TechLinked Podcast Summary

Episode: Phil Spencer retires, Wikipedia blacklists Archive.today, Hacktivists vs. Persona + more!
Date: February 24, 2026
Host: Linus Media Group

Episode Overview

This episode dives into a whirlwind of recent tech and gaming news, focusing on major leadership changes at Microsoft Gaming, a high-profile Wikipedia ban, an explosive hacktivist exposé on an age-verification company, and a rapid-fire round of “quick bits” spanning semiconductors to smart showers. The tone is fast, irreverent, and laced with inside jokes and self-aware commentary on the cyclical nature of tech news.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Phil Spencer Retires, Major Xbox Shake-up

• Details:

  • Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft’s gaming division and synonymous with Xbox, is retiring.
  • Spencer turned around Xbox after the rocky Xbox One launch in 2014.
  • Xbox President Sarah Bond is also departing; employees reportedly welcome her exit due to the controversial “Xbox Everywhere” strategy, which shifted focus from consoles to mobile and cloud.
  • Noted: "This is an Xbox" slogan ironically blurred the brand, coinciding with three years of falling hardware revenue.
  • Spencer replaced by Asha Sharma, formerly president of Microsoft’s core AI division, with previous stints at Meta and Instacart.

• Concerns from the Community:

  • “That corporate pedigree isn’t inspiring optimism from Xbox fans...” (02:10)
  • Fear among fans that Sharma’s AI background could spell doom for the console.
  • Sharma’s commitments: "great games, the return of Xbox and the future of play, whatever that means" (03:12), and a promise not to "flood our ecosystem with soulless AI" (03:24).
  • Host’s verdict: "Whether Sharma is the savior or executioner of Xbox remains to be seen. There’s also a Third option where she sort of just continues keeping Xbox in a wraith-like, neither dead-nor-alive, undead kind of state." (03:35)

2. Wikipedia Blacklists Archive.Today

• Background:

  • Archive.today, a paywall bypass tool often confused with archive.org, is blacklisted after being connected to DDoS attacks and snapshot tampering.
  • Wikipedia will purge ~695,000 links to the site due to security and reliability risks.

• Conflict Unpacked:

  • Drama ignited when blogger Yanni Patokalio (Gyrovag) exposed purported aliases of Archive.today’s maintainer.
  • In response, Archive.today allegedly embedded malicious code in its Captchas, launching DDoS attacks against Gyrovag.
  • Evidence of web page tampering: a blog post author changed from "Nora" to "Yani Patakilio."
  • Host pokes fun at the situation: "Archive Today reportedly embedded malicious code in its Captchas to funnel DDoS traffic..." (05:06).

• Escalation – Bizarre Threats:

  • The maintainer made threats about publishing an OSINT investigation into Patokalio’s Nazi grandfather and making a "Gyrovag-branded gay dating app" (06:41).
  • "Potentially the most terminally online threat ever. Ew. And we wouldn't want your socially conservative mother to see that, would we?" (06:49)

• Aftermath:

  • Archive.today’s maintainer claimed the campaign "turned out pretty well" and plans to scale down the DDoS, brushing off the incident as "just a little bit of fun." (07:10)

3. Hacktivists Expose Persona’s Age Verification System

• Incident:

  • Persona’s entire frontend codebase exposed on a US government server, discovered by researcher Celeste.
  • Code revealed 269 (not nice) verification checks – flagging users against terrorism/espionage watchlists, doing facial recognition, flagging “suspicious entities” based on faces.

• Rumors & Clarification:

  • Rumors swirled about links to AI surveillance used by ICE (because of the “Onyx” deployment), Peter Thiel's Founders Fund, and Palantir.
  • Reality: "Zero direct references to ICE, Palantir, or immigration enforcement..." (09:24), according to Celeste.

• Industry Response:

  • Persona CEO Rick Song personally reached out, acknowledged the error, explained Onyx was named after a coworker’s favorite Pokémon: "It’s a rock snake, you guys." (10:14)
  • Song agreed to answer questions and posted the entire email exchange online.
  • Celeste credited Persona for quickly fixing the issue and clarified that not all flagged concerns were severe. The exchange was "constructive, civil, dare I say, flirty." (10:42)
  • "I'm shipping Celeste and Song hard right now. Almost as hard as I'm shipping our sponsor." (11:04)

4. Quick Bits (Rapid Fire News)

• OpenAI’s Sam Altman on AI Energy Use

  • At the AI Impact Summit, Altman said: "It also takes a lot of energy to train a human... it takes like 20 years of life and all the food you eat before you get smart." (14:09)
  • Host’s retort: “Altman seems like the kind of guy who, when presented with the trolley problem, advocates for the trolley.” (15:12)

• AMD Stops Updating Ryzen Z1 Extreme Drivers?

  • Rumors via forums and Reddit claim AMD has stopped Windows driver support for the Z1 Extreme, a chip used in many gaming handhelds.
  • "Notably, neither Asus nor Lenovo have released a new Z1 Extreme driver update in roughly 66 months..." (16:10)
  • AMD hasn't confirmed; Z2 updates are still ongoing.

• Intel and AMD Desktop Chip Delays

  • Next-gen Intel Nova Lake S and AMD Zen 6 chips may both be delayed until CES 2027, according to leaks and rumors on Weibo and Bench Life. (17:04)
  • Host: “None of this is confirmed yet. However, it would be nice to get a CES with some proper good old fashioned gaming CPUs for once.” (17:23)

• MIT Prints a Working Linear Electric Motor

  • MIT researchers made a multi-material 3D printer that can make a fully functional linear electric motor in a single print for about 50 cents.
  • "What if you printed an electric motor gun?" (18:03)
  • Last step: magnetize the coil for it to work.

• Kohler’s Smart Shower System

  • The “Anthem Evo Cycle” recycles and filters your own shower water in real time.
  • Host quips: “After putting cameras in toilets, they’ve now moved on to creating a way for you to spray yourself with hot, filtered piss.” (19:13)
  • And quotes Jerry Jeff Walker’s “Pissing in the Wind” as the "showering" soundtrack. (19:22)

Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “I think I’m stuck in a time loop... but it doesn’t matter that I’m trapped in an infinite cycle of delivering tech news until the heat death of the universe.” (00:19)
• "We will not chase short term efficiency or flood our ecosystem with soulless AI. Slope games are and always will be art crafted by humans." – Asha Sharma, summarizing her vision for Xbox (03:24)
• "Potentially the most terminally online threat ever." (06:49) – On Archive Today's feuds
• "It’s a rock snake, you guys. I did not just think of that just now." (10:14) – On Persona’s AI project codename
• “Altman seems like the kind of guy who, when presented with the trolley problem, advocates for the trolley.” (15:12) – Host’s zinger on OpenAI’s Sam Altman
• “After putting cameras in toilets, they’ve now moved on to creating a way for you to spray yourself with hot, filtered piss. It’s even gold colored, for obvious reasons.” (19:13)

Key Timestamps

• Phil Spencer retires/Xbox shakeup: 00:19–03:50
• Wikipedia vs Archive.today: 03:51–07:32
• Persona hacktivist expose: 07:33–11:10
• Sam Altman on AI energy: 14:09–15:12
• AMD Ryzen Z1 Extreme driver rumors: 16:10–16:42
• Intel/AMD delays: 17:04–17:23
• MIT 3D-prints an electric motor: 18:03–18:24
• Kohler recycling shower water: 19:13–19:48

Conclusion

This episode delivered an energetic, biting roundup of pivotal tech and gaming developments. With plenty of zingers and in-jokes for regular listeners, the TechLinked host broke down the implications of executive shakeups, infosec controversies, and the relentless march of new hardware—serving up a news fix that’s both informative and distinctly irreverent.