What Next: TBD | Tech, power, and the future
Every Friday and Sunday, Slate’s popular daily news podcast What Next brings you TBD, a clear-eyed look into the future. From fake news to fake meat, algorithms to augmented reality, Lizzie O’Leary is your guide to the tech industry and the world it’s creating for us to live in.
- Update frequency
- every 3 days
- Average duration
- 28 minutes
- Episodes
- 601
- Years Active
- 2017 - 2025
Why Is the U.S. Scared of Huawei?
Recently a special delegation of senior Trump administration officials arrived in the U.K. Their mission? To convince prime minister Boris Johnson to bar Huawei from their new 5G network.
Why is the…
00:19:27 |
Fri 31 Jan 2020
Which Tech Companies Are Doing the Most Harm?
Last week, Slate published The Evil List, an expansive attempt to document the most concerning tech companies around the world, according to the experts. Some you’ve heard of, some you probably haven…
00:22:20 |
Fri 24 Jan 2020
The Silicon Valley Dream Was Always a Fantasy
In 2013, Anna Wiener moved from New York to San Francisco to join the city’s booming tech scene. Over the course of four years, she worked at three companies: an e-book startup, a data analytics comp…
00:23:03 |
Fri 17 Jan 2020
How Targeted Ads Started Watching Us All
In 2019, for the first time, more advertising money went toward targeted digital ads in the U.S. than on radio, television, cable, magazine, and newspaper ads combined. The moment was the culmination…
00:19:48 |
Fri 10 Jan 2020
Do Algorithms Make Sentencing Fairer?
Around the country, states are employing algorithms to help reduce prison populations and predict recidivism. This week, we hear from a Wisconsin judge with serious reservations about the algorithm u…
00:19:20 |
Fri 03 Jan 2020
A Landmark Privacy Law Takes Effect. Now What?
On January 1st, a new law will grant Californians the right to see, delete, and stop the sale of personal information collected by tech companies. But the impact of the bill may reach far beyond Cali…
00:18:31 |
Fri 27 Dec 2019
Ring: Your Doorbell Is Watching
Back in 2013, an entrepreneur named Jamie Siminoff appeared on Shark Tank. He was seeking an investment in a new product he was calling Doorbot, a smart doorbell that would make answering the door mo…
00:19:37 |
Fri 20 Dec 2019
Inside The Influence Economy
Over the past decade, the world of influencers has grown from a fringe marketing movement to a multibillion-dollar industry. Now, tactics and strategies originally developed by influencers can be fou…
00:18:02 |
Fri 13 Dec 2019
What Is Google After Larry and Sergey?
On Tuesday, Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page announced that they are stepping down from their respective roles as president and CEO of Alphabet, Google’s parent company. The move will leave…
00:18:50 |
Fri 06 Dec 2019
Is TikTok Really a National Security Threat?
TikTok now has over 1.5 billion downloads, putting it in the company of social media giants like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. While all of these companies have faced scrutiny from lawmakers in o…
00:22:18 |
Fri 22 Nov 2019
How WhatsApp Got Hacked
Recently, Facebook filed a lawsuit against a little-known Israeli spyware firm called NSO Group. Facebook is accusing NSO of supplying technology that enabled a hack of 1,400 WhatsApp accounts.
Bu…
00:21:11 |
Fri 15 Nov 2019
The Uber Drivers Who Don’t Want to Be Employees
California recently passed a law that would classify rideshare drivers across the state as employees, rather than contractors. Among many other benefits, they’d be allowed to unionize, collect overti…
00:17:45 |
Fri 08 Nov 2019
The Price of Automating Aviation
This week, Boeing’s CEO Dennis Muilenburg appeared in front of Congress. He was there to answer questions about what his company knew, and when, before two 737 Max airplanes crashed and claimed the l…
00:17:38 |
Fri 01 Nov 2019
Inside Facebook's Political Ad Mess
Over the last week, Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg have been under fire for declining to fact-check political ads. But a former insider says this is the wrong debate to be having—and it misses a more f…
00:20:06 |
Fri 25 Oct 2019
Announcement: What Next: TBD
Hey If Then listeners! As of now, the new Slate podcast What Next: TBD will be taking over this feed. What Next: TBD is a weekly analysis with host Lizzie O’Leary of how technology is impacting our l…
00:00:54 |
Thu 24 Oct 2019
Smash Bros Side Hustlers
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00:41:28 |
Wed 16 Oct 2019
The People Who Hold The Internet Together
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00:43:45 |
Wed 09 Oct 2019
What it Takes to Study Online Harassment
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00:41:16 |
Wed 02 Oct 2019
The Surveillance Is Coming From Inside The (Smart) House
Host Shannon Palus talks to Roxanne Leitao, a UK-based designer researching ways to make the smart home gear safer for victims of domestic abuse. They’ll discuss the ways that smart thermostats can b…
00:38:30 |
Wed 25 Sep 2019
Breaking Away From Google
Host Aaron Mak discusses with journalist Nithin Coca his attempt to abstain from using any Google products in his daily life. They discuss why he did it, the useful alternatives he found for specifi…
00:42:13 |
Wed 18 Sep 2019
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