B (2:18)

You okay?

A (2:18)

No, I still have to do my taxes.

B (2:20)

Why don't you get them over with already? On National Admin Night from Tax act, there's social gatherings for getting through your to do list.

A (2:27)

Oh, what are you going to tell me it's at night of fun camaraderie, finding deductions and filing your taxes with tax Act?

B (2:33)

Well, yes. And right now you can file your federal and state return for just 49 bucks through April 8th.

A (2:39)

Oh, then sign me up.

B (2:40)

Just head to taxact.com/admin-knight for details. That's taxact.com/admin-Knight. Let's start with a quick update on the war in Iran. It looks like the fighting has stopped for now. Last night, Hours before an 8pm deadline, President Trump said that he agreed to suspend debilitating attacks on Iran's civilian infrastructure for two weeks, subject to Tehran reopening the state of Hormuz since the war began. This was the fifth time that Trump had threatened to escalate the bombing campaign before taco ing. Wall street parlance for Trump always chickens out. But this threat was not like the others. Yesterday morning, Trump unleashed a geopolitical earthquake with an ominous social media post that read a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again, which was criticized as unhinged and amoral by Democrats and some Republicans. Soviet cease fire is now in place. How are the markets reacting?

A (3:32)

I mean, we are ripping right now, Neil. Dow Futures are up 2.2% as of 4:00am this morning. S&P 500 futures up 2.4. The Nasdaq futures are up 3.2%. At the same time, oil is free falling. Brent crude, which is the global standard, fell as much as 16%, trading around $95 a barrel. We haven't seen sub 100 prices in a while. European natural gas futures, which is a closely watched metric for that neck of the woods, posted their biggest decline in more than two years. So they falling. And also good news for your summer travel plans. Refined fuels, which are diesel and jet flu, are also tumbling. Still, it's not like things are totally hunky dory. Even though the markets did snap back once trade strait of Hormuz transit resumes, it's not going to resume instantaneously. Output has been reduced at a bunch of oil and gas fields. Refineries have also curtailed production, so it's going to take a little while until normal operations resume.

B (4:30)

And it's unclear just how many ships that Iran is going to allow to pass because in a statement they said for a period of two weeks, safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz will be possible via coordination with Iran's military. So who knows what that means in terms of getting traffic back back to normal levels because right now we are just about like at 10% of normal levels and now they have to coordinate with the military. Looks like they're going to extract some of those bribes and toll booth that they set up of $2 million per ship. So we'll see what happens. Looks like negotiates negotiations between the US and Iran on a more comprehensive resolution to end the war will start on Friday.

A (5:06)

By the way, did finish slightly in the green yesterday. Which meant like the taco trade was always expected to come back. The taco was priced in even though futures are up bigly this morning. Moving on, Anthropic just dropped a new frontier model. That early benchmark show is the most powerful LLM ever created. But they won't let you use it yet. Mythos was announced yesterday by the Claude maker, but it's not for you or me to try yet because Anthropic thinks it's too dangerous for normies to get their hands on right now. They delayed the broader release of Mythos because it is too good at finding, quote, high severity vulnerabilities at critical points around the web. Instead, Anthropic has launched Project Glasswing where they are giving 11 select organizations access to the model in addition to $100 million in usage credits to try and poke around and develop proper cybersecurity safeguards so they can eventually unleash Mythos to the masses. What is Anthropic so afraid of? And one test, Mythos was able to escape from a virtual sandbox environment and then emailed a researcher while he was eating a sandwich at the park bragging it had done so. Mythos also found a long hidden vulnerability and open bsd, one of the more difficult to hack operating systems in the world. The fear is that in the wrong hands, or in anyone's hands really, Mythos could be used to exploit weak points around the web with minimal training or effort. Neal, again, this model isn't even out yet, but there's already a Mythos surrounding it.

B (6:33)

Do you know the first message ever sent on a telegraph? It was what hath God wrote? Sent by Samuel Morse in 1844. And it feels like that oh snap moment has arrived in AI with Mythos. Some argue that if this thing got into the wrong hands, it could bring down entire governments. And that's because Mythos on the cheap has already identified thousands of zero day bugs and vulnerabilities in software programs around the world, including every major operating system and browser. According to Anthropic, what we mean by zero day vulnerabilities is one that, that the creators of the software itself have no idea about. So they have zero days to patch it up or work on a fix. So these are critical vulnerabilities and exploits that Mythos has, has found. And that's why they're not releasing to the public and instead saying, okay, experts, we need to, we need to look at this and see what it can find before we get there, before we get the public's hands on it, because it's just too dangerous.

A (7:31)

Anthropic is nervous about two things. One is that Mythos is power enough that non experts like people like you or me could capitalize on its capability. So I could, you know, before I go to bed, say, hey, try to hack Mozilla Firefox browser and then wake up. And Mythos will have been able to do that. That is literally the test that they ran a couple of times. And Mythos continue to come back to them with zero day exploits that it unearthed. And then the other problem is, what if it is in the hands of a capable hacker? Then you are talking about, you know, nation state size issues. A lot of people on were reacting and saying that if Anthropic wasn't a US Company, right, we would be facing zero day exploits, you know, coming against us at a level in a scale that is unprecedented. So people were saying, like, if China got their hands on this model before the US said, what would, you know, the web look like right now? That is why Anthropic, maybe it's part hype, maybe it's not. Like this does seem to be part of their sort of marketing engine is to say, like our models are so good we literally can't release them because they're too dangerous to the world. But a lot of people in the cybersecurity industry are saying, we are glad they did this because this is a powerful.

B (8:40)

They have won widespread praise for being a responsible actor here. It still raises concerns though, that a group of employees or executives at Anthropic could perhaps potentially hypothetically bring down entire nation states with this particular LLM. And it's not going to be the only one soon. So we're now in a paradigm where private companies are more powerful technologically than governments. I think this is the first time Maybe in the history of the world where this has happened, because usually the US Government or other governments are on the leading edge of technology because of military applications. But now we just have this group of guys in, in Silicon Valley who have created this extremely powerful AI system that could bring down, who knows, and big infrastructure projects and things like that. And meanwhile, the Pentagon is feuding with Anthropic and saying, actually, we don't want to work with you and we are going to blacklist you from any company working with you. So, huge national security implications. They've created this Glasswing consortium to figure out exactly how best and safely to use this particular model.

A (9:40)

By the way, look up the Glasswing Butterfly, which is, it's named after very cool animal right there. So if you want a fun animal, that too, as a palate cleanser to, you know, all the doom and gloom, we just said check out the Glasswing Butterfly.

B (9:53)

Let's move on. As AI companies make more breakthroughs, the backlash to their data centers has taken a violent turn. On Monday morning, an attacker fired bullets into the home of an Indianapolis City council member who supported a data center project in the neighborhood and left a note on the doorstep that read, no data centers. No one was hurt. And police said it was an isolated, targeted incident. But the shooting comes at a time when grassroots resistance to the data center buildout is reaching a fever pitch. On Monday, Maine's House of Representatives voted to block major data centers from being built through November 2027, which, if enacted, would make it the first state to establish a data center moratorium. It probably won't be the last. In town halls, city councils, and state capitals across the country, lawmakers are discussing whether to freeze data center construction until their impact on electricity prices and the environment are better understood. Local resistance is something that Big Tech has to be worried about. Hyperscalers, those behemoth companies like Metta and Google that are racing to lead the AI revolution, have collectively pledged to spend $710 billion on data centers this year, money that's keeping the stock market afloat and driving all kinds of economic activity. Those plans could face major roadblocks from the most formidable force in American society, Angry neighbors.

A (11:04)

Yeah, let's dive into this shooting because obviously it is a pretty intense encapsulation of this broader issue. So, Ron Gibson is a city councilman in Indianapolis, and he has been a very vocal supporter of this project. But residents have pushed back with the same sort of talking points. We've seen environmental impacts, changes to historic parts of the neighborhood. These are kind of the main talking points that they were putting up, why they were opposing the data center. But Gibson's case for the data center was that the site that it was being proposed to be built on had been vacant for 40 years. So it is a classic case of do you want to boost the local economy through tax breaks and hopefully bring in some economic activity, or do you want to preserve a status quo, maybe a NIMBY asset sort of mindset. So even though it is one, you know, one project in one city, it does seem like this is the battle lines that are drawn across the entire country.

B (11:58)

Americans hate. I mean, poll after poll shows this in March. Quinnipac Unit, Quinnipiac University. Sorry, Quinnipiac. I love you. Great hockey team. Found that while use is increasing, 55% of Americans believe more harm than good will come from the technology in their daily lives. That is up from 44% in a poll last year. And Americans as a group of people, as a nation, are more negative about AI than people in any other country, according to Pew Research. They're also very fiercely protective of their property rights. And we saw this a few months ago when this video went viral of a Kentucky woman and her mother talking about an unnamed company approaching them last year. They own a bunch of farmland in Kentucky and they said they were approached by this company and offered $26 million to build a data center on part of their farmland. And they refused, saying, this, this farm has been with us through generations. And that that woman became a folk hero that caught on by wildfire showing, showing the immense resistance to data center buildout.

A (13:00)

And I mean, we're talking about Maine here, Indianapolis, Kentucky. These are not, you know, ground zero for the data center build out. Virginia has 579 server farms. Texas has 411 server farms. So if you think that there's backlash growing in these more isolated parts of the country or not, you know, the most popular parts of the country for data centers to be built in, Imagine what maybe is eventually going to happen in Virginia and Texas where all these server farms are descending upon.

B (13:28)

And it actually goes back to our back our last story, because if you are in the AI community and you are supporting of the AI build out and more data centers, you're saying, well, look, what if China had established Mythos before Anthropic did? And that is a result of all this compute that AI companies are bringing on the table through data centers. So this is actually a national security issue that we beat that we build data centers and have enough compute to be able to create more powerful Ms. Than our adversaries. So very interesting, very interesting question that's really going on in every single town hall around America right now.

A (14:02)

All right, we're going to take a quick break and come back with more stories right after this.

B (14:10)

This episode is brought to you by Apple. There is nothing like your first Mac. When I got mine, I was heading into freshman year at the University of Maryland. A lot was uncertain that fall, but I knew I had a dependable sidekick for homework, connecting with other students, and devouring blogs about our basketball recruiting class. What about you, Toby?

A (14:27)

For me, it was right as my sister started to get recruited to play soccer in college, I was given the very important task of making her a highlight tape. And Imovie was my best friend. She ended up playing at Georgetown. So I'd say it was all worth it.

B (14:40)

That's how we felt with our first Macs.

A (14:42)

How will you check out the all new MacBook Neo, an amazing Mac at a surprising price. Find out more@apple.com Mac that's apple.com Mac Neil, let's make a deal.

B (14:56)

Last time you said that, I ended up painting your fence and you did

A (14:59)

such a good job on that. But datasight can deliver deal intelligence across every stage of the investment life cycle. Powered by the best available AI models and protected by security standards dealmakers trust,

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A (15:19)

You can move faster on deals and win with data sites AI when you visit datasite.com brew that's datasite.com brew Neil, it's dangerous to do your taxes alone.

B (15:33)

You're exactly right. Well, except the danger part. But that's why there's National Admin Night from Taxact. There's social gatherings for getting through your to do list.

A (15:41)

Get ready for a night of fun, finding deductions and filing your taxes with TaxAct. And right now, you can file your federal and state return for just $49 through April 8th. Let's get together and get them over with.

B (15:55)

Visit taxact.comadmin-knight for details. That's taxact.com admin-knight I've got some great news to share. The middle class is shrinking. Little Misdirection learned that from Rodney Dangerfield. It's true America's middle class is shrinking. But that's only because more people are climbing into higher rungs of the economic ladder. Specifically the upper middle class. A new report from the American Enterprise Institute found that the upper middle class is bursting at the seams, making it now the country's largest economic group. Back in 1979, just 10% of American households belong to the upper middle class. In 2024, that share tripled to 31%. You're probably wondering what the upper middle class is, and there's no universal definition, but the AEI characterizes them as the households earning between about $154,000 to 462,000 for a family of four. So these folks aren't the first class flyers, but it wouldn't be surprising to find them in the Delta Lounge before their ski trip to Japan. The Rising Economic Fortunes of the Average the rising economic fortunes of the average American explains a lot about corporate America's big push into more premium goods and services, from $900 credit cards to Equinox style gyms to omakase tasting menus. Despite feeling gloomy around the US Economy, overall American's own financial situations have improved, and their unwavering commitment to spending money has propped up a US Economy that's been lapping its peers.

A (17:21)

What's behind this? You know, thrust into the upper middle class? It's really two things. One is the rise of dual earner families, which means that women in particular are making a lot of professional gains. If you go back to 1970, the share of women with college degrees was 11%. Now the share of women with bachelor's degrees or higher today is about 40%. And college degrees on the whole are linked to higher lifetime earnings. So if you have more college degrees out there, that means more women are bringing in more money to their families. And also so just get married if you want to have a better chance of climbing the economic ladder. More than 80% of people in the upper middle class and rich categories were married or in cohabitating households. So definitely you have a better chance of becoming rich or moving up the economic rungs if you have two incomes coming into the same household.

B (18:15)

Yeah, that makes sense. And also, I want to address a narrative violation around Millennials. So remember, Millennials are supposedly doing way worse than their parents. They got hit with the financial crisis. Everything was going bad for millennials. They don't eat tuna anymore. They ruined everything. But in early 2024, millennials and older members of Gen Z had, on average and adjusting for inflation, about 25% more wealth than Gen Xers and baby boomers did at a similar age. That's according to the St. Louis Fed. So Millennials are doing well. And then, of course, baby doomers are Also doing well because they are sitting on a lot of real estate value. They've owned these houses for decades. So across the generational spectrum, we're seeing incomes rising a little bit faster than inflation.

A (18:55)

I do think though, that you touched on a very important issue here, is that a lot of Americans don't feel like they're doing better. And I think that that tension arises from the big financial milestones are seemingly always out of grasp. Even though our incomes are going up. Owning a home, you know, that feels unattainable for a lot of Americans. Paying for college. College prices have exploded in recent years. So these are things that generations did quite regularly and quite easily because, you know, it just seemed more approachable given the incomes level at that time. But housing, education, health care, these are the places that people feel most pinched. Which is why maybe the vibe does not reflect what the data is actually showing. Moving on. When you Google something these days, you don't get a buffet of links to choose from anymore. Instead there's an appetizer course before the URLs in the form of an AI overview. But how accurate is that? A moose boosh of AI? Well, thanks to an experiment by the startup UMI analyzed by the New York Times, we have a better sense of its batting average, and it's pretty good. 9 out of 10 times the blurb you see is accurate. If that was your free throw percentage in the NBA, you'd be Steph Curry. But if you're the most popular search engine in the world, it does leave a little to be desired. Google processes more than 5 trillion searches a year, which means millions of erroneous answers are being served up every hour. The test involved running 4326 different Google searches. Once in October when most answers were being served up by Gemini 2, and then again in February when Gemini 3 came out. Gemini 2 was 85% accurate, while 3 bumped that up to 91%. Again, not bad, but not perfect. For Google, this is a bit of an egg on the face moment, but not a full omelet. The company does include some fine print under every search that reads I can make mistakes, so double check responses. They also push back on umi's analysis, saying that the questions it use doesn't really reflect what people are actually searching on Google. Neil Glass half full. Nine out of ten searches are right. Glass half empty. Billions of searches per year are inaccurate.

B (21:00)

Let's look under the hood for one example of how AI overviews works and how might produce an erroneous answer. So The New York Times asked Google when Bob Marley's home was converted into a museum. AI Overview said it happened in 1987, but the museum actually opened on May 11, 1986. So the the overview linked to three websites as its sources. Here they are. The first was a link to a Facebook page from Bob Marley's daughter who posted a photos after visiting the museum. There was no information about when the museum opened. The second link was a travel blog which also gave inexact information. And the third was a wick the Wikipedia page for Bob Marley Museum which said that the museum was founded in both 1986 and 1987. So a lot of contradictory sources and information there. Google Overviews is only going to be good as the source material it draws on. And a lot of the source material is Facebook and also Reddit. Facebook was the second most cited sources in Google AI overviews and Reddit was the fourth most cited. I'm sure that your history teacher who said you couldn't use Wikipedia probably wouldn't be allowing you to use overviews.

A (22:06)

Also, the issue is is the undergroundedness of these answers. As you kind of alluded to in that example, when you get an inaccurate response, it's not because they interpreted the source material incorrectly, is that they just kind of made it up. The source material doesn't even support the information that they provided. And so when you want to click deeper and say was this really started in 1986? You click on the Facebook post that has nothing to do with it. You're like, so where did any of this information even come from? That's the bad user experience that Google definitely wants to avoid. So I think like legally speaking, the fact that they have the disclaimer there allows them to get away with something like this. And again, 90% of the time it is right. Like we do rely on it for a lot of answers. I mean, before the show I said what is a zero day vulnerability? And I just looked at what the Google overview spat out. So it is a good reminder to say like hey, maybe pause for one extra beat if something feels a little bit off, off, go a little deeper. Do the normal Google search process because you know, tried and true, it still works.

B (23:09)

Let's sprint to the finish with some final headlines. The wireless festival has been canceled after the UK government blocked Kanye west, who was set to headline from entering the country. Backlash has grown after Wireless booked Kanye to headline all three nights of the festival, citing his history of anti Semitism and pro Nazi statements. Sponsors like Pepsi and Diageo cut ties with the festival, and Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the booking deeply concerning. In recent months, west has apologized for his past comments and said he'd be grateful for the opportunity to meet with the UK's Jewish community ahead of the summer festival. The UK government was not moved, denying west permission to enter the country on the grounds that his presence would not be conducive to the public good. And Wireless left with no headliner and a sponsor, Exodus was forced to scrap the entire thing.

A (23:52)

I mean, wireless isn't small, 150,000 attendees each year, so this is a big cancellation. Definitely saw a split reaction to this online because on the one hand, Kanye has hurt a lot of people, said a lot of hurtful things, but also some people are pushing back on the UK government doing this because bringing barring someone who's not conducive to the public good is a slippery slope. Like you could apply that label to a lot of people. So those were kind of the two camps that were forming on either side of this issue. Moving on, the minds at Food Channel may have just cooked up the best game show ever. What if you combine Survivor with Chopped? Enter Chopped Castaways, a spinoff series that comes out in May of this year that strands 12 chefs on a remote island and whittles them away through cooking competitions until the winner takes home 100 grand. Chopped host Ted Allen is on the mic, so you'll still get the satisfying you've been chopped sign off, but the Survivor elements will introduce physical challenges that chefs will have to compete in to earn their mystery basket ingredients. Chefs also have to build a working kitchen from basic supplies and cook everything over an open flame so a round might look like spearfish. Run back to camp, prep it into a delicious ceviche, and serve it up to judges in less than 30 minutes. Neal, how long until Jeff Probst shows up with a beef Wellington?

B (25:09)

I think my thoughts on this are best summed up by a couple of replies on X1 is this is the dumbest thing I've ever heard. I Hope it runs 19 seasons and how incredibly stupid. I can't wait to watch it then. I know there's no official connection to Survivor, but there could be one day because Warner Brothers, which owns Food Network, and Paramount, which owns CBS Survivor, are merging. So we'll see whether in the next few seasons because it is going to run at least 19 seasons. Jeff Ropes does show up with a beef Wellington.

A (25:38)

I love Chop Chop is my, you know, goat TV show because I always wonder like if I open a basket. What could I do with 30 minutes and, you know, peanut butter and anchovies or something like that? So. So adding the additional element of having to cook it over a flame, that's just great.

B (25:52)

Tell and source it yourself.

A (25:53)

Yeah.

B (25:53)

All right. Finally, let's close out the show with a new Wednesday segment we're calling Suggestion Box, which is where Toby and I will each give a recommendation on something that's brought us joy in the hopes that it will make your life better as well. Because where would we be without friends sharing advice? I probably still have green hair. And I should note, if we recommend a specific product, it's not sponsored. We just love it. Tell you what's something you've been obsessed with recently.

A (26:15)

All right, My rec is called Music League. It is all the rage here in the Morning Brew offices. You send out an invite to your friends to join the musical. It's an app or a website. The league is made up of rounds and each round has a theme. When the round starts, everyone submits a song that satisfies the theme, but your submission is anonymous. Once everyone has submitted, you have a certain amount of votes to dole out and a few down votes to whoever has the most upvotes over the course of a season wins. For instance, I'll just give you an example of what this week was at the Morning Brew offices. Best song from a canceled artist. So there was a lot of Kanye on there. I won't say what I chose yet, since voting is still going on, but you can try out Music League with your friends or your coworkers. It is perfect water cooler talk. You develop ops who always seem to downvote your songs. You really you figure out who actually has horrible taste in music. It is great. Just search musically online. I can't recommend it enough.

B (27:11)

Definitely recommend bringing it to your office. Okay. Something that's brought me joy recently is making stuff at home that you typically buy at the grocery store. And it's super, super easy. Nothing like Survivor chopped. I've made mayonnaise, which I highly recommend doing. Greek yogurt, mozzarella cheese. And my latest thing is propagating veggies like scallions. There's nothing worse than buying scallions at the store over and over again. But the thing is, you can put the roots you chop off in water or soil and they'll just grow back really quickly. Boom. You have infinite free scallions. So just go on Google overviews or ask Cloud. What are some basic staples that you can make at home? And the next thing you know, you'll be making ice cream.

A (27:48)

I learned a lot of things right there. That little spiel. Neil, one propagate didn't know that that was the term for regrowing your own scallions, too. Are you really making your own mayo?

B (27:58)

Oh, yeah, that's super easy. You just take an egg yolk, some lemon salt, and then you just literally poured a lot of oil while beating the egg. And then it turn. It just turns into mayo, and it's delicious.

A (28:09)

I've made my own mayo before, but the amount of oil that I put in, maybe reconsider, like, what am I putting in my body right now? So I don'. Know, you know, the nitty gritty ingredients. Just give me the final.

B (28:20)

Okay. But, you know, you don't want to know what's in hell. Yeah, that's right. That's true. But I will say some of these things are better than the grocery store, but some are worse. I mean, like Greek yogurt, like, it wasn't as good as fire. I'm just going to be, you know, I loved it because I made it, but it was just better.

A (28:37)

Yeah.

B (28:37)

So some of these things will be better or worse than you get at the grocery store, but you made it at home, and therefore you'll love it as well. All right, that is all the time we have. Thanks so much for starting your morning with us and have a wonderful Wednesday. If you'd like to reach us, send an email to Morning Brew daily at morning broadcom or DM us on Instagram @me. Daily Show. Let's roll the credits. Emily Milian is our supervising producer. Raymond Lu is our senior producer. Our producer is Olivia Graham, and our associate producer is Olivia Lake. Hair and makeup is spearing some fish for dinner. Devin Emery is our president, and our show is a production of Morning Brewing.

A (29:08)

Great show today, Neil. Let's run it back tomorrow.