It’s all a lot of screens on this episode, really. Screens in suitcases next to pools. Screens that look like sunflowers. Screens for scrolling, screens for tapping, screens that show everyone yelling at each other while you try to watch football. It’s The Vergecast, the flagship podcast of the hutch your family computer used to be in.
College football conferences: super confusing, ultimately made up, and surprisingly important to the future of entertainment. Oh, and if you haven’t seen The YouTube Effect yet, this podcast will still make total sense, but you should add it to your watch list for sure.
Radiolab’s most recent episode is a dive into Section 230, and while it doesn’t make a ton of new arguments or discoveries, it’s a really good 30-minute summation of the many sides, feelings, bills, and more feelings about how 230 works.
Honestly, it’s worth listening just to hear Ron Wyden recite the 26 words from memory.
[Radiolab Podcasts | WNYC Studios]
It should, right? Definitely should. But also, no, terrible idea, why would Apple want that headache. Who knows! But on The Vergecast, we tried to make sense of it. We also talked Slack, Zoom, MrBeast, the future of CarPlay, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Like and subscribe!
And at the very least can we make the prices less confusing? We discuss why the numbers keep going up, plus why Apple should and shouldn’t buy Disney. Then we make sense of the backlash to Zoom’s AI policies, dig into Slack’s redesign, and spend a lot of time talking about fart apps. Because to get to the future, you gotta start with fart apps.
This rumor — that Apple might acquire Disney — has been around forever, and there’s nothing in this Hollywood Reporter story that makes me think it’s real this time. But the story does lay out a fascinating case for how it might work:
While it may be very true that Apple doesn’t want to buy a studio, maybe it would want to buy this studio —the one that, despite the challenges of the moment, has a vault full of priceless IP and remains the most valuable brand in entertainment.
[The Hollywood Reporter]
Coming to you today with an episode from Land of The Giants, which this season is all about Tesla. (It’s a very good season, you’re not too far behind, you can catch up wherever you find your fine podcasts!) This one just felt particularly Vergecast-y to us: it’s the story of how Musk took over at Tesla, and reshaped the company in his image. We are the flagship podcast of corporate in-fighting, after all.
