Unintended Consequences

By Patrick

Every weekday, one true story of good intentions gone sideways. From cobra bounties in colonial Delhi to recommendation algorithms, each episode follows a single case through the original idea, how it... more

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FAQs about Unintended Consequences:

How many episodes does Unintended Consequences have?

The podcast currently has 29 episodes available.

Unintended Consequences episodes:

June 01, 2026 Ep 19: Wikipedia invited the entire world to write its own encyclopedia, yet the result is an archive that still underrepresents half of humanity.
Wikipedia invited the entire world to write its own encyclopedia, yet the result is an archive that still underrepresents half of humanity.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In January 2011, a UNU-MERIT survey of more than 176,000 Wikipedia contributors found that roughly 91 percent identified as male. The platform that had promised to “sum up all human knowledge” was being written almost entirely by one demographic. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
📝 Full show notes, transcript & sources: read the episode page
🌐 Part of the Nerra Network — explore every show at nerranetwork.com.
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7min
May 28, 2026 Ep 17: Engineers built smartphones to put the world's knowledge in every pocket, and created 50 million tonnes of e-waste a year instead.
Engineers built smartphones to put the world's knowledge in every pocket, and created 50 million tonnes of e-waste a year instead.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In the yards of Agbogbloshie, Ghana, teenagers pry open smartphone casings with screwdrivers and set the plastic on fire to free the copper wiring inside. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
7min
May 28, 2026 Ep 18: Ring sold doorbells to keep families safe, but its Neighbors app built a private surveillance grid shared with thousands of police departments.
Ring sold doorbells to keep families safe, but its Neighbors app built a private surveillance grid shared with thousands of police departments.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In the spring of 2019, a woman in a predominantly Black neighborhood of Detroit opened her front door to find police officers on her porch. They had received an alert through the Neighbors app that a “suspicious person” was lingering outside her house; the footage came from a Ring camera three blocks away. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
6min
May 25, 2026 Ep 16: PageRank was meant to surface the web’s most relevant pages — and it trained everyone to write for the algorithm instead.
PageRank was meant to surface the web’s most relevant pages — and it trained everyone to write for the algorithm instead.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In the fall of 1998, two Stanford graduate students finished a prototype that ranked web pages by counting and weighting the links pointing to them. Larry Page and Sergey Brin called the method PageRank, and they believed it would finally separate authoritative sources from noise. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
5min
May 22, 2026 Ep 15: Ian Goodfellow designed GANs in 2014 to let machines create realistic images from scratch; five years later the same system was generating non-consensual pornography and fabricated political videos at scale.
Ian Goodfellow designed GANs in 2014 to let machines create realistic images from scratch; five years later the same system was generating non-consensual pornography and fabricated political videos at scale.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In a Montreal apartment in 2014, Ian Goodfellow sketched an idea on a napkin that would let one neural network critique another until both produced images no human could easily dismiss as fake. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
7min
May 21, 2026 Ep 14: Justin Rosenstein built Facebook’s Like button to let friends share quick appreciation — and it became the global yardstick for personal worth.
Justin Rosenstein built Facebook’s Like button to let friends share quick appreciation — and it became the global yardstick for personal worth.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In the spring of 2007, Justin Rosenstein sat at his desk inside Facebook’s Palo Alto offices and sketched a small thumbs-up icon meant to replace the longer process of typing “That’s great!” under a friend’s post. The goal was simple: remove friction so that positive signals could travel faster across the network. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
6min
May 20, 2026 Ep 13: A designer removed one click to make browsing smoother in 2006 — and helped build the endless feeds that now shape how billions spend their time.
A designer removed one click to make browsing smoother in 2006 — and helped build the endless feeds that now shape how billions spend their time.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In the spring of 2006, Aza Raskin sat at a desk testing a new way to move through long lists of search results. Instead of clicking a “next” button to load another page, the content would simply continue as the user scrolled downward. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
6min
May 19, 2026 Ep 12: GPS promised to erase every wrong turn, yet it quietly began shrinking the brain’s built-in navigation system.
GPS promised to erase every wrong turn, yet it quietly began shrinking the brain’s built-in navigation system.
Segment 1 — The Cold Open
In 2016 a delivery driver in London followed his GPS down a narrow towpath beside the Regent’s Canal and became wedged between two bridges, his van blocking the path for hours. The route had looked perfect on the screen. What the driver could not see was that the same device had already begun to change how his brain stored the city’s layout. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
6min
May 18, 2026 Unintended Consequences - Episode 11 - May 18, 2026
Segment 1 — The Hook
In September 2006, Facebook rolled out its News Feed feature to give every user a personalized stream of updates rather than forcing them to hunt across separate profile pages. The engineers who built the first ranking systems wanted people to see the posts that mattered most to them, measured by clicks, likes, and comments. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
7min
May 15, 2026 Unintended Consequences - Episode 10 - May 15, 2026
Segment 1 — The Hook
In 1941, a police constable named Albert Alexander lay dying in an Oxford hospital from a simple scratch that had spread infection through his face and bloodstream. Doctors turned to a new experimental drug, penicillin, and watched the infection retreat within days. ...
AI Disclosure: This podcast is curated by Patrick but uses AI-generated voice synthesis for audio production.
...more
8min

FAQs about Unintended Consequences:

How many episodes does Unintended Consequences have?

The podcast currently has 29 episodes available.