Navigating Age Verification in the Digital Landscape

It’s a huge week in AI, with OpenAI releasing GPT-OSS and GPT-5, Grok getting deeply problematic again with its “spicy” video generator, and Tim Cook admitting that Apple may need to cut some deals. Then we talk the age gating of the internet and how you might soon need an ID card to get just about anywhere online. Finally, the Lightning Round gets re-rebranded. Adi Robertson and Alex Heath join the show to discuss.

Further reading:

• GPT-5 is being released to all ChatGPT users
• OpenAI releases a free GPT model that can run on your laptop
• Why open-source AI became an American national priority
• Mark Zuckerberg promises you can trust him with superintelligent AI
• xAI’s new Grok image and video generator has a ‘spicy’ mode
• Grok’s ‘spicy’ video setting instantly made me Taylor Swift nude deepfakes
• I tested Grok’s Valentine sex chatbot and it (mostly) behaved
• Tim Cook says Apple ‘must’ figure out AI and ‘will make the investment to do it’
• Tim Cook says Apple is ‘open to’ AI acquisitions

• Ready or not, age verification is rolling out across the internet
• The UK is now age-gating the internet
• The UK is slogging through an online age-gate apocalyps
• The UK’s new age-gating rules are easy to bypass
• Reddit and Discord’s UK age verification can be defeated by Death Stranding’s photo mode
• Reddit rolls out age verification in the UK to comply with new rules
• Five EU states to test age verification app to protect children
• The EU approach to age verification
• Commission presents guidelines and age verification app prototype for a safer online space for children
• Porn age-gating is the future of the internet, thanks to the Supreme Court
• The Supreme Court just upended internet law, and I have questions
• Florida Sues Huge Porn Sites Including XVideos and Bang Bros Over Age Verification Law
•  “Over the last two and a half years, 19 states – home to more than a third of Americans – have passed laws that require pornography websites to confirm a user’s age by checking a government-issued ID or scanning their face, among other methods.”
• Google is using AI age checks to lock down user accounts
• Today's Supreme Court Decision on Age Verification Tramples Free Speech and Undermines Privacy
• Age Verification Harms Users of All Ages
• Blocking Access to Harmful Content Will Not Protect Children Online, No Matter How Many Times UK Politicians Say So
• Zero Knowledge Proofs Alone Are Not a Digital ID Solution to Protecting User Privacy
• Age Verification in the European Union: The Commission's Age Verification App

• RFK Jr. pulls $500 million in funding for mRNA vaccine contracts
• Epic just won its Google lawsuit again, and Android may never be the same
• Google has just two weeks to begin cracking open Android, it admits in emergency filing
• Instagram adds a reposts feed and rips off Snap Maps
• OpenAI charts crime
• OpenAI gets caught vibe graphing
• Nintendo raises the Switch 1 price from $299 to $339
• Apple says Trump’s tariffs are adding another $1 billion to its costs

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