TechSequences

Have you ever tried to Google yourself and wished you could erase an embarrassing link or an old mistake from search results? When Spanish citizen Mario Costeja González successfully sued to remove a decade-old newspaper clipping about his past debts, he secured a landmark 2014 European Union ruling: the digital “Right to Be Forgotten.” But while celebrated as a victory for personal privacy, allowing individuals to selectively scrub history introduces profound economic and societal risks. When high-risk individuals can conceal past defaults or misconduct, how do we protect the public from opportunistic history-laundering? If hiding information forces decision-makers to rely on imperfect—or even discriminatory—proxies, where is the line between human redemption and rewriting reality?

Join us for a conversation with Christopher S. Yoo, the Imasogie Professor in Law and Technology at the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, holding joint appointments at the Annenberg School for Communication and the Department of Computer and Information Science. One of the nation’s leading authorities on technology law, regulatory policy, and Internet governance, he helps us unpack the economics of hidden information, the limits of digital erasure, and the delicate balance between personal privacy and the public good.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

Have you ever come across an enticing offer for a 100% free VPN, or a chance to earn passive income simply by sharing your unused Internet bandwidth? The moment you click “Accept,” your home Wi-Fi can be quietly transformed into a silent Residential Proxy for global threat actors. To a fraud detection system or a law enforcement subpoena, a cybercriminal operating halfway across the globe suddenly looks identical to an innocent homeowner checking email from their couch. How can network operators identify compromised home devices without violating customer privacy? And with manufacturers abandoning cheap smart hardware long after the sale, can the tech industry self-regulate, or are government security mandates now inevitable?

Join us for a conversation with Jason Livingood, Vice President of Technology Policy, Product & Standards at Comcast. A long-standing industry leader who has served on the Internet Architecture Board and the FCC’s Technological Advisory Council, Jason brings three decades of network architecture and tech policy expertise to unpack the defender’s dilemma and the real consequences of hijacked household networks for unsuspecting consumers.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

Remember when a viral video of a kid doing something funny was just an innocent, isolated moment of Internet joy?

Today, those organic sparks are the fuel for a $8 billion kidfluencer advertising industry. From Ryan Kaji’s multi-million-dollar toy unboxing empire to the highly polished, curated worlds of teen creators, childhood has shifted from a phase of development into an industrialized, platform-driven global market. As the kidfluencer market swells to a valuable industry, the line between authentic family memories and commercial exploitation has entirely blurred. When parents act simultaneously as guardians, employers, and bankers, traditional labor laws completely fail. How do we protect minors when their entire developmental history is being systematically commodified by algorithms? Where should the responsibility lie—with the parents holding the camera, the platforms engineering the incentives, or the regulatory systems trailing behind?

Join us for a conversation with Dr. Crystal Abidin, a Professor of Internet Studies at Curtin University and Director of the Influencer Ethnography Research Lab. A world-renowned digital anthropologist and incoming Editor-in-Chief of New Media & Society, Crystal has published 5 books and over 250 articles on internet celebrity. She also serves on major advisory panels, including TikTok’s Content and Safety team, providing a vital policy voice on the front lines of digital visibility.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

The greatest risk we face today isn’t that AI is becoming “too smart”; it’s that we are beginning to treat this technology as an infallible “oracle” rather than a capable, yet fundamentally fallible, “intern.” As the baseline for production drops to zero, the economy of human value is shifting away from raw output and toward the only two things a machine cannot authentically replicate: judgment and intent. How should we use AI to augment and enhance our professional output, instead of simply automating  and potentially replacing our value? How can we navigate the “Calculator Trap” to ensure our foundational critical thinking doesn’t atrophy?  

Join us for a conversation with Ted Yang, an MIT-trained engineer and seasoned entrepreneur who has founded more than twelve companies. A former finance executive at legendary firms like Bridgewater and Citadel, Ted is an Emmy-nominated author and a member of Connecticut’s Board of Regents for Higher Education. His new book, Ageless Peak Performance, provides a practical playbook for professionals looking to thoughtfully adopt AI to expand human capability and opportunity.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

Author and journalist Michael Pollan characterizes our era as the “Second Copernican Shock,” a civilizational turning point where the boundary between human empathy and algorithmic calculation is increasingly blurred. From AI companions like ElliQ providing “virtual hugs” to the elderly, to “moral machines” tasked with navigating life-and-death dilemmas, we are entering a global experiment in the outsourcing of ethics and accountability. As we delegate our conscience to systems that exist outside the weight of consequence—systems not haunted by regret nor soothed by redemption—are we experiencing a dangerous “ethical de-skilling”? And if so, what are the consequences?

Join us for a conversation with Dr. Robert Sparrow, Professor of Philosophy, and Associate Investigator in the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society at Monash University,  and founding member of the International Committee for Robot Arms Control.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

Six years after launching in the uncertainty of April 2020, Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle revisit the origins of TechSequences and the world that shaped it. What began as a conversation about contact tracing, digital privacy, and the early influence of “the algorithm” now reads like a snapshot of a more stable reality—one where truth still felt anchored and shared. In this milestone 101st episode, they reflect on how quickly that foundation shifted, and how the systems we once trusted to inform us have been transformed by an escalating competition for attention.

As the Internet evolved from a collaborative frontier into a hyper-optimized commercial ecosystem, the incentives changed—and with them, our experience of reality itself. News became content, attention became currency, and AI accelerated everything: from the rise of synthetic media and “hallucinated” facts to the emergence of fully personalized information environments. Alexa and Leslie explore how these forces have blurred the line between signal and simulation, raising urgent questions about trust, consent, accountability, and whether a shared understanding of truth can still exist in an age of infinite, tailored persuasion.

Looking ahead, the conversation turns to what comes next. If the past six years caught us off guard, what are we missing now? From the growing value of human authenticity to the risk of deepening digital divides, and the possibility of new innovation cycles beyond today’s tech giants, this episode is both a reflection and a reckoning. Six years in, TechSequences is no longer just tracking the evolution of technology—it’s grappling with how that evolution is reshaping reality itself, and what it means for the future we’re building.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

The human-speed defense of small business is being obliterated by the machine-speed offense of AI-driven cybercrime. Today, what large companies treat as a manageable risk is a terminal expense for small enterprises, with 60% of small enterprises shutting down within six months of a major attack. As AI-crafted phishing lures achieve a 54% click-through rate, traditional “awareness” training has become a shallow defense against an automated tide. We are at a strategic crossroads: do we outsource our security to Big Tech, wait for the government to mandate a minimum level of security, or return to the “radical collaboration” that built the Internet itself? Can we bake immunity directly into the Internet’s plumbing before the 400 million small businesses that form our economic backbone become mere collateral damage?

Join us for a conversation with Brian Cute, the CEO of the Global Cyber Alliance. A veteran of Internet governance, he has held leadership roles at ICANN and the Public Interest Registry (the .org registry). He now leads The Global Cyber Alliance’s mission to deliver practical and effective tools to those most at risk in a fractured digital landscape.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

“The homeland has never been less secure.” This was the testimony of Retired Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery to the United States Congress on the first day of the Committee for Homeland Security in 2025. Why? We are facing a new era of state-sponsored espionage where foreign adversaries l aren’t just stealing data—they are planting “sleeper bots” deep within our networks, waiting for the signal to strike. But even as US federal budgets rise, front-line defenses at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) are struggling with massive staffing attrition and the sudden dissolution of critical advisory structures, such as the Cyber Safety Review Board (CSRB). Is the US equipped to defend against an enemy that is already inside, patiently waiting for the signal to strike?

Join us for a conversation with Dr. Nadya Bliss, the Executive Director of the Advanced Capabilities for National Security Institute at Arizona State University. Formerly, she was the founding group leader of the Computing and Analytics Group at MIT Lincoln Laboratory, and past chair and current steering committee member of DARPA’s Information Science and Technology Study Group.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

The fundamental rules of creativity and ownership, established in law since the time of the printing press, are now collapsing under the weight of Generative AI. Its rapid-fire creation is built upon billions of human-authored works, leading to the “Original Sin” of the algorithm: the unauthorized copying of protected content for training. This conflict has ignited high-stakes lawsuits—from the New York Times challenging the AI input phase to the music industry battling against the creation of “almost identical” outputs—forcing the legal system to confront the “Authorship Challenge” and the threat of voice cloning.

Join us as we explore the legal and ethical price of convenience with our guest, Dr. Andrés Guadamuz, a Reader in Intellectual Property Law at the University of Sussex and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of World Intellectual Property. Dr. Guadamuz’s groundbreaking research illuminates how centuries-old copyright principles must adapt to find a functional middle way that protects human ingenuity while allowing for technological innovation.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

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The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.

When the disruptive power of Artificial Intelligence is discussed, the fate of the radiologist is often the cautionary tale: a specialist whose job is supposedly obsolete. In fact, the opposite is true. We face a severe global shortage of medical imaging specialists, worsened by a 10% annual increase in studies. Not to mention burnout, as specialists have to interpret more than one image per second just to keep up. AI is emerging not as a threat, but as a critical complement. AI is poised to offer opportunities beyond better diagnosis and access to care. 

Join us as we explore the future of diagnostic imaging  with our guest, Dr. Akshay Chaudhari, Assistant Professor of Radiology and Biomedical Data Science at Stanford, and the co-founder of Cognita Imaging, a pioneering clinical AI company.

Hosted by: Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle.

Further reading:

The views and opinions expressed in this program are our own and may not reflect the views or positions of our employers.