Terms of Service with Clare Duffy

If you have new tech gadgets on your holiday wishlist, chances are you also have old devices that have passed their prime. What’s the safest and most responsible way to get rid of these items? Christine Datz-Romero, the co-founder and executive director of the Lower East Side Ecology Center, shares some tips for reducing and recycling e-waste. Terms of Service is a CNN Podcasts and Goat Rodeo production. This episode was produced by Hazel Hoffman. At Goat Rodeo, the lead producer is Rebecca Seidel, and the executive producers are Megan Nadolski and Ian Enright. At CNN, Matt Martinez is our Senior Producer and Dan Dzula is our Technical Director. Production support from Sofía Sanchez. Steve Lickteig is the Executive Producer of CNN Audio. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Making friends can be hard. So, 23-year-old Avi Schiffmann decided to create his own Friend, a wearable AI device that he says “bottles” the best human relationships he’s had. Friend listens and creates “memories” of everything you say and chats with you via an app. Clare sat down with Avi to discuss why he created the device, his controversial New York City marketing campaign and why he thinks we should embrace a new kind of relationship with AI.  We’re taking listener questions for upcoming episodes! If you have tech questions or concerns you’d like answered, email us or send us a voice note at CNNTermsOfService@gmail.com. Terms of Service is a CNN Podcasts and Goat Rodeo production. This episode was produced by Cara Shillenn. At Goat Rodeo, the lead producer is Rebecca Seidel, and the executive producers are Megan Nadolski and Ian Enright. At CNN, Matt Martinez is our Senior Producer and Dan Dzula is our Technical Director. Production support from Sofía Sanchez. Steve Lickteig is the Executive Producer of CNN Audio. Production support from Anna Sturla and Kelly Burns.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nikki Petrosi, a former social media executive and host of the Scrolling to Death podcast, advocates for better online safety for kids. She shares insights on the uphill battle of managing screen time, discussing the gaps in parental controls across devices. Nikki emphasizes the importance of communication with children about their online experiences and suggests kid-friendly devices like Bark and Gab. Her message is clear: it's not just about limiting time but understanding content risks and fostering ongoing conversations with kids.

Lisa Eadicicco, CNN's tech editor with over a decade of experience in gadgets, dives into the evolving world of smart glasses. She discusses the advancements since Google Glass, including improved designs and AI features. The conversation highlights their potential to handle quick tasks and photography, while examining the new competitive landscape with giants like Samsung and Apple. Privacy concerns and their current limitations are honestly assessed, ultimately questioning if these glasses are worth the investment for now.

With the launch of apps like OpenAI’s Sora 2, creating videos with AI is easier than ever. On our feeds, it’s getting harder to spot AI-generated videos — and to avoid obvious slop. How much of this boom is novelty and how much is here to stay? Henry Ajder, a deepfake expert and co-founder of the University of Cambridge’s AI in Business Program, charts the latest developments in the field and offers advice about trying to determine what’s real and fake. We’re taking listener questions for upcoming episodes! If you have tech questions or concerns you’d like answered, email us or send us a voice note at CNNTermsOfService@gmail.com. Terms of Service is a CNN Podcasts and Goat Rodeo production. This episode was produced by Jay Venables. At Goat Rodeo, the lead producer is Rebecca Seidel, and the executive producers are Megan Nadolski and Ian Enright. At CNN, Matt Martinez is our Senior Producer and Dan Dzula is our Technical Director. Production support from Sofía Sanchez. Steve Lickteig is the Executive Producer of CNN Podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Omar Jimenez, a CNN anchor and podcast host, takes the reins to celebrate a year of insights on tech and its impacts. Clare shares her motivation for starting the show amidst rapid tech changes. They discuss the shift from AI excitement to real concerns about jobs, while Clare recounts important topics like deepfake pornography and AI-generated police reports. She reflects on how the podcast has influenced her tech habits and looks forward to tackling parenting, food tech, and the environmental impact of AI in the coming year.

Cryptocurrency ATM machines have become a prime tool for scammers to seize money from victims — in some cases, tens of thousands of dollars. How do these scams work, and how can you steer clear of them? Curt Devine, a producer for CNN Investigates, shares what his team found when they dug into these scams. You can read more about their investigation here. –For an upcoming episode, we want to know how AI is affecting high school students’ plans for what to study in college or what to pursue as a career. If you’re a high school student, or if you’re a parent of a teen who’d be willing to talk with us about this, please get in touch. Send us a voicenote or email at CNNTermsOfService@gmail.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Over the past few decades, we have all collectively gotten worse at reading. Is our ever-increasing screen time part of the problem? Or could new technology actually help us raise better readers? According to Susan Neuman, a specialist in early literacy development and a professor at NYU, it’s a bit of both. We’re taking listener questions for upcoming episodes! If you have tech questions or concerns you’d like answered, email us or send us a voice note at CNNTermsOfService@gmail.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What if we could understand what the animals around us are saying? It’s the subject of countless movies and thought experiments, and something many of us wish we could do. Thanks to artificial intelligence, that reality may be closer than ever. Aza Raskin is the co-founder of the Earth Species Project, a nonprofit that's using AI to decode animal communication. He explains how AI identifies language patterns across the animal kingdom, which species we’re closest to understanding, and how to mitigate harms that could result from this new technology.  We’re taking listener questions for upcoming episodes! If you have tech questions or concerns you’d like answered, email us or send us a voice note at CNNTermsOfService@gmail.com.  The humpback whale songs you heard in this episode were recorded by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute. You can listen to the audio at https://freesound.org/s/498708/. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Frank McCourt, billionaire investor and founder of Project Liberty, champions user control over personal data. He discusses his bid for TikTok and the vision of an internet prioritizing individuals' rights. The conversation delves into the challenges of data ownership in the AI era and the risks posed by chatbots. McCourt outlines his ideas for sovereign AI agents that preserve user privacy and explains a new economic model for data sharing, ultimately advocating for a future where users regain agency.