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The Vergecast

The Vergecast

Written by: The Verge
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 The Vergecast is the flagship podcast from The Verge about small gadgets, Big Tech, and everything in between. Every Friday, hosts Nilay Patel and David Pierce hang out and make sense of the week’s most important technology news. And every Tuesday, David leads a selection of The Verge’s expert staffers in an exploration of how gadgets and software affect our lives – and which ones you should bring into yours.© 2022 Vox Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved Politics & Government
Episodes
  • Millions of books died so Claude could live

    Millions of books died so Claude could live
    Feb 3 2026
    AI companies want all the data, everywhere, to make their models bigger and better. That means a lot of questions about piracy and copyright, and at least in one case it means Anthropic systematically destroying countless books just to feed them to the model. The Washington Post's Will Oremus joins the show to explain how that worked, why Anthropic, Meta, OpenAI and others are doing it, and what the law has to say. Then, Puck's Julia Alexander helps David figure out whether Netflix is serious about showing movies in theaters, and what theaters need to do to survive in the entertainment business going forward. Further reading: From The Washington Post: Anthropic ‘destructively’ scanned millions of books to build Claude Anthropic wins a major fair use victory for AI — but it’s still in trouble for stealing books Meta’s AI copyright win comes with a warning about fair use Did AI companies win a fight with authors? Technically From Puck: Why Netflix Needs Warner Bros. Welcome to the big leagues, Netflix Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to vergecast@theverge.com or call us at 866-VERGE11. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    1 hr and 29 mins
  • Tim Cook is destroying his own legacy

    Tim Cook is destroying his own legacy
    Jan 30 2026
    We've been covering what's happening in Minnesota, and the killing of Alex Pretti, all week on The Verge. To begin this episode, Nilay explains why — and why so many others seem to feel the same way right now. After that, the hosts talk about the CEO-studded screening of Melania Trump's documentary last weekend, the disastrous public appearance from Tim Cook, and whether Cook and other CEOs have any other option but to capitulate to the Trump administration. Then it's time for some gadgets: we talk about the super-foldy, super-expensive Samsung Galaxy Z Trifold, the Clawdbot / Moltbot phenomenon, and whether Google can finally put Chrome OS and Android together the right way. Finally, in the lightning round, it's time for Brendan Carr is a dummy, Tesla's anti-car pivot, Apple's design hires, and more. Further reading: On the ground in Minneapolis after the killing of Alex Pretti I grew up with Alex Pretti Creators and communities everywhere take a stand against ICE It doesn’t matter if Alex Pretti had a gun Why won’t anyone stop ICE from masking? Tim Cook, Andy Jassy, and AMD CEO Lisa Su are at the White House for a VIP screening of the Melania doc. Tim Cook had ‘a good conversation’ with Trump about deescalation Cook in 2020: Speaking up on racism From The New York Times: Amazon’s $35 Million ‘Melania’ Promotion Has Critics Questioning Its Motives From The Hollywood Reporter: ‘Melania’ Set for a $3 Million Opening Despite Amazon’s $35 Million Marketing Push Here’s Tim Cook hanging out with accused rapist Brett Ratner at the Melania screening What TikTok’s new owners mean for your feed TikTok USA is broken TikTok is still down, here are all the latest updates TikTok is still struggling in the US due to a “cascading systems failure.” TikTok US is mostly back up and running TikTok blames its US problems on a power outage Oracle admits it broke TikTok. Congress doesn’t seem to know if the TikTok deal complies with its law Is New TikTok banning the word “Epstein” in DMs? Not really. TikTokers are heading to UpScrolled following US takeover Mark Zuckerberg is all in on AI as the new social media Meta is stopping teens from chatting with its AI characters Bluesky is testing ‘live’ features to take on X Best gas masks The Samsung Trifold will cost nearly three grand Google just leaked a first look at Android for PC in action Chromebooks train schoolkids to be loyal customers, internal Google document suggests Moltbot, the AI agent that ‘actually does things,’ is tech’s new obsession Clawdbot’s bad day I used Claude to vibe-code my wildly overcomplicated smart home The FCC’s Late Night Comedy Show Tesla discontinuing Model S and Model X to make room for robots Tesla says production-ready Optimus robot is coming soon Tesla hits a grim milestone: its second straight year of decline Elon Musk invests $2 billion in Elon Musk Hang on, there’s a Trump Phone Ultra coming too? Halide co-founder Sebastiaan de With is joining Apple’s design team The Stream Deck-packed gaming keyboard is a monster of good ideas Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to vergecast@theverge.com or call us at 866-VERGE11. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    1 hr and 35 mins
  • Truth and AI in Minneapolis

    Truth and AI in Minneapolis
    Jan 27 2026
    Like so many others, we’re still reeling from the killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis. To open the show, we talk with Adi Robertson about how videos of the incident moved around social platforms, how even well-intentioned people got confused by AI imagery, and what we’ve learned about the state of misinformation. Then Adi explains the new TikTok, which is both the same and very different from the old TikTok. The newly US-centric version of the app has had some switching pains so far, and the changes may only be just beginning. After that, it’s time for a hard pivot, as Vulture’s Nick Quah joins the show to talk about Netflix’s entry into podcasts — and whether what Netflix is doing can even be called “podcasts” anymore. Finally, David answers an old Vergecast Hotline question that got him thinking about all the ways we hold our phones to make calls, and which one is the best. Further reading: It doesn’t matter if Alex Pretti had a gun The day of the second killing TikTok USA is broken Everything (Including Netflix) Will Become YouTube This Year It’s finally time to retire the word ‘podcast’ Subscribe to The Verge for unlimited access to theverge.com, subscriber-exclusive newsletters, and our ad-free podcast feed.We love hearing from you! Email your questions and thoughts to vergecast@theverge.com or call us at 866-VERGE11. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
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    1 hr and 15 mins
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