Best Mike Masnick Podcasts (2025)

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Nodestar: The Eternal September w/ Mike Masnick 52:43

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3d ago52:43

52:43

How did the internet become three companies in a trenchcoat? It wasn’t always that way! It used to be fun, and weird, and full of opportunity. To set the scene for the series, we spoke to a stalwart advocate of decentratilsation, Mike Masnick. More like this: Big Tech’s Bogus Vision for the Future w/ Paris Marx This is part one of Nodestar, a three…

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How the World Works with Rachel Barkley 1:02:27

4d ago1:02:27

1:02:27

Kevin D. Williamson is joined by Rachel Barkley, Director of Able Americans, a nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank project dedicated to advancing innovative, free-market solutions that empower Americans with intellectual, developmental, and physical disabilities. They discuss America’s extensive safety net, spanning more than 80 programs across 14 ag…

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087: The Values of Radical Liberalism (w/ Cory Massimino) 51:46

3d ago51:46

51:46

You can think of this episode as kind of a soft reboot of ReImagining Liberty. Or a back-to-basics. This is a show about politics, but it's a politics grounded in a particular set of values and a particular perspective, and with the political and policy specifics downstream of those. Ever since the election, I've spent a lot of time on those specif…

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Short: UK Groups Sue To Block Data Center Expansion 13:56

10d ago13:56

13:56

Foxglove and Global Action Plan have just sued the UK government over their YOLO hyperscale data center plans. More like this: Net0++: Data Centre Sprawl Local government rejected the data center. But Starmer’s administration overruled them. They want to force the development of a water-guzzling, energy draining data center on a local community who…

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Big Tech’s Bogus Vision for the Future w/ Paris Marx 41:12

10d ago41:12

41:12

What’s the deal with Silicon Valley selling imagined futures and never delivering on them. What are the consequences of an industry all-in on AI? What if we thought more deeply than just ‘more compute’? More like this: Big Dirty Data Centres with Boxi Wu and Jenna Ruddock This week, Paris Marx (host of Tech Won’t Save Us) joined Alix to chat about …

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You Asked, We Answered 50:21

7d ago50:21

50:21

This is the second of our special episodes for the month of August. Last time, we talked a bit about the past and future of Ctrl-Alt-Speech; this time, Mike and Ben answer some questions from our listeners, and also share a few of the latest reviews. We're taking one more week off after this, then we'll be back in the first week of September with a…

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086: Podcasting's Political Power (w/ Landry Ayres) 40:44

13d ago40:44

40:44

Today's episode gets a bit meta. I've done something like ninety ReImagining Liberty shows, and hundreds more on other podcasts, but I've never done one on the place of podcasting itself in the political environment. This even though podcasting has been one of the big themes of politics lately, in many ways blamed for the rise, or at least persiste…

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Consciously Uncoupling from Silicon Valley w/ Cori Crider 53:45

17d ago53:45

53:45

How do we yank power out of tech oligarch hands without handing it over to someone else? More like this: Is Digitisation Killing Democracy? w/ Marietje Schaake Cori Crider is a fearless litigator turned market-shaping advocate. She started litigating during many years at leading human rights organisation Reprieve, and then moved on to co-founding F…

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What's Next for Ctrl-Alt-Speech 37:06

22d ago37:06

37:06

We're taking a little break from our regular weekly news roundups this month, but we've got a couple special episodes lined up in the mean time, starting with a conversation all about the past and future of Ctrl-Alt-Speech. This week, Mike and Ben talk about how the podcast got started, how we create the episodes, our philosophy about sponsorship, …

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085: AI, Cultural Tools, and Pluralism (w/ Ted Underwood) 50:30

24d ago50:30

50:30

We sometimes talk about technology on ReImagining Liberty, in the context of how it interacts with a liberal society, or how technology can help us defend and advance liberal. The big technology everyone's talking about right now is, of course, artificial intelligence. It's a topic I've written about, but not one I'd yet done an episode about speci…

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How the World Works with Adam Bellow 1:13:26

1M ago1:13:26

1:13:26

Kevin D. Williamson is joined by Adam Bellow, a leading figure in conservative publishing for more than 30 years. Together, they discuss the contemporary publishing landscape, literary controversies, and the complexities of publishing in today’s hyperpolitical climate.By Kevin D. Williamson

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After the FAccT: Labour and Misrepresentation 50:54

1M ago50:54

50:54

Did you miss FAccT? We interviewed some of our favourite session organisers! More like this: Part One of our FAccT roundup: Materiality and Militarisation. Georgia, Soizic, and Hanna from The Maybe team just went to FAccT. Georgia and Soizic interviewed a bunch of amazing researchers, practitioners, and artists to give you a taste of what the confe…

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Live at TrustCon 2025 1:09:13

1M ago1:09:13

1:09:13

Our second annual live at TrustCon recording of Ctrl-Alt-Speech! Ben was unable to make the trip halfway around the world, but Mike was joined by trust & safety influencer Alice Hunsberger from Musubi and Ashken Kazaryan, a Senior Legal Fellow at the Future of Free Speech at Vanderbilt University. They cover: As millions adopt Grok to fact-check, m…

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Short: Musk: Reanimating Apartheid w/ Nic Dawes 14:20

1M ago14:20

14:20

In May, Grok couldn’t stop talking about white genocide. This injection of right-wing South African politics triggered a conversation with a Musk contemporary, Nic Dawes. In this short Nic shares his perspective on how post-apartheid white communities have dealt with apartheid’s end. And how Musk is basically seeking out an information environment …

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084: Liberalism's Radical Future (w/ Andy Craig) 50:36

1M ago50:36

50:36

It's difficult to be optimistic about liberalism's future. Certainly in the short to medium term. We're in an acute period of democratic backsliding and authoritarian ascendency. The opposition party, or at least its leadership, has been largely supine in response. A backlash is rising, but it's an open question whether it'll be enough, and soon en…

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After the FAccT: Materiality and Militarisation 1:04:20

1M ago1:04:20

1:04:20

Georgia, Soizic, and Hanna from The Maybe team just went to FAccT. Georgia and Soizic interviewed a bunch of amazing researchers, practitioners, and artists to give you a taste of what the conference was like if you didn’t get to go. Alix missed it too — you’ll learn along with her! In part one we explore the depth of AI’s hidden material impacts, …

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The UK Wants Us To Ask Your Age Before You Listen 1:02:24

1M ago1:02:24

1:02:24

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: a16z-Backed AI Site Civitai Is Mostly Porn, Despite Claiming Otherwise (404 Media) Hugging Face Is Hosting 5,000 Nonconsensual AI Models of Real People (404 Media) Ofcom head says age checks are ‘really big moment’ for childr…

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Making Myths to Make Money w/ AI Now 38:08

2M ago38:08

38:08

AI Now have just released their 2025 AI Landscape report — Artificial Power. Alix sat down with two of it’s authors, Amba Kak and Sarah Myers-West for a light unpacking of the themes within. This report isn’t a boring survey of what AI Now have been doing this year; it’s a comprehensive view of the state of AI, and the concentrated powers that prop…

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Move Fast and Mistake Things 47:32

2M ago47:32

47:32

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Jack Cable calls out Cluely over bogus DMCA (X) The cofounder of the viral AI 'cheating' startup Cluely says he only hires people for 2 jobs (Business Insider) Missouri AG: Any AI That Doesn’t Praise Donald Trump Might Be “Co…

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Is Computer Science Made for Dudes? w/ Felienne Hermans 54:41

2M ago54:41

54:41

Felienne Hermans calls herself an ‘involuntary ethnographer of computer science’. She studies the culture behind programming, and challenges the dominant idea that learning to program has to be painful. Alix and Felienne chat about the history of programming and how it went from multidisciplinary and inclusive, to masochistic and exclusive. They al…

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Don't Believe What This Podcast Says About Misinformation 53:59

2M ago53:59

53:59

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: The Misleading Panic over Misinformation (Cato Institute) Claims that Online Misinformation Fears Are Overblown ‘Radically Understates’ the Scale of the Threat (Byline Times) EU Disinformation Code Takes Effect Amid Censorshi…

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083: Classical Liberalism and Michel Foucault (w/ Mark Pennington) 54:17

2M ago54:17

54:17

Liberals, particularly classical liberals and libertarians, have too narrow a view of power. They focus on government force, or the threat of government force, and ignore all the other ways power is exercised in society. And the way classical liberals and libertarians imagine the fully autonomous self is at odds with our deep cultural embeddedness …

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The Elephant in the Algorithm: Live from ZEG Fest in Tbilisi 46:15

2M ago46:15

46:15

Smart people focused on technology politics issues get it. We trade high level helpful concepts like surveillance capitalism, automated inequality, and enshittification. And even as some of these ideas are making it more mainstream, normies aren’t getting the message. We need stories for that. But how? How do we take the technical jargon and high-l…

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Teen But Not Heard 46:09

2M ago46:09

46:09

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by guest host Bridget Todd, a technology and culture writer, speaker and trainer and host of two great podcasts, There are No Girls on the Internet and IRL: Online Life is Real Life. Together, they cover: AI Models And Parents Don’t…

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How the World Works with Matthew Polstein 48:18

2M ago48:18

48:18

Kevin D. Williamson is joined by Matthew Polstein, owner and operator of the New England Outdoor Center in Millinocket, Maine. The NEOC, founded in 1982, has progressed from a whitewater rafting operation on the Penobscot and Kennebec Rivers, to a full-fledged, year round outdoor adventure resort featuring rafting, snowmobiling, Nordic skiing, cano…

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Is Digitisation Killing Democracy? w/ Marietje Schaake 37:56

2M ago37:56

37:56

There has been an intentional and systematic narrative push that tells governments they are not good enough to provide their own public infrastructure or regulate tech companies that provide it for them. Shocking: these narratives stem from large tech companies, and this represents what Marietje Schaake refers to as a Tech Coup — which is the title…

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Outsourced But Not Out Of Mind 1:09:17

2M ago1:09:17

1:09:17

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by guest host Mercy Mutemi, lawyer and managing partner of Nzili & Sumbi Advocates. Together, they cover: Meta can be sued in Kenya for human trafficking and for algorithmic amplification of harm (Open Democracy) Billy Perrigo on in…

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082: Reclaiming the Internet (w/ Mike Masnick) 56:13

2M ago56:13

56:13

What's happened to Twitter, or now X, is the clearest example of why it's actually not great that so much of our digital communication is controlled by just a few firms and, through them, the whims of guys like Elon Musk or Mark Zuckerberg. These single points of control not only mean a product we love today can be unlovable, or just gone, tomorrow…

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AI in Gaza: Live from Mexico City 1:00:02

3M ago1:00:02

1:00:02

This episode contains some descriptions of torture methods, automated human targeting by machines, and psychological warfare throughout Last week Alix hosted a live show in Mexico City right after REAL ML. Four panellists discussed a huge important topic, which has been wrongfully deemed as taboo by other conferences: the use of AI and other techno…

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Outrage For The Machine 50:55

3M ago50:55

50:55

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: He’s a Master of Outrage on X. The Pay Isn’t Great. (NY Times) The vulnerable teen drawn into far-right extremism online (Financial Times) X, Bluesky and Reddit in France’s crosshairs amid porn clampdown (Politico) EU sideste…

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081: How Trump is Using the Surveillance State Against Us (w/ Patrick G. Eddington) 38:02

3M ago38:02

38:02

The government's power to see is its power to oppress. The more the state knows about us, the more levers it has to control us. Understanding that connection, its history and its application, is critical if we are to secure our liberties in the face of authoritarian threats, such as the illegal and unconstitutional actions of the federal government…

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Logging Off w/ Adele Walton 43:57

3M ago43:57

43:57

Adele Walton’s new book *Logging Off: The Human Cost of our Digital World* is out NOW — for this week’s episode Alix sat down with her to discuss the book, and what pushed her to write it. Adele shares her experiences of using social media from age ten, and growing up only ever feeling ‘understood’ by her followers. And now, the constant ‘how can I…

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Short: Sam Altman’s World w/ Billy Perrigo 20:53

3M ago20:53

20:53

Sam Altman is doing another big infrastructure push with World (previously Worldcoin) — the universal human verification system. We had journalist Billy Perrigo on to chat what’s what with World. Is Sam Altman just providing a solution to a problem that he himself caused with OpenAI? Do we really need human verification, or is this just a way to si…

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080: Liberty Means Taking Equality Seriously (w/ Jonathan Blanks) 50:35

3M ago50:35

50:35

Equality is central to the liberal project. Thomas Jefferson failed, dramatically and unforgivably, to live up to this ideal, but he stated in correctly when, in a letter, he wrote that "the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately." Liberalism views us as e…

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The Collective Intelligence Project w/ Divya Siddarth and Zarinah Agnew 54:31

3M ago54:31

54:31

Most of the time we interview people who say No to AI. In this interview, Georgia and Alix talk to two people who look at AI and ask How and For What. And lots of other questions too. Divya Siddarth and Zarinah Agnew from the Collective Intelligence Project share CIP’s work using AI systems to explore more consultative democratic governance, how to…

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Algorithm Shrugged 1:01:41

3M ago1:01:41

1:01:41

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by guest host Zeve Sanderson, the founding Executive Director of the NYU Center for Social Media & Politics. Together, they cover: If algorithms radicalize a mass shooter, are companies to blame? (The Verge) Large Language Models A…

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How the World Works Podcast with Mike Masnick 1:06:53

3M ago1:06:53

1:06:53

Kevin D. Williamson is joined by Mike Masnick, founder and editor of Techdirt. They discuss the evolving challenges of content moderation, the day-to-day realities of running an independent tech publication, and how the internet has changed over time from its early decentralized roots to a more complex and structured environment.…

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079: What the Right Gets Wrong About Men (w/ Toby Buckle) 58:52

3M ago58:52

58:52

The Trumpist right has a very clear picture of what they imagine masculinity to be, and are quite upset that it's not a picture all men find all that appealing. It's one of violence, belligerence, and professions of heavy labor. Anything else, including the whole of the knowledge economy that has made the developed world rich, is inauthentically ma…

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Net0++: Data Center Sprawl | NEW Research from The Maybe 54:09

3M ago54:09

54:09

We’re excited to finally share our report on data center expansion and resistance around the world. It’s been a labor of love, but also showcases the amazing work of many organisations, activists, and journalists around the world that are working to create space for meaningful consultation about hugely consequential decisions. Download it here. In …

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Moderation Without Representation 53:43

3M ago53:43

53:43

In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by guest host Hank Green, popular YouTube creator and educator. After spending some time talking about being a creator at the whims of platforms, they cover: Crash Course Coin (Complexly) Everyone Is Cheating Their Way Through Coll…