In this week's monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through how the media's lackluster approach to critiquing the powerful led to the needless, unsustainable AI bubble - and how things could change for the better. Vote for Better Offline's "Man Who Killed Google Search" as the best business podcast episode in this year's Webby's! Open until April 17! Vote today!https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/business Vote for Weird Little Guys in this year’s Webbys! https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/crime-justice --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at Ed's Socials: https://twitter.com/edzitron https://www.instagram.com/edzitron https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com https://www.threads.net/@edzitronSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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10:14
OpenAI Cannot Survive
In the first part of this week's two-part episode, Ed Zitron walks you through how impossible it will be for OpenAI to stay alive - and how SoftBank’s attempts to help are materially harming the company.Vote for Better Offline's "Man Who Killed Google Search" as the best business podcast episode in this year's Webby's! Open until April 17! Vote today!https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/business Vote for Weird Little Guys in this year’s Webby's! https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/crime-justice --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at Ed's Socials: https://twitter.com/edzitron https://www.instagram.com/edzitron https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com https://www.threads.net/@edzitronSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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40:16
Monologue: OpenAI's Non-Profit Problem
In this week's monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through the precarious nature of OpenAI's non-profit status - and how a petition to the California Attorney general is an existential threat to the company. Petition: https://aboutblaw.com/bhNa --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at Ed's Socials: https://twitter.com/edzitron https://www.instagram.com/edzitron https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com https://www.threads.net/@edzitronSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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8:09
Radio Better Offline: Allison Morrow, Paris Martineau & Ed Ongweso Jr.
Welcome to Radio Better Offline, a tech talk radio show recorded out of iHeartRadio's studio in New York city.Ed Zitron is joined in studio by Allison Morrow of CNN, Ed Ongweso Jr. of the Tech Bubble newsletter, and Paris Martineau of The Information to talk about the collapse of the AI bubble, the goofy “AI 2027” fan fiction that has gone viral in the tech industry, and how the tech media faces a reckoning once the bubble truly bursts. Vote for Better Offline's "Man Who Killed Google Search" as the best business podcast episode in this year's Webby's! Open until April 17! Vote today!https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/business Vote for Weird Little Guys in this year’s Webby’s! https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/crime-justiceAllison Morrowhttps://www.cnn.com/profiles/allison-morrowhttps://bsky.app/profile/amorrow.bsky.socialEd Ongweso Jr.https://thetechbubble.substack.com/https://bsky.app/profile/edwardongwesojr.com Paris Martineauhttps://www.theinformation.com/u/parismartineau?rc=kz8jh3 https://bsky.app/profile/paris.nyc https://ai-2027.com/ New York Times article on AI 2027 - https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/03/technology/ai-futures-project-ai-2027.html CNN - Apple’s AI isn’t a letdown. AI is the letdown - https://www.cnn.com/2025/03/27/tech/apple-ai-artificial-intelligence/index.html CNN - The AI bubble may not be bursting, but tariff chaos is sure helping to deflate it https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/01/business/ai-bubble-markets-tariffs-nightcap/index.html WSJ - How Is SoftBank Funding Its Mega Investment in OpenAI? A Lot of Debt - https://www.wsj.com/business/deals/openai-softbank-investment-debt-51b4a130 TechCrunch - OpenAI reportedly mulls buying Jony Ive and Sam Altman’s AI hardware startup - https://techcrunch.com/2025/04/07/openai-reportedly-mulls-buying-jony-ive-and-sam-altmans-ai-hardware-startup/ --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at Ed's Socials: https://twitter.com/edzitron https://www.instagram.com/edzitron https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com https://www.threads.net/@edzitronSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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1:25:06
Monologue: OpenAI's Albatross
In this week's monologue, Ed Zitron walks you through how OpenAI's new image generator has become a massive burden on the company, and how OpenAI’s melting GPUs are a bad omen for the future.Vote for Better Offline's "Man Who Killed Google Search" as the best business podcast episode in this year's Webby's! Open until April 17! Vote today!https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/business Vote for Weird Little Guys in this year’s Webby’s! https://vote.webbyawards.com/PublicVoting#/2025/podcasts/individual-episode/crime-justice OpenAI’s new image generator is now available to all users - https://techcrunch.com/2025/03/31/openais-new-image-generator-is-now-available-to-all-users/OpenAI Forecast Shows Shift From Microsoft to SoftBank (citation for $13 billion number) - https://www.theinformation.com/articles/openai-forecast-shows-shift-from-microsoft-to-softbank?rc=kz8jh3 --- LINKS: https://www.tinyurl.com/betterofflinelinks Newsletter: https://www.wheresyoured.at/ Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/BetterOffline/ Discord: chat.wheresyoured.at Ed's Socials: https://twitter.com/edzitron https://www.instagram.com/edzitron https://bsky.app/profile/edzitron.com https://www.threads.net/@edzitronSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Better Offline is a weekly show exploring the tech industry’s influence and manipulation of society - and interrogating the growth-at-all-costs future that tech’s elite wants to build.
Combining narrative-form storytelling, one-on-one interviews and panel-based discussions, Better Offline cuts through the buzzwords and obfuscation of the tech industry, investigating and evaluating the schemes and scams of everyone from cryptocurrency scumbags to the greediest of the venture capital elite. Tech industry veteran Ed Zitron and a dynamic coterie of guests will help listeners understand the who, how and why of how tech’s most powerful players are changing the world - for better or for worse.