GeekWire

Hundreds of Amazon employees walked out of the office in Seattle this week, gathering in between the company's headquarters towers while holding signs, participating in chants and listening to speakers urge the tech giant to do better. It was part of a global walkout that organizers said drew participation from more than 2,000 Amazon employees worldwide. 

So why did they walk out, and what do they hope to accomplish? 

On this episode of the GeekWire Podcast, we hear from Amazon employees in the crowd and speakers at the podium, explain the company's perspective, and put the walkout in the larger context of the tectonic shifts taking place in the tech industry.

With GeekWire reporter Kurt Schlosser and co-founder Todd Bishop.

Related stories:

• Amazon employees walk out, seeking bolder climate action and end of return-to-office policy
• How big was that Amazon walkout crowd?
• Amazon employee groups expect nearly 2,000 workers to participate in walkout

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This week on the GeekWire Podcast, we're coming to you from our mobile recording studio, aka Todd's car, as he and John make the most of their time in a clogged parking garage to discuss the comments they had just heard from T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert at the Technology Alliance annual State of Technology luncheon.

Topics include artificial intelligence, national security concerns over Chinese hacking, downtown safety, and getting employees back to the office. From there, we take an impromptu driving tour of Amazon HQ to see things first-hand.

Stories discussed on this week's show:

• How T-Mobile plans to use AI to improve one of its most important business metrics
• ‘It’s your responsibility’: T-Mobile CEO exhorts tech industry leaders to return to the office
• Car and foot traffic data show impact of Amazon’s return to office mandate on Seattle commutes
• Microsoft says critical U.S. infrastructure targeted by Chinese hackers
• Amazon responds to walkout plan: ‘We respect our employees’ rights to express their opinions’

With GeekWire co-founders Todd Bishop and John Cook. Audio clips of Sievert provided by the Tech Alliance. See GeekWire.com for more coverage.

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The theme at this week's GeekWire Awards was Star Wars, but we didn't need to go to a galaxy far, far away to find the force that promises to reshape the technology industry. The game-changing potential of AI was on the minds of many finalists and attendees, and integral to the business models of many of the companies featured on stage. This episode features conversations with finalists and attendees about the economy, artificial intelligence, and more ... plus lots of cool tech along the way.

• GeekWire Awards 2023 revealed: Community honors top innovation in Pacific Northwest tech
• Seattle Seahawks legend, NASA astronaut, ‘Love is Blind’ star share wisdom at the GeekWire Awards

More Coverage: GeekWire Awards 2023

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We're back this week on the GeekWire Podcast as humans, not bots, we promise, but we've still got a lot of AI to talk about.

On this week's episode, Todd shares highlights from his visit to Google I/O, including two of the generative AI tools that demonstrated the potential of technology to change the way we process and convey information. 

Todd and John wrestle with the implications of these AI tools for human creativity, consider the long-term impact on society, balance these concerns against their natural sense of awe and wonder about innovation, and discuss ways that new tech realities are shielding companies from scrutiny.

Stories and topics referenced on this week's show.

• We had our AI voice clones read an AI-generated GeekWire Podcast script — listen to the result
• Microsoft’s optimistic view of AI sees technology ending the drudgery of ‘digital debt’
• In search of AI’s killer app … and other notes from Google I/O
• Project Tailwind (Google)
• Google Workspace Duet AI (Google)
• Google teases Project Tailwind — a prototype AI notebook that learns from your documents (The Verge)
• Dan Deacon's pre-show Google I/O performance. (YouTube)
• How Gmail's New AI Feature Will Write Your Emails for You  (CNet)
• As storm clouds clear for travel, Expedia Group looks to become a bigger tech provider to industry
• Trump's Town Hall, Santos Charged, and STFU with Dan Lyons (Pivot)

With GeekWire co-founders John Cook and Todd Bishop.

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For all the hype over generative artificial intelligence, how far has AI really advanced? Where is the new line between humanity and technology, and what does it mean for the future of our daily lives and work?

GeekWire is exploring these questions in our Bot or Not series, and this week on the GeekWire Podcast, we share and assess the preliminary results of an experiment that we’ve been doing as part of this effort. We created AI voice clones for GeekWire's John Cook and Todd Bishop, and had those clones read an AI-generated podcast script.

You can hear a short clip from this experiment in the first segment of this week’s episode, followed by reactions from our colleague Kurt Schlosser, and from John, who was hearing his own voice clone for the first time.

Stay tuned in the coming weeks for a more in-depth look at this process and the larger issues raised by AI voice cloning as part of our Bot or Not series.

• In the second segment, we get Kurt’s first-hand report from Amazon headquarters as the tech giant’s employees return to the office en masse for the first time in more than three years.
• In the final segment, listen for a preview of the GeekWire Awards, coming up May 18 in Seattle. Check out all of our GeekWire Awards coverage here, and learn more on the GeekWire Awards event site.

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Today's top STEM teachers embrace learning opportunities wherever they arise, whether it's baby squirrels that have fallen from their nest, or engineering design failures that literally go up in smoke.

At the GeekWire Awards on May 18, we’re celebrating two STEM Educators of the Year:

• Ted Rodriquez, an instructor for high school juniors and seniors at the Sno-Isle TECH Skills Center in Everett, Wash.
• Melissa Pearcy teaches kindergarten-through-fifth-grade students in her role as a science specialist at Jefferson Elementary, which is part of Spokane Public Schools. 

These teachers are among the best in delivering science, technology, engineering and math education. They're teaching students fundamental scientific principals -- but perhaps even more importantly, they're helping them learn how to solve problems, take risks, and recover from failure.

The GeekWire Awards recognize the top innovators and companies in Pacific Northwest technology. Our STEM educator honorees were selected based on community nominations, along with input from GeekWire Awards judges.

We recently spoke with the two teachers to learn more about their creative, engaging efforts to inspire the next generation of STEM leaders. Bank of America is the sponsor of this award, now in its third year.

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Biomedicine pioneer Leroy Hood says that artificial intelligence will play a key role in the future of healthcare by accelerating the progress of "scientific wellness," an approach that he has championed for many years.

Hood, co-founder of the Institute for Systems Biology, delves into this approach in his new book, “The Age of Scientific Wellness,” which he wrote with co-author Nathan Price, an ISB professor and chief scientific officer of Thorne HealthTech.

In this week's GeekWire Podcast we talk with Hood about the book, how AI is key to the future of medicine, and what the average person can do now to live a healthy life.

"AI will be the core foundation for the diagnosis and delivery of actionable possibilities for the information that comes from data-driven health in the future," he said. "It will be able to take each individual and map out exactly how they should optimize their health and keep track of it."

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This week on the GeekWire Podcast, we're joined by a University of Washington professor whose Twitter account was abruptly suspended last week for reasons that seemed inexplicable at the time. The story is a glimpse into the erratic, arbitrary, and divided state of social media, communications, and modern economics.

We also get a reality check on the new era of artificial intelligence, including the ongoing tendency of OpenAI's ChatGPT to generate facts out of thin air.

And in the final segment, we hear why the late David Bowie was right all along about the "exhilarating and terrifying" future in which the rest of us our now living.

Our guest is Kathy Gill, a tech veteran who is an adjunct professor at the University of Washington and Bellevue College, focusing on communications and user experience. Her current courses include a writing class for UW engineering students. She's a writer, motorcyclist, and self-described news hound. Follow her @kegill or @kathygill, and read her work at wiredpen.com.

Related links and resources

• TechDirt: Twitter Suspends User For Sharing Washington Post Story About Pentagon Docs Leaker
• WiredPen: Yes, ChatGPT can answer questions. Can you trust it? Nope
• Conducting research: a guide for undergrads, by Kathy Gill
• Watch the full interview with David Bowie from the BBC in 1999, as resurfaced by Michael Warburton this week.

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Amazon CEO Andy Jassy's annual letter to shareholders this week delivered a dual message: while the company might not be done streamlining its operations, it's also not scaling back its ambitions for future growth.

Jassy outlined the company's strategy to expand further into generative artificial intelligence, healthcare, satellite broadband and other sectors, even as he hinted that the company might continue to cut costs in other areas.

He also made it clear the company isn’t backing down from its push to get employees back in the office for at least three days a week starting in May.

GeekWire's Todd Bishop and John Cook share some of their key takeaways from Jassy's shareholder letter and talk about the future of the tech giant on this episode of the GeekWire Podcast. Audio editing and production by Curt Milton.

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Humans have become increasingly vulnerable to technology engineered to grab our attention, pulling us away from more meaningful and fulfilling moments and interactions in our lives. Can technology itself be part of the solution? Our guest this week on the GeekWire Podcast is Caroline Cadwell, co-founder and CEO of Unpluq, a recent graduate of the Techstars Seattle accelerator program. The startup offers an app, subscription service, and keychain tag designed to help people become more conscious and mindful about their use of smartphones, social media, and other addictive apps and services.

Related links:

Seattle Public Schools sues TikTok, YouTube, Instagram and others, seeking compensation for youth mental health crisis

Rational Overrides: Influence Behavior Beyond Nudging — research that helped to inspire Unpluq's approach.

Could You Live Without a Smartphone? — TedX talk by Anastasia Dedyukhina of  Consciously Digital, who is referenced by Caroline Cadwell on the episode.

Our favorite startup pitches from Techstars Seattle Demo Day

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