She spent 20 years at Siemens, Intel, and Google — and held on to her BlackBerry until it practically had smoke coming out of it.

Then she got laid off, picked up ChatGPT, and built a political organization's website in 48 hours. Then wrote a book in 90 days. Then started teaching herself Stanford's CS curriculum on the subway.

But the moment that stopped us cold was in a hair salon on the Lower East Side. Wanjiku sat down next to a young single mother working two jobs, opened ChatGPT, and in 45 minutes they'd found a GED program, childcare subsidies, and a path to a completely different life.

We talk about the language of tech as a gatekeeping mechanism, why she voice-noted 80% of her book while walking her dog, and what Mara means when she says "you know who you think you are."

This is the episode to send to someone who thinks AI isn't for them.