Computer Says Maybe

Hosted by Alix Dunn

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Episodes

142

Latest episode

Oct 2026

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EN-US

About the show

Technology is changing fast. And it's changing our world even faster. Host Alix Dunn interviews visionaries, researchers, and technologists working in the public interest to help you keep up. Step outside the hype and explore the possibilities, problems, and politics of technology. Learn more at www.themaybe.org/podcast.

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60 recent

October 16, 2026Episode 14454 min

Flock Shock: How Local Fights Over Surveillance Are Reshaping American Politics w/ Sarah Hamid & Anthony Ralphs

You may have seen the viral clip of a man in a full Darth Vader costume protesting Flock at a San Diego City Council meeting. The man behind the mask was Anthony Ralphs, who spent months trying to get the city to reconsider its contract with the surveillance tech company. After repeatedly raising concerns with the council, he turned to political theater - and got national attention. His protest is part of a growing backlash against Flock, bringing people across the political spectrum together to challenge surveillance tech and demand more say in how it’s used. In this episode, Anthony reflects on what it took to get people to listen. Then, Sarah Hamid from the Electronic Frontier Foundation breaks down how Flock’s data-sharing works and explains a strategy gaining traction in communities looking to get this technology out of their cities: bringing lawmakers and community organizers together before contracts are signed. Together, they unpack how backlash against Flock is turning frustration with surveillance tech into renewed political engagement. Further reading and resources: The Man Behind the Anti-Flock Darth Vader Mask Wants to Know: 'When Will This End? — 404 Media Flock Taught Cops How to Surveil No Kings Protesters — 404 Media Street Level Surveillance: ALPRs ** — Electronic Frontier Foundation EFF's Policy Position on ALPR Surveillance: Eliminate It and Reduce Its Harms — Electronic Frontier Foundation Cities terminate Flock contracts at record pace in August — Ars Technica Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology with a community of fellow co-conspirators. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

October 9, 2026Episode 14346 min

The Climate Cost of AI Prophecies: How Data Centers Fuel Big Fossil w/ Ketan Joshi

Tech companies keep telling us that the answer to solving climate change lies in AI. Meanwhile, the data centers required to power AI are keeping coal plants open longer, bringing in gas turbines, and driving plans for power stations bigger than anything we’ve built before. More like this: The Colossus Crossroads: Fighting for the Future of Memphis w/ KeShaun Pearson In this episode, Ketan Joshi, an independent climate analyst based in Oslo who tracks the climate impact of data centers and AI, explains how we got from facilities that drew the power of a suburb to facilities that consume as much electricity as Nigeria’s entire power grid. A former wind industry advocate, Ketan breaks down how a company can claim to run on 100% renewable energy while still driving up fossil fuel use, why Big Tech stopped talking about offsets and started promising that AI itself will solve the climate crisis, and what you find when you read the footnotes of their sustainability reports. He also argues that the real winners of the AI boom aren't even the tech companies... but fossil fuel companies like Chevron, who still come out ahead even if the bubble pops. Further reading & resources: Ketan Joshi’s Big Tech Annual Emissions + Energy Data Reports The AI Climate Hoax Report — Ketan Joshi The real energy use of agentic AI — Zeke Hausfather Microsoft and Chevron plan one of the largest gas-powered data center projects in US — TechCrunch, June 2026 Join The Maybe Collective for our first event: How to Resist AI in Schools: Learnings on Local Action with recent podcast guest, Ifeoma Ozoma on Thursday, October 15th 12-1pm ET for a participatory conversation about turning activation into action. This event is free to register HERE . Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout.

October 2, 2026Episode 14244 min

Beware the AI Prophets: Hype, Doom, and Prediction as Tools of Control w/ Carissa Véliz

When a tech executive says AI will be doing your job next year, it sounds like a forecast. Dr. Carissa Véliz argues it's something else: a command, delivered in advance, that works only if enough of us obey it. If you believe the prediction, you buy the product, reorganize your company, and bet the economy on it, and the prediction comes true because you made it so. So who gets to make predictions that stick? And what would it take to stop treating them as news and start hearing them as orders? More like this: AGI is Scientifically Impossible w/ Adam Becker In this episode, Alix Dunn talks with Carissa Véliz, associate professor at Oxford's Institute for Ethics in AI and author of Prophecy: Prediction, Power, and the Fight for the Future, From Ancient Oracles to AI . Carissa explains why a prediction is a command disguised as a description, how powerful people use algorithms to fulfill their own forecasts, and why the alternative just might be being relying on preparation over prediction. Further reading & resources: Prophecy: Prediction, Power, and the Fight for the Future, From Ancient Oracles to AI — Carissa Véliz Beware the Power of Prediction — Carissa Véliz, TED Talk The Origins of Totalitarianism — Hannah Arendt The Dangerous Ideas of “Longtermism” and “Existential Risk” — Émile P. Torres, Current Affairs Join The Maybe Collective to unpack this month's series on AI, elections, and who gets to shape the future with us. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

September 25, 2026Episode 14152 min

The Kids Are Online: Are Social Media Bans the Answer? w/ Cori Crider and Pamela Wisniewski

Almost everyone studying kids’ safety online agrees that a blanket social media ban won't work. And nearly every government moving on the issue is passing one anyway. This week, a researcher and a policy lawyer dig into why - and what could actually work instead. More like this: When Kids Can’t Consent: The Case Against Tech in the Classroom w/ Andrew Liddell This is the final episode in our back-to-school series on tech and kids. Pamela Wisniewski, a principal research scientist at the International Computer Science Institute, spends the first half of the conversation dismantling the myths that are driving most kids-online safety policies: that teens are victims with no agency, that we're all "addicted" in the same way, and that “bad kids” are seeking risk rather than connection. Her research suggests that safety isn't the absence of risk; it's having the agency and support to navigate it. She also explains why age verification often strips that agency from kids and parents alike, without making anyone safer. Cory Crider, executive director of the Future of Tech Institute, picks up where Pam leaves off. She walks us through Europe's Kids Act, the political pressure that is pushing Brussels to act, and why she'd rather fix toxic feed design than wall kids off from platforms that remain exactly the same underneath. She also gets into how easily an age-check system built for social media could creep into every corner of the internet if nobody's watching. Further reading & resources: Promoting Adolescent Online Safety and Privacy through Human-Centered Computing [VIDEO] — Pam Wisniewski, University of Waterloo CrySP Speaker Series on Privacy EU KIDS Act to restrict social media platforms’ access to children in the EU — European Commission What is in the EU's planned KIDS Act? — Reuters Protection of persons under 18: Seven out of ten children, aged between 10 and 14, think that setting the digital age of majority at 15 is a good idea — Arcom Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

September 18, 2026Episode 14049 min

When Kids Can’t Consent: The Case Against Tech in the Classroom w/ Andrew Liddell

No tech that your kid uses in the classroom was designed for their benefit. Not the tablet, not the "learning app," not the AI chatbot helping with homework. It was designed to benefit the company that made it — and your kid's data, attention, privacy, and, most importantly, safety, are the price. More like this: Meet the Mom Winning Against AI in Schools w/ Ifeoma Ozoma This week, Andrew Liddell, co-founder of the EdTech Law Center, walks us through exactly how EdTech works, why it made its way into schools with so little oversight, who it actually serves, and the cases his firm has fought against the companies putting these devices into classrooms. His firm has gone after student-data pipelines it flagged as hackable — and later watched get hacked — laws like FERPA and COPPA being twisted into loopholes that bypass parental consent entirely, and school-issued AI tools pulling kids into the same crises we’ve watched play out among adults. What ties it together, Liddell says, is a business model that was never built with kids in mind, and a legal system that’s still trying to catch up. Andrew’s looking for parents in California who are concerned about their kids’ usage of AI chatbots. If that’s you, get in touch here: https://chatgptlitigation.com/ Further reading & resources: EdTech Law Center Parents’ Consent at the Heart of Ed Tech Lawsuits — The 74 Google's work in schools aims to create a 'pipeline of future users,' internal documents say — NBC News Children's Screen Time Action Network Mothers Against Media Addiction Phone Free Schools Movement Fair Play Schools Beyond Screens Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

September 15, 2026Episode 13956 min

The Battle for Power Inside Big Tech: Against Tech Oligarchy w/ JS Tan & Clarissa Redwine

Over the last decade, tech workers have staged walkouts, signed open letters by the tens of thousands, and built more than a dozen new unions across the industry. And yet, over that same decade, tech companies have ramped up carbon emissions, raced to militarize AI, signed contracts with the Trump administration, rolled back protections for marginalized users, and, in some ways, engineered their platforms to be protest-proof. In Against Tech Oligarchy , authors JS Tan and Clarissa Redwine ask the question: did tech workers ever actually learn how to fight? More like this: Meet the Mom Winning Against AI in Schools w/ Ifeoma Ozoma JS Tan and Clarissa Redwine are both former tech workers who spent years organizing from the inside. This week, they join Alix to map the last decade of tech labor organizing: the walkout era of 2018, when public pressure and shame campaigns actually worked; the pivot toward formal unionization after Kickstarter's breakthrough; and the sharp turn after 2022, when rising interest rates gave bosses cover to stop pretending they cared what workers thought. They get into why revenue-based leverage barely applies to an industry that runs on perceived valuation, why AI researchers and rank-and-file engineers may need very different organizing strategies, and the line that anchors the whole conversation: you can spend years organizing for power, and the moment you actually have it, realize you have no idea how to use it. Further reading & resources: Buy the book: Against Tech Oligarchy — JS Tan & Clarissa Redwine How a Tech Worker Fought Back from Being Fired as a Union Organiser — Clarissa Redwine, Branch Why the Balance of Power in Tech is Shifting Towards Workers — Jane Lytvynenko, MIT Technology Review Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

September 11, 2026Episode 13853 min

Meet the Mom Winning Against AI in Schools w/ Ifeoma Ozoma

Imagine dropping your kid off at school, assuming they’ll spend the day being taught by… teachers, of course. But then you find out that part of their day is actually spent talking and reading out loud to a cute, cartoonish AI avatar named Amira. And while they’re reading, Amira is recording their voice, without ever receiving consent from the parent or child. In New Mexico, this very technology is being mandated in classrooms across the state. But when one parent, with a reputation for speaking out and getting laws changed, discovered what was happening, she was ready to fight for the kids in her school district and beyond. More like this : https://www.themaybe.org/podcast/the-digital-delusion-w-dr-jared-cooney-horvath That parent is Ifeoma Ozoma. After Pinterest pushed her out for raising concerns about pay discrimination and health misinformation, she moved to Santa Fe, where a new fight found her. We get into how one mom with a DIY website got fifteen school districts to opt out in six weeks flat, what digging into public records revealed about how deep this actually goes, and how she’s working to get the whole thing banned outright. Further reading & resources: Amira Opt-Out SFPS Schools Beyond Screens New York City Bans A.I. in Elementary and Middle Schools — The New York Times Get unvetted AI out of New Mexico schools — Ifeoma Ozoma Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout.

September 4, 2026Episode 13742 min

The Digital Delusion: The False Promise of Ed Tech w/ Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath

A screen is built to do one thing well: split your attention across as many things as possible, as fast as possible. A developing brain needs the opposite— sustained, undivided focus— to learn anything at all. Cognitive neuroscientist Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath doesn't think ed-tech is failing kids by accident. He thinks it's failing them because the two things it's built to do are the same two things guaranteed to keep them from learning. More like this: You Seem Lonely. Have a Robot w/ Stevie Chancellor In this episode, Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath, a former classroom teacher turned cognitive neuroscientist and author of the new book The Digital Delusion, walks Alix through why so much of what makes a screen effective is exactly what makes it useless for learning: it invites multitasking when the brain needs focus, it rewards speed when comprehension requires slowing down, and it replaces face-to-face attention with something that looks like connection but doesn't function like it. Dr. Horvath takes us back over a deacde ago to trace how we got here, where a tool to fail students by design continues to become more embedded into the classroom. Further reading & resources: Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology — Neil Postman The Pen Is Mightier Than the Keyboard — Mueller & Oppenheimer, Psychological Science, April 2014 This laptop had to fail so Chromebooks could become back-to-school essentials — Tech Radar, August 2022 Chromebook Remorse: Tech Backlash at Schools Extends Beyond Phones — The New York Times, May 2026 Buy The Digital Delusion: How Classroom Technology Harms Our Kids' Learning by Dr. Jared Cooney Horvath through The Maybe on Bookshop.org ! Every purchases supports the author and independent bookstores across the country. Want to join the authors we interview for exclusive Q&As? Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Sarah Myles, Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

August 28, 2026Episode 13654 min

Meet the Guy (Actually) Passing Tech Laws

You've likely heard of the National Sexual Assault Hotline. What you might not know is that it's operated by RAINN, an organization that has become one of the more unlikely players in tech policy. Since the pandemic, RAINN has seen a sharp rise in calls from young people. As more time is spent online, more opportunities for online sexual abuse follow. More like this: How Anduril Tried to Kill Democracy in Ohio (& How Farmers Fought Back) Stefan Turkheimer, RAINN’s VP of Public Policy, joins Alix to talk about how the crisis line led him to fight the ways tech platforms enable abuse at scale. Nearly 500,000 people contact RAINN's hotline every year, and a majority now call about tech-enabled assault: deepfakes, non-consensual intimate images, and coerced CSAM. RAINN didn't set out to become a tech accountability organization. But Stefan didn't just want to treat the symptoms. He wanted to change the root of the problem. From a Facebook algorithm connecting predators to kids, to a bill Elon Musk killed and Melania Trump revived, to the current fight over Grok generating nudes, Alix and Stefan map the wins, the losses, and the laws still standing in the way of real accountability. This conversation lands the same week Meta agreed to pay $18 billion to settle claims from dozens of states that it knowingly designed Instagram and Facebook to addict kids. While it comes with tangible changes, daily time limits, nighttime blocks, age checks, it's also a clear example of what Stefan and Alix discuss in this episode. This settlement, and the safety standards that come with it, were hammered out behind closed doors with no public weigh in. Why is that still how we decide what safety looks like for millions of kids? Content note: this episode discusses sexual assault, child sexual abuse, and non-consensual offenses. Further reading & resources: Kids law needed beyond Meta settlement, backers say — Roll Call The Take It Down Act is in full effect. What is it and how do you use it? — The 19th Grok chatbot allowed users to create digitally altered photos of minors in "minimal clothing" — CBS News To learn more, support, or get support about the National Sexual Assault Hotline, visit RAINN.org . Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Sarah Myles , Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

August 21, 2026Episode 13551 min

How Anduril Tried to Kill Democracy in Ohio (& How Farmers Fought Back)

In Madison Township, Ohio, families have farmed the same land for generations. Then a commercial real estate company started buying up their neighbors' fields under the code name "Project Thor." They wouldn't find out until later that the buyer was Anduril, a venture-backed weapons company chasing a slice of the trillion-dollar Pentagon budget. Now, those farming families’ cattle and cornfields are being bulldozed to make way for a drone and cruise missile factory. More like this: The Colossus Crossroads: Fighting for the Future of Memphis w/ KeShaun Pearson In this episode, Taylor Barnes, a field reporter with Inkstick Media, takes us to Madison Township, where a fight over zoning has become a fight over who actually gets a say: communities that have a vote, or corporations that have a check. She walks us through the nearly billion dollars in tax breaks Anduril is set to receive, the lobbyist-drafted state law that stripped residents of their right to vote on the project, and what happens when the people with the least power over a decision are the ones who have to live with it. Further reading & resources: In Ohio, Who Really Gets a Say in Anduril Weapons Factories? — Taylor Barnes, Inkstick Media How an Anduril Lobbyist Quashed Local Voting Rights on Ohio — Taylor Barnes Emails Show Defense Tech Lobbyist Targets Local Voters — Inkstick Media This fight isn't over. The farmers leading it are up against Anduril's legal team, largely on their own. If you're a lawyer - especially with experience in zoning or local democratic rights - and want to help, get in touch. We'll make the introduction. Join The Maybe Collective to explore the politics of technology through fresh ideas that you won't hear anywhere else. Sign up for monthly insights, access to exclusive digital events, and real ways to get more involved on issues you care about. Computer Says Maybe is produced by Kushal Dev, Marion Wellington, Sarah Myles , Van Newman, and Zoe Trout

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