Unity is one of those hidden in plain sight companies we love here on Decoder, and CEO Matt Bromberg is in many ways the perfect Decoder guest. He's been on the job less than a year and took over in a moment of crisis. He describes the company as being "at war with its customers" before he joined, and he's not wrong.

The game industry right now is also contracting overall — studios are closing, and some big bets on things like the metaverse and live service games haven’t paid off. So we talked about all that, and where Matt sees growth ahead: Unity isn’t just a game engine provider, but the platform for everything from running those big live services and the monetization on top of them.

Links: 

• Unity’s struggles continue with fresh wave of layoffs | The Verge
• Unity attempts to turn things around with latest game engine release | The Verge
• Unity has eliminated its controversial runtime fee | The Verge
• ‘We want to be a fundamentally different and better company’ | IGN
• John Riccitiello is out at Unity, effective immediately | The Verge
• Unity is laying off 25% of its staff | The Verge
• Unity cancels town hall over reported death threats | The Verge
• Unity has changed its pricing model and developers are pissed off | The Verge
• Toyota chooses Unity for next-generation interface | Unity

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Today we’re talking about bird flu, but in a pretty Decoder way. Science journalist Lauren Leffer, who recently wrote a piece for The Verge about bird flu and how it’s becoming a forever war, is joining me on the show. We’re going to talk about the systems, structure, and culture that might control bird flu — and those that might make it worse.

Links: 

• We’ve entered a forever war with bird flu | Verge
• Kennedy’s alarming prescription for bird flu on poultry farms | NYT
• First bird flu death in US reported in Louisiana | NYT
• Bird flu found in sheep in UK, a world first | NYT
• Shell shocked: how small eateries are dealing with record egg prices | NYT
• Animal Farm: eggflation’s monopoly problem | The Lever
• At the ‘Wall Street of Eggs,’ Demand Is Surging | WSJ
• How to protect your pets from bird flu | Popular Science
• What to know about the bird flu outbreak in wild birds | AP
• Bird flu continues to spread as Trump experts are MIA | Ars Technica

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Today, I’m talking with Kakul Srivastava, CEO of music creation platform Splice, which is one of the biggest marketplaces around for loops and samples. You can just go sign up, pay the money, and download these loops to try to make pop hits all day long. Take, for instance, Sabrina Carpenter’s Espresso, which was composed almost entirely out of Splice loops. 

Now, if you’re a Decoder listener, you know that some of my favorite conversations are with people building technology products for creatives, and that I am obsessed with how technology changes the music industry, because it feels like whatever happens to music happens to everything else five years later. So this one was really interesting, because Splice is all wrapped in all of that. 

Links: 

• Sabrina Carpenter’s Espresso highlights the way new music is made | Bloomberg
• Major record labels sue AI company behind ‘BBL Drizzy’ | Verge
• Splice CEO’s message for AI sceptics? “Trust the artists” | MusicTech
• Splice launches voice recording on Splice Mobile at SXSW | Splice
• OpenAI & Google ask government to let them train AI on content they don’t own | Verge
• AI Drake just set an impossible legal trap for Google | Verge
• Pharrell Williams: $7.3 million Blurred Lines verdict threatens all artists | Verge
• Lady Gaga, nostalgia, and the ‘reheated nachos’ phenomenon in pop culture | Her World
• AI music startups say copyright violation is just rock and roll | Verge
• Suno CEO says musicians don’t actually like making music | Vice

Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/632036

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Today we're talking about the Tesla Takedown protest movement, which has emerged as a way for people to express how deeply unhappy they are with Elon Musk installing himself as a not-so-shadow president who is tearing the federal government apart, leaving confusion and destruction in his wake.

Tesla's stock price is sinking, new car registrations and down, and hype around the company is fading rapidly. There's an opportunity there for the protestors, and I asked Ed Niedermeyer on the show to help me pull it all apart.

Links: 

• Is Tesla cooked? | Verge
• Elon Musk Has Become Too Toxic for YouTube | New York Magazine
• ‘Tesla Takedown’ wants to hit Elon Musk where it hurts | Verge
• The Tesla protests are getting bigger — and rowdier | Verge
• ‘Tesla Takedown’ protesters planning ‘biggest day of action’ | Verge
• Tesla registrations — and public opinion — are in a free fall | Verge
• Multiple Teslas set on fire in Las Vegas and Kansas City | Verge
• Mark Rober’s Tesla video was more than a little weird | Verge
• Tesla sales fell year-over-year for the first time | Verge
• The cybertruck isn’t all it’s cracked up to be | Verge
• Tesla autopilot, FSD linked to hundreds of crashes, dozens of deaths | Verge
• Tesla crash victims’ families worried about Musk influence on investigations | Verge

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

I'm talking to Evan Smith, who started Altana in 2019 because he predicted the first wave of globalized manufacturing and trade would end, and that companies would want new powerful tools to adapt their supply chains as the world grew more complex. Here in 2025, that looks like a pretty good bet — even if the way it's playing out is more stressful and chaotic than anyone really wants it to be.

There are some big, unsettling ideas here, but talking about them directly and with clarity at least made me feel like I had a framework to understand the endless on-again, off-again news cycle on tariffs and trade.

Links: 

• Globalization 2.0 Manifesto | Altana
• The ‘giant sucking sound’ of NAFTA | The Conversation
• ‘Offensive Realism’: The never-ending struggle for power | American Diplomacy (2002)
• Foreign Affairs Big Mac I | NYT (1996)
• The end of the Golden Arches Doctrine | Financial Times
• Trump could scale back tariffs, Lutnick says | CNBC
• China joined rule-based trading system — then broke the rules | Politico
• Open Source and China: Inverting Copyright? | Wisconsin International Law Journal
• How the US lost out on iPhone work | NYT

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Today, I’m talking to Verge policy editor Adi Robertson about a bill called the Take It Down Act, which is one in a long line of bills that would make it illegal to distribute non-consensual intimate imagery, or NCII. This is a real and devastating problem on the internet, and AI is just making it worse. 

But Adi just wrote a long piece arguing that giving the Trump administration new powers over speech in this way would be a mistake. So in this episode, Adi and I really get into the details of the Take it Down Act, how it might be weaponized, and why we ultimately can’t trust anything the Trump administration says about wanting to solve this problem. 

Links: 

• The Take It Down Act isn’t a law, it’s a weapon | Verge
• A bill combatting the spread of AI deepfakes just passed the Senate | Verge
• Welcome to the era of gangster tech regulation | Verge
• FTC workers are getting terminated | Verge
• Bluesky deletes AI protest video of Trump sucking Musk's toes | 404 Media
• Trump supports Take It Down Act so he can silence critics | EFF
• Scarlett Johansson calls for deepfake ban after AI video goes viral | Verge
• The FCC is a weapon in Trump’s war on free speech | Decoder
• Trolls have flooded X with graphic Taylor Swift AI fakes | Verge
• Teen girls confront an epidemic of deepfake nudes in schools | NYT

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Almar Latour is the publisher of the Wall Street Journal and also CEO of its parent company, Dow Jones — itself a part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Almar's been with the paper since the 90s, and now he's got insight into all the modern messes. He's made a big deal with OpenAI, while also suing Perplexity — all while building his own AI data products for Dow Jones customers.

He's also a strong defender of press freedom who fought to have Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich released from Russia after being imprisoned for more than a year — while News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch famously has deep ties to Trump and has overseen a vastly polarized and politicized era of news media.

Links: 

• Here are the WSJ journalists whose jobs were eliminated | Talking Biz News
• OpenAI, WSJ parent strike content deal valued at over $250M | Wall Street Journal
• News Corp sues Perplexity for ripping off WSJ, New York Post | The Verge
• Dow Jones negotiates AI usage rights with 4,000 publishers | Nieman Lab
• Rupert Murdoch joins Trump in Oval Office | The Hollywood Reporter
• WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich is free | Wall Street Journal
• Trump sues Iowa newspaper and top pollster | Reuters
• The FCC is a weapon in Trump’s war on free speech | The Verge
• CBS considers caving on Trump lawsuit to save Skydance merger | The Verge
• Why The Atlantic signed a deal with OpenAI | Decoder

Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/626229

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

So today I’m talking to Andy Hawkins, The Verge’s transportation editor, about what’s going on in the skies. Andy just edited a big piece for us by writer Darryl Campbell that helps put a lot of what’s happening in air travel right now in perspective. It has some very reassuring data points, but it also raises important questions about what we need to do next to reinstill confidence in air travel.

Andy and I talked about how safe it really is to fly right now — extremely safe, it turns out — and how the current air traffic systems might change for better and worse. And, of course, we talked about Elon Musk.

Links: 

• What’s the deal with all these airplane crashes? | Verge
• How Elon Musk muscled his way into the FAA | Bloomberg
• Elon Musk says upgrade of FAA’s air traffic control system is failing | CNN
• FAA targeting Verizon contract in favor of Musk’s Starlink, sources say | WashPo
• FAA officials ordered staff to find funding for Elon Musk’s Starlink | Rolling Stone
• FAA announces ‘hiring supercharge’ for air traffic controllers | Forbes
• Air traffic control trainees to get raise, in nod to cost of living | NYT
• Some of the 400 jobs that were cut at the FAA helped support air safety | AP
• DC plane crash marks first major commercial crash in US since 2009 | ABC
• What the ATC controller sees | Flight Training Central

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Panos Panay is in charge of devices and services at Amazon — that's everything from Alexa and Kindle to Ring, Eero, and even the Project Kuiper satellite internet service that's meant to compete with Starlink.

He's led the team through giving Alexa a big AI infusion which is what drew him to Amazon after nearly 20 years with Microsoft. Like so many folks in tech, he sees AI as a platform shift that will change the way we use computers.

Fair warning: We talk about Alexa a lot in this one, so you might want to go mute your Alexa device mics now.

Links: 

• With Alexa Plus, Amazon finally reinvents its best product | Verge
• The future of the Kindle with Panos Panay | Vergecast
• Amazon announces AI-powered Alexa Plus | Verge
• All of the announcements from Amazon’s Alexa Plus event | Verge
• Alexa Plus arrives with promise but plenty of questions | Verge
• Amazon Leadership Principles | Amazon
• How Amazon runs Alexa, with Dave Limp (2021) | Decoder
• Alexa loses her voice | YouTube
• Humane is shutting down the AI pin | Verge
• Mike Krieger wants to build AI products that are worth the hype | Verge

Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/621232

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

This is Alex Heath, deputy editor of The Verge. I’m guest hosting today’s episode while Nilay is still away for a much-needed vacation. He’ll be back next week. But today, we’re diving into the bromance between Elon Musk and Donald Trump, and more specifically, how it’s impacting the changing right-wing political movement here in the United States. 

There’s no better place to get that temperature check than CPAC. Musk showed up there this year for a wild interview — you may have seen clips of him waving around a literal chainsaw. Thankfully, Verge policy Gaby del Valle was on the ground this year, and as you’ll hear her say, she barely slept. But she got a front-row look at how the world of MAGA really feels about Elon, DOGE, and regulating Big Tech. 

Links: 

• I cannot describe how strange Elon Musk’s CPAC appearance was | Verge
• At CPAC, the world’s populists parrot the leader who inspired them | Politico
• Government still threatening to ‘semi-fire’ workers who don’t answer Musk email | Verge
• Saying ‘no’ to Musk | NYT
• What that chainsaw was really about | NYT
• Sequins, merch, chainsaws: Trump’s return to CPAC | NYT
• Bannon calls Musk a ‘parasitic illegal immigrant’ | NYT
• New York got $80 Million for migrants. The White House took it back | NYT
• Federal technology staffers resign rather than help Musk and DOGE | AP
• National Park Service layoffs, hiring delays impact visitors | NPR

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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

Vimeo started many years ago as something of an artsier, more creative competitor to YouTube. Its last CEO, Anjali Sud, took the company through a pretty huge transformation into an enterprise software company, and we had her on the show to talk about that transformation a couple years ago.

Now, her successor, new CEO Philip Moyer, not only has to decide what parts of that strategy are working, but also how to navigate the addition of AI to the mix, and deal with the basic math of the creator economy: The amount of video in the world is exploding, but the total amount of time a person can spend watching any of it is pretty fixed. So with AI adding to the volume, how is anyone going to be able to make any money at all?

Links: 

• How Anjali Sud reinvented Vimeo | Decoder (2021)
• How Dropout is taking control with Vimeo OTT | Vimeo
• Squarespace CEO Anthony Casalena on making a website in 2023 | Decoder
• Wix CEO Avishai Abrahami on why the web isn’t dying | Decoder
• NBCU’s streaming chief isn’t worried about you canceling cable | Decoder
• Vimeo names new CMO as it focuses on business video | WSJ
• The truth about Vimeo and YouTube SEO | Vimeo
• Google’s counteroffer to a breakup is unbundling Android apps | Verge
• China opens Google antitrust probe in retaliation to tariffs | Verge
• Vimeo’s position on AI | Vimeo

Transcript: https://www.theverge.com/e/616820

Credits:

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

Our producers are Kate Cox and Nick Statt. Our editor is Ursa Wright. 

The Decoder music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.

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