsolete with its new crossover coupe — The Verge Volvo and Polestar drift a little farther apart — The Verge Polestar gets a nearly $1 billion lifeline — The Verge Car-tech breakup fever is heating up — The Verge Polestar is working on its own smartphone to sync with its EVs — The Verge Polestar’s electric future looks high-performing, and promising — The Verge Electric car maker Polestar to cut around 450 jobs globally — Reuters Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23912151 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, Verge transportation editor Andy Hawkins and I are going to try and figure out Tesla. I said try — I did not say succeed. But we’re going to try. That’s because Tesla has been on a real rollercoaster these past two weeks, in terms of its stock price, its basic financials, and well, its vibes. If you’ve been following the company, you know that that gap between what the business is and how its valued has been getting bigger and bigger for years now – and lately, with Elon Musk saying he’s going all-in on autonomy and announcing a robotaxi event in August, it seems like we’re getting closer to a make or break moment, especially as competition in the broader EV market heats up.  Links: Tesla reaches deals in China on self-driving cars — NYT Elon Musk goes ‘absolutely hard core’ in another round of Tesla layoffs — The Verge Tesla’s Autopilot and Full Self-Driving linked to dozens of deaths — The Verge Elon Musk says Tesla will reveal its robotaxi on August 8th — The Verge A cheaper Tesla is back on the menu — The Verge Tesla’s profits sink as the company struggles with cooling demand — The Verge Tesla lays off ‘more than 10 percent’ of its workforce, loses top executives — The Verge Tesla recalls all 3,878 Cybertrucks over faulty accelerator pedal — The Verge Elon Musk says it’s “time to reorganize” Tesla — The Verge Elon Musk lost Democrats on Tesla when he needed them most — WSJ Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A lot has changed since the last time Ola was on Decoder. Back then, he said Mercedes would have an all-EV lineup by 2030 — a promise a whole lot of car companies, including Mercedes, have now had to soften or walk back. But he doesn't see that as a setback at all, and he and Mercedes are both still committed to phasing out gas in the long run. We also spent some time talking about what's happening both on the outside of cars — Mercedes' classic look and its EV look aren't necessarily quite in the same place — and on the inside of them, as infotainment becomes a huge point of competition and design. Links:  How Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius is refocusing for an electric future - The Verge Mercedes-Benz opens its first 400kW EV charging station in the US - The Verge Mercedes-Benz is the first German automaker to adopt Tesla’s EV charging connector - The Verge Is the metaverse going to suck? A conversation with Matthew Ball - The Verge The Mercedes G-Wagen, the ultimate off-road status symbol, goes electric - The Verge Mercedes workers file federal charges with NLRB to stop union busting - The Alabama Political Reporter The MBUX Hyperscreen - Mercedes-Benz USA Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23904592 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, we’re talking about the brand-new TikTok ban — and how years of Congressional inaction on a federal privacy law helped lead us to this moment of apparent national panic about algorithmic social media. This is a thorny discussion, and to help break it all down, I invited Verge senior policy reporter Lauren Feiner on the show. Lauren has been closely covering efforts to ban TikTok for years now, and she’s also watched Congress fail to pass meaningful privacy regulation for even longer. We’ll go over how we got here, what this means for both TikTok and efforts to pass new privacy legislation, and what might happen next.  Links:  Biden signs TikTok ‘ban’ bill into law — The Verge TikTok ban: all the news on attempts to ban the video platform — The Verge Anyone want to buy TikTok? — Vergecast Congress takes on TikTok, privacy, and AI — Vergecast Tiktok vows to fight 'unconstitutional' US ban — BBC ‘Thunder Run’: Behind lawmakers’ secretive push to pass the TikTok bill — NYT On TikTok, resignation and frustration after potential ban of app — NYT Lawmakers unveil new bipartisan digital privacy bill after years of impasse — The Verge A real privacy law? House lawmakers are optimistic this time — The Verge Congress is trying to stop discriminatory algorithms again — The Verge Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to Jason Citron, the co-founder and CEO of Discord, the gaming-focused voice and chat app. You might think Discord is just something Slack for gamers, but over time, it has become much more important than that. For a growing mix of mostly young, very online users steeped in gaming culture, fandom, and other niche communities, Discord is fast becoming the hub to their entire online lives. A lot of what we think of as internet culture is happening on Discord. In many ways Discord represents a significant shift away from what we now consider traditional social platforms. As you’ll hear Jason describe it, Discord is a place where you talk and hangout with your friends over shared common interests, whether that’s video games, the AI bot Midjourney, or maybe your favorite anime series. It is a very different kind of interface for the internet, but that comes with serious challenges, especially around child safety and moderation.  Links:  Discord opens up to games and apps embedded in its chat app — The Verge Discord is nuking Nintendo Switch emulator devs and their entire servers — The Verge Inside Discord’s reform movement for banned users — The Verge Discord ends deal talks with Microsoft — WSJ Discord cuts 17% of workers in latest tech layoffs — NYT Discord to start showing ads for gamers to boost revenue — WSJ Discord says it intentionally does not encrypt user messages — CNN How Discord became a social hub for young people — NYT ‘Problematic pockets’: How Discord became a home for extremists — WashPo Discord CEO Jason Citron on AI, Midjourney — Bloomberg Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23898955 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, we're talking about Disney, the massive activist investor revolt it just fought off, and what happens next in the world of streaming. Because what happens to Disney really tells us a lot about what's happening in the entire world of entertainment. Earlier this month, Disney survived an attempted board takeover from businessman Nelson Peltz. While investors ultimately sided with Disney and CEO Bob Iger, the boardroom showdown made something very clear: Disney needs to figure out streaming and get its creative direction back on track.  To help me figure all this out, I brought on my friend Julia Alexander, who is VP of Strategy at Parrot Analytics, a Puck News contributor, and most importantly, a former Verge reporter. She's a leading expert on all things Disney, and I always learn something important about the state of the entertainment business when I talk to her.  Links:  The Story of Disney+ — Puck News ​​Disney’s CEO drama explained, with Julia Alexander — Decoder Is streaming just becoming cable again? Julia Alexander thinks so — Decoder Disney Fends Off Activist Investor for Second Time in 2 Years — NYT For Disney, streaming losses and TV’s decline are a one-two punch — NYT Disney’s ABC, ESPN weakness adds pressure to make streaming profitable — WSJ Disney reportedly wants to bring always-on channels to Disney Plus — The Verge The Disney Plus-Hulu merger is way more than a streaming bundle — The Verge Disney’s laying off 7,000 as streaming boom comes to an end — The Verge The last few years really scared Disney — Screen Rant Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At the absolute most basic, Dropbox is cloud storage for your stuff — but that puts it at the nexus of a huge number of today’s biggest challenges in tech. As the company that helps you organize your stuff in the cloud itself goes all remote, how do we even deal with the concept of “your stuff?” Today I’m talking with Dropbox CEO Drew Houston about those big picture ideas — and why he thinks generative AI really will be transformative for everyone eventually, even if it isn’t yet now. Links:  Dropbox AI and Dash make it easier to find your files from all over the web | The Verge Kids who grew up with search engines could change STEM forever | The Verge No, Dropbox's cafeteria didn't get a Michelin star | VentureBeat It's official: San Francisco's office vacancy rate just set a record | San Francisco Examiner Jeff Bezos: This is the 'smartest thing we ever did' at Amazon | CNBC Dropbox is laying off 500 people and pivoting to AI | The Verge Congress bans staff use of Microsoft's AI Copilot | Axios Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23892647 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today we’re talking about Vice, the media company: Where it came from, what it did, and, ultimately, why it collapsed into a much smaller, sadder version of itself.  This is a lousy time for digital media, and it’s hard to make a profit from putting words on the internet right now. So when Verge senior reporter Liz Lopatto went to go report on what happened, she and I both assumed Vice had been done in by the brutal economics of digital advertising on the web. But the Vice story is more than that — in the word of one executive that talked to Liz, it was a “fucking clown show.”  Links: How Vice became 'a fucking clown show' — The Verge Vice is abandoning Vice.com and laying off hundreds — The Verge Vice, decayed digital colossus, files for bankruptcy — NYT Vice Is Basically Dead — New York Magazine Shane Smith and the Final Collapse of Vice News — The Hollywood Reporter At Vice, cutting-edge media and allegations of old-school sexual harassment — NYT HBO cancels ‘Vice News Tonight,’ severing relationship with Vice Media — CNN Shane Smith has a secret multimillion-dollar Vice deal — New York Magazine Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Cloudflare is an infrastructure provider basically protecting more than 20% of the entire web from bad actors. When everything is going well, you don't even have to know it exists. It's one of the only defenses — sometimes the only defense — standing between websites and the people who want to take them down. Protecting free speech on the internet around the world, across war zones and hundreds of different kinds of government, is no easy feat. That puts the company, and CEO Matthew Prince, right at the heart of some of Decoder's biggest challenges and themes.  Links:  A Cloudflare outage broke large swathes of the internet | The Verge Why security company Cloudflare is protecting U.S. election sites for free | Fast Company The Daily Stormer just lost the most important company defending it | The Verge (2017) Cloudflare to revoke 8chan’s service, opening the fringe website up for DDoS attacks | The Verge (2019) Cloudflare blocks Kiwi Farms due to an ‘immediate threat to human life’ | The Verge Why Cloudflare Let an Extremist Stronghold Burn | Wired Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince interview on Ukraine cybersecurity | Semafor 3 ways the ‘splinternet’ is damaging society | MIT Sloan Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23885440 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, and welcome to Decoder. This is David Pierce, editor-at-large at The Verge and co-host of The Vergecast, subbing in for Nilay, who’s out on vacation. Regular Decoder programming returns next week. In the meantime, we have an exciting episode for you today all about video game emulation, which, as it turns out, is a whole lot more complicated than it seems.  Gaming emulation made headlines recently because one of the most widely used programs for emulating the Nintendo Switch, a platform called Yuzu, was effectively sued out of existence. There’s a whole lot going on here, from the history of game emulation to the copyright precedents of emulators to how the threat of game piracy still looms large in the industry. To break down this topic, I brought Verge Senior Editor and resident emulation expert Sean Hollister on the show. Let’s get into it.  Links: Nintendo sues Switch emulator Yuzu — The Verge Nintendo Switch emulator Yuzu will fold and pay $2.4M to settle its lawsuit — The Verge Steve Jobs announcing a PlayStation emulator for the Mac — YouTube Fans freak out as Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom leaks two weeks early — Kotaku Tears of the Kingdom Was Pirated 1 Million Times, Nintendo Claims — Kotaku The solid legal theory behind Nintendo’s new emulator takedown effort — Ars Technica How Nintendo’s destruction of Yuzu is rocking the emulator world — The Verge How strong is Nintendo’s legal case against Switch-emulator Yuzu? — Ars Technica Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to Intuit Mailchimp CEO Rania Succar, who took over as CEO in 2022 after a pretty rough patch in the company’s history. In 2021, Intuit acquired the company, and the very next year, co-founder Ben Chestnut stepped down after telling employees that he thought introducing themselves with pronouns in meetings did more harm than good. After that, Rania took over. This is a pretty huge culture change, especially as Mailchimp became more integrated with Intuit. It was also a big challenge for a new leader who came in from the outside. You’ll hear us talk about that transition a lot. Rania and I also got into the weeds of making decisions, which is very Decoder. And, of course, we had to talk about generative AI, which is a big part of the Mailchimp road map. This was a really fun conversation with some honestly scary ideas in it — and it’s all about email. Links: Mailchimp employees have complained about inequality for years — The Verge Mailchimp Employees Are Fuming Over $12 Billion Deal — Business Insider Did this email cost Mailchimp's billionaire CEO his job? — Platformer Mailchimp is shutting down TinyLetter — The Verge TinyLetter, in memoriam — The Verge Did Mailchimp censor J.D. Vance? — Mother Jones Hackers breached Mailchimp to phish cryptocurrency wallets — The Verge Boring, mundane businesses have an exhilarating, viral life on TikTok — The Verge Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23879556 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey everyone it’s Nilay – I’m on vacation this week, so the Decoder team is taking a short break. We’ll be back next week with both the interview and the new explainer episodes. To tide you over until Monday, we have a bonus episode from our friends at Vox Media and Eater’s Gastropod about an incredible patent battle in the world of pizza.  I’m serious: One of the biggest fights in the pizza industry took place in US court in the ‘90s — an intellectual property dispute about stuffed crust pizza between Pizza Hut and patent holder Anthony “The Big Cheese” Mongiello.  So much of what we talk about on Decoder comes down to IP lawsuits like copyright or patent disputes, and how judges decide those cases and where the law ends up can steer the course of history. And that’s true whether we’re talking about a line of code, the distribution method of an MP3, or, yes, even stuffed crust pizza.  Links:  Can You Patent a Pizza? — Gastropod Ivana and Donald Trump Pizza Hut Commercial — YouTube The Next Big Thing in Pizza? Try 'Stuffed Crust' — NYT Who Created the Stuffed Crust Pizza? It's Complicated. — Eater Method of making a pizza — Google Patents Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to Jay Graber, the CEO of Bluesky Social, which is a decentralized competitor to Meta’s Threads, Mastodon, and X. Bluesky actually started inside of what was then known as Twitter — it was a project from then-CEO Jack Dorsey, who spent his days wandering the earth and saying things like Twitter should be a protocol and not a company. Bluesky was supposed to be that protocol, but Jack spun it out of Twitter in 2021, just before Elon Musk bought the company and renamed it X. Bluesky is now an independent company with a few dozen employees, and it finds itself in the middle of one of the most chaotic moments in the history of social media. There are a lot of companies and ideas competing for space on the post-Twitter internet, and Jay makes a convincing argument that decentralization — the idea that you should be able to take your username and following to different servers as you wish — is the future. Links:  Twitter is funding research into a decentralized version of its platform — The Verge Bluesky built a decentralized protocol for Twitter — and is working on an app that uses it — The Verge The fediverse, explained — The Verge Bluesky showed everyone’s ass — The Verge Can ActivityPub save the internet? — The Verge The ‘queer.af’ Mastodon instance disappeared because of the Taliban — The Verge Usage Of Elon Musk’s X Dropped 30% In The Last Year, Study Suggests — Forbes Bluesky snags former Twitter/X Trust & Safety exec cut by Musk — TechCrunch Bluesky and Mastodon users are having a fight that could shape the next generation of social media — TechCrunch Protocols, Not Platforms: A Technological Approach to Free Speech — Mike Masnick Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23872913 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Both the EU and US have spent the past decade looking at Big Tech and saying, "someone should do something!" In the US, lawmakers are still basically shouting that. But in the EU, regulators did something. The Digital Markets Act was proposed in 2020, signed into law in 2022, and went into effect this month. It's already having an effect on some of the biggest companies in tech, including Apple, Google, and Microsoft. In theory it's a landmark law that will change the way these companies compete, and how their products operate, for years to come. How did we get here, what does the law actually say, and will it work half as well in practice as it does on paper? Verge reporter Jon Porter comes on Decoder to help me break it down.  Links:  The EU's new competition rules are going live — here's how tech giants are responding | The Verge Apple hit with a nearly $2 billion fine following Spotify complaint | The Verge Experts fear the Digital Markets Act won’t address tech monopolies | The Verge Dirty tricks or small wins: developers are skeptical of Apple's App Store rules | The Verge Google Search, WhatsApp, and TikTok on list of 22 services targeted by EU’s tough new DMA | The Verge The EU’s Digital Services Act is now in effect: here’s what that means | The Verge Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’ve got a fun one today — I talked to Figma CEO Dylan Field in front of a live audience at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas. And we got into it – we talked about everything from design, to software distribution, to the future of the web, and, of course, AI.  Figma is an fascinating company – the Figma design tool is used by designers at basically every company you can think of. And importantly, it runs on the web. It became such a big deal that Adobe tried to buy it out in 2022 for $20 billion dollars, a deal that only just recently fell through because of regulatory concerns.  So Dylan and I talked a lot about where Figma is now as an independent company, how Figma is structured, where it’s going, and how Dylan’s decisionmaking has changed since the last time he was on the show in 2022. Links: Why Figma is selling to Adobe for $20 billion, with CEO Dylan Field — Decoder Adobe abandons $20 billion acquisition of Figma — The Verge Adobe’s Dana Rao on AI, copyright, and the failed Figma deal — Decoder Figma’s CEO on life after the company’s failed sale to Adobe — Command Line Amazon restricts self-publishing due to AI concerns — The Guardian Wix’s new AI chatbot builds websites in seconds based on prompts — The Verge Apple is finally allowing full versions of Chrome and Firefox on the iPhone — The Verge What Is Solarpunk? A Guide to the Environmental Art Movement. — Built In Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23866201 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you’ve been listening to Decoder or the Vergecast for a while, you know that I am obsessed with Google Search, the web, and how both of those things might change in the age of AI. But to really understand how something might change, you have to step back and understand what it is right now.  So today I’m talking with Verge platforms reporter Mia Sato about Google Search, the industries it’s created, and more importantly, how relentless search engine optimization, or SEO, has utterly changed the web in its image. Mia and I really dug into this to explain why search results are so terrible now, what Google is trying to do about it, and why this is such an important issue for the future of the internet. Links:  How Google is killing independent sites like ours — HouseFresh How Google perfected the web — The Verge The people who ruined the internet — The Verge A storefront for robots — The Verge The end of the Googleverse — The Verge The unsettling scourge of obituary spam — The Verge What happens when Google Search doesn’t have the answers? — The Verge The AI takeover of Google Search starts now — The Verge AI is killing the old web, and the new web struggles to be born — The Verge Google is starting to squash more spam and AI in search results — The Verge Ethics Statement — The Verge Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. Our supervising producer is Liam James.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to Kyle Chayka, a staff writer for The New Yorker, a regular contributor to The Verge, and author of the new book Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture. Kyle has been writing for years now about how the culture of big social media platforms bleeds into real life, first affecting how things look, and now shaping how and what culture is created and the mechanisms by which that culture spreads all around the world.  If you’ve been listening to Decoder, this is all going to sound very familiar. The core thesis of Kyle’s book — that algorithmic recommendations make everything feel the same — hits at an idea that we’ve talked about countless times on the show: that how content is distributed shapes what content is made. So I was really excited to sit down with Kyle and dig into Filterworld and his thoughts on how this happened and what we might be able to do about it. Links:  Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture — Kyle Chayka Welcome to AirSpace — The Verge The Stanley water bottle craze, explained — Vox TikTok and the vibes revival — The New Yorker Why the internet isn’t fun anymore — The New Yorker The age of algorithmic anxiety — The New Yorker Lo-fi beats to quarantine to are booming on YouTube — The Verge Taylor Swift has encouraged her fans' numerology habit yet again — AV Club How fandom built the internet as we know it, with Kaitlyn Tiffany — Decoder Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23858379 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our Thursday episodes are all about big topics in the news, and this week we’re wrapping up our short series on one of the biggest topics of all: generative AI. In our last couple episodes, we talked a lot about some of the biggest, most complicated legal and policy questions surrounding the modern AI industry, including copyright lawsuits and deepfake legislation. But we wanted to end on a more personal note: How is this technology making people feel, and in particular how is it affecting how people communicate and connect? Verge reporter Miya David has covered AI chatbots — specifically AI romance bots — quite a bit, so we invited her onto the show to talk about how generative AI is finding its way into dating. We not only discussed how this technology is affecting dating apps and human relationships, but also how the boom in AI chatbot sophistication is laying the groundwork for a generation of people who might form meaningful relationships with so-called AI companions. Links:  Speak, Memory — The Verge A conversation with Bing’s chatbot left me deeply unsettled — NYT Google suspends engineer who claims its AI is sentient — The Verge The law of AI girlfriends — The Verge Replika’s new AI therapy app tries to bring you to a zen island — The Verge Replika’s new AI app is like Tinder but with sexy chatbots — Gizmodo Don’t date robots; their privacy policies are terrible — The Verge AI is shaking up online dating with chatbots that are ‘flirty but not too flirty’ — CNBC Loneliness and suicide mitigation for students using GPT3-enabled chatbots — Nature Virtual valentine: People are turning to AI in search of emotional connections — CBS Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23856679 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On this special episode of Decoder, science educator and YouTuber Hank Green is guest hosting. And the guest? It’s Nilay Patel, who sat down with Hank to discuss building The Verge, the state of media, and the future of the web. Also: whether the fediverse is worth investing in, and how social platforms’ control of distribution has shaped the internet. In the words of Hank: “Nilay has got some weird ideas about the internet. For example, that he’s going to revolutionize the media through blog posts. He keeps saying it, but what the hell does he mean? While I was busy building my business on other people’s platforms, Nilay has built something very rare in the year 2024: a website that publishes content and isn’t behind a paywall yet still makes money. How does he do it? How does he make decisions? How is The Verge structured? The tables have turned.” Links: Why Hank Green can’t quit YouTube for TikTok — Decoder Platformer’s Casey Newton on surviving the great media collapse and what comes next — Decoder Just buy this Brother laser printer everyone has, it’s fine — The Verge Sports Illustrated Published Articles by Fake, AI-Generated Writers — Futurism The fediverse, explained — The Verge Can ActivityPub save the internet? — The Verge Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23851875 The Vergecast and Decoder are live at SXSW this weekend, March 8th and 9th. SXSW attendees can see both shows live on the official Vox Media Podcast Stage at the JW Marriott, presented by Atlassian. Learn more at voxmedia.com/live. Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our new Thursday episodes of Decoder are all about deep dives into big topics in the news, and this week we’re continuing our mini-series on one of the biggest topics of all: generative AI. Last week, we took a look at the wave of copyright lawsuits that might eventually grind this whole industry to a halt. Those are basically a coin flip — and the outcomes are off in the distance, as those cases wind their way through the legal system.  A bigger problem right now is that AI systems are really good at making just believable enough fake images and audio — and with tools like OpenAI’s new Sora, maybe video soon, too. And of course, it’s once again a presidential election year here in the US. So today, Verge policy editor Adi Robertson joins the show to discuss how AI might supercharge disinformation and lies in an election that’s already as contentious as any in our lifetimes — and what might be done about it. Links:  How the Mueller report indicts social networks Twitter permanently bans Trump Meta allows Trump back on Facebook and Instagram No Fakes Act wants to protect actors and singers from unauthorized AI replicas White House calls for legislation to stop Taylor Swift AI fakes Watermarks aren’t the silver bullet for AI misinformation AI Drake just set an impossible legal trap for Google Barack Obama on AI, free speech, and the future of the internet Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Rahul Purini, the president of Crunchyroll, a streaming service focused entirely on anime — and really, the biggest anime service still going. Rahul has a long history with anime: he spent more than seven years at Funimation, a company that started in the 90s to distribute Dragon Ball Z to US audiences, before getting the top job at Crunchyroll. Anime might seem like niche content, but it’s not nearly as niche as you might think – our colleagues over at Polygon just ran a huge survey of anime viewers and found that 42% of Gen Z and 25% of millennials watch anime regularly. And Crunchyroll is growing with that audience — like most entertainment providers, the service absolutely exploded during the pandemic, going from 5 million paying subscribers in 2021 to more than 13 million as of last month.  But interestingly Rahul says Crunchyroll’s growth isn’t being driven by more and more people watching anime, but more and more anime fans — especially those watching pirated content — choosing to pay for it. Links:  Anime is huge, and we finally have numbers to prove it — Polygon Funimation is shutting down — and taking your digital library with it — The Verge Sony completes acquisition of Crunchyroll from AT&T — The Verge Funimation’s anime library is moving over to Crunchyroll — The Verge Crunchyroll now has more than 13 Million subscribers — Cord Cutters News Crunchyroll's CEO Colin Decker leaves company; Rahul Purini becomes new president — Anime News Network PlayStation keeps reminding us why digital ownership sucks — The Verge Sony’s Crunchyroll launches free 24-hour streaming channel — Variety Crunchyroll is adding mobile games to its subscription — The Verge How Is Funimation producing so many simuldubs? — Anime News Network Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23845221 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Decoder team is off this week. We’ll be back next week with both the interview and the new explainer episodes; we’re really excited about what’s on the schedule here.  In the meantime, I thought you all might enjoy a conversation I had with Kara Swisher, the Wall Street Journal’s Joanna Stern and Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman about the Apple Vision Pro. All of us have been covering Apple for a very long time, and we had a lot of fun swapping impressions, talking strategy, and sharing what we liked, and didn’t like, about Apple’s $3,500 headset.  Links:  Apple Vision Pro review: magic, until it’s not — The Verge The shine comes off the Vision Pro — The Verge Everything we know about Apple’s Vision Pro — The Verge Why some of Apple’s biggest fans are returning their Vision Pros — Bloomberg Apple’s Vision Pro Is an iPad killer, but not anytime soon — Bloomberg I worked, cooked and even skied with the new Apple Vision Pro — WSJ Vision Pro review: 24 hours in Apple’s mixed-reality headset — WSJ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our new Thursday episodes are all about deep dives into big topics in the news, and for the next few weeks we’re going to stay focused on one of the biggest topics of all: generative AI. There’s a lot going on in the world of generative AI, but maybe the biggest is the increasing number of copyright lawsuits being filed against AI companies like OpenAI and StabilityAI. So for this episode, we’re going to talk about those cases, and the main defense the AI companies are relying on: an idea called fair use. To help explain this mess, I talked with Sarah Jeong. Sarah is a former lawyer and a features editor here at The Verge, and she is also one of my very favorite people to talk to about copyright. I promise you we didn’t get totally off the rails nerding out about it, but we went a little off the rails. The first thing we had to figure out was: How big a deal are these AI copyright suits? Links:  The New York Times sues OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement --- The Verge The scary truth about AI copyright is nobody knows what will happen next — The Verge How copyright lawsuits could kill OpenAI — Vox How Adobe is managing the AI copyright dilemma, with general counsel Dana Rao --- The Verge Generative AI Has a visual plagiarism problem - IEEE Spectrum George Carlin estate sues creators of AI-generated comedy special — THR AI-Generated Taylor Swift porn went viral on Twitter. Here's how it got there — 404 Media AI copyright lawsuit hinges on the legal concept of ‘fair use’ — The Washington Post Intellectual property experts discuss fair use in the age of AI — Harvard Law School OpenAI says it’s “impossible” to create useful AI models without copyrighted material — Ars Technica Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Jonathan Kanter, the Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Antitrust Division at the Department of Justice. Alongside FTC chair Lina Khan, Jonathan is one of the most prominent figures in the big shift happening in competition and antitrust in the United States. This is a fun episode: we taped this conversation live on stage at the Digital Content Next conference in Charleston, South Carolina a few days ago, so you’ll hear the audience, which was a group of fancy media company executives.  You’ll also hear me joke about Google a few times; fancy media execs are very interested in the cases the DOJ has brought against Google for monopolizing search and advertising tech — and Jonathan was very good at not commenting about pending litigation. But he did have a lot to say about the state of tech regulation, he and Khan’s track record so far, and why he thinks the concepts they’re pushing forward are more accessible than they’ve ever been. Links:  The top Biden lawyer with his sights on Apple and Google — Politico Judge blocks a merger of Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster — NYT FTC’s Khan and DOJ’s Kanter beat back deals at fastest clip in decades — Bloomberg Google will face another antitrust trial September 9th, this time over ad tech — The Verge In the Google antitrust trial, defaults are everything and nobody likes Bing — The Verge Google Search, Chrome, and Android are all changing thanks to EU antitrust law — The Verge Aggregation Theory — Stratechery Adobe explains why it abandoned the Figma deal — The Verge How the EU’s DMA is changing Big Tech — The Verge Epic Games CEO calls out Apple’s DMA rules as ‘malicious compliance’ — TechCrunch Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23831914 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’re very excited for today’s episode, because from now on we’ll be delivering you two Decoders every week. On Monday’s we’ll have our classic interviews with CEOs and other high-profile guests. But our new shorter Thursday episode – like today’s – will explain big topics in the news with Verge reporters, experts, and other friends of the show.  The big idea we’re going to jump into today does in fact have a lot of problems: electric vehicle adoption in the US. We invited Verge Transportation Editor Andy Hawkins, who’s been covering the EV transition for years, to walk us through what’s happening.  Late last year, Andy wrote a fantastic article called, “The EV Transition trips over its own cord.” It was all about the kind of paradox of the EV market right now: The momentum for electric cars in America feels like it’s started to hit serious snags, even though more people than ever before are going fully electric. The stakes are high, and there’s a lot going on. Let’s get into it.  Links:  The EV transition trips over its own cord — The Verge We’re down to just a handful of EVs that qualify for the full US tax credit — The Verge Electric cars were having issues. Then things got political — WSJ Tesla is becoming a partisan brand, says survey — Eletrek 16 Republican governors urge Biden EPA to roll back proposed electric vehicle standards — USA Today Slow rollout of national charging system could hinder EV adoption — NYT Want to stare into the Republican soul in 2023? — Slate Biden vetoes Republican measure to block electric vehicle charging stations — NYT The Biden administration is pumping more money into EV charging infrastructure — The Verge GM should just bring back the Chevy Volt — The Verge Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Casey Newton, the founder and editor of the Platformer newsletter and co-host of the Hard Fork podcast. Casey is also a former editor here at The Verge and was my co-host at the Code Conference last year. Most importantly, Casey and I are also very close friends, so this episode is a little looser than usual.  I wanted to talk to Casey for a few reasons. One, the media industry overall is falling apart, with huge layoffs at almost every media organization you can think of happening weekly, but small newsletters seem to be a bright spot. So I wanted to talk about how Platformer started, how Casey got it to where it is, and how much farther he thinks it can go. And then, I wanted to talk about Substack. It’s the newsletter platform Paltformer used to call its home, but content moderation problems — including its decision to allow Nazis to monetize on the platform — have pushed away a number of its customers, including Platformer.  This episode goes deep, but it’s fun — Casey is just one of my favorite people, and he is not shy about saying what he thinks. Links:  Can Substack CEO Chris Best build a new model for journalism? — The Verge Substack launches its Twitter-like Notes — The Verge Substack Has a Nazi Problem — The Atlantic Substack says it will remove Nazi publications from the platform --- Platformer Substack keeps the Nazis, loses Platformer — The Verge  Why Platformer is leaving Substack — Platformer The Messenger to close after less than a year — The New York Times Do countries with better-funded public media also have healthier democracies? — Nieman Lab AI is killing the old web, and the new web struggles to be born — The Verge The Biden deepfake robocall Is only the beginning — WIRED Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23823565 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Senator Brian Schatz, of Hawaii. We joke that Decoder is ultimately a show about org charts, but there’s a lot of truth to it. We talked about the separate offices he has to balance against each other, and the concessions he has to make to work within the Senate structure. We also talked a lot about two of the biggest issues in tech regulation today. One is Europe, which is doing a lot of regulation while the US does almost none. How does a senator think about the U.S. all but abdicating that space? The other is one of the few places the US is trying to take action right now: children’s online safety. Schatz is involved with two pieces of child safety legislation, the Kids Online Safety Act and the Protecting Kids on Social Media Act, that could fundamentally reshape online life for teens and children across the country. But the big stumbling block for passing any laws about content moderation is, of course, the First Amendment. Links:  Strict Scrutiny — LII / Legal Information Institute The Uniquely American Future of US Authoritarianism — WIRED How the EU’s DMA is changing Big Tech: all of the news and updates — The Verge AI Labeling Act of 2023 (S. 2691) — GovTrack.us Mark Zuckerberg testimony: senators seem really confused about Facebook — Vox Big Tech and the Online Child Sexual Exploitation Crisis — Senate Judiciary Committee AI tools will make it easy to create fake porn of just about anybody — The Verge They thought loved ones were calling for help. It was an AI scam — The Washington Post. Protecting Kids on Social Media Act (S, 1291) — GovTrack.us Kids Online Safety Act (S. 1409) — GovTrack.us Kids Online Safety Shouldn’t Require Massive Online Censorship and Surveillance — EFF TikTok ban: all the news on attempts to ban the video platform — The Verge Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23818699 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Representative Ro Khanna, a Democrat from California. He’s been in Congress for eight years now, representing California’s 17th District, which is arguably the highest-tech district in the entire country. You’ll hear him say a couple of times that there’s $10 trillion of tech market value in his district, and that’s not an exaggeration: Apple, Intel, and Nvidia are all headquartered in his district, along with important new AI firms like Anthropic and OpenAI.  I wanted to know how Khanna thinks about representing those companies but also the regular people in his district; the last time I spoke to him, in 2018, he reminded me that he’s got plenty of teachers and firefighters to represent as well. But the politics of tech have changed a lot in these past few years — and things are only going to get both more complicated and more tense as Trump and Biden head into what will obviously be a contentious and bitter presidential election. Links:  Democrats must not repeat the mistakes of globalization California bill to ban driverless autonomous trucks goes to Newsom's desk In labor snub, California governor vetoes bill that would have limited self-driving trucks A lawyer used ChatGPT and now has to answer for its ‘bogus’ citations Barack Obama on AI, free speech, and the future of the internet Music streaming platforms must pay artists more, says EU Sideloading and other changes are coming to iOS in the EU soon Clock running out on antitrust bill targeting big tech Silicon Valley’s Rep. Ro Khanna talks Congress’ plans to regulate Big Tech Trump pushing Microsoft to buy TikTok was ‘strangest thing I’ve ever worked on,’ says Satya Nadella Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23810838 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I'm talking to Dana Rao, who is General Counsel and Chief Trust Officer at Adobe. Now, if you're a longtime Decoder listener, you know that I have always been fascinated with Adobe, which I think the tech press largely undercovers. If you're interested in how creativity happens, you're kind of necessarily interested in what Adobe's up to. And it is fascinating to consider how Dana's job as Adobe's top lawyer is really at the center of the company's future.  The copyright issues with generative AI are so unknown and unfolding so fast that they will necessarily shape what kind of products Adobe can even make in the future, and what people can make with those products. The company also just tried and failed to buy the popular upstart design company Figma, a potentially $20 billion deal that was shut down over antitrust concerns in the European Union. So Dana and I had a lot to talk about. Links:  Adobe abandons $20 billion acquisition of Figma Adobe explains why it abandoned the Figma deal Why Figma is selling to Adobe for $20 billion, with CEO Dylan Field Figma’s CEO laments demise of $20 billion deal with Adobe Adobe proposes anti-impersonation law Adobe’s Dana Rao doesn’t want you to get duped by A The New York Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft Adobe’s Photoshop on the web launch includes its popular desktop AI tools Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23791239 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

2023 will go down as the year that Elon Musk killed Twitter. First he did it in a big way, by buying the company, firing most of the employees, and destabilizing the platform; then he did it in a small, but important, symbolic way, by renaming the company X and trying to make a full break with what came before. So now that the story of the company named Twitter is officially over, it felt important to stop and ask: What was Twitter, anyway, and why were so many powerful people obsessed with it for so long? In this special episode, I sat down with Marty Baron, former executive editor of The Washington Post, and Zoe Schiffer, managing editor of Platform and author of Extremely Hardcore: Inside Elon Musk’s Twitter. We discussed how two of Twitter’s most dedicated power users – Donald Trump and Elon Musk — were addicted to the platform, defined it, changed it, broke it, and then put it to rest. Links:  The year Twitter died: a special series from The Verge Extremely softcore Inside Elon Musk's “extremely hardcore” Twitter How Twitter broke the news Trump vs. Twitter: The president takes on social media moderation Martin Baron recounts leading The Washington Post during the Trump era Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ryan Petersen is the founder and CEO of Flexport, which makes software to optimize shipping everything from huge containers to ecommerce deliveries. It’s a fascinating company; we had Ryan on to explain it last year. Right around the first time we spoke, Ryan handed off the CEO role to 20-year Amazon veteran Dave Clark. Then, barely a year later, Dave got fired, and Ryan returned after CEO. I always joke that Decoder is a show about org charts… so why did Ryan make and then unmake the biggest org chart decision there is?  Links:  Can software simplify the supply chain? Ryan Petersen thinks so - The Verge Amazon consumer chief Dave Clark to join Flexport as its new CEO Flexport CEO Dave Clark resigns from logistics startup after one year in the role Flexport founder publicly slams his handpicked successor for hiring spree, rescinds offers Ousted Flexport CEO Dave Clark strikes back The real story behind a tech founder's 'tweetstorm that saves Christmas' Panama Canal has gotten so dry and backed up after brutal drought that shippers are paying up to $4m to jump the queue When Shipping Containers Sink in the Drink | The New Yorker Transcript:  https://www.theverge.com/e/23770977 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The US Digital Service has a fascinating structure: it comprises nearly 250 people, all of whom serve two-year stints developing apps, improving websites, and streamlining government services. You could call USDS the product and design consultancy for the rest of the government. The Obama administration launched the USDS in 2014, after the disastrous rollout of healthcare.gov and the tech sprint that saved it. USDS administrator Mina Hsiang explains to Decoder how it all works, and what she hopes it can do next. Links:  Here’s Why Healthcare.gov Broke Down (2013) Obamacare's 'tech surge' adds manpower to an already-bloated project (2013) Decoder: Barack Obama on AI, free speech, and the future of the internet Jeff Bezos Confirmed the "Question Mark Method" A comprehensive list of 2023 tech layoffs Tech to Gov U.S. Digital Corps Presidential Innovation Fellows AI.gov United States Digital Service Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23761681 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

IBM made some announcements this week about its plans for the next ten years of quantum computing: there are new chips, new computers, and new APIs. Quantum computers could in theory entirely revolutionize the way we think of computers… if, that is, someone can build one that’s actually useful. Jerry Chow, director of quantum systems at IBM, explains to Decoder just how close the field is to actual utility.   Links:  What is a Qubit? | Microsoft Azure IBM Quantum Summit 2023 The Wired Guide to Quantum Computing IBM Makes Quantum Computing Available on IBM Cloud to Accelerate Innovation (2016) Multiple Patterning - Semiconductor Engineering IBM Quantum Roadmap (2023) That viral LK-99 ‘superconductor’ isn’t a superconductor after all - The Verge NIST to Standardize Encryption Algorithms That Can Resist Attack by Quantum Computers Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23752312 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge, and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today I’m talking with Avishai Abrahami, the CEO of Wix. You might know Wix as a website builder. It’s a competitor to WordPress and Squarespace. Tons of sites across the web run on Wix. But the web is changing rapidly, and Wix’s business today is less about web publishing, and more about providing software to help business owners run their entire companies. It’s fascinating, and Avishai has built a fascinating structure inside of Wix to make all that happen.   Wix is also an Israeli company. Avishai joined from the company’s headquarters in Tel Aviv. And I’ll just tell you right up front that we talked about Israel’s war with Hamas and its impact on the company. And that this conversation was not always comfortable. But the main theme of our conversation was, of course, the future of the web, especially a web that seems destined to be overrun by cheap AI-generated SEO spam. Links:  Doom runs on Excel Wix will let you build an entire website using only AI prompts Wix.com Launches Wix ADI and Delivers the Future of website creation YouTube is going to start cracking down on AI clones of musicians The people who ruined the internet The restaurant nearest Google OpenAI can’t tell if something was written by AI after all AI is killing the old web, and the new web struggles to be born Squarespace CEO Anthony Casalena on why anyone makes a website in 2023 What will changing Section 230 mean for the internet? Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23742026 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What actually happened at OpenAI in the last three days? Decoder host and Verge editor-in-chief Nilay Patel talks with Verge editors Alex Heath and David Pierce to break it down and try to work out what's next. Further reading: Sam Altman fired as CEO of OpenAI OpenAI’s new CEO is Twitch co-founder Emmett Shear OpenAI board in discussions with Sam Altman to return as CEO Emmett Shear named new CEO of OpenAI by board Microsoft hires former OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Hundreds of OpenAI employees threaten to resign and join Microsoft Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO We’re doing a survey on how people use The Verge (and what they’d want from a Verge subscription). If you’re interested in helping us out, you can fill out the survey right here: http://theverge.com/survey Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Liam James, Kate Cox, and Nick Statt. It was edited by Andru Marino.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to Jim Rowan, the CEO of Volvo Cars. Now, Jim’s only been at Volvo for a short time. He took over in 2022 after a decades-long career in the consumer electronics industry. Before Volvo, his two longest stints were at BlackBerry, whose QNX software is used in tons of cars, and then at Dyson, which once tried and failed to make an electric car. Jim and I talked a lot about how that unique experience has influenced how he thinks about the transformational changes happening in the world of cars. For Volvo, the stakes are high. The company has pledged to be all-electric by the end of the decade, and Jim is also making some very different bets on software and revenue than the rest of the car industry. Jim’s view is that automakers are undergoing three major shifts all at once: electrification, autonomy, and direct-to-consumer sales. With Volvo, Jim is trying to steer the ship through these changes and come out an EV-only carmaker on the other end. Links: Volvo plans to sell only electric cars by 2030 Volvo’s EX90 is a powerful computer that also happens to be an impeccably designed EV Can Polestar design a new kind of car company? The EV transition trips over its own cord Volvo’s upcoming EVs join the Tesla Supercharger bandwagon Future Volvo cars to run on Volvo operating system Audi and Volvo will use Android as the operating system in upcoming cars Volvo’s first EV will run native Android The rest of the auto industry still loves CarPlay and Android Auto The future of cars is a subscription nightmare Everybody hates GM’s decision to kill Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for its EVs Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23722862 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’ve got a good one today. I’m talking to former President Barack Obama about AI, social networks, and how to think about democracy as both of those things collide.  I sat down with Obama last week at his offices in Washington, DC, just hours after President Joe Biden signed a sweeping executive order about AI. You’ll hear Obama say he’s been talking to the Biden administration and leaders across the tech industry about AI and how best to regulate it. My idea here was to talk to Obama the constitutional law professor more than Obama the politician. So this one got wonky fast.  You’ll also hear him say that he joined our show because he wanted to reach you, the Decoder audience, and get you all thinking about these problems. One of Obama’s worries is that the government needs insight and expertise to properly regulate AI, and you’ll hear him make a pitch for why people with that expertise should take a tour of duty in the government to make sure we get these things right. Links:  Biden releases AI executive order directing agencies to develop safety guidelines Clarence Thomas really wants Congress to regulate Twitter moderation Google CEO Sundar Pichai compares impact of AI to electricity and fire Sam Altman sells superintelligent sunshine as protestors call for AGI pause The Skokie case: How I came to represent the free speech rights of Nazis Disinformation is a threat to our democracy World leaders are gathering at the U.K.'s AI Summit. Doom is on the agenda. George R.R. Martin and other authors sue OpenAI for copyright infringement A conversation with Bing’s chatbot left me deeply unsettled Introducing the AI Mirror Test, which very smart people keep failing Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23712912 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today I'm talking with Golnar Khosrowshahi, the founder and CEO of Reservoir Media, a newer record label that I think looks a lot like the future of the music industry. As Golnar explains, Reservoir thinks of individual songs as assets, and after acquiring them, the company sets about monetizing those assets in various ways. This is a copyright-based business in an age where copyright is under a lot of pressure — from TikTok, generative AI, and all of the now-familiar threats to the music business. If you're a Decoder listener, you know that I love thinking about the music industry. Whatever technology does to music, it does to everything else five years later. So paying attention to music is the best way I know to get ahead of the curve. I also just love music. Golnar is herself a musician. She obviously cares about music a lot, and she's clearly given a lot of thought to what happens next. So this was a great conversation.  Links: Drake’s AI clone is here — and Drake might not be able to stop him Hipgnosis made mega deals for song catalogs. Its future Is unclear. Reservoir acquires iconic Tommy Boy Music for $100 million Ed Sheeran wins copyright case over Marvin Gaye’s ‘Let’s Get It On’ Spotify is reportedly making major changes to its royalty model Hipgnosis shareholders vote against continuation of UK-listed music investment trust AI can actually help protect creativity and copyrights Google and YouTube are trying to have it both ways with AI and copyright No Fakes Act wants to protect actors and singers from unauthorized AI replicas ‘Glocalisation’ of music streaming within and across Europe Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23702539 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to internet policy legend Lawrence Lessig. He's been teaching law for more than 30 years, and is a defining expert on free speech and the internet — and something of a hero of mine, whose works I've been reading since college. You’ll hear us agree that the internet at this moment in time is absolutely flooded with disinformation, misinformation, and other really toxic stuff that’s harmful to us as individuals and, frankly, to our future as a functioning democracy. But you’ll also hear us disagree a fair amount about what to do about it. The First Amendment, AI, copyright law — there's a lot to unpack here. Links:  https://asml.cyber.harvard.edu/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/10/17/1081194/how-to-fix-the-internet-online-discourse/ https://www.protocol.com/facebook-papers https://www.tiktok.com/@aocinthehouse/video/7214318917135830318?lang=en https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/sensitive-claims-bias-facebook-relaxed-misinformation-rules-conservative-pages-n1236182 https://bigthink.com/neuropsych/repetition-lie-truth-propaganda/ https://www.theverge.com/23883027/alvarez-stolen-valor-first-amendment-kosseff-liar-crowded-theater https://fortune.com/2023/05/30/sam-altman-ai-risk-of-extinction-pandemics-nuclear-warfare/ https://www.americanbar.org/groups/intellectual_property_law/publications/landslide/2019-20/september-october/into-fandomverse/ Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23693274 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking to Kashmir Hill, a New York Times reporter whose new book, Your Face Belongs to Us: A Secretive Startup’s Quest to End Privacy as We Know It, chronicles the story of Clearview AI, a company that’s built some of the most sophisticated facial recognition and search technology that’s ever existed. As Kashmir reports, you simply plug a photo of someone into Clearview’s app, and it will find every photo of that person that’s ever been posted on the internet. It’s breathtaking and scary. Kashmir was the journalist who broke the first story about Clearview’s existence, starting with a bombshell investigation report that blew the doors open on the company’s clandestine operations. Over the past few years, she’s been relentlessly reporting on Clearview’s growth, the privacy implications of facial recognition technology, and all of the cautionary tales that inevitably popped up, from wrongful arrests to billionaires using the technology for personal vendettas. The book is fantastic. If you’re a Decoder listener, you’re going to love it, and I highly recommend it.  Links:  The secretive company that may end privacy as we know it What we learned about Clearview AI and its secret ‘co-founder’ Clearview AI does well in another round of facial recognition accuracy tests hiQ and LinkedIn reach proposed settlement in landmark scraping case My chilling run-in with a secretive facial-recognition app Clearview’s facial recognition app Is identifying child victims of abuse ‘Thousands of dollars for something I didn’t do’ How we store and search 30 billion faces Clearview AI agrees to permanent ban on selling facial recognition to private companies Clearview fined again in France for failing to comply with privacy orders Privacy law prevents Illinoisans from using Google app’s selfie art feature Madison Square Garden uses facial recognition to ban its owner’s enemies Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23683175 Credits:  Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today we’re bringing you the last of our live-on-stage interviews from the 2023 Code Conference. Verge deputy editor Alex Heath sat down to chat with Roblox CEO David Baszucki.  Roblox definitely started out as a kid thing, but the company has big plans to change all that, and Alex got to find out a bit about how that’s going. Roblox is determined to be a platform, even more than a product — something users can develop games and experiences on. And of course, David and Alex spoke about AI. David sees a lot of opportunity for generative AI to help content creators on the Roblox platform in the not-so-distant future.  Links:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfYz8weQm4M https://techcrunch.com/2023/09/21/roblox-cuts-30-on-talent-acquisition-team-as-hiring-slows/ https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/8/23864858/roblox-ceo-prediction-adults-dating-experiences-rdc-2023 https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/27/23889307/meta-ray-ban-smart-glasses-wearables-connect https://www.theverge.com/23775268/roblox-ceo-david-baszucki-gaming-metaverse-robux-virtual-reality https://mashable.com/article/karlie-kloss-roblox-klossette https://www.theverge.com/23734209/parsons-roblox-design-class-metaverse-fashion Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23677085 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Amanda Rose Smith. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’ve got another interview from the Code Conference today. My friend and co-host, CNBC’s Julia Boorstin, and I had a chance to talk with Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe. Rivian is a newer company — RJ started it in 2009, and it took more than 10 years to start shipping cars to consumers. But its first vehicle, the R1T pickup, made a big splash when it arrived in 2021, and the company has more back orders for both the R1T and its second vehicle, the R1S SUV, than it can handle. For now. We asked RJ about that production ramp and whether Rivian can meet demand, and whether it’s just early adopters buying EVs or if they’ve finally gone mainstream. The conversation also touched on Rivian’s deal with Amazon and the auto industry’s push toward subscription features. And, of course, I had to ask Scaringe about the Cybertruck. How could I resist?! Links:  BMW starts selling heated seat subscriptions for $18 a month BMW drops plan to charge a monthly fee for heated seats U.A.W. expands strikes at automakers: Here’s what to know. Rivian boosts EV production target as supply problems ease Ford F-150 Lightning gets $10K price cut as ramping supply meets demand First look at Cybertruck’s comically large windshield wiper in action Amazon says it has ‘over a thousand’ Rivian electric vans making deliveries in the US Rivian to adopt Tesla's charging standard in EVs and chargers Rivian electric pickup caught fire while charging at Electrify America station Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23672708 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Callie Wright. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Last week, when I was co-hosting the Code Conference, I got to talk with Getty Images CEO Craig Peters. The generative AI boom is a direct threat to Getty in many ways. For example, the company is suing Stability AI for training the Stable Diffusion model on Getty content — sometimes clearly including AI-generated copies of the Getty watermark — without permission. Getty's answer? Its own proprietary, in-house AI tool, trained — with permission — on its own content, using a model where the original creators can get paid. Getty's put some pretty strict guardrails around it for now, but, as even Craig told us, there's still a lot of work to do. Links:  https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/21/23364696/getty-images-ai-ban-generated-artwork-illustration-copyright https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/6/23587393/ai-art-copyright-lawsuit-getty-images-stable-diffusion https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/25/23884679/getty-ai-generative-image-platform-launch https://www.theverge.com/23900198/microsoft-kevin-scott-ai-art-bing-google-nvidia-decoder-interview https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/06/section-230-the-internet-law-politicians-love-to-hate-explained/ https://www.npr.org/2023/05/18/1176881182/supreme-court-sides-against-andy-warhol-foundation-in-copyright-infringement-cas https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/26/23808184/big-ai-really-wants-to-convince-us-that-theyre-cautious https://journal.everypixel.com/ai-image-statistics https://www.npr.org/2023/05/22/1177590231/fake-viral-images-of-an-explosion-at-the-pentagon-were-probably-created-by-ai Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23667741 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and was edited by Amanda Rose Smith. The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I co-hosted the Code Conference last week, and today’s episode is one of my favorite conversations from the show: Microsoft CTO and EVP of AI Kevin Scott. If you caught Kevin on Decoder a few months ago, you know that he and I love talking about technology together. I really appreciate that he thinks about the relationship between technology and culture as much as we do at The Verge, and it was great to add the energy from the live Code audience to that dynamic. Kevin and I talked about how things are going with Bing and Microsoft’s AI efforts, as well the company’s relationship with Nvidia and whether it's planning to develop its own AI chips. I also asked Kevin some pretty philosophical questions about AI: Why would you write a song or a book when AI is out there making custom content for other people? Well, it’s because Kevin thinks the AI is still “terrible” at it for now, as Kevin found out firsthand. But he also thinks that creating is just what people do, and AI will help more people become more creative. Links:  Microsoft CTO Kevin Scott thinks Sydney might make a comeback Hands-on with the new Bing: Microsoft’s step beyond ChatGPT Microsoft Bing hits 100 million active users in bid to grab share from Google How Microsoft is trying to lessen Its addiction to OpenAI as AI costs soar AMD CEO Lisa Su on the AI revolution and competing with Nvidia Microsoft's tiny Phi-1 language model shows how important data quality is for AI training Microsoft says listing the Ottawa Food Bank as a tourist destination wasn’t the result of ‘unsupervised AI’ Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/23664239 Credits: Decoder is a production of The Verge and is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Today’s episode was produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt. It was edited by Callie Wright.  The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder. Our Editorial Director is Brooke Minters and our Executive Producer is Eleanor Donovan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices