Instagram Instants Flop, Bumble Removes Swiping & Elon Musk Trial Juror Speaks Out - NEWS ROUNDUP

Summary

There Are No Girls on the Internet Episode: Instagram Instants Flop, Bumble Removes Swiping & Elon Musk Trial Juror Speaks Out - NEWS ROUNDUP Host: Bridget Todd Date: May 15, 2026

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Episode Overview

This weekly news roundup dives into the latest developments in tech and internet culture, centering on marginalized voices and how rapidly changing platforms such as Instagram and Bumble are impacting user experience and social connection. Bridget Todd and producer Mike cover Instagram’s ever-evolving identity crisis, new AI-driven dating trends, a viral WIRED article about “the sad wives of AI,” and the story of an outspoken Elon Musk trial juror.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Instagram’s Identity Crisis & the New “Instants” Feature

[02:09 – 16:03]

• Instagram launched “Instants,” a feature mixing elements of Snapchat and BeReal, allowing users to send disappearing photos via direct messages.
• Bridget and Mike assert that Instagram is lost, attempting to be “everything for everyone” by copying features from every competitor (Reels, Stories, Instants, IGTV).
• Bridget: “Instagram wants to be everything to everyone. And in turn, ... the expectation is that ... you will be active on every, in every way that their platform shows up. Stories, reels, grid, posts, close friends, now instants—it's just exhausting.” (07:21)
• User experience is suffering: even close friends rarely see each other’s posts due to the algorithm prioritizing brands and celebrities.
• The role of celebrities (notably the Kardashians) in resisting changes to social media platforms was discussed, with an anecdote about Kylie Jenner’s tweet tanking Snapchat’s stock (05:51).
• Quote from Harmony Music on Threads: “Welcome to Instagram, a low stakes, low pressure environment to share Candid photos with your friends. Over the years, we will change everything you like about the app until it becomes a shell of its former self. Then we will introduce Instagram Instance, a low stakes, low pressure environment to share candid photos with your friends.” (10:05)
• The proliferation of new features is seen as a lack of vision, serving business interests rather than genuine user needs.

2. Viral AI Scams & Reasonably Shady Podcast Crossover

[19:25 – 33:15]

• Bridget is a fan of RHOP hosts Robyn Dixon and Gisele Bryant’s “Reasonably Shady” podcast and highlights their coverage of AI-generated scams.
• Notable scam: AI-generated videos featuring marginalized identities intended to provoke strong emotional engagement and fraudulently solicit money—e.g., a Black boy allegedly bullied while selling purses, which turned out to be an AI fabrication.
• Robin and Giselle reported falling for such scams, along with celebrities like Viola Davis. Bridget notes the emotional manipulation leans heavily on real tensions and traumas.
• Bridget: “The reason why that scam worked on so many celebrities ... is because it speaks to something real inside of us as black folks. ... And our natural inclination to want to support and want to, you know, show love and show grace and lift up ...” (29:28)
• AI is now used to rapidly generate and A/B test emotionally provocative content at scale on platforms like TikTok and YouTube, inflaming social divisions and exploiting authenticity triggers.
• Practical takeaway: know your own “triggers” and remain skeptical of content seemingly tailor-made to provoke you.

3. “Sad Wives of AI” – Gender, Tech Obsession, and Domestic Toll

[38:09 – 62:14]

• In-depth discussion of WIRED’s article “Meet the Sad Wives of AI” by Alessandra Ram, exploring the lived reality for women partnered with men obsessed by AI careers or AI culture (Bay Area context, white-collar focus).
• Quote: “There are two babies in this household now: the small human one and the large language model. Both demand constant attention. Both keep us up at 2am.” [38:52]
• Bridget summarizes: In these relationships, the men become emotionally unavailable, fixated on staying ahead in the “AI gold rush,” often leading to neglected domestic responsibilities and emotional disconnect.
• Gender dynamics: Women are adopting AI less due to occupational segmentation, leading to compounded inequality as men pursue AI careers while women shoulder more household labor.
• Resentment is pervasive, and several women turn to AI tools (like ChatGPT) for therapy—often finding that bots validate rather than challenge their feelings, sometimes even implicitly supporting emotional affairs or infidelity.
• Mike (re: ChatGPT’s advice): “You have to leave them immediately!” [55:17]
• Bridget: “Princess Diana famously said there were three people in her marriage – for the sad wives of AI, the third is a chatbot.” [57:24]
• The conversation expands to whether AI obsession is being gendered as a new form of tech “machismo” and economic striving.

4. Bumble’s Shift from Swiping to AI (Bumble 2.0)

[65:21 – 79:40]

• Bumble is abandoning its iconic swipe feature and “women message first” rule, replacing it with an AI dating assistant (B), which screens matches based on user interests and creates “chapter-based” personal profiles.
• Bumble’s revenue and user engagement are in decline—a trend also seen in Tinder—and younger generations are increasingly disillusioned with dating apps and AI-based experiences.
• Bridget: “If I’m fatigued about the experience of being on dating apps and also AI, I’m not so sure the solution to that is more AI in my dating app, you know?” (72:36)
• Broader cultural trends: Young people desire genuine, IRL connection rather than algorithmic “matching.” Attempts to automate social interaction are seen as missing the point.
• Analogous problems in other realms (e.g., hostel culture, social media) where technology is misapplied to connection needs better served by actual human interaction.
• Memorable hostel anecdote: People seek authentic moments but must actively create culture/community rather than expecting it to be passively delivered through tech.

5. Jury Duty, Elon Musk, and the Limits of Impartiality

[83:22 – 86:05]

• Mike recounts the viral transcript from Elon Musk’s civil trial juror selection, where a prospective juror openly stated: “I believe it would be to the benefit of the human race for Mr. Musk to be sent to prison.”
• The juror claims they can still be impartial in a civil trial because, “I don’t believe a loss of several hundreds of millions of dollars ... would be even a drop in the bucket to his wealth.” (84:15)
• Bridget: “I love this juror. Shout out to this juror, juror number 96. I too think humanity would be better off if Elon Musk were in prison.” (85:11)

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “Instagram wants to be everything to everyone. ... Stories, reels, grid, posts, close friends, now instants—it’s just exhausting.”
  — Bridget Todd [07:21]

• “The reason why that scam worked on so many celebrities ... is because it speaks to something real inside of us as black folks.”
  — Bridget Todd [29:28]

• “There are two babies in this household now: the small human one and the large language model. Both demand constant attention.”
  — WIRED article quoted by Bridget [38:52]

• “Princess Diana famously said there were three people in her marriage – for the sad wives of AI, the third is a chatbot.”
  — Bridget Todd [57:24]

• Elon Musk juror: “I believe it would be to the benefit of the human race for Mr. Musk to be sent to prison. However, I don’t believe a loss of several hundreds of millions of dollars in a civil trial would be even a drop in the bucket to his wealth.”
  — Juror No. 96, recounted by Mike [84:15]

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Important Segment Timestamps

• Instagram/Instance Feature Discussion: 02:09 – 16:03
• AI Scams & Reasonably Shady Crossover: 19:25 – 33:15
• WIRED: Sad Wives of AI Analysis: 38:09 – 62:14
• Bumble, Dating Apps, Authentic Connection: 65:21 – 79:40
• Elon Musk Trial, Jury Duty Anecdote: 83:22 – 86:05

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Overall Tone

Candid, humorous, and self-aware, with a focus on how tech and platforms impact real lives, especially for people outside the center of mainstream tech narratives. Bridget balances cynicism about tech-overreach with a persistent yearning for genuine community and connection.

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Final Thoughts

This episode spotlights the exhaustion many feel with social platforms and dating apps remaking themselves around fleeting business objectives and AI hype. It draws attention to emotional manipulation in online scams, the gendered burden of tech obsession, and the widespread desire for authenticity in connection—plus, it isn’t afraid to roast tech CEOs and jurors, all with wit and heart.

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For Further Information:
All articles referenced and AI scam detection resources will be linked in the show notes. Listeners are encouraged to share their own experiences with dating apps, Instagram changes, or AI fatigue via the show’s email or Spotify comments.

Transcript

[Bridget Todd]

This is an iHeart podcast.

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[Bridget Todd]

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[Mike]

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[Bridget Todd]

There Are no Girls on the Internet is a production of iHeartRadio and unbossed creative. I'm Bridget Todd and this is There Are no Girls on the Internet this is There Are no Girls on the Internet, a podcast where we cover tech power and who gets left out. And this is our weekly news roundup where we dig into all the stories that you might have missed online this week so you don't have to. And Mike, I want to start with a question. Does Instagram even know what it is or who it's for anymore? I should be Clear. This is kind of a rehash of what I have always said about Instagram, that they don't really know who or what they are for. They are just throwing a bunch of stuff at the wall and, and seeing if any of this will help them compete. We did an episode about this way back when in 2022 when Instagram was first pushing Reels to compete with TikTok, like short form video content. And I remember when that happened, both Kim Kardashian and Kylie Jenner, they spoke out and said, make Instagram Instagram again, stop trying to be TikTok. I just want to see cute photos of my friends. I gotta say, I do think that part of the reason why the Kardashians specifically would be so against reels is that I think the Kardashians have or had that version of Instagram down where you just sort of post great looking, polished photos of yourself looking super hot. And that's kind of all it takes to do well on a photo based, image based platform. And when they switched over to reels, you had to be saying something or doing something of note. I'm sure they figured it out. You know, it's not like they've lost any capital since this, this shift. But I understood why people like the Kardashians especially were like, oh, actually we would like it if this was more of a visual photo based medium, please.

[Mike]

And not just them. I mean, for every creator, it's so much more work to create videos and it's a longer thing. The editing is more difficult, the scripting is more difficult. It's. It's so much more work for everybody.

[Bridget Todd]

Oh, you know this. Working as my producer, I am trying to get better at video, but ultimately if I, if I want to talk my shit, I want to be able to do it with, you know, in my pajamas. Y' all can't see me because my video is off right now. I look insane right now, but I still have something to say. The idea of, okay, I've got to get out my ring light. I've got to do a soft glam makeup or put on a filter just to like talk crap about somebody. No, I don't have, I don't. I can't hack video. So you know this about me. I also feel like the podcast, I'm better on Mike when I'm not seeing myself and when I don't have video, I actually find looking at myself deeply distracting. Whenever I'm in a video on Zoom, I have to have it angled so that I can't see myself or have my self view turned off because I'll just be looking at myself the entire time. Do you, do you find that?

[Mike]

Oh totally, yeah. When I am on zoom or whatever, if there's an option to turn my own self camera off I will because it is just so distracting. I think people can't help it but look at videos in general, but especially videos of ourselves. You know, like maybe there's somebody out there whose eye is not drawn to a video of themselves, causing them to constantly second guess every movement and you know, out of place hair or what have you. But I don't think that's most people's experience.

[Bridget Todd]

I completely agree. So when Instagram made this change pushing short form video with reels, the Kardashians weren't pleased. And you know, you might be thinking like, oh well, who cares what they want. But celebrities like the Kardashians have had a big influence on the way that we understand social media platforms and how they work. Back in February 2018, Kylie Jenner posted a tweet saying, so does anyone else not open Snapchat anymore or is it just me? Ugh, this is so sad. Basically saying Snapchat is played out. And I guess Instagram didn't agree or doesn't agree because they just released a feature called Instance, which is kind of like if Snapchat and that social media app Be Real had a baby. It lets you send quick disappearing photos to friends or mutual followers through Instagram's DM inbox, which just a big reminder, Instagram recently ended encrypted messaging for their DMs. So just know that you can share these Instance with a select group of followers. They're live for 24 hours and they disappear once the person that you send it to opens them. So that's something that makes it different than Instagram's Current Stories feature, which you can, even after you open it, you can still rewatch a story, even if it's in your close friend's story.

[Mike]

They have so many different formats like grid, posts, reels, stories, instants. It's a lot for one app.

[Bridget Todd]

That is what I am saying. I guess I think that Instagram wants to be everything to everyone. And in turn, if you are somebody who is a creator or maybe you have a podcast that you would like to promote on social media, including Instagram, the expectation is that to do that in any kind of real way, you will be active on every, in every way that their platform shows up. Stories, reels, grid, posts, close friends, now instants it's just exhausting. And I also think it reveals that this is not a platform that really knows what they're about, what they're trying to do, and what the role they want to carve out, you know, in our current digital diet. Back when Instagram was rolling out reels to be more like TikTok, I saw this tweet that I thought really summed it up. It's like, if your mistress got plastic surgery to look more like your wife, and you're thinking, don't you understand what, what this is like? Don't you understand why it is that I, that you're appealing to me like, this isn't what I want at all? And I think that's really the vibe with Instagram. When they were making that switch, switch over to reels, I remember my number one villain, Adam Oseri, the head of Instagram, he put out this video that said, you know, we're just trying to give people what they want, which is video content. I really took issue with that because, you know, you're saying that people want video content while prioritizing video content and putting your thumbs on the scale. So of course you're gonna say, oh, people want video content, so we're just giving them what they want when you have prioritized that. And so that's what performs well on the platform. One, but two, he said video content is what Instagram needs to do in order to be able to compete in our current digital landscape. And I just remember thinking, just from my perspective as somebody who like, uses Instagram, why do I care? Like, like I don't have any kind of stock in Instagram. You're basically saying that you don't really care about delivering an experience that me, the user actually wants. You're only focused on, you know, how to best compete and your growth, which I understand, but why should I be invested in that? You know, I, I'm interested in like a social media experience that doesn't feel horrible. And I guess I say that to say I think Instagram is really spinning their wheels and just trying to compete with so many different platforms at this point, Snapchat, TikTok, YouTube, that they cannot deliver one user experience that might actually be pleasant.

[Mike]

One platform to rule them all. Like, they just have to go after everybody, right? They want to have a monopoly on social media.

[Bridget Todd]

I really agreed with this post from Threads user, which, haha, irony talking about something I saw on Threads from a Harmony Music who said, welcome to Instagram, a low stakes, low pressure environment to share Candid photos with your friends. Over the years, we will change everything you like about the app until it becomes a shell of its former self. Then we will introduce Instagram Instance, a low stakes, low pressure environment to share candid photos with your friends. And I think that really speaks to how folks were responding to this change. Whenever Instagram rolls out a feature, it's never the features that people want. It's always the features where you're like, well, who was asking for that? And, you know, back in the day, Instagram really was, it was just a chronological feed of unappetizing photos of your friends, lunches, or their cats. In 2016, they ditched that chronological feed in favor of the algorithmic one that we have now. Then to compete with Snapchat, they started Stories, they started live streaming, and then in 2018, they had IGTV, which was kind of a YouTube knockoff, which they later shut down. And I wanted to give that bit of context that we've just been here before of, of Instagram trying to compete with so many things and not doing any of them particularly well, and the entire experience just sort of being an unfun slog.

[Mike]

Yeah, I mean, I, I, there was a time when I used Instagram pretty regularly. I, I, I really don't too much these days. And when I do, very rarely am I interacting with anyone that I know personally. Right. It's mainly like celebrities and big accounts.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah. That is one of the big complaints of Instagram, that you rarely see people that you actually know or that you actually want to see anymore.

[Mike]

I had to work like hell to get it to show me your posts, which was crazy because I was like, trying to see them all the time.

[Bridget Todd]

There's probably not a person that, that I, that I like you. You're probably the person that I interact digitally the most with. And it's wild to me that it's like, oh, well, certainly you all don't want to see what each other is posting.

[Mike]

It would, it was like you didn't exist. I would have to search for you over and over. Now that you've been posting those news roundup carousels to the grid, it does show me those. It has finally caught on that, like, you are a person I'm interested in seeing.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, the, the post that you help create every week, Instagram is like, oh, maybe Mike would be interested in having these surfaced. In any event, if you want to turn off Instagram instance, we will put instructions on how to do that in the show notes. But let us know what you all think Listen, I complain about every new feature that they roll out and then in a few weeks time I'm using it if they don't, if they don't pull it. So I'll talk my shit, but you'll probably see me on Instagram Instance too, so just keep that in mind.

[Mike]

I guess I'm curious if it takes off just because like I said, it feels like Instagram is not for connecting with friends anymore. It's for connecting with brands, giant accounts like celebrities. And so I wonder, are brands gonna start using Instance or.

[Bridget Todd]

Oh God, I sure fucking hope not. I think your point really is valid though, because as I, as I said, Instagram, when it first started it was like, these are your friends, this is your friend's cat, this is your friend's cat on a Kelvin filter. For some reason that looks weird, but now, because I am a person who makes a creative thing that I want people to find, I watch Adam Moseri's like webinars on what the platform is prioritizing. First of all, they're absurd. The amount of work that if I were to follow the instructions that he gives on how to perform well on the platform, it would be my full time job. It's like, oh, make five reels a week or you know, be posting X amount of stories, an amount of content that is just not sustainable. Like if you have any, if you make a podcast or make a thing that you're trying to promote on the platform, there would be no time to make that thing and then also promote the thing on Instagram. So people who are good at it, I have no idea how they're doing it and they really give very, very specific instructions on how to do it. Like your hook has to come within three seconds, this, that, the third. And so I think people are rightly saying, well, hey, this doesn't feel like a fun way to connect with people in my life and meet new people in my life and engage with the people that I know. This feels like work. This feels like me having to do a very specific set of things to succeed on this platform and like have anybody see my content. And so I do think that they're like, oh, well, people think Instagram has become too polished, too commercial, too manufactured, will do Instance and that'll be a way for people to, you know, lower stakes connect with the actual people that they know. It's all. If the brands aren't there yet, it's only a matter of time until Instance feels the exact same way that regular Instagram feels. Then they're gonna have to make an even, even more insular thing where it's like, oh, instance is now all brands selling you stuff. Try this new thing. You know, it's gonna, it's just gonna be new tech that nobody wants all the way down.

[Mike]

It's, it's like a version of enshinification, right. Like they have to be constantly changing it. And I guess it, it makes sense that things in tech change and evolve, but so many of these changes don't feel like they are designed to improve the user experience. Right. They're designed to sell more ads, eat the lunch of whatever competitor du jour is threatening their market dominance. And they're able to do it because they have our social grid.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, we're all just caught in the middle. Let's take a quick break.

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[Bridget Todd]

room, all nurses to the nurses station.

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[Bridget Todd]

And we're back.

[Mike]

All right, Bridget, what else you got for us?

[Bridget Todd]

So you know this, Mike, I love my Bravo. I love my Real Housewives of Potomac, which I believe to be the crown jewel in the Bravo universe. And so I have been trying to get in touch with Robyn Dixon and Gisele Bryant, who are from Real Housewives of Potomac, who have a podcast on this very network on iHeartrading, which is very popular, called Reasonably Shady. I have been trying to get their attention, not in the, like, Jodie Foster way. I've just been trying to get on their radar for a while because they, like, not.

[Mike]

Have you considered shooting Reagan, just going out to the cemetery and unloading?

[Bridget Todd]

Not, not in that way. But they had this very popular podcast called Reasonably Shady. And they have been talking so much about AI, specifically AI scams and sort of getting taken by AI generated content, the same kind of stuff that we're talking about on this podcast. And what I find so interesting is that there, I would say that, I mean, as our producer, I guess I will be curious for your thoughts. But I think of our audience as people who are, like, thinking about technology, thinking about social media, thinking about AI. It's something that they spend some time thinking about it. Maybe they don't identify as techies or like tech people. I know a lot of people do. We have a lot of folks who are way smarter about technology than I am and are, like, much more credentialed in the space. But the reasonable shady audience are people who are probably not super. You know, they're not thinking about technology a lot. Right. And so I think it's fascinating and also really cool that they are using this Sort of general audience platform that they've built up to have meaty conversations about AI Even conversations about what it feels like to get scammed personally by AI Because a while back, they talked about this video that they saw where it was, like, an AI Generated female sportscaster who was at a basketball game trying to report, and then she falls over, and she kind of falls into the lap of this guy. She's also dressed pretty slinky for a newscaster, which Might have. Could have been a tip that, like, maybe it wasn't real. They talked about this, and then they had to follow up and say, oh, it turns out this video was AI So at that point, they had. They had a, like, pretty good discussion about AI Generated content. I reached out, and I was like, y', all, not only am I a super fan of Real Housewives of Potomac, I know about AI Bring me on your podcast to talk about AI and why we are all getting taken by AI that was also around the time where I got taken by, like, four different AI Generated videos of cute animals that weren't real. I think I said, you won. The bunnies jumping on the trampoline. The bunnies jumping on a guy's stomach. Like, AI Generated videos of animals gets me every time.

[Mike]

I feel. It's a particular vulnerability you have because you're, like, very interested in cute animals, but don't really have a lot of, I guess, experience with the animal kingdom, you know? Is that fair to say you were, like, a plant, girly?

[Bridget Todd]

I. Yeah. I mean, I'm a city mouse. So, like, the level of animals that I'm regularly coming into contact with are my cats, the occasional cockroach, rats in my alley. Actually, rats everywhere. Because I live in D.C. you know, birds, squirrels. That's really the. The. My main contact. I want to believe in this. This world where when the lights go out, wild animals are having all kinds of all manner of adventures. And maybe. Maybe they are, but just not in. Not. Not in the videos that I am seeing, because those videos are fake. They're AI Generated.

[Mike]

Yeah. No, there's not. Like, a videographer. They're like, okay, bunnies, time to get up on the trampoline.

[Bridget Todd]

Oh, my God. I actually almost sent one to you. And then. And then even. Even for. Because, like, y' all know I have a, like, vulnerability about animal videos. And so whenever I see a cute animal video online, I have to just. Even. Even if I think it's real, I have to not share it, because I'm like, I. I clearly can't be Trusted.

[Mike]

But there was good that you're aware of this, because, like, one of these days, you're going to get a call that's gonna be like, hey, this is the bunny. I have been arrested. I need you to send some prepaid gift cards immediately.

[Bridget Todd]

And I would. And I would. There was one just last night where somebody was like, oh, I put a GoPro on a crab at the beach. To show you what? When crab. You know, when. At the beach when crabs go into holes, and you're like, what are they doing under there? And the beginning.

[Mike]

Yeah, so they put a GoPro on a crab. Yeah, that makes sense. Go on.

[Bridget Todd]

So the crab goes into the hole, and at first you're like, okay, this is about what I would expect it to look like. You know, sand a few other crabs. But then the deeper that he goes, it's like the crabs have figured out architecture where it's like columns and columns and columns. And, like, there's a whole underground world down there, and there's crabs on each column, and it's like they've got some sort of a hierarchy. And then I was like, wait a minute. I don't think this is legit. I'll post a video in the show notes and y' all can. Yeah, basically, this video purported to show that these crabs have built kind of like an underground coliseum type situation in the sand. So while you're, like, up on the beach having a nice time under the. Under the sand, the crabs have a whole situation down there that we don't even know about.

[Mike]

They've got architecture, they've got societal hierarchies, they've got art, they've got an economy. They're like. They've got classes.

[Bridget Todd]

You're joking. But literally, this AI generated video, it looks like. And this is where the crabs would have their Eyes Wide Shut parties. Like, they've got a whole world we don't know about down there.

[Mike]

All right, well, I'm glad that you didn't share that. Right. Like, you almost did. But then you paid attention to some of the Tells of AI videos, and you were like, wait a minute. This is not real. I'm not going to share this.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes. And so that is why I'm so keen to talk to Robin and Giselle from the Reasonably Shady podcast about this, because, you know, once they. They followed up with their conversation about this AI generated video of the sportscaster falling over, I reached out and I was like, oh, my God, bring me on the podcast. Let's talk about AI they passed, unfortunately, which is Totally fine.

[Mike]

Sure. They were busy.

[Bridget Todd]

I mean, they're like celebrities. I understand. It was. It was a little bit of a Hail Mary. Ask if anybody knows them, though.

[Mike]

I would lie.

[Bridget Todd]

I genuinely am a fan of the content that they're creating around AI. So then. So they pass. Whatever, whatever. So we did an episode of this podcast about those AI generated scams, wherein generally they are racialized, where it'll be like a black person saying, you know, I make these handcrafted purses or this handcrafted after the item. And then I was the victim of racialized abuse where white boys came and threw my items on the ground. Now I'm crying, please buy my handcrafted lamps or purses or shirts or whatever to make me feel better. We did a whole episode about that where we talked to Jeremy Carrasco, this researcher who was kind of known online as like the AI debunker guy, all about how you can sort of protect yourself from scams like that and how to spot them and why they are taking off. Mike, you and I had a conversation about how often these scams are racialized and how often they exist at the fractures of genuine identity tensions. We put that episode out this week. Robin on the Reasonably Shady podcast tells a story about getting taken by the exact same scam where it's a AI generated black boy who says he has made these handmade purses. White kids come and like torment him and knock the purses down. He's sobbing and asking for people to buy the purses. She tells her co host, Gisele Bryant. This Giselle says, not only did I see that same video, I bought two purses. Robin breaks down, like, all of these different celebrities like Viola Davis are in the comments of this video being like, oh, my God, keep your head up, son. Like, you're doing so great. Don't let these guys get you down. And I just thought it was a very meaty, good, helpful conversation. So, genuinely, kudos to Robin and Giselle from Reasonably Shady for breaking this down. And I think it's especially good to be having those conversations for an audience who, you know, might not be tuning into AI and tech and social media conversations all the time. And I just thought it was interesting that we had literally just done that episode and the exact same scam got them.

[Mike]

It is interesting and it really, I think, goes to one of the central things you say about the show. One of the reasons that you created this show is because even people who don't self identify as techies or interested in tech are still dealing with technology and the Internet, like all the time in their lives. And, you know, they might not think about it as a tech issue, but they're definitely thinking about and talking about challenges that they encounter due to the fact that all of our lives are mediated through technology now.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes. I mean, I think of this podcast as like a show about culture and identity, just using tech as a lens. And I guess that if I could like wrap this segment up, that sort of. My point is that how sensitive all of us are to being taken, especially with the proliferation of AI generated content on social media platforms when the content that we're seeing is identity based. Right. The reason why that scam worked on so many celebrities like Robin Dixon and Gisele Bryan and Viola Davis and all these people is because it speaks to something real inside of us as black folks. Right. The idea that this young black visionary would be making these amazing handmade crocheted purses and that white kids would go and try to hold this person down and like, you know, jam him up and make fun of him and ridicule and humiliate him for this. And our natural inclination to want to support and want to, you know, show love and show grace and lift up and build up these scams are so good at targeting the things in us that. That really are sensitive and soft and wounds and tensions. You know, I've seen this new scam kind of popping up a little bit where the whole thing is AI generated, but it purports to show an AI generated gender non conforming or trans person trying to get into a public bathroom while a man blocks the door while saying, my. Sometimes he says, it's my wife is in there or his daughter is in there and I'm not letting you in. And it just is so good at taking these things that genuinely are unfortunately flashpoints in our society and then basically using AI to create this content that is meant to, I guess, align with your. Whatever your existing understanding or framework is, speak to that to make you engage with it. Years ago I was talking about how this kind of content was all over TikTok. The sort of trans person getting the what for from a patriot dad or whatever. How that kind of content was all over TikTok, but it was skits, it was like live action skits where sometimes it would say trans teacher tries to indoctrinate student and parent puts a stop to it. And it's meant to be a parent, you know, accosting the teacher. Sometimes that same person would then be, oh, that person's now the parent and now the scenario is something different. So this is obviously just a skit. Now that we have AI, you don't even need to cast these skits. You can just, you know, very easily using VO3 or whatever is your, you know, AI generating platform of choice, make this kind of content that inflames the exact right identity based tension to get people to engage and feel moved. And so yeah, if you, if you're finding yourself encountering content like this, you know, I would say one know your triggers. I know my trigger is animal videos. When I see an animal video or I get sucked into an animal video, that is my cue to pump the brakes and say bridge it. Do you think that crabs have architecture? Do you really think like, do you? So knowing what your triggers are and then two, when you encounter content that just seems tailor made to get some sort of reaction out of, you just know that it probably is, you know, and in the, in the age of AI, like that's, that's the, that's the grift.

[Mike]

It really is. And like you said, AI is not just like so good at creating it, but able to create so much of it so quickly and so cheaply. And a B test, like a thousand videos to find the handful that really just goes straight to the nerve of that unfortunate human tendency we have to be hoodwinked by stories that speak to our like deepest fears and suspicions about other people.

[Bridget Todd]

I'm so glad that you brought up that point about a B testing because it takes no time at all to figure out what is the exact scenario that will get you personally to have a reaction or engage. And you know, it takes me back to the episode that we did about the Diddy trial and how AI generated YouTube pages were just getting, probably making so much money at the time, like so much engagement, millions of views just swapping in different celebrities who they said testified at Diddy's trial because the trial was not televised. And so it would be, you know, Oprah, Tyler Perry, Will Smith, Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Prince. What? Who? Whatever celebrity would be the celebrity that would make you click and be like, oh, huh, Mine was definitely Prince. That's how I got sucked into that rabbit hole. They have infinite time and infinite matchups to find the thing that would make you, you know, give it a second look. More after a quick break.

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[Bridget Todd]

Let's get right back into it. So I love A wired long read and there's one that I think everyone should read. We'll put it in the show notes. It is by Alessandra Ram and it's called Meet the Sad Wives of AI. Are you married to a man who's obsessed with AI? I'm so, so sorry. So the piece opens with the writer sitting at home at 11 o' clock at night with her 10 month old baby while she FaceTimes her husband at 2am from a hotel room in Cambridge, Massachusetts. And he's screaming, just look at this. And pointing his phone on FaceTime at a laptop screen showing Claude code.

[Mike]

Woof.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, she writes, quote, there are two babies in this household now. The small human one and the large language model both demand constant attention. Both keep us up at 2am this piece made me really sad, but I also think it named something that I have noticed in some heterosexual pairings. And the piece really coins this term the Sad wives of AI, and makes the case for the fact that this is a more genuinely widespread phenomenon than you might think. Basically, in a heterosexual relationship, these are the women who are paired with men who either work in AI, want to work in AI, have aspirations to work in AI, or are otherwise obsessed with AI to the point where it feels like it's taking them out of the reality of their day to day relationship together and that this is a growing problem in heterosexual pairings. It kind of makes sense when you think about it because as the piece points out, 71% of AI skilled workers are men. There are roughly 35,000 open jobs for AI roles in the United States at any given moment. So if you broaden that out to include AI investors, then you're adding thousands more. If you broaden that out even further to every man who has mentioned to his wife that he is, quote, looking at some opportunities in the AI space, well, that's gotta be like millions of men. Conservatively, she writes, that means hundreds of thousands of partners are holding down the fort while someone mansplains the singularity to them. Horrible vibes. 0 out of 10.

[Mike]

It does seem like so many people are AI pilled. You look at LinkedIn and there are people just talking about it all the time, as I guess I hadn't really thought about their wives and partners who are maybe sick of hearing about it.

[Bridget Todd]

I read an article that talked about kind of, for lack of a better phrase, intercultural relationships where one person is super into AI and one person isn't. But this is the first piece that I think puts that into context and sort of answers the question of, well, what. What would that look like if you were in a relationship like that? And the answer is really not good. And because we already know that women are adopting AI less for lots of reasons. If anybody is trying to sell you that, like, oh, women are too stupid to understand AI, the reasons are much more complicated when you get scolded on Instagram by celebrities like Mel Robbins or Reese Witherspoon. Just know that. However, if women are adopting AI less than our male counterparts, it kind of makes sense that if you're in a relationship with a man as a woman, you might be in a relationship where the man is super jazzed about AI and maybe thinks that he's going to make it his whole identity and his whole career, and you might be sort of left kind of picking up the pieces of what that actually looks like. So the writer is very deliberate about who she is talking about in this piece. She's mostly speaking with white collar heterosexual couples in the Bay Area because that is where she says this psychological crisis seems most acute. And she's also, like, super clear about the dynamic. It often goes like this. He works in AI and she does everything and anything else. Sometimes it's a lot bleaker, though. Like, the guy desperately wants to work in AI or feels he must work in AI and she wants him to do literally anything else because she's so ready for him to stop talking about AI in any event, as the writer puts it, the men go in and the women want out. What's funny to me about this piece is that she says, straight up, I didn't bother talking to any of the actual husbands for this story. I'm sick of hearing from the men in AI. And they have podcasts and Senate hearings and magazine profiles and probably a group chat with the president. They've been talked to. And I can't stress this enough. Enough.

[Mike]

It's such an interesting piece. The fact that it's focused in the Bay Area. Do you think that this is a phenomenon that is specific to that area or all over the place and just like, really concentrated there?

[Bridget Todd]

What a good question. I briefly lived in the Bay Area. I lived there kind of on the early crest of the tech boom. I remember when I was living there, I lived in Berkeley. And this is when Uber had moved their headquarters to Oakland. And at the time, that was a big deal. I think they were moving to the Lake Merritt area. I didn't last in the Bay Area long. And one of the reasons why is that it did feel like, you know, you would Go out and all the people that you met worked for Google also. A lot of that might have been me. It's like, I live in D.C. and I hate when people say everybody in D.C. works in politics. And it's like, oh, are you actually doing the work to get out of your bubble? Are you actually doing the work to meet people who don't, you know, who have other kinds of jobs and other kinds of interests? I think the Bay Area is probably similar in that, like, I was personally not invested in the work of casting a wide net to find the people who exist out there who are not involved in tech, which I know exists. The Bay Area is fantastic and is full of, like, artists and organizers and all kinds of interesting folks. However, when I was there, I was just like encountering a lot of tech employees and that was just like the vibe. And so I do just. This is just my own anecdotal thoughts. I do think this phenomenon must be more concentrated in the Bay Area. If you're thinking about the United States, maybe Bay Area, possibly like New York,

[Mike]

Austin, I guess, any place there's a big tech industry, you know. And as somebody who doesn't live in one of those areas, I see stories like this and it's like I'm reading about a foreign country or something. But as the writer says, so often these accounts really center the men who are really leading these like, industry specific cultures. And so it's interesting to read a piece that is centering their partners and like, what the domestic life is like adjacent to that industry specific culture.

[Bridget Todd]

The piece talks to one woman who she moved from New York to San Francisco for her husband's career. He co founded an AI company. And she says that, you know, she misses her life in New York where her friends were nurses and teachers and people in finance and fashion, and none of them talked about work when they went out. Every time I go out in San Francisco, she says, it feels like I'm at a work happy hour. Another woman that she spoke to describes driving past these billboards for companies that her husband has backed. I'm on the edge, she says, while my husband drives by and is like, oh, wow, that's my company's billboard. Cool, great. And do you remember, Mike, when we were at south by Southwest and we ended up meeting the hosts of this fantastic podcast called Bitch Talk, which if you like movies, definitely subscribe to the Bitch Talk podcast. They were such a delight to meet, but they live in the Bay Area. We started talking about AI because they had just seen that AI documentary And we were like, oh yeah, what's the vibe around AI in the Bay Area? And she said, all of the billboards are for AI companies and none of the billboards make any sense. That was the thing I remember her saying the most.

[Mike]

We have to do like a collab with them at some point. I don't want to get us off track here, but they were so cool.

[Bridget Todd]

So the complaints from these sad AI wives are consistent across the board. Basically, their husbands are putting in a lot of time, hours, obsession into thinking about AI. And there's this sense from their partners where the partners genuinely believe that stopping for five minutes means missing the most important AI technological shift of a lifetime. But because AI is very volatile and because, like, if you are in AI as an investor or like trying to make it your job or identity, of course that would come with emotional volatility. One woman straight up said he is always depressed about something, which if I had attached my entire identity to how AI is faring, I would also be very depressed.

[Mike]

Yeah, it's such a dark other side to that idea that, like, AI is going to replace everything and if you are not on the cutting edge, you will just be shunted down to the permanent underclass, which I think a lot of people believe, and I think a lot of people would like explicitly say that out loud. It just does seem like a worldview almost designed to make one insecure and unhappy.

[Bridget Todd]

Insecure and unhappy seems to be the name of the game in these relationships. The piece also gets into the fact that there's a TikTok meme making the rounds where it's. It shows a young woman doing their makeup or at a laptop. And the caption will say, quote, working so hard so my man can work on his AI startup that loses 30k a month. And then all the comments will say, yes, Queen, just so he can have founder in his bio. I mean, that is so depressing.

[Mike]

I didn't realize that this was like, to the level of a meme where there is a genre of videos around this.

[Bridget Todd]

Oh, yeah, it's a meme and, you know, the whole thing kind of reads like a lifestyle piece, but it is also making a very clear structural argument. Jana Vandermullen Rogers, who is the chair of Labor Studies at Rutgers University, says that this is not just like a bad vibe that we're talking about. It is a genuine labor market story. The AI boom is creating what she calls a perfect storm that is reshaping household dynamics along predictably gendered lines. As I was saying earlier, women are about 20% less likely than men to use generative AI. Not because of some innate gender difference, but one of the reasons is that women are disproportionately represented in jobs like healthcare, education, and social services that just generally currently use AI less. And that means that women are going to see AI less as this, like, huge financial boom. And instead, on the flip side, we'll actually be holding a lion's share of the responsibility for the domestic labor that any kind of boom might actually create. So it's this gap that then compounds over time. And then there is what is, in my opinion, the ultimate relationship killer, resentment. Because the resentment piece is deeply, deeply embedded in all of this. Several of these sad wives that were interviewed had turned down job opportunities in AI themselves, not because they weren't qualified, but because, as the writer puts it, it is hard to raise kids and also try to, you know, do what you're being told is going to disrupt civilization at the same time. And so it creates this system where the man gets to be this like ideal worker who is using AI to be cutting edge and build the financial boom and change everything and all of that. And the woman is just left to manage everything else, whether it's childcare, pet care, household labor. Actually, you know, if your partner is like investing in AI and it's not going well, sometimes actual like being like breadwinning. And they really point out how this is not a new story. They take it all the way back to the gold rush, the industrial revolution, the dot com boom, but that the AI version of this has a specific texture because the stakes feel so outsized and the culture around it is so all consuming. So. Exactly. That dynamic that you were describing before, Mike, where people say you're going to get left behind, you're going to be a permanent underclass, like you got to get on board with AI, yada, yada, yada. All, all of that hype and all of that conversation makes this feel different from some of these earlier things like the dot com boom or the industrial Revolution, because it feels the stakes feel so high and it feels so all consuming.

[Mike]

Yeah, it's like existential threat at scale.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes. So the writer talks about how she is in therapy to deal with this and that her therapist mentions that her client base is almost entirely women whose partners are professionally adjacent to AI and how that is genuinely impacting their relationships. So this looks like they're men having zero boundaries or constant fighting that isn't really about the specific fight, it's about something bigger or something else. The guy is basically in another world, a world of prompts and benchmarks and late night epiphanies. Meanwhile, she's trying to put food on the table and raise the kid and do all the kind of mundane, humdrum things that an adult has to do to live a life.

[Mike]

Those late night epiphanies seem to me like, if not the main thing, like one of the main things that differentiates this from earlier tech revolutions or, you know, tech changes, where, like, it's not even just about building a product or changing an industry, but it's about the future of humankind. Or like AGI or like the writer said, mansplaining the singularity.

[Bridget Todd]

I wish a motherfucker would wake me up in the middle of the night to tell me that they've had a chatgpt generated late night epiphany about the singularity.

[Mike]

Oh, my God. Like, hey, hey, baby, baby, baby, wake up. I've discovered AGI. Check out this code that I'm showing you on my phone while we're FaceTiming.

[Bridget Todd]

Just.

[Mike]

Just look at this code.

[Bridget Todd]

Oh, my God. Oh, my God. I. I feel for these women. I feel. I mean, this is like the biggest thing is, like, the risk of marrying a loser, moving a loser into your home, getting mixed up with a loser. It terrifies me. That's really what this. This. It's a tech story, but it's what this story is really about. So, Mike, do you want to know what some of these women are turning to to deal with all of this? Sure.

[Mike]

Drugs, alcohol.

[Bridget Todd]

I'm sure those things might be options available to them. But also AI therapy. The piece reports that some of these women have stopped going to therapy with a human therapist to process their marriages, and instead they are process processing with ChatGPT. And according to a clinician that they interviewed for the piece, sometimes they're not having such great outcomes because ChatGPT often validates them rather than challenging them. And so if I'm fed up with my husband who won't shut up about AI, and he's not moving, and then I talk to ChatGPT, and ChatGPT is like, Girl, you're right, he's wrong. Basically, it's a stalemate. Right. And so the conflict do not resolve. And also the piece says that ChatGPT is apparently telling some of these women that it makes complete sense that they're seeking attraction elsewhere because they're. A partner is emotionally unavailable because all of his emotional capacity is going to AI. When the writer of this piece talked to the therapist, the Therapist said, well, that's probably not a great idea. You probably should address the stuff that's coming up in your marriage, not just go have sex with someone else. So then you have chatgpt, like, nudging these sad AI wives toward affairs. It just doesn't seem like a good situation.

[Mike]

No. You know, my understanding is that Reddit has formed a big part of the training corpus of ChatGPT and the other big, large language models that are out there. And if you've ever seen the advice that people give on Reddit, it's always like, divorce. Like, first thing, divorce. You have to leave them immediately.

[Bridget Todd]

Literally. It'll be like a, like a. Am I the asshole? Or advice post on Reddit where it'll be like, oh, my husband, I. I hate roses. And I have told him I hate roses a million times and he bought me roses. What should I do? Divorce him.

[Mike]

Divorce him.

[Bridget Todd]

Divorce him, girl. Leave him. Take the kids. Like, I, I'm not saying that nobody should get divorced. Sometimes divorce is like a. There is, like, a healthy option. But every single time I have brought a quandary in my life to Reddit, I get, like, very extreme advice.

[Mike]

Yeah, People commenting on Reddit, they're ready to pull the trigger. Just end the relationship. It's over.

[Bridget Todd]

Like, for the, like, oh. Talk during the movie. Divorce.

[Mike]

Divorce. Unforgivable.

[Bridget Todd]

Lawyer up. Start talking to a lawyer now. Start moving your money now.

[Mike]

So I have to imagine that some of that discourse is informing Chad GPT's response here when it nudges these sad AI wives towards affairs.

[Bridget Todd]

According to the piece, ChatGPT is not nudging them toward divorce. It's saying it makes sense to cheat at this point. Like what? I mean, it's a totally valid option at this point. He loves the AI more than you, girl. Like, you need to get. You need to get some romance in your life going.

[Mike]

I think that therapist response is pretty good. Like, it's probably not a great idea. You should probably address the stuff that's coming up in your marriage. That's. That's sound advice there.

[Bridget Todd]

The kind of advice you can get from a human therapist.

[Mike]

Yeah, not like ChatGPT that just tells you to go out and have you tried getting railed.

[Bridget Todd]

Sounds like somebody needs to get their back blown out. Have you tried that? Okay, so to be fair, this piece does note that not every woman in this situation is miserable. The piece talks to a woman who says that AI has supercharged her life. It's made caring for her aging parents, housekeeping and wedding planning. Pet care a lot easier. Meanwhile, her husband is only thinking about how AI is going to change the economy. She's thinking about how it will change her life. Specifically, another woman's husband is convinced that they're going to have a household robot within the next decade. And she's sort of cautiously open to it. She says, maybe people felt that way about washing machines, but these are exceptions. For the most part, the women that they talk to for this piece, the closest thing to a silver lining they can find in this. This way that AI is intruded into their relationships is that it has given them something new to talk about over dinner. And the piece ends with the writer. Her husband is on a plane and watching the movie Train Dreams, which is about this guy who essentially abandons his family for work in the American west and spends the rest of his life filled with regret for essentially abandoning his family. And so he asks her, like, is this what I'm doing? Have I basically abandoned my family for AI? But he says, I'm doing it for our daughter. I've always wanted the things I've worked on to be necessary. And the piece does not end in a, like, satisfying. Maybe satisfying isn't the right word. There's not really a resolution in the piece. She says that he asks her, like, have I done what the guy in the movie Train Dreams does? And that I've essentially abandoned my family for AI and she doesn't really answer. She says, I thought about it for a while, and then I asked him to take the dog out. Like, why don't you help me with some of this, you know, business of our actual lives together? And she writes in the piece, Princess Diana famously said there were three people in her marriage for the sad wives of AI the third is a chatbot. I spoke to a few other family therapists, and they agreed with mine. The phenomenon is getting worse. It's a lot of tech wives, one said, sighing. A lot of tech wives, wives.

[Mike]

How do you think that writer's husband feels?

[Bridget Todd]

I don't know. I don't want to put words in her mouth. If at the end of the piece, he is like, I am more available, I understand that I need to be more present in the household. That would be one thing. But literally, this is the last. The last bit of the article. I thought about it for a while, Then I asked him to take the dog out. So I don't feel like I'm telling tales out of school. To be like, well, that does not sound like somebody who is, like, painting a very rosy picture of her own marriage.

[Mike]

No, it sounds like she's really working some stuff out on the page here. I hope it works out for them. It sounds challenging.

[Bridget Todd]

The comments on this article are very interesting and super juicy. Bagel Warrior says. I believe this obsession is caused by the fear of not being able to have a job in the AI marketplace. Needless to say, this is also causing the male loneliness epidemic. I do imagine a world divide between AI wannabes and nature wannabes, and I found that really interesting and it made me wonder when we did our episode about Braden Peters, AKA Clavicular. One of the things that came up is that in the manosphere, the thing that is supposed to be kind of manly and desirable for men is jobs where you don't have a 9 to 5 job where you're an entrepreneur or you, you know, make your own way. And part of me wondered if is AI being gendered in this way where, you know, real men are taking advantage and getting, getting on the getting in on the ground floor of this like, AI boom and if you're too afraid to be involved in AI, you're not a real man. And that these women are just sort of being taken along for the ups and downs and whether or not that actually pans out financially, they're just sort of like on the hook for that. Do you know what I mean?

[Mike]

That's a really interesting question. Yeah, like how does machismo show up in these AI husbands? I guess, to use the vocabulary of the article, it's a really interesting question.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, I don't have the answer, but I want to hear folks's thoughts. That would just like popped into my head from reading that comment. More after a quick break.

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[Chelsea Handler]

This is Chelsea Handler from Dear Chelsea. Everyone deserves access to high quality, affordable health care no matter what. And that's why millions of people rely on Planned Parenthood health centers for services like cancer screenings, wellness exams, birth control, STI tests, and more. In fact, one in three women in the US have been to Planned Parenthood for care. So it kind of blows my mind that lawmakers are trying to permanently shut them down. They already passed a law that blocks patients that use Medicaid from getting the preventive, affordable care they need, and now they want to make that law permanent. No one benefits when people are getting fewer exams, paying more for care, or just skipping the health care that they need. And we know that's happening. Planned Parenthood health centers have reported that fewer patients are getting basic care like breast exams and STI tests since the Trump administration and their backers defunded Planned Parenthood. Patients shouldn't suffer because of their laws. Our communities deserve better to get involved. Text update to 22422.

[Bridget Todd]

Let's get right back into it. We've talked about this on the podcast before, but dating apps are in their flop era. Mike. When I was coming of age, dating apps were just sort of part of being a young person. They didn't, they, they weren't really that popular when I was in college. I have not really had a lot of experience with dating apps myself. But you know, by the time I was, you know, a young person in the city, you know, dating and having sex and all of that, dating apps was just like in the background of the experience of young people. And it sounds like that is no longer the case. Was was that Was that the vibe for you?

[Mike]

I'm sorry to say that it was not. I'm a little bit older than you and like, I remember when I was in college, one of my professors who really great guy who I really liked, super smart, he had met his wife on a dating service, OkCupid, in fact, which was like one of the first big popular ones. And that was something novel and kind of taboo at the time. It was the sort of thing that people, like, gossiped about when we were having drinks outside the lab. It was a topic of conversation because it was interesting and unusual that he had not just met somebody for a casual encounter, but had actually, like, met his wife on an online dating service. And I look back at that time from now when I feel like most people I know now who have partnered up in the past couple of years, meeting on some kind of dating app is the norm. And it's almost unusual when someone has just met up because they happen to be at a bar together or some other IRL situation.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes, well, that might be changing because millennials and Gen Z's aren't really fucking with dating apps like that anymore. 2025 marks the first annual revenue decline in dating app market history. Tinder's revenue dropped 5.2% and Bumble dropped 9.5%. Bumble share price has also collapsed more than 90% from its peak in 2021, erasing most of its $13 billion valuation. And this change is not just being reflected in the apps, but also like a broader change in people's dating behavior generally. A 2025 study called State of Us National Study on Modern Love and Dating in 2025, conducted by DatingNews.com and the Kinsey Institute, led by Dr. Justin Laymiller and Dr. Amanda Gesselman, surveyed a nationally representative sample of 2,000 single U.S. adults and found that American singles averaged fewer than two in person dates in the preceding year, while almost half of all single men and a third of single women had not gone on any dates at all. So dating apps are done and people are not really going on dates. And this makes sense to me because I feel like my friends who met their partners or met their person a few years ago, it was like catching the last chopper out of Vietnam. Because I think that dating apps right now are just a hellscape.

[Mike]

Yeah, I've heard that, that people are just like, over dating. I can't help but feel like it's. It must be connected to the loneliness epidemic and the fact that people just have, like, fewer social outings. In general, you know, obviously dating is a little bit different than just general social outings and interactions. But I don't know, I'm just speculating, but it all feels like, connected.

[Bridget Todd]

Yeah, I just think the vibes are bad right now. And who wants to go out and like, yeah, I don't know. You. I think it's a hard time to go out and sell the best version of yourself and be really genuinely engaged in meeting someone. Like, I just don't. I just. Nobody has any money. Like, I just. I don't think the vibes are good. However, Bumble thinks they have the answer. Do you want to know what it is?

[Mike]

Uh, yeah.

[Bridget Todd]

What can you guess? It's AI. Is it?

[Mike]

Or. Oh, it's AI. It's AI.

[Bridget Todd]

So last week, Bumble founder Whitney Wolfhard, who did step down in 2023 after a decade at the company, then came back, announced that Bumble is removing its signature swipe feature altogether. So that swipe, like swiping on people, that defined like a decade of dating culture. They are also getting rid of that rule that really set Bumble apart that women have to message first. That was the entire premise of Bumble. What they're doing instead is testing an AI dating assistant called B. Hey, that's my name. Which collects data about your interests and your preferences to find you more compatible matches. Well, essentially it's like your AI dating assistant will screen potential dates. They've also introduced something called chapter based profiles, where instead of the current format that feels like an identity card, you would present yourself through like a short story section that are meant to sort of be chapters of your life. The entire thing is called Bumble 2.0.

[Mike]

Boy, that really just sounds like an entirely different product.

[Bridget Todd]

Yes. And I don't know. I don't know how I feel about this. I. I am very skeptical of this future. Like I've heard Whitney Wolf heard, who is a very compelling speaker. I've heard her speak about the future, what she sees as the future of dating. And it's AI agents dating each other or dating in scare quotes, like essentially screening so my AI date agent would know all the stuff that I like and don't like. And then someone else's AI agent would be the same and our agents would be the first layer of screening of whether or not we might be compatible rather than us swiping on each other. I don't know. I've seen her speak. She's like a very. She is a very compelling speaker. It's not often that I hear a Tech CEO speak. And I'm like, oh, that actually was like, interesting and like made me understand how they came to this work and made me curious to know more about their story. I'll put it that way. All of that said, I almost feel like this move, especially when you think about young people, is like not listening to what younger folks are telling us, right? Younger folks self report being burnt out on both dating apps and AI. And I just feel like this solution, to me it sounds like it's like actually not listening to what this demographic that you want to be making inroads with, like young people who are single and on the market and dating who might be using your app. I think that it's. This proposed solution is not actually a solution to what they are saying they're fatigued about. Like, if I'm fatigued about the experience of being on dating apps and also AI, I'm not so sure the solution to that is more AI in my dating app, you know?

[Mike]

Yeah, probably not. You do have to wonder if, like, the world has just moved on and no longer wants this category of product. Obviously the people who make Bumble are hoping that's not the case. But, you know, I don't know.

[Bridget Todd]

I honestly think that's. That's part of it. I just think that dating apps had their moment when I was coming of age and I don't know that that moment is going to be recreated. I keep hearing different apps rolling out different things. Like Tinder was doing their very expensive luxury service, like, all like rolling out, the ability to like screen people via height, all of this stuff. I just don't know that you're ever going to recreate the time that these apps came out, became ubiquitous, went from being novel to being everywhere. And I just don't think that's ever going to come back. And I read this piece a few years ago that really put it well, that just said that like Gen Z is not avoiding dating apps because something is wrong at the interface level. They're actually avoiding them because what they're looking for is human connection, an actual genuine feeling, authentic connection. And that's just not something that can be replaced with an app or an algorithm. Like, that's not something that can be manufactured. I think that's what we're all sort of looking for right now.

[Mike]

Thinking back to the conversation we had at the top of this episode about Instagram and how much that has changed, I don't know, I'm like, probably speculating wildly here. I have to wonder if it's A coincidence that, like, the heyday of Instagram, when, like you, I was genuinely using it to connect with my friends who lived in my neighborhood. Like, looking at photos of their cats, the thing they were eating, a poorly framed photo of them on vacation. You know, it. It did feel personal, and it felt like a reflection of my IRL life and their IRL life. And as social media has gotten further and further away from that, to the point where today in 2026, not only does it not feel like an extension of my personal IRL physical life, but, like, I feel compelled to protect that separation because putting my personal life out there, which just feels so extremely risky in so many ways, I have to wonder if that shift is related to this big shift in people's attitudes towards dating apps.

[Bridget Todd]

Oh, that's such a good point. As I said, I, you know, need to be on social media to promote the show and my work and all of that, but I do not think of my social media presence as connected to me in any real capacity. There was a time where social media did feel like a fun. Sorry, it's my reminder to go to sleep. It's 10:30. It's time for bed.

[Mike]

No sleep for you. Keep recording.

[Bridget Todd]

I remember, like, when social media felt like a creative expression of what actually filled my life. That is completely gone. I do not see social media as anything connected with my actual life. It is just a way to promote my work. My cats are in there some because they're so darn cute. Who wouldn't want to see them? But yeah, I think that people are less and less seeing these digital versions of themselves as their real selves. I guess I just feel like this move toward dating AI agents doesn't take into consideration that that's how people might be feeling. Again, this is just my anecdotal opinion, but I do think that is what these people are telling us. They're saying, listen, what we want is something that feels like a genuine, authentic human connection, and AI is maybe not going to get us there. And maybe this is not even a thing where there is a tech solution. Perhaps there is not a tech solution to this thing that we're saying that we're craving and yearning. And I do think maybe there are some specific use cases when it comes to human connection where technology simply presents a challenge rather than the solution. And also, you know, when you were talking about this, we talked about this not on the podcast, but on Reddit. I came across this post. This is a little bit of a non sequitur. Came across a Post from the Hostiles subreddit. Basically this person was saying that social media and technology kind of ruin the experience of hostels. And how all the reviews on hostels will say, oh, there wasn't any good culture. I didn't meet anybody, I didn't have any good conversations. And it's this attitude where people come to stay at a hostel sort of thinking that the culture of the hostel is just a commodity that will be ready made when they arrive as opposed to something they have to bring and create. And this person was like, well, you know, if you go to a hostel and you spend all your time in your own room, in your own bed, with the privacy shade shut on your phone or with your headphones in, no shit, there's not going to be culture. No shit, you're not going to have these like bonding experiences and meet different people. And basically it was a rundown of like, okay, well if you're on a hostel, don't have your headphones on, make food in the kitchen and like have conversation. If somebody asks you to go get a drink, go get a drink with them. Even if you don't drink, like get a Coke. And you know, that's how you build the culture that people are sort of have in their head and come to these hostels looking for and then leave bad reviews when they don't find. And it sparks this very lovely chain of comments of older folks talking about their travel experiences and all these different experiences they, that they had in hostels abroad. One person described how on New Year's they were up at the roof on their hostel and like one guy brought wine, one guy made food. Like all these people made food from their culture. Somebody brought cash and they just spent hours watching fireworks on the roof with these people, connecting with them. People that they never saw again. But that it was this like very, it was like a moment of authentic connection and that you can't really have that if you are not kind of like committed to creating it. I don't want to make it seem like I'm demonizing technology here, because I'm not. But there are certain things that technology just is not going to be conducive to creating and cultivating and irl authentic feeling, leading connection is one of them. And of course there are all kinds of exceptions and caveats and use cases for when and how technology might actually facilitate bringing folks, even strangers, together in meaningful ways and why somebody would opt towards that. But I do think there are times like meeting strangers in a hostel who you want to have A connection or a good experience with or perhaps dating, where technology might actually be presenting challenges to.

[Mike]

Totally. I think it's a fair criticism of social media and smartphones that it has created a lot of opportunities for us to not engage with strangers, not connect with people who we don't already know, because in those times of, like, social awkwardness, you know, when you're at a hostel or something or wherever, you can just look at your phone and you don't have to be physically present. And I don't think that pointing that out is necessarily the same as being like, anti technology because, you know, one of the things we say all the time, technology isn't neutral. The tech landscape that we have is one that has really been shaped by this small number of enormous companies that want to hijack our attention and sell us ads. So, like, no shit, it's not leading to organic connection with other people.

[Chelsea Handler]

Yeah.

[Bridget Todd]

I was listening to the Rewatchables, the Ringer movie podcast about the movie Before Sunrise, which is one of my favorite movies, where it's two beautiful young people who meet on a train in Vienna and decide to get off the train, and they have a beautiful night, exploring and getting to know each other. They were like, that movie could only have happened at that moment in time, because if you made Before Sunrise, like, even just a couple years later, that wouldn't have happened because they'd both have headphones on and be on their phone.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Bridget Todd]

One of my most treasured travel experiences is when I was in Havana, Cuba. And if you've ever been to Havana, it's not a place that has reliable cell coverage. Like, you basically, when you are out and about, you don't really. You can't really count on your cell phone. And that really forced me to have a very different relationship with the city and, like, get to know the city in a different way. And one of my most treasured memories, I've been using this as an anecdote in. In at Stories for Dinner Parties forever. Is there being a rainstorm while I was checking out a monument? Running across the street to a cafe with other people at the monument, chatting with one of them. She's an ER doctor. And, you know, the first thing that you ask somebody when you find out they're an ER doctor is do you have any crazy ER stories? And she told me that the hardest part of her job is keeping a straight face when somebody comes into the ER with something up their butt that shouldn't be up there. And they. They'll tell the story of how it wound up there and she just has to nod and be like, sure, happens all the time. Happens all the time. And keep a straight face. And I asked her, what's the weirdest thing that anybody ever got up their butt? And she said, a light bulb. She also said, if you're ever putting anything up your butt, make sure it has an anchor. We talked for about like stuff up butts for like two hours. It was, it was one of the most interesting conversations of my life. And I don't think it would have happened had I been able to just, you know, check the weather on my phone and be like, oh, there's going to be a rainstorm. I better head home. I better call an Uber, because we got caught in a rainstorm together. I've been telling this anecdote for years. So we've been thinking a lot about the role that technology and AI plays in human connection. We even wrote an audiobook. And if you are somebody who is using dating apps, I would love to know how that experience is going. I'm just curious. Maybe we'll do a follow up episode about people's experiences. But does the data that people are using dating apps less and finding them to be a less enjoyable, less effective way to meet people, does that resonate for you? And what do you think about Bumble replacing Swipe with AI? Let us know.

[Mike]

Okay, Bridget, before we go, I just wanted to share this thing that I saw posted from. Of the lawsuits that Elon Musk is currently involved in. You know, he's, he's involved in multiple. But one of them is about his Twitter stock manipulation case. It's not really that important what it's about. The important thing is that they were going through juror selection where lawyers for both sides interview the jurors, trying to, you know, find out if they're going to be able to give a fair verdict. And one of the jurors had some choice things to say about their ability to be impartial. In this case in which Elon Musk was at trial, the judge asked them, juror number 96, I think that you also have strong views. Could you set them aside? Meaning would they be able to be a fair juror and consider the facts of the case? Even though Elon Musk is like a very famous person who they are probably already showing up to this trial with some opinions about him? The juror replies, I believe that in a criminal trial I would feel morally obligated to convict. However, in a civil trial, I feel I can set those views aside. The judge responds, that that's pretty interesting, invites the juror to elaborate, and the juror says, I'm happy to expand. I believe it would be to the benefit of the human race for Mr. Musk to be sent to prison. However, I don't believe a loss of several hundreds of millions of dollars in a civil trial would be even a drop in the bucket to his wealth. So it doesn't really matter. Therefore, I would be able to consider the facts.

[Bridget Todd]

I love this juror. Shout out to this juror, juror number 96. I too think humanity would be better off if Elon Musk were in prison.

[Mike]

I mean, I hope you don't get called to be on a jury for one of Elon's many lawsuits.

[Bridget Todd]

We've already had a conversation about my take on jury duty. No, no need to rehash it now. It's controversial.

[Mike]

That's fair. Yeah.

[Bridget Todd]

Trying to get me in trouble with the listeners?

[Mike]

No, our listeners, whom we love, who always have such interesting, insightful things to share. Please share your thoughts with us about these stories or anything else. Send us an [e-mail], comment on Spotify.

[Bridget Todd]

I read every Spotify comment she does,

[Mike]

she really does, and flags me on many of them. Our listeners are the best.

[Bridget Todd]

That's right. Mike. Thanks so much for being here. Thanks to all of you for listening and I will see you on the Internet. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach [e-mail] youm can also find transcripts for today's [e-mail] There are no Girls on the Internet was created by me, Bridget Todd. It's a production of iHeartRadio and unbossed creative. Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Producer Tari Harrison is our producer and Sound Engineer Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm U.S. transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

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[Bridget Todd]

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[Bridget Todd]

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[Mike]

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[Bridget Todd]

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[Chelsea Handler]

CT mobile.com this is Chelsea Handler from Dear Chelsea, the Trump administration and its backers in Congress are messing around with our health care. In case you haven't heard, they already passed a law defunding Planned Parenthood that blocks Medicaid patients from getting life saving care like cancer screenings, wellness exams, birth control, STI treatment and more. And now these lawmakers want to shut down health centers by defunding Planned Parenthood permanently. Our communities deserve better. So to learn how you can get involved, Text update to 22422 Oregon this is our home.

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[Bridget Todd]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.