TWiT 1023: This is Not Tax Advice

Date: March 17, 2025
Host: Leo Laporte
Panel: Amy Webb, Glenn Fleischman, Micah Sargent
Main Themes: The convergence of AI, sensor, and biotech trends (“The Beyond”); controversies in tech industry memoirs; AI embodiment and robotics; security and privacy in the age of AI; power struggles over AI/tech innovation; kill switches in military tech.

Episode Overview

This week’s “This Week in Tech” features a high-powered panel: Amy Webb (futurist, author, Future Today Strategy Group), Glenn Fleischman (tech writer, author, printing historian), and TWiT’s own Micah Sargent. The discussion is rich, ranging from the fallout of Meta’s book-banning efforts and whistleblower culture to AI’s shifting landscape, the necessity for embodied AI (robots), and the ethical and practical implications of converging technologies. The show keeps returning to big questions of privacy, technological disruption, and the increasingly blurry line between prediction and participation.

Key Topics & Discussion Points

1. Tech Industry Tell-Alls and the Streisand Effect

Timestamps: 05:55–16:40

• Meta (Facebook) is in legal battles to stop publication of “Careless: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed and Lost Idealism,” a memoir by former public policy head Sarah Wynn Williams, containing spicy and potentially damaging accounts of Meta leadership (notably Sheryl Sandberg and Mark Zuckerberg).
• Streisand Effect: The legal attempt to suppress the book has heightened buzz and sales. (“What is the best way to make sure a book gets sold? Go after the author and try to shut the book down, right?” — Leo, 05:56)
• Discussion turns to the actual history/effectiveness of such books: most don’t bring down companies; blockbuster exposés like John Carreyrou’s “Bad Blood” (on Theranos) make waves if built on deep reporting, not just palace intrigue.
• Memoirs are not usually fact-checked; traditional publishers protect themselves by leaving it up to authors.
• Quote: “When you try to shut something like this down, you’re pretty much guaranteeing you’re going to get a lot more attention.” (Leo, 09:25)

2. Amy Webb’s “Beyond” Trend Report: Three General-Purpose Tech Convergences

Timestamps: 16:45–44:10

• Amy Webb recaps her South by Southwest talk, announcing the 1,000-page Future Today Strategy Group Trend Report (free at ftsg.com).
  • Focus: We’re in a “liminal” phase — “the Beyond” — defined by the converging advancement of:
    1. Artificial Intelligence,
    2. Advanced Sensing,
    3. Biotechnology.
• The Enhanced Games: “The goal is doping... overtly talking about creating superhumans” (Amy, 18:33), emblematic of boundary-pushing tech/society intersections.
• Metamaterials: Sound and light manipulation is no longer science fiction. Applications in crowd control, mood influence, and next-gen materials.
• Biohybrid Computers: The world’s first “wetware” computers are now cloud-connected, powered by neurons—no longer just theory.
• Embodied AI/Robotics: Why tied shoe robots matter (“It’s been an impossible challenge for robots for literally decades. The knot it tied is terrible… but it achieved that.” — Amy, 28:29).
• AGI (Artificial General Intelligence): The real test will be creativity and unexpected solutions, not just human-level mimicry.
  • “What’s interesting is... LLMs are finding connections that we have missed or haven’t seen. At some point we’ll come up against something we can’t understand, just like a dog doesn’t understand a human.” (Stephen Wolfram, cited by Leo, 39:42)
• Language Barriers: Microsoft’s “Droid Speak” demonstrates a future where AIs speak a machine-native “math” language, inaccessible to humans (Amy, 41:43).

3. The 2025 Tech Macrotrends (from the Future Today Strategy Group)

Timestamps: 57:54–65:25

Amy lists 10 crucial shifts (not predictions, but lenses for the coming year):

1. Living Intelligence: AI, sensors, and biotech merge into evolving adaptive systems.
2. Tech Giants’ Unlikely Alliances: Computing and AI demands force governments and rivals to collaborate.
3. Action Models Eclipse Language Models: Shift from conversational models to AI that actually acts in the world.
4. Robots Escape the Factory: Real world adaptability brings home and service robots into everyday life.
5. Climate Crisis Drives Tech: AI and other innovations to counteract climate shocks.
6. Nuclear Power Resurgence: AI’s energy needs re-ignite investment in small modular reactors.
7. Agentic AI Systems: AIs setting their own goals, not merely following orders.
8. Quantum Computing Inflection: Advances in error correction unlock practical, near-term use cases.
9. Metamaterials: Engineered substances break traditional physical limits, transforming product design.
10. Sislunar Space Economy: Private industry expands into Earth-to-Moon commerce—3D printing, manufacturing, medical advances.

Quote: “The future is not just agentic AI. There are other things happening… If you’re interested in robotics, now is probably a good time to pay more attention to that.” (Amy, 65:58)

4. Privacy, Data Sovereignty & Global Tech Politics

Timestamps: 96:12–132:02

• China’s Ernie & Deep Seek AIs: Baidu’s latest model claims parity with Western LLMs, raising questions about real innovation vs. cloning (Amy is skeptical about the “from scratch” PR, 98:23).
• Saudi Arabia Buys Niantic/Pokemon Go: Raises concerns about long-term privacy and personal data in foreign (sometimes authoritarian) hands—Amy says most people needn’t panic, but it’s a valid consideration for public figures/critics (118:08).
• TikTok & ByteDance Risk: TikTok’s roots in China’s social credit system make it uniquely concerning: “What are the ultimate intentions of a company that built a pretty authoritarian, digitally authoritarian system?” (Amy, 122:50).
• Smart Devices as Surveillance: The panel debates whether there is meaningful escape as long as we’re all carrying smartphones loaded with unpredictable apps.
• Quote: “We’re all carrying in our pockets the ultimate spy device.” (Leo, 127:05)

5. Security & Kill Switches: Tech at War

Timestamps: 148:40–163:46

• Tech Employee Revenge: A former Eaton Corp engineer, Davis Liu, planted a “kill switch” that triggered when his name was removed from Active Directory after being terminated, causing company-wide disruption. Assessed as textbook illegal; he faces up to 10 years (149:31).
• Military Tech Kill Switches: F-35 Fighter Jets
  Allies like Canada fear advanced U.S. jets contain software that allows remote disabling, undermining sovereignty (157:06+).
  • On some missions, programming and maintenance can’t be done locally; full capabilities are U.S.-locked. Only Israel has full access.
  • Analogy: “It’s like printer cartridges,” Micah jokes (161:00).
  • Implications for arms deals, international alliances, geo-strategic leverage.

6. Consumer Tech Moments

• Sonos Cancels Video Box (178:29): Rumored “high-end” streaming box dead in the water, as company focus falters.
• Amazon Echo “Voice Review” Off Switch Removed (180:29): Amazon will resume sending Echo voice snips for analysis, with no opt-out.
• HP Updates Brick Their Own Printer Cartridges (163:39): Firmware update disables even genuine cartridges in certain laser printers.
• DNA Hard Drives Launch (107:20): French company Biomemory now selling “DNA drives”—first commercial DNA-based storage.

Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Tech Disruption Anxiety:
  “We’re all about to be very uncomfortable… Part of what you have to learn how to do is refocus your attention so that you’re able to zoom back out. It’s OK to be uncomfortable while also staying connected to what’s happening around you.”
  — Amy Webb, on her “discomfort block” South by Southwest talk (55:00)

• On Embodied AI:
  “Robots will finally start to take off, but also computers won’t be computers… Imagine a computer powered, instead of traditional silicon, with neurons. The first actual biohardware computer launched two weeks ago.”
  — Amy Webb (25:37)

• On AGI:
  “There is no agreed upon AGI definition. But from my point of view, that is the beginning of AGI.”
  — Amy (38:43)

• On Privacy Futility:
  “We’re all carrying in our pockets the ultimate spy device loaded with apps from a variety of places, many of whom we don’t know the provenance of… pretty much out of luck.”
  — Leo (127:05)

• On AI as Multiplicative:
  “Technology has always been an accelerant… not as replacing people but as multiplicative.”
  — Paraphrasing Richard Feynman and Discord user “Dr. Dew” (69:26)

Timestamps for Highlight Segments

• Memoir controversy & Streisand effect: 05:55–16:40
• Amy Webb’s South by Southwest, “The Beyond”: 17:14–44:10
• Key Macrotrends for 2025: 57:54–65:25
• Privacy & global data concerns (TikTok, Niantic): 96:12–132:02
• Kill switches (employee revenge, F-35s): 148:40–163:46
• Consumer tech follies (Sonos, HP firmware): 178:29–164:00

Tone & Style

• Clever, slightly irreverent, highly informed
• Deep dives by Amy Webb are balanced by Leo’s wit and Glenn’s practical skepticism
• Panel often refers to pop culture (Simpsons, Futurama, Citizen Kane), bringing levity to heavy topics

Summary Takeaways

• We’ve crossed the Rubicon: The tech landscape is in a phase of unprecedented, uncomfortable change (53:04). The world is set to become “weirder and weirder by the second” (44:58).
• Embodiment and Convergence: AI alone is not enough—its merging with sensors and biotech signals the next general-purpose platform.
• Privacy is practically gone: The global data economy and integration with authoritarian interests make complete privacy nearly impossible, even for the careful.
• Security and autonomy tension: From F-35s to employee code bombs, control—either human or technological—remains an unresolved source of risk.

For further details, check out:

• FTSG Trend Report (ftsg.com)
• South by Southwest 2025: Amy Webb’s Tech Trends talk (on SXSW YouTube)

“This is not tax advice.” — Running joke throughout as the panel navigates the daunting, uncertain new world we now inhabit.