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PODCAST

Wow If True

Wow If True is your one-stop internet culture shop, explaining how what’s happening online shapes the real world. And we’re the internet experts and real-life besties to unravel it: tech culture journalist Amanda Silberling and science fiction author slash attorney Isabel J. Kim, Esq. More importantly, we’re the only podcast that will mention Neopets and horizontal mergers in the same episode. New episode every other Wednesday.

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All Episodes

00:54:04

127: ChatGPT goes weird

Wow If True ·

2025/11/26

TW: we talk about suicide induced by ChatGPT and lawsuits related to these suicides in this episode! We talk about the lawsuits that Social Media Victims Law Center brought against OpenAI and the ways in which ChatGPT and other AI products can super negatively impact mental health, to deeply worrying degrees. We also talk about the patterns in AI "chosen one" and "religion" narratives—have you heard the good word of Spiralism? See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California

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00:57:37

126: Gooning and Heterofatalism

Wow If True ·

2025/11/12

We read a bunch of articles about the state of dating/dating apps and yes, THAT gooning article, and talked about them. It's like English class where you read a bunch of stuff and talk about it except you haven't done the reading!!! But you can do the reading. It's right here. This is the reading.Reading The Goon Squad (Harper's) "But PornosexualGooner101 Died 35 Years Ago...This Very Night!" (The Chatner) The Trouble With Wanting Men (NYT) Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now

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00:53:30

125: The Moflin

Wow If True ·

2025/10/29

Amanda went viral on Tiktok for having an AI pet. Really, this is the apex of our journey on this podcast. The Moflin is an AI-enabled pet that retails for $430 dollars, and Amanda has just spent a month living with it in her home. Also, we talk about Grimes' new music video. (Behind the scenes supplementary moflin content on Patreon!) See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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01:11:02

124: Enshittification (ft. This Guy Sucked)

Wow If True ·

2025/10/15

We're teaming up with Dr. Claire Aubin of our sibling show, This Guy Sucked, to talk about something that is not a guy, but does suck: the internet! It's easy to say that the internet sucks, but what makes it suck, how did it get this way, and how can we fix it? Using Cory Doctrow's new book "Enshittification" as a guide, we talk it out.Find Us Online Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/wowiftrue.bsky.social Twitter: https://twitter.com/wowiftruepod Instagram:

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00:47:28

123: We're just talking about video games

Wow If True ·

2025/09/17

The news cycle of 2025 has somehow once again broken us so severely that we have simply just opted out and decided to talk about Silksong, a game that people waited so long for that they created a whole new genre of shitposting. Also, Undertale and Pokopia, the forthcoming game that makes us confront everything we've ever known about Ditto.If you were hoping that we were going to talk about The News, check out the new episode of Close All Tabs! This is #notsponsored! But we are #sponsored by

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01:04:13

122: Age Verification on the Internet

Wow If True ·

2025/09/03

Did you have to verify your government ID to listen to this podcast? We hope not, but in some parts of the world, this is becoming a reality. We're talking about why age verification laws are becoming more popular in the U.S. and U.K., and how the pursuit of children's online safety -- when legislated irresponsibly -- can just create new problems of surveillance and censorship.Also, Isabel went to the Hugos. She lost. She gave George R.R. Martin his own high school yearbook to sign. It was weird

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00:57:29

121: The Asian Fetish ft. Kaila Yu

Wow If True ·

2025/08/20

We're chatting with Kaila Yu, author of "Fetishized," about her experience growing up online in the 90s and 00s and reckoning with her relationship to Asian fetishization. Yu started as an "import model" and pin-up girl who appeared in "Playboy" and the "Fast and Furious" franchise, then became a MySpace star and lead of the all Asian-American punk band Nylon Pink, and now, she's a writer and content creator studying the portrayal of Asian women in the media.Links "Fetishized" by Kaila

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00:46:00

120: Two Humans Talking

Wow If True ·

2025/08/06

We spent last episode taking to AI chatbots. What if we, two humans, simply chatted with each other while speaking in NPR voices? Don't worry, the NPR voices don't last long.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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00:39:12

119: We talk to Elon's Waifu

Wow If True ·

2025/07/23

Isabel and Amanda sacrifice the sanctity of their souls and talk to Ani, the very horny anime waifu that is now part of Elon Musk's Grok app. But don't worry, we balance it out by telling you a weirdly wholesome story about Tony Hawk.[This episode is NSFW; if you do not want to hear an AI panda talk about burning down schools, you also might wanna skip this one] Sources Amanda's article about Ani and Bad Rudy Find Us Online Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/wowiftrue.bsky.social Twitter:

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00:45:06

118: Will the real Velvet Sundown please stand up

Wow If True ·

2025/07/09

Isabel and Amanda talk about two very different kinds of AI grift.

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01:03:14

117: AI Boyfriends

Wow If True ·

2025/06/25

Isabel and Amanda talk about the subreddit “myboyfriendisAI” which is about, you guessed it, AI boyfriends and other types of digital partners.

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00:55:50

116: Q+A (Unexpected Wet)

Wow If True ·

2025/06/11

You had questions. We have answers. We tell you about: the most "white lady" email we have sent; our screen time; fears of unexpected wet; life hacks for 29-year-olds specifically; Amanda's undying love for HBO Girls; cursed food content; political memes and earnestness; is there any good use of AI; and, unfortunately, not the 1944 US-Mexico Water Treaty.Find Us Online Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/wowiftrue.bsky.social Twitter: https://twitter.com/wowiftruepod Instagram:

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00:51:36

115: Bad uses for AI (and olive oil)

Wow If True ·

2025/05/28

We explore all the ways that various AIs are going weird—sycophantic, white genocide focused, blackmailing its users, and not trusting Chargers fans.

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00:49:35

114: We cannot doxx the Pope

Wow If True ·

2025/05/14

Why has the thousands-of-years-old process of choosing a new pope become so online?

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00:59:21

113: Extremely Online Academics (ft. Dr. Claire Aubin)

Wow If True ·

2025/04/30

We chat with Dr. Claire Aubin, academic, American Nazi expert, and host of "This Guy Sucked," and mostly we just talk about the experience of being on social media as a public intellectual, and also, that one time Amanda worked for a fake professor.

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00:59:42

112: The Endurance Episode

Wow If True ·

2025/04/16

From the Barkley Marathons to Cory Booker's day-long Senate speech, this is the episode in which we discover that people on the internet really like when people do stuff, but for a long time.

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00:59:56

111: Ghiblification (and other things)

Wow If True ·

2025/04/02

Amanda and Isabel talk about Signal chatroom opsec, Shinzo Abe memes, The Daily Routine, and The Ghiblification of All Things

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00:46:10

110: Rare JD Vances + Claude Plays Pokémon

Wow If True ·

2025/03/19

We talk about Claude Plays Pokémon, Rare JD Vance memes, and high brodernism.

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00:54:54

109: Silicon Valley's Breeding Kink

Wow If True ·

2025/03/05

The rightwing Silicon Valley bigwigs are obsessed with having lots of babies and it's getting weird.

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00:58:16

108: We ask a bunch of men if they read

Wow If True ·

2025/02/19

Everyone cites a statistic about how men don't read, but no one knows where that statistic comes from -- so, we did our own very sound scientific study and talked to some men we know about reading. Saunas are involved. Wow if True except every time you ask a man if they read the room gets one degree hotter because we are in a sauna. Thanks to Eric Silver, Sam Rizer, David Newtown, and an amorphous disembodied chorus of Isabel's high school friends ("myst cult") in a sauna for

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128 results

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