What Next: TBD | Tech, power, and the future

America’s head of cybersecurity isn’t worried about the election being hacked or the results being tampered with. But this election cycle does have her worried for our democracy. Guest: Jen Easterly, Director of Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency  Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate pod...

Elon Musk went from voting for Hillary to supporting Trump so hard that he may have broken election laws. And with Musk influencing both on X and in campaign finance, Democrats are kicking themselves for letting him go. What will his political and financial support actually amount to this election season?  Guest: Teddy Schleifer , New York Times reporter covering campaign finance and billionaire i...

How did 23andMe go from the peak of the double-helix to a death spiral? And if it goes under, is all of the genetic data it collected at risk?  Guest: Kristen V. Brown , staff writer covering health for The Atlantic . Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by...

The crypto project “World Liberty Financial,” which was announced on X by Donald Trump, isn’t a cryptocurrency, nor a crypto-exchange, nor is it actually run by any Trumps. The truth is even stranger.  Guest: David Yaffe-Bellany, New York Times reporter Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. S...

Decades ago, Three Mile Island was shut down after a near catastrophic nuclear meltdown. So why is Microsoft paying over a billion dollars to open it back up?  Guest: Matt Reynolds, senior writer at Wired Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try...

In the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, the idea of a climate haven has been upended. And as the climate change gets worse every year, fewer places will be safe from its devastation. Guest: Sarah Kaplan, Washington Post climate reporter covering humanity's response to a warming world. Keith Campbell, managing editor at the Asheville Watchdog Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access...

America is caught in a vicious cycle of trying to alleviate traffic by expanding and building more highways, only for them to clog right up with more cars. How do you beat the traffic? Guest: David Zipper , Senior Fellow at the MIT Mobility Initiative who writes about transportation policy. Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family a...

Over the last decade, the European Union has been the vanguard regulating Big Tech, and the push has been led by Margrethe Vestager. As she steps down, Vestager is looking both back at the battles she’s fought, and how the fight will continue.  Guest: Margrethe Vestager , European Commissioner for Competition. the European Commission’s Executive Vice President on a Europe Fit for the Digital Age....

Given Laura Loomer’s history of saying outright offensive and often bewildering things, how did she get into the Trump campaign’s inner circle?   Guest: Ken Bensinger , New York Times politics reporter . Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try...

Instagram’s new default privacy settings for teenagers are designed to keep kids safe from strangers online. It’s a worthy endeavor, but are privacy settings enough? And what about all the other hazards teenagers face on social media?   Guest: Natasha Singer , New York Times tech reporter , focused on how technology is affecting childhood and schooling. Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate...

Boeing’s Starliner has now landed successfully—but Butch and Sunny weren’t on it. With a pair of astronauts still stuck on the ISS, when will NASA be ready to bring them back? And how? Guest: Micah Maidenberg , space business reporter for the Wall Street Journal . Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate...

The law has been passed and signed by the president: TikTok’s parent company must sell or divest from the app. But that’s not happening without a legal fight.   Guest: Emily Baker-White , investigative reporter at Forbes . Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcast...

An outbreak of eastern equine encephalitis in the northeast made headlines, but as far as mosquito-borne illnesses go, EEE is serious but still rare. What’s getting way too common is the mosquito itself. Guest: Amesh Adalja, doctor and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next f...

A month after a federal judge declared that Google was operating as a monopoly because of its search engine, the Justice Department has alleged that Google’s ad business was breaking antitrust law as well.  What if Google loses again? Guest: Leah Nylen, Bloomberg antitrust reporter. Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all y...

Telegram was supposed to be the platform with the freest of free speech, which meant it was also rife with the worst the internet has to offer—"criminal activity” puts it lightly. But are French authorities setting a dangerous precedent with the arrest of Telegram CEO Pavel Durov?  Guest: Joseph Menn, tech reporter for the Washington Post covering privacy and security. Want more What Next TBD? Sub...

Since the pandemic, schools have been reporting that their students are more anxious and having trouble learning. How much does simply removing cell phones from the classroom address these problems? Guests:  Laura Meckler , national education writer for the Washington Post Russell Shaw, head of Georgetown Day School and author of “ Why We’re Banning Phones at Our School ” for the Atlantic. Want mo...

Why are national politicians like Nancy Pelosi lining up alongside artificial intelligence companies to oppose safety regulations on this new industry proposed in California’s state legislature?  Guest: Rachael Myrow , senior editor on KQED’s Silicon Valley news desk. Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Sl...

The last crypto boom left the industry cash-rich and reputation-poor, so they’re doing what any beleaguered industry does—donating to politicians. Guest: Zeke Faux, investigative reporter for Bloomberg and author of Number Go Up . Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple...

GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy are in high demand and short supply. The internet makes it easy for you to have a compounding pharmacy whip you up a batch—but should you? Guest: Kate Knibbs, senior writer at Wired.  Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts b...

Since Elon Musk took over Twitter - now X - in 2022, he’s increasingly used it to push his conservative views. A suit against a non-profit brand safety group of advertisers and an exclusive interview with former President Trump show that Elon was never interested in keeping Twitter as a town square, but rather, a soapbox for him to push his political agenda.  Guest: Nitish Pahwa, associate writer...

The hype has slowed but electric vehicles aren’t going away—once the infrastructure is in place, they’ll go everywhere. Guests:  Nitish Pahwa, associate writer for business and tech at Slate. Paula Gardner, business reporter for Bridge Michigan Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe...

Should the other Silicon Valley giants be worried following the Department of Justice’s decisive win against Google?  Guest: Leah Nylen, antitrust reporter at Bloomberg Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page....

Earlier this month, AT&T was hit by the largest telecom hack ever. Not long after, Sydney Sweeney’s phone number was stolen by criminals, who used it to hack her social media and promote a memecoin. With how much sensitive data telecom companies have on us, why is their security so bad? And how can we protect ourselves?  Guests: Joseph Cox, investigative reporter and cofounder of 404 media. Wa...

The age when you need to start being screened for cancers may need to be updated, as rates among younger people are on the rise. New testing methods could make the process a lot easier than, say, a colonoscopy - but they’re not perfect.  Guest: Dylan Scott, senior correspondent and editor for Vox . Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next...

How France changed its own laws to have the safest, most pervasively surveilled Olympics ever—and why some are worried the new security system will stay in place long after the games end. Guests:  Anne Toomey McKenna , professor, author, and expert in electronic surveillance. Henry Grabar, covering the Olympics in Paris for Slate. Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free...