IM 851: Intelligent Machines Best of 2025 - Our Favorite Interviews from 2025

Our interviews with: Ray Kurzweil Alex Hanna Emily Bender Mike Masnick Pliny the Liberator Kevin Kelly Host: Leo Laporte Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free audio and video feeds, a members-only Discord, and exclusive content. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit

Forget the "AI is killing the planet" panic—this episode unpacks what's actually driving tech's power grab, the financial bubble no one wants to talk about, and why the big models are starting to look eerily similar. CJ Trowbridge - cjtrowbridge.com - https://www.tiktok.com/@cjtrowbridge Gemini 3 Flash: frontier intelligence built for speed The new ChatGPT Images is here | OpenAI Last Week on My Mac: How good is AI at solving Mac problems? Time Magazine's 'Person of the Year': the Architects of AI - Slashdot OpenAI are quietly adopting skills, now available in ChatGPT and Codex CLI "I was forced to use AI until the day I was laid off." Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry Roomba Maker iRobot Files for Bankruptcy, With Chinese Supplier Taking Control Coursera to buy Udemy, creating $2.5 billion firm to target AI training Purdue University Approves New AI Requirement For All Undergrads It's beginning to look a lot like (AI) Christmas Trump Pretends To Block State AI Laws; Media Pretends That's Legal This major cruise line just banned Meta Ray-Ban and other smart glasses — is this category already doomed? Woman Hailed as Hero for Smashing Man's Meta Smart Glasses on Subway Oscars Bolts from ABC to YouTube Starting in 2029 When AI Takes the Couch: Psychometric Jailbreaks Reveal Internal Conflict in Frontier Models Simulating Life Paths with Digital Twins: AI-Generated Future Selves Influence Decision-Making and Expand Human Choice The worst person in tech bracket Banned fonts Subway bagel rats Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau Guest: CJ Trowbridge Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free audio and video feeds, a members-only Discord, and exclusive content. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: agntcy.org auraframes.com/ink

What happens when every major AI model gets jailbroken within days? This week, the world's most prolific AI red teamer lifts the curtain on how and why "safe" AI might be an impossible promise. Pliny the Liberator | pliny.gg - discord.gg/basi ChatGPT Nears 900 Million Weekly Active Users But Gemini is Catching Up From Llamas to Avocados: Meta's shifting AI strategy is causing internal confusion Google Tells Advertisers It'll Bring Ads to Gemini in 2026 Meta Acquires Limiteless, an A.I. Pendant Company Backed by Sam Altman Here's how Google is laying the foundation for our mixed reality future OpenAI, Anthropic, and Block Are Teaming Up to Make AI Agents Play Nice Svedka's First Super Bowl Ad Will Be Made Primarily With AI AI Slop Is Ruining Reddit for Everyone TESCREALers paying journalists at major outlets to cover AI The Resonant Computing Manifesto (from Masnick) Techdirt fundraiser From Sam Lessin: Tech bros head to etiquette camp as Silicon Valley levels up its style Bare Metal Email Jeff in Austria Golden Globes enter the world of podcasts and tread carefully, avoiding controversy Who says AI isn't useful? Real-time Cricket Sorting By Sex Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Mike Elgan Guest: Pliny the Liberator Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free audio and video feeds, a members-only Discord, and exclusive content. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: auraframes.com/ink ventionteams.com/twit agntcy.org outsystems.com/twit

Spies aren't just in the shadows anymore—AI has turned every smartphone and social feed into a battlefield of influence and surveillance. This episode exposes how intelligence agencies, rogue states, and even TikTok are using machine learning to reshape what we know, believe, and fear. Apple AI Chief Retiring After Siri Failure Claude 4.5 Opus' Soul Document OpenAI CEO Declares 'Code Red' to Combat Threats to ChatGPT, Delays Ads Effort AI helps drive record $11.8 billion in Black Friday online spending I love AI. Why doesn't everyone? Dozens of US universities and colleges have announced new AI departments and programs over the last two years; an AI program is now MIT's second-largest major Austria's Rebel Nuns Refuse To Give Up Instagram To Stay In Their Convent Don't get angry, but the 2025 Oxford Word of the Year is 'rage bait' AI Slop Recipes Are Taking Over the Internet — And Thanksgiving Dinner The race to AGI-pill the pope Suno Creates an Entire Spotify Catalog's Worth of Music Every Two Weeks, Says Investor Pitch Deck for $250M Fundraise Hosts: Leo Laporte, Paris Martineau, and Jason Howell Guest: Dr. Anthony Vinci Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: Melissa.com/twit agntcy.org ventionteams.com/twit monarch.com with code IM

AI pioneer Emad Mostaque joins Intelligent Machines to predict the intelligence inversion that could make human cognitive labor economically obsolete within a few years. Are we on the brink of a world where AI not only replaces remote jobs, but outcompetes entire companies of people? Fox News hires Palantir to build AI newsroom tools White House pauses executive order that would seek to preempt state laws on AI, sources say Jony Ive, Sam Altman: OpenAI plans elegantly simple device Kicking Robots, by James Vincent Work is "optional" and irrelevant money: Musk's creepy utopian dream The Twins Pushing Elon Musk's Plans to Replace X Staff With Grok The prof crashed I'm a Professor. A.I. Has Changed My Classroom, but Not for the Worse. Lawn gone: Robotic lawnmower devastates sports field in Aurich Latest Yudkowsky nutballery: An International Agreement to Prevent the Premature Creation of Artificial Superintelligence AI-Salesman: Towards Reliable Large Language Model Driven Telemarketing Project Rachel: Can an AI Become a Scholarly Author? A beautiful Nic Cage commercial This stuffing recipe How Taco Bell Knows Exactly What You Want to Eat at 2 a.m. 'A nucleus of a community': the five-hour stage play about Dungeons & Dragons The Stahl House A $100,000 Robot Dog Is Becoming Standard in Policing — and Raising Ethical Alarms Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau Guest: Emad Mostaque Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: agntcy.org zscaler.com/security spaceship.com/twit ventionteams.com/twit

What does it take to build tech the world actually trusts? Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales joins the crew to dig into the real crisis behind AI, social networks, and the web: trust, and how to build it when the stakes are global. Teen founders raise $6M to reinvent pesticides using AI — and convince Paul Graham to join in Introducing SlopStop: Community-driven AI slop detection in Kagi Search Part 1: How I Found Out $1 billion AI company co-founder admits that its $100 a month transcription service was originally 'two guys surviving on pizza' and typing out notes by hand His announcement leaving Meta White House Working on Executive Order to Foil State AI Regulations Nvidia stock soars after results, forecasts top estimates with sales for AI chips 'off the charts' Jeff Bezos Creates A.I. Start-Up Where He Will Be Co-Chief Executive Jack Conte: I'm Building an Algorithm That Doesn't Rot Your Brain AI love, actually Cat island road trip: liquidator's warehouse Gentype The Carpenter's Son... My excerpt from the Q&A Image of the paper Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau Guest: Jimmy Wales Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: ventionteams.com/twit zapier.com/machines agntcy.org spaceship.com/twit

Can radical optimism about AI truly shape our future, or are we stuck in a cycle of doom-and-hype? This episode features an unfiltered debate with Wired co-founder Kevin Kelly on why most fears about artificial intelligence might be missing the bigger picture. Vibe Coding' Named Word of the Year By Collins Dictionary OpenAI CFO Says Company Isn't Seeking Government Backstop, Clarifying Prior Comment Montana Becomes First State to Enshrine 'Right to Compute' Into Law - Montana Newsroom Sam Altman's Worldcoin Project Struggles Toward Billion-User Ambition With 17.5 Million Sign-Ups Meta's chief AI scientist Yann LeCun reportedly plans to leave to build his own startup Exclusive: US Army to buy 1 million drones, in major acquisition ramp-up Facebook Dating Is a Surprise Hit For the Social Network - Slashdot 12 Things I've Heard Boomers Say That I Agree With 100% The FBI has subpoenaed the domain registrar of archive.today, demanding information about the owner of the archiving site as part of a criminal investigation How Similar Are Grokipedia and Wikipedia? What We Can Learn From Brain Organoids If the US Has to Build Data Centers, Here's Where They Should Go LLM-Based Multi-Agent System for Simulating and Analyzing Marketing and Consumer Behavior No. 10's synthetic voters Tim Wu and Cory Doctorow's NPCs: Non-Player Consumers Eric Schmidt: This Is No Way to Rule a Country My torture for you Ohio State to hire 100 new faculty with AI expertise 'A frightening development': How AI-Articles are flooding the internet with fake news Internet Archive's legal fights are over, but its founder mourns what was lost YouTube TV deal reportedly hung up on ESPN pricing as Disney loses $30 million a week How people really use ChatGPT, according to 47,000 conversations shared online Tort Law museum visit Bread and Puppet Museum We're famous in Germany Brand new bridge Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau Guest: Kevin Kelly Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: zapier.com/machines ventionteams.com/twit Melissa.com/twit agntcy.org

Is today's AI stuck as a "spiky superintelligence," brilliant at some things but clueless at others? This episode pulls back the curtain on a lunchroom full of AI researchers trading theories, strong opinions, and the next big risks on the path to real AGI. Why "Everyone Dies" Gets AGI All Wrong The Nonprofit Feeding the Entire Internet to AI Companies Google's First AI Ad Avoids the Uncanny Valley by Casting a Turkey Coca-Cola Is Trying Another AI Holiday Ad. Executives Say This Time Is Different Sam Altman shuts down question about how OpenAI can commit to spending $1.4 trillion while earning billions: 'Enough' How OpenAI Uses Complex and Circular Deals to Fuel Its Multibillion-Dollar Rise Perplexity's new AI tool aims to simplify patent research Kids Turn Podcast Comments Into Secret Chat Rooms, Because Of Course They Do Amazon and Perplexity have kicked off the great AI web browser fight Neural network finds an enzyme that can break down polyurethane Dictionary.com names 6-7 as 2025's word of the year Tech companies don't care that students use their AI agents to cheat The Morning After: Musk talks flying Teslas on Joe Rogan's show The Hatred of Podcasting | Brace Belden TikTok announces its first awards show in the US Google wants to build solar-powered data centers — in space Anthropic Projects $70 Billion in Revenue, $17 Billion in Cash Flow in 2028 American Museum of Tort Law Dog Chapel - Dog Mountain Nicvember masterlist Pornhub says UK visitors down 77% since age checks came in Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau Guest: Jeremy Berman Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: threatlocker.com/twit agntcy.org spaceship.com/twit monarch.com with code IM

Can an AI truly care about your feelings—or is emotional intelligence in machines just the most sophisticated form of manipulation? Dr. Alan Cowen of Hume AI joins the crew to unpack the promise and peril of emotionally adept bots, even as they're quietly shaping how we connect, seek help, and parent in the digital age. Virtual Try On Free Online - AI Clothes Changer | i-TryOn Oreo-maker Mondelez to use new generative AI tool to slash marketing costs OpenAI Moves to Generate AI Music in Potential Rivalry With Startup Suno Surprising no one, researchers confirm that AI chatbots are incredibly sycophantic Microsoft's Mico heightens the risks of parasocial LLM relationships Armed police swarm student after AI mistakes bag of Doritos for a weapon - Dexerto A Definition of AGI OpenAI Finalizes Corporate Restructuring, Gives Microsoft 27% Stake and Technology Access Until 2032 - Slashdot This mom's son was asking Tesla's Grok AI chatbot about soccer. It told him to send nude pics, she says Nvidia Becomes World's First $5 Trillion Company - Slashdot Paris Hilton Has Been Training Her AI for Years How Realistic is OpenAI's 2028 Timeline For Automating AI Research Itself? Tesla's "Mad Max" mode is now under federal scrutiny Zenni's Anti-Facial Recognition Glasses are Eyewear for Our Paranoid Age Alphabet earnings Meta earnings You Have No Idea How Screwed OpenAI Actually Is Elon Musk's Grokipedia Pushes Far-Right Talking Points AOL to be sold to Bending Spoons for roughly $1.5B Casio's Fluffy AI Robot Squeaked Its Way Into My Heart For the sake of the show, I will suffer this torture -jj Machine Olfaction and Embedded AI Are Shaping the New Global Sensing Industry A silly little photoshoot with your friends Bugonia Celebrating 25 years of Google Ads The Data Is In: The Washington Post Can't Replace Its "TikTok Guy" Peak screen? Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau Guest: Dr. Alan Cowen Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: zscaler.com/security zapier.com/machines agntcy.org ventionteams.com/twit

Is the future of artificial intelligence running on your desk instead of in massive data centers? This episode breaks down how Nvidia's Blackwell chip and HP's new ZGX Nano could let anyone fine-tune jaw-dropping language models at home—and why privacy, cost, and control are suddenly up for grabs. Introducing ChatGPT Atlas Claude Skills are awesome, maybe a bigger deal than MCP Leo... AI assistants make widespread errors about the news, new research shows The Majority AI View - Anil Dash OpenAI cracks down on Sora 2 deepfakes after pressure from Bryan Cranston, SAG-AFTRA Is Andrej Karpathy Right About Overhyped AI? Happy 18th Birthday to None Pizza Left Beef Originality.ai Hosts: Leo Laporte, Paris Martineau, and Mike Elgan Guests: Joey de Villa and Andrew Hawthorn Download or subscribe to Intelligent Machines at https://twit.tv/shows/intelligent-machines. Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts! Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit Sponsors: agntcy.org fieldofgreens.com Promo Code "IM" ventionteams.com/twit