Ah, New York—where it’s hot, loud, and the air is barely breathable. So it’s not especially surprising that Governor Kathy Hochul is opting out of adding to all of that and announcing a moratorium on building new data centers in the state. 

Guest: Nitish Pahwa, Slate staff writer

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Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

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Is Microsoft laying off 3,200 employees from the Xbox division just a new boss coming in and pruning an overgrown asset, or is it a sign that console gaming is coming to the end?  

Guest: Jason Schreier, reporter at Bloomberg News, cohost of Triple Click, author of Play Nice, Press Reset, and Blood Sweat and Pixels. 

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Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

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If you’ve seen ads for Trump Accounts for kids, but also know anything about Donald Trump, you might be wondering “Free $1,000 per baby? Okay, what’s the catch?” It’s a classic. 

Guest: Justin Wolfers, Professor of Economics and Public Policy, University of Michigan, and founder of Platypus Economics.

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Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

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Thanks for joining us during the holidays. White our team is taking a break, we want to share a series with you that we think you’ll love. It’s called Diving In. 

Getting food delivered should be simple — but somehow it's gotten outrageously expensive. Economist Justin Wolfers breaks down why food delivery apps like DoorDash, Uber Eats, and Grubhub make it nearly impossible to compare prices, and why that's no accident. 

Subscribe on YouTube https://youtube.com/platypuseconomics

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Follow on Social Media @PlatypusEconomics and @JustinWolfers

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Through stealing your job or simply tanking the stock market—whichever comes first—the rise of artificial intelligence (companies) is a very futuristic sounding problem. It may have some very old-fashioned sounding solutions however.

Guest: Cory Doctorow, sci-fi author, journalist, blogger and author of “The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Life After AI.”

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Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

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People are asking artificial intelligence large language models how to do everything—even how to harm themselves and others. And while companies claim there are guardrails in place for those situations, we’ve already seen real-world instances of an LLM’s advice being used to plan a mass shooting.

Guest: Mark Follman, national affairs editor at Mother Jones and author of “Trigger Points: Inside the Mission to Stop Mass Shootings in America.”

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Podcast production by Rob Gunther, Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames-Ducharme and Patrick Fort.

Paige Osburn is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TBD.

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Is Elon Musk’s SpaceX leading humanity to Mars? Or is that just grandiose window-dressing for an A.I. company leading several other A.I. companies to IPOs? 

Guest: Max Chafkin, reporter with Bloomberg Businessweek and cohost of the Everybody's Business podcast.

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Ducharme, Patrick Fort, Rob Gunther and Paige Osburn. 

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It’s an awkward time to have a Department of Education that seems so disinterested in, uh, education. It’s leaving teachers to grapple with how to integrate artificial intelligence into the classroom—if at all. 

Guest: Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers.

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Ducharme, Patrick Fort, Rob Gunther and Paige Osburn.

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How the Trump administration has tried to put pressure on Disney for opinions expressed by Jimmy Kimmel and the hosts of The View—and how the Mouse is fighting back.

Guest: Anna M. Gomez, commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission since September 2023.

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell, Madeline Ducharme, Patrick Fort, Rob Gunther and Paige Osburn.

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The promise of an “internet for niche communities” and “the empowered independent creator” has been taking a beating as the web has become less open and increasingly dominated by a few platforms and players. But does it have to be that way?

Guest: Jack Conte, CEO and cofounder of Patreon.

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Podcast production by Evan Campbell, and Patrick Fort.

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