Our guest today is Gaby Del Valle, a policy reporter here at The Verge, and we’re discussing the growing backlash against AI data centers. Gaby recently reported a fantastic piece about Hernando County, Florida, where last month the county commission unanimously approved a year-long moratorium on data center construction.

So I wanted Gaby to talk me through what these protests look like on the ground, from voters whose party affiliations have typically aligned them with big business.

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• Right-wingers protesting data centers have a lot in common with the left | The Verge
• No data centers in my backyard | Jasmine Sun
• Who’s afraid of the big, bad GPU? | The Verge 
• NY becomes the first state to enact a data center moratorium | The Verge
• The fight against AI data centers is just beginning | The Verge
• Florida gives millions in tax breaks to data centers under DeSantis-backed law | Tampa Bay Times

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Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our supervising producer is Greg Ott, and our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Toni Schneider, the new head of social platform Bluesky who formally took over after a short stint as interim CEO. This is one of my favorite kinds of interviews, because a couple years ago we had Bluesky’s prior CEO, Jay Graber, on the show — she’s now the company’s chief innovation officer. All of that kind of shuffle is pure Decoder bait: a new CEO often brings with them new priorities, which is perhaps the most Decoder subject of all.

Read the ⁠full interview transcript on The Verge⁠.

Links: 

• Bluesky CEO Jay Graber | Decoder (2024)
• Bluesky CEO Jay Graber steps down | TechCrunch
• Staying in the game | Toni Schneider
• The messy WordPress drama, explained | The Verge
• Proton CTO Bart Butler | Decoder

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder’s producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. This episode was edited by Eileen Felix. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey everyone, this is Nick Statt, senior producer on Decoder. We’re taking a brief publishing break while Nilay is out on vacation. We’ll resume regular programming next week, and we’ve got some great episodes in the works. 

In the meantime, we wanted to share an episode from the excellent podcast The Gray Area, with host Sean Illing. In this one, Sean sat down with The Atlantic journalist Charlie Warzel to talk specifically about the state of the internet in 2026 — and what it means that it feels increasingly overrun by non-human actors. 

Links: 

• The Gray Area with Sean Illing | Apple Podcasts
• Galaxy Brain | The Atlantic
• The internet is all bots now | The Gray Area (YouTube)
• The feeling of control slipping away | The Atlantic
  
• How much of the internet is fake? Turns out, a lot of it, actually| New York Magazine
• How bots took over our lives | The New Yorker
• The ‘dead internet theory’ is real — and it’s killing the web | Fast Company
• The fanfare around the band Geese actually was a psyop | Wired

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Evan Smith, cofounder and CEO of Altana, was last on the show in early 2025 to talk about how Trump’s first few waves of tariffs were starting to affect global trade. It was a very alarming and also very illuminating chat; Evan and I got into the existential weeds of international relations and economics almost immediately.

A year and a half later, and everything is somehow even more chaotic than it was the last time Evan and I talked — and that’s true about both trade and also the world of running a software company. Agentic AI, whack-a-mole tariff policy, war in Iran — we jumped right back into weeds yet again.

Read the full interview transcript The Verge.

Links: 

• How Trump’s tariff chaos is already changing global trade | Decoder
• Skydio CEO Adam Bry on not drawing red lines for drone use | Decoder
• Trump imposes new global tariffs, drawing protests from trading partners | Reuters
• Greer: USMCA Talks Could Stretch Into Next Year | Wall Street Journal
• Trump hits Canada with new 50% tariffs | Associated Press
• Iran weaponized the Strait of Hormuz. Now neighbors are going around it | CNN
• The Iran war is testing Southeast Asia’s faith in the US | Politico

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder’s producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. This episode was edited by Kabir Chopra. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today, I’m talking with Hayden Field, The Verge’s senior AI reporter, about the major trade secrets lawsuit between Apple and OpenAI, and what this tells us about OpenAI’s future. 

Hayden has been covering OpenAI for years now, and she also just talked to a bunch of lawyers who specialize in intellectual property and trade secret law to get a sense of how serious this case is. The answer is not entirely positive for OpenAI. This legal battle could also affect OpenAI’s hardware plans, its forthcoming IPO, and its already-damaged reputation. 

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• Sam Altman didn’t need another lawsuit | The Verge
• OpenAI’s first device will be moveable, screenless speaker | Bloomberg
• Apple sues OpenAI for allegedly stealing hardware secrets | The Verge
• The 6 wildest claims in Apple’s lawsuit against OpenAI | The Verge
• OpenAI is buying Jony Ive’s AI hardware company | The Verge

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dr. Jill Lepore is one of the best writers there is at identifying institutional patterns in history, and Decoder is a show about systems and organization — so her new book, The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State, is a perfect fit for the show.

You build systems by measuring things — gathering information, quantifying it as data, and taking action on it. The book's big thesis is that this kind of systemic measurement is really a dehumanizing act, one that flattens humanity and human concerns into something, well, artificial.

These artificial structures touch everything — not just in the more obvious places like in apps or AI, but all the way up to politics, governance, and the very future of the nation-state itself.

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• The Artificial State | The New Yorker 
• ‘Terminator’ to tech titans: Jill Lepore on the ‘artificial state’ | Yale Univ.
• The failed ideas that drive Elon Musk | New York Times
• Sam Altman | The Joe Rogan Experience

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder’s producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. This episode was edited by Xander Adams. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane.

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’ve got the first of a two-part series on the systems that run the world: I’m talking today with Bart Butler, the CTO of Proton, the company that makes private and secure productivity software.

There’s a lot of big Decoder themes in this one. That includes how Proton has structured its ownership and architected its products to align its incentives with protecting users. At the same time, Proton faces new challenges and pressures, both at home in Switzerland and from the EU and US government that are putting its values to the test. 

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• Proton now offers an entire bundle of office services | The Verge
• Proton Mail helped FBI unmask anonymous ‘Stop Cop City’ protester | 404Media
• Proton says it will leave Switzerland if this controversial law Is passed | Vice
• Age verification is a mess but we’re doing it anyway | The Verge
• Let’s build a children’s public internet | The Verge
• Let me see some ID: age verification is spreading across the internet | The Verge
• Why Chat Control 1.0 is the EU's most Orwellian law yet | Euronews

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nvidia is obviously in the news constantly because of the AI boom — but it's also a major supplier to the entire auto industry As head of Nvidia's automotive division, Xinzhou Wu has a front-row seat to all the challenges EVs and autonomous vehicles are facing, especially in the US.

And of course, you can’t talk about electric cars or vehicle autonomy in the US without talking about Elon Musk and Tesla. So I asked Xinzhou pretty directly if Tesla full self driving can actually do what Elon claims it will be able to do without using LiDAR. You tell me if you think his answer holds up.

Read the ⁠full interview transcript on The Verge⁠.

Links: 

• Nvidia’s head of autonomous driving opens up about his plans | The Verge
• Hyundai, Nissan, BYD, and Geely Join Nvidia’s Level 4 | MotorTrend
• Nvidia, auto suppliers roll out partnerships to rekindle self-driving  | Reuters
• Meet Alpamayo, Nvidia’s new AI model for autonomous cars | Forbes
• I tested Nvidia’s FSD competitor — Tesla should be worried | The Verge

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder’s producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt; this episode was edited by Xander Adams. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

My guest today is Peter Kafka, chief correspondent at Business Insider and host of Channels, a podcast about the media industry. And it’s a big week for the media industry — Comcast just announced that it’s splitting itself up, into the Comcast broadband company and the NBCUniversal entertainment company.

This dream, that you can combine distribution with big splashy entertainment properties, has failed time and again. But Comcast tried the content plus pipes strategy for longer than most. So Peter and I discussed what happened in the media and broadband industries over the last 15 years, and what might happen next. 

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• Comcast is cutting NBCUniversal loose | Business Insider
• Comcast’s split could make or break Peacock | The Verge
• Comcast and NBCUniversal will go it alone. But for how long? | NYT
• Comcast split shows bigger is no longer better | Deadline
• A cable scion’s hardest deal yet: breaking up his family’s company | WSJ

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today I’m talking with Ali Berman and Raina Penchansky, who run the Creators Division at United Talent Agency. UTA is an enormous talent agency, and Ali and Raina's creators division represents some of the biggest creators and influencers in the world.

So I really wanted to know how Raina and Ali identify up-and-coming talent, how they work with that talent to build durable businesses, and what the machinations of being a top creator actually look like in practice.

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• The power brokers behind the $250B influencer economy | Wall Street Journal
• The Influencer Cliff | Carmen Vicente (TikTok)
• UTA Unveils Upscale Office for Creators | The Hollywood Reporter
• YouTube Stars Breach Hollywood’s Most Gilded Gate | New York Times
• CAA, TPG form holding company to acquire creator-led businesses | Variety
• How creator talent agencies are evolving into multi-platform operators | Digiday

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt; this episode was edited by Xander Adams. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We’ve got a special Decoder today. I had the chance to talk with Amy Lanzi, the CEO of Digitas North America, in front of a live audience at the Uber villa at the Cannes Lions advertising festival in the south of France.

There’s a lot in this one on AI, the creator economy, and the future of marketing – like I said, Amy is as sharp as they come, and I really enjoy talking to her about how the money really works.

Read the full interview transcript on The Verge.

Links: 

• The Influencer Cliff | Carmen Vicente (TikTok)
• The Wrong Promises | Publicis Groupe (YouTube)
• You can just tell the Instagram algorithm what you want now | The Verge
• How brands and creators are fighting for your attention and money | Decoder (2025)
• How influencers are changing advertising, with Digitas’ Amy Lanzi | Decoder (2024)

Subscribe to The Verge to access the ad-free version of Decoder!

Credits:

Decoder is a production of The Verge and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

Decoder is produced by Kate Cox and Nick Statt and edited by Ursa Wright. Our editorial director is Kevin McShane. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices