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PODCAST

Machines Like Us

The Globe and Mail

Machines Like Us is a technology show about people. We are living in an age of breakthroughs propelled by advances in artificial intelligence. Technologies that were once the realm of science fiction will become our reality: robot best friends, bespoke gene editing, brain implants that make us smarter. Every other Tuesday Taylor Owen sits down with the people shaping this rapidly approaching future. He’ll speak with entrepreneurs building world-changing technologies, lawmakers trying to ensure

technology

All Episodes

00:31:21

Hong Shen on How Tech Really Works behind the Great...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/07/08

Western democracies and tech companies have long painted the Chinese tech sector as not only a threat to the US sector but also as operating in direct conflict with American companies. They say that China is walled off from the rest of the world, that these tech companies are just an extension of the state, and that they create and promote state surveillance and censorship tools. While China, the country, isn’t completely innocent — there are clear examples of state interventions and human rights

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00:48:34

Victor Pickard on the Future of Journalism

Machines Like Us ·

2021/06/24

The journalism industry in America has grown and adapted over its 300-year history. Different business models and ownership schemes have been tried, mostly in an attempt to establish an independent free press. Social media platforms have contributed to both the decline in revenue for news outlets and the echo-chamber effect that results when users are only consuming news that fits their political viewpoint. In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Victor Pickard, a professor of media

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00:32:42

Pranav Dixit on Modi’s Moves to Manipulate Platforms

Machines Like Us ·

2021/06/10

Tech platforms from around the world have turned their attention to the India as a new area for user growth. These tech giants are keen to see mass adoption of their products and services by the one-billion-strong Indian market. At the same time, politicians in India have leveraged the platforms’ powers to entrench their own power. In late May, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government announced new “IT rules” that give authorities power to ask platforms and digital news media to trace chats, break

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00:43:41

Kate Crawford on the Toll AI Is Taking on Humans and...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/05/27

Artificial intelligence (AI) is hailed as a great technological leap forward, one that will enable immense efficiencies and better decision making across countless sectors. But AI has also been met with serious questions about who is using it and how, about the biases baked in and the ethics surrounding new applications. And an ever-growing concern about AI is the environmental toll it takes on our planet. Do the benefits of AI innovations outweigh all these concerns? Is it even worth it to develop

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00:35:24

Eliot Higgins on Citizen Journalists' New Form of...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/05/13

In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Eliot Higgins, the founder of Bellingcat.com, an open-source intelligence and investigative journalism website. Higgins’s site uses publicly accessible online data to investigate and fact-check human rights abuses, war zone atrocities and other criminal activities. Bellingcat’s reporting on the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine gained the site wide attention, including from the Kremlin, whose public statements on their

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00:46:14

Ethan Zuckerman on Why Institutional Failure Can Spur...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/04/29

Americans’ trust in democratic institutions has been strained over the past few years. The stress fractures are expressed in everything from cries of “fake news” against the media, to outrage over violent and racist police actions, to suspicion about COVID-19 precautions and vaccines, to the siege on the US Capitol Building in the aftermath of the presidential election. When trust in institutions falls, the populace can be stirred into action. Depending on the issue and the group, this action can

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00:49:03

Naomi Klein on Entering the Tech Governance Debate

Machines Like Us ·

2021/04/15

Global technology companies that power websites and services, like Amazon and Microsoft, and platforms, like Facebook and Google, have created spaces and tools that allow corporations, states and themselves to exert power in many sectors of our lives.In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Naomi Klein, author, social activist and filmmaker. Over her two decades of work, books such as No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies and The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism have,

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00:44:19

Nicole Perlroth on the Cyber Weapons Arms Race

Machines Like Us ·

2021/04/01

In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Nicole Perlroth, New York Times cybersecurity journalist and author of This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race. Nicole and Taylor discuss how that the way in which nation-states go about acquiring cyber weapons through underground online markets creates an incentive structure that enables the entire cyberwarfare complex to thrive while discouraging these exploits from being patched. “So they don’t want to tell anyone

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00:46:19

Mutale Nkonde on How Biased Tech Design and Racial...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/03/18

In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Mutale Nkonde, founder of AI for the People (AFP). She shares her experiences of discrimination and bias working in journalism and at tech companies in Silicon Valley. Moving into government, academia and activism, Nkonde has been able to bring light to the ways in which biases baked into technology’s design disproportionately affect racialized communities. For instance, during the 2020 US presidential campaign, her communications team was able to

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00:30:25

Rod Sims on Australia’s New Law to Rebalance Media Power

Machines Like Us ·

2021/03/01

The world watched as the Australian government passed a new law in February 2021 requiring Facebook and Google to pay news businesses for linking to their work. In the lead-up to its passing, Facebook followed through on its threat to remove news from its platform. But many viewed Facebook’s move as only reinforcing the government’s position that big tech had market dominance. In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Rod Sims, the chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer

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00:39:15

Bishop Steven Croft on Keeping Humanity at the Centre...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/02/18

In the early days of the internet, information technology could be viewed as morally neutral. It was simply a means of passing data from one point to another. But, as communications technology has advanced by using algorithms, tracking and identifiers to shape the flow of information, we are being presented with moral and ethical questions about how the internet is being used and even reshaping what it means to be human. In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with the Right Reverend Dr

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00:36:10

Lana Swartz on the Power of Payment Platforms

Machines Like Us ·

2021/02/04

Are retail investors and message boards rewriting financial markets? The GameStop shakeup over the past week demonstrated how the market could be manipulated by users of the subreddit group WallStreetBets and robo-investing apps like Robinhood. The activities that happened in cyberspace on social media and financial digital platforms made waves in the real-world financial markets. Our guest Lana Swartz calls this moment infrastructural inversion, “when suddenly something stops working, and you

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00:48:02

Joan Donovan on How Platforms Enabled the Capitol...

Machines Like Us ·

2021/01/21

During his term, President Donald Trump has vilified the media, spread mis- and disinformation and built a loyal base of followers who believe his message. His refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election, failed legal challenges and Stop the Steal campaign further rallied his supporters. The tipping point came on January 6, 2021, just as law makers were meeting at the Capitol to certify the election. In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Joan Donovan, research director of the

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00:46:30

Beeban Kidron on Why Children Need a Safer Internet

Machines Like Us ·

2021/01/07

In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Baroness Beeban Kidron, OBE, across-bench member of the British House of Lords, a filmmaker and the chair of 5Rights Foundation. Kidron is a strong advocate for children’s online rights. She is a member of the UK government’s Democracy and Digital Technologies Committee working to implement the Age Appropriate Design Code, which explains how the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) applies in the context of children using digital services and

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00:50:59

Ron Deibert on Resetting Our Relationship with...

Machines Like Us ·

2020/12/22

However you use telecommunications technology — and billions use it for everything from routine daily tasks and entertainment to seeking help, sharing confidential information or organizing civil actions — your communications are all running on decades-old network protocols with gaping vulnerabilities that can enable cybercrime and security breaches. High-risk individuals and organizations, in particular, are vulnerable, not only to surveillance but to targeted retaliation by autocratic states who

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00:35:03

Heidi J. Larson on the Root Causes of Vaccine Hesitancy

Machines Like Us ·

2020/12/10

Vaccine hesitancy and anti-vax sentiment have been around for as long as vaccines themselves have been available. Misinformation about vaccines has, for example, led to a decline in early childhood vaccination, resulting in the worldwide resurgence of the measles virus. In 2020, a vaccine appears to be the only viable path to ending the COVID-19 pandemic and returning to normal. But many distrust this new vaccine (or vaccines) and could refuse to get vaccinated.In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor

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00:58:21

Cory Doctorow on the True Dangers of Surveillance...

Machines Like Us ·

2020/11/26

Where does the tech industries’ power lie? Are they “mind-control” platforms, as some have described them, capable of influencing everything from consumer choices to election results, or does their true threat to society lie in market concentration? In this episode of Big Tech, Taylor Owen speaks with Cory Doctorow, a science fiction author, activist and journalist. Doctorow’s latest book, How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism, argues that big tech’s purported powers of manipulation and control,

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00:02:04

Season Three Trailer

Machines Like Us ·

2020/11/19

Depending who you ask, big tech is either going to save humanity or destroy us. Taylor Owen thinks it’s a little more complicated than that. Join him in conversation with leading thinkers as they make sense of a world transformed by technology.

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00:34:33

Everybody Cares about Democracy and Technology: David...

Machines Like Us ·

2020/08/27

In this episode of Big Tech, co-hosts David Skok and Taylor Owen discuss how our understanding of the impacts big tech has on society has shifted over the past year. Among these changes is the public’s greater awareness of the need for regulation in this sector.In their conversation, David and Taylor reflect upon some of the major events that have contributed to this shift. The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need for better mechanisms to stop the spread of misinformation. And it has shown that

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00:28:43

Ellen Jorgensen on Biotech’s Potential and the...

Machines Like Us ·

2020/08/13

Biotechnology — the use of biological processes for industrial and other purposes, especially through genetic manipulation of micro-organisms — is a field experiencing massive growth worldwide. For many decades, advances in biology have been made in large academic or corporate institutions, with entry to the field restricted by knowledge and financial barriers. Now, through information sharing and new means of accessing lab space and equipment, a whole new community of amateur scientists are

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