The Times Tech Podcast

Jim Steyer, Founder of Common Sense Media, talks about the pivotal year for democracy in 2024, concerns over Facebook's readiness, the impact of TikTok as a news source, AI-powered misinformation, and the need for regulation outside of Washington. Steyer also discusses Elon Musk's actions at Twitter and the best and worst case scenarios for 2024.

David Stein, CEO of Babson Diagnostics, discusses the importance of blood testing, how Babson differs from Theranos, their success, using a tiny amount of blood, fighting against the Theranos effect, and the new age of biological data.

Christian Angermayer, founder of Apeiron Investments, discusses psychedelics in Oregon, the spiritual experience of a 'trip', FDA approval progress, societal acceptance, new approach to ageing, breakthrough in life span, AI dovetails with psychedelics and longevity.

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Keith Rabois of Founders Fund to talk about leaving San Francisco for Miami (4:00), why San Francisco is a “black hole” (7:00), why remote work is broken (11:00), staying on the AI sidelines (16:30), running Openstore (18:40), the Paypal story (26:50), hiring well (30:00), shrinking their fund (33:50), and why big venture capital funds won’t make money (38:20). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Former CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman, discusses the recent leadership turmoil at OpenAI and the conflicts over AGI development. The firing of Altman is explored, along with the aftermath and potential impact on the company. The speaker reflects on AI's power and skepticism surrounding its hype.

Naveen Rao, founder of MosaicML, discusses the efficiency of the human brain, slashing the cost to train AI models, the evolution of the car, selling to Databricks, the future of the AI market, and more.

Dan Siroker, founder of Rewind AI, discusses recording everything you do, see and read, living life on a “hot mic”, bringing Black Mirror to life, AI as cognitive butler, growing up in Palo Alto, working on the Obama campaign, making mistakes at other companies, Sam Altman, how he uses Rewind, and dealing with the hallucination problem.

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Hugh Harvey, managing director of consultancy Hardian Health, to talk about his time at Babylon Health (4:30), his first look at the company’s “artificial intelligence” (7:00), why it’s hard to build a medical chatbot (11:30), the siloed nature of the company (14:30), its regulatory loophole (16:20), Ali Parsa’s obsession with creating an “AlphaGo moment" (21:10), the gong (24:15), how the company became more brazen with its marketing (27:10), why getting chatbots certified as medical devices is so hard (29:45), and why the Silicon Valley way often doesn't work in medicine (33:00). Link to The Sunday Times' investigation: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rise-and-fall-of-babylon-healthcare-the-doctor-in-your-pocket-3p6q6jjfx Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on two guests to talk about artificial intelligence. The first is Vinod Khosla, the legendary tech investor and founder of Khosla Ventures, to talk about how the rise of AI compares to previous breakthroughs (4:00), how it is like the Manhattan Project (8:00), why universal basic income may be necessary (16:20), and the culture war aspect of AI (20:25). Then, Tyler Cowen, the George Mason University economist, blogger and author, comes on to talk about this moment in history (26:00), AI doomerism (28:40), the open v closed debate (31:50), why he’s not too worried about misinformation (35:25), why AI will save crypto (40:30), the return of ‘moving history’ (42:50), how he has changed how he teaches (45:20), the end of the smartphone (47:20), the future of work (51:50), AI as a doomsday weapon (55:30), why he published the world's first “generative’ book (1:00:15), and the end of the browser (1:05:20). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Krishna Rangasayee, founder and CEO of Sima.ai, to talk about why we need to remake the tech infrastructure for the AI age (5:10), what the “edge” is (8:30), why he started the company (11:00), the problem with the cloud (15:00), developing a new architecture (19:00), growing up in India (20:45), coming to Mississippi (25:20), starting the company at age 50 (30:00), why being the boss has been so challenging (34:40), the future (37:00), and why AI is like teenage sex (41:00). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.