Stanford Radio

The Future of Everything with Russ Altman:

E204 | Lawrence Wein: Computation cracks cold cases

This episode’s guest on Stanford Engineering’s The Future of Everything podcast is Lawrence Wein, an expert in the science of catching criminals using DNA left behind years or even decades prior. All it takes is a snippet of the killer’s DNA and for a relative of the killer to have registered their DNA with one of the many genealogy websites in operation today. Armed with those few details, genetic detectives quickly narrow in on the suspect. They’ve used it to capture some of the most reviled, previously unidentified killers on record.

Listen in as Wein joins host Russ Altman to discuss the mathematics of forensic genetic genealogy on this episode of The Future of Everything podcast.

Evelyn and Alex discuss how China’s censors are struggling to contain information about the ongoing protests, how they are going on the offensive, and why that offensive includes an image of Alex with horns.They also, of course, check in on Twitter with the weekly Elon Musk segment, and discuss US-backed information operations.

Evelyn and Alex talk about the latest Musk shenanigans, why the flight to decentralized platforms isn’t solving all our content moderation problems, account hijacking at Meta, and what to make of the discussion of the security risks of TikTok. Also, Evelyn learns the results of the Big Game.

The Future of Everything with Russ Altman:

E203 | Doug James: Computer-generated sound catches its graphical sibling

Natural sounds in the world around us are based on the principles of physics. Today’s guest on Stanford Engineering’s The Future of Everything podcast, Doug James, uses those same principles to create computer-generated sounds to match the imaginary computer-generated objects and creatures that inhabit almost every movie or game these days.

His algorithms speed the animator’s work and make the final product all-the-more believable, as James tells host Russ Altman on this episode of The Future of Everything podcast

Come for the discussion of whether Musk is going to find himself in hot water with the FTC, stay for the discussion of privacy and data security regulation more generally. Evelyn discusses Twitter’s data security problems and what this says about privacy regulation more generally with Whitney Merrill, the Data Protection Officer and Privacy Counsel at Asana and long-time privacy lawyer including as an attorney at the FTC, and Riana Pfefferkorn, a Research Scholar at the Stanford Internet Observatory.

Evelyn and Alex talk about what the Election Integrity Partnership saw online in terms of mis- and dis-information around the midterms, and what the results might mean for tech policy. And... Elon. Sigh. What a week. Twitter's security team resigned -- what does this mean for compliance with an FTC consent order and... what does it mean for Twitter's security? Elon says they're turning off "microservices." That can't be good. What does it mean? And other exciting developments in the Musk/Twitter debacle.

The Future of Everything with Russ Altman:

E202 | Mellisa Valentine

This episode's guest on Stanford Engineering’s The Future of Everything podcast, management science and engineering professor Melissa Valentine studies a workplace phenomenon known as the flash organization. These ad hoc groups of experts are assembled online and exist only long enough to solve a particular problem—perhaps a week or few months at a time. As soon as the problem is solved, the flash org dissipates, and the participants get paid for their time and expertise. It’s a whole new way to work.

Join us for a look at the future of the gig economy on this episode of Stanford Engineering’s The Future of Everything podcast.

Special note: At the end of this episode, host Russ Altman, along with the entire production team of The Future of Everything, offer a tribute to our audio engineer, Ray Avila, who passed away in October of 2022. Ray's work was instrumental in making this podcast possible and his presence is sorely missed.

Evelyn and Alex discuss Musk's "just tweet through it" approach to Twitter ownership; the pros and cons of the great Mastodon Migration; Rumble pulling out of France over demands it block RT; the Intercept's (poor) reporting on DHS-Platform collaboration,; what to expect with the Midterms (GO VOTE!); and check in on legislative developments in India and the UK.

Our guest on this episode of Stanford Engineering's The Future of Everything podcast, Elaine Treharne, is an English professor and an authority on ancient manuscripts. She's using modern tools like machine learning to unlock the secrets hidden inside these aged pages. Despite frequent predictions of the demise of physical writing, she says, books will never go away. Physical writing, she believes, is a perfectly human manifestation of our humanity—an effort by transient beings to create something eternal.

All this and more as Treharne and our host Russ Altman discuss the future of books, writing and reading on this episode of The Future of Everything.

Evelyn and Alex reluctantly talk about Elon Musk and Twitter, again, before some updates about The Wire in India, the midterms at home, Meta's political ad transparency fine in Washington state, and the publication of the EU's mammoth regulation, the Digital Services Act.