These days I am quite stressed about the fate of “liberal democracy.” It’s not a concept I previously felt very attached to, mostly because I didn’t like the way the Dems talked about it.

But now, we are in a far, far worse place. Masked ICE agents are grabbing people off the streets. Millions of kids will die due to mindless aid cuts and anti-vax policies. Free speech is in the worst place it’s been in decades.

I wanted to talk to somebody who is a believer in “liberalism,” but who can also be candid about liberalism’s future, its threats, and why people have become increasingly skeptical.

I thought that Kelsey Piper would be the perfect first guest. She’s a staff writer at The Argument and previously a senior writer for Vox’s Future Perfect. Today we discuss:

[00:10:00] How the Democrats alienated tech

[00:50:33] Zoomer nihilism and authoritarian envy

[01:02:11] Improving the “user experience” of government

[01:16:46] AI and democratic institutions

[01:30:03] Kelsey’s journalism career and joining The Argument

Today's podcast guest is Fred Turner, a Professor of Communication at Stanford and probably the best historian of Silicon Valley culture over the past 100 years.

His book, From Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the Rise of Digital Utopianism, is my favorite book on Silicon Valley's history, focusing on how hippies and hackers came together from the 60s to the 90s. But he’s researched essentially every Silicon Valley micro-movement, from Buckminster Fuller to the maker movement to diversity posters at Facebook.

Fred is also one of the warmest, most enthusiastic storytellers I know—the kind of history teacher everyone wishes they had. You’ll leave this listen with a bunch of fun facts about the Whole Earth Catalog, Burning Man, and the Italian futurists; but more importantly, a deep appreciation for what humans and the humanities can offer.

Topics:

- The two types of Bay Area hippies

- How the cyberculture got corporatized

- Disembodiment and dating apps

- The dangers of accelerationism

- Teaching the humanities in 2025

Sometimes, a piece of writing goes so viral that it becomes an event in and of itself. One of the most successful recent instances of this is AI 2027: a detailed scenario outlining how AI might doom humanity within a few short years, as accelerating capabilities intertwine with US-China competition, recursive self-improvement, deceptive misalignment, and job loss.

I’m skeptical about some of AI 2027’s predictions, but appreciative of the format and conversation it sparked. There are plenty of others writing policy reports and op-eds; we need new styles to shock people into thinking in new ways, and to consider a broader-than-usual range of possible outcomes.

Therefore, I invited AI 2027 author Daniel Kokotajlo on the podcast to discuss his team’s approach to creating AI 2027, answers to common critiques of forecasting (e.g. is it just bad sci-fi), and why he thinks writing scenarios can improve your thinking.

Today’s episode is for the media nerds out there. I’m talking to author/podcaster extraordinaire Kevin Roose: New York Times tech columnist, Hard Fork cohost, and the author of 3.25 excellent books on the subcultures of AI, Wall Street, and evangelical Christianity.

I’ve known Kevin since I was a freshman in college, when Young Money single-handedly persuaded me not to become an investment banker. It took another 7 years for me to realize that writing was the One True Path, but I’m now helping him with a new book on the inside story of the race to build AGI. Among other things, we discuss:

* Wall Street vs. Silicon Valley vs. evangelical culture

* Why does tech hate journalists so much?

* Storytelling tips for young writers

* Will nonfiction books will survive AGI?

* AI hot take lightning round

Links and transcript are at jasmi.news. Subscribe for new episodes!

I invited my friends Anson Yu and HudZah to chat today, as young people thriving amid these ~unprecedented times~. Our conversation is very much about agency: how it’s nurtured by family and by community; how it’s shaped by stories, books, and films; and how AI can instill it or take it away.

Anson and HudZah are both graduating seniors at the University of Waterloo. Anson studied systems design and HudZah math. They're both involved in organizing Socratica, which recently rallied 2500 young people around the world to fill a hockey stadium for a giant demo day. They also have a million other projects under their belt. But to highlight two, Anson spent six months on a road trip filming Unstuck, a feature-length climate documentary with a friend, and HudZah is perhaps best known for using Claude to build a nuclear fusor in his kitchen. Now, they’re cofounding an AI-for-hardware company together.

I recorded this conversation to learn from them, and I think you will too.

I'm obsessed with web-highlighter / read-it-later app / research assistant Readwise, so I was honored when to be the first guest on Readwise’s podcast. It was a fun conversation, so I'm cross-publishing it here. Among other things, we discuss:

* Why Substack built Notes & how the algorithm works

* Growth & confidence tips for beginning writers

* My research/revision stack (ft. Readwise, Claude, ChatGPT)

* Why I’m no longer as worried that AI will steal my job

Today's podcast features Audrey Tang. She's the current Cyber Ambassador of Taiwan, a principal author of the book Plurality, and a major inspiration for my approach to tech.

Audrey is like no other politician you will ever encounter. She's a middle school dropout and an autodidact. She has worked on Siri at Apple and founded startups before joining the pro-democracy Sunflower Movement and then the Taiwanese government.

Among other things, we discuss:

- Substack, Bluesky, and Partiful as pro-social media

- What DOGE gets wrong about hacking the bureaucracy

- How LLMs can scale citizen participation

- Going from a consumer to a producer society

- Audrey’s live-stream with Laura Loomer

Read the full transcript and links at jasmi.news.

Today’s podcast features the brilliant and singular Mills Baker. Formally, he’s the Head of Design at Substack, where we met, and also fallibilist, New Orleanian, and OG blogger extraordinaire.

Among other things, we discuss:

* Is the “literacy crisis” real?

* The case for reading novels

* Why humans are not just fleshy LLMs

* Parenting for a post-AGI world

* Why Mills didn’t become a full-time writer

* Girardian scapegoating

Find transcripts & links at jasmi.news.

Today’s show features my dear friend Tianyu Fang! Tian is a writer and researcher focused on tech policy and US-China relations. He’s currently a Tech and Democracy fellow at New America, and is a cofounder of the iconic Chinese internet newsletter Chaoyang Trap.

We discuss:

* How Tian became a teenage China watcher

* The death of the China journalist

* Why Chinese founders don’t blog

* Censorship and its discontents

* Has the “China model” won?

* The Falun Gong’s alternative internet

Transcript and links at jasmi.news.

This episode is an accompaniment to my “tech right (disambiguation)” post from last week.

My guest today is my good friend Arjun Ramani. We've known each other since freshman year of Stanford when we got into a late night dorm argument about critical theory in high school debate (which says a lot about our friendship).

Arjun is currently a PhD candidate in economics at MIT. And for the last few years, he's been a correspondent for The Economist covering topics like finance, AI and India.

Among other things, we discuss:

* Mark Zuckerberg’s new look

* PG’s new essay on The Origins of Wokeness

* Why tech leaders admire Malcolm X and Robert Moses

* How 21st century billionaires differ from 20th century ones

* Non-Silicon-Valley reasons for R&D mania

* Growth rates in the US, India, and UK

* Buying the dip on effective altruism

* Cars as an analogy for AI impacts

* Why “human-like” AGI may be the wrong goal

Find a full edited transcript, a list of links/books, and more content on jasmi.news.