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AI News Podcast | Weekly AI News Roundup with ChatGPT and OpenAI · Elon Musk Podcast

0:00
Pinterest just announced layoffs for up to 15% of its workforce.
0:05
The reason for that was AI in this lands In the same week Elon
0:09
Musk made headlines for a public spat with Ryanair CEO Michael
0:13
O'Leary and batters on Polly Market found a way to profit by
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wagering against Musk's promises.
0:19
Last part is interesting, right? So what connects Pinterest and
0:26
their job cuts? A billionaire ego clash in
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prediction market skeptics. The answer is simpler than you'd
0:34
think. Comes down to how tech leaders
0:36
are using AI as a shield, a sword, and sometimes just an
0:40
excuse. We're going to look at what
0:42
Pinterest is actually doing, why Musk's credibility is now a
0:45
treatable asset, and what all of this tells you about the state
0:48
of tech in 2026. And we'll get right into that
0:51
after this very short break. So Pinterest is cutting jobs
0:57
while posting strong earnings. Company filed paperwork saying
1:00
it expects to eliminate up to 675 positions by September.
1:04
That changes the math for employees who thought good
1:07
numbers meant job security. And Pinterest had about 4500
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workers globally as of last April.
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Now the company says it needs to reallocate resources toward AI
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powered products. A quick definition here,
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reallocating resources as corpus speak for moving money and
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people from one project to another and often meaning people
1:27
are going to get fired in the areas being de prioritized.
1:32
Now Pinterest is not struggling. CEO Bill Reddy said in November
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that investments in AI and product innovation are paying
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off. Company claimed it has turned
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its platform into an AI powered shopping assistant serving 600
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million users. So things are going well.
1:49
Why cut people out and fire them?
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Company says it wants to prioritize AI powered
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capabilities. And now that raises a fair
1:59
question. Is this a genuine strategy or is
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it something else? And there's a term for this,
2:05
it's called AI washing. That means companies exaggerate
2:09
how much AI factors into decisions, using it as cover for
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standard cost cutting moves. A consulting firm found that AI
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was the stated blame for around 55,000 layoffs in the US last
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year. It puts pressure on workers to
2:25
wonder whether their employer is truly pivoting the AI or just
2:28
using the buzzword to justify headcount reductions.
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Pinterest also said it is cutting office space.
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Computers don't need cubicles, people do.
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So don't pay that rent if you don't need to right now.
2:43
I've been digging into the analytics of the show and I
2:45
found out that 39% of you are following or subscribe to the
2:49
channel. Thank you so much, 60. 1% of you
2:53
are not though, and you probably listen to an episode or two and
2:56
just haven't hit the follow or subscribe button going to ask
2:58
you for one second your time hit that.
3:00
It means so much to the show and it helps us out tremendously.
3:04
So thank you for that. Now let's move on to Elon.
3:08
He got into a public clash with Ryanair CEO Michael O'lary
3:12
recently. O'lary reportedly rejected some
3:15
form of outreach or proposal from Elon and Musk did not take
3:19
it well. It was kind of described as a
3:22
hissy fit by Elon. Somebody else called it a battle
3:25
between a big idiot and an insufferable chimp.
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The exchange became fodder from marketing analysis asking what
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brands can learn from watching 2 billionaires trade insults on
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social media. Now Musk's public persona has
3:40
become so predictable that people are now betting money on
3:44
this. On Polymarket, which is a
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prediction market platform, users have found a profitable
3:50
strategy. They let people wager real money
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on whether specific events will happen.
3:55
If Musk says something will occur by a certain date, betters
3:59
can put money on it not happening.
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And apparently that bet has been paying off.
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So what do we do about this? Musk has a long history of,
4:08
let's call them ambitious timelines that slip.
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Self driving cars by a certain year.
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Full self driving by, I think it was 5-6 years ago.
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Robots in production by a certain quarter of 2026.
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Mars missions by 6 years ago. Now that opens the financial
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opportunity for skeptics. If enough people believe Musk
4:32
will miss the target, the market prices that in and betters who
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wager against him collect what he does not deliver.
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It's not just one person, though.
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It reflects something broader about trust in the leadership of
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technology. When Aceo's word becomes
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treatable and it can make you money, it's profitable to bet on
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this. That limits how much credibility
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that person could deploy in the future.
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Investors in the public start to discount promises automatically.
5:00
That makes it harder to really support for new projects.
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Eli doesn't really have this problem quite yet, but in time,
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who knows. Pinterest cutting workers while
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claiming AI leadership has been happening.
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Musk losing credibility to the point where prediction markets
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profit from his missed deadlines.
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These are not isolated stories. There's a pattern going on here.
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Companies and leaders use AI as a justification for decisions
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that might otherwise face more scrutiny.
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And when promises consistently fall short like Elon's, we find
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a way to price that in. Pinterest is laying off up to
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675 people despite strong earnings and those people made
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money for Pinterest company says it's prioritizing AI might be AI
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washing Elon Musk clash with Ryanair CEO betters on
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Polymarket are making money from this crazy.
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And the take away is that you have to watch what these
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companies do, not just who's in charge and what they say.
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If a firm posts record earnings and then cuts a bunch of people
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in the name of AI, ask whether the technology truly requires
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fewer people or whether AI is just a convenient excuse for
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people to make more profits. And if a tech leaders word has
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become so unreliable like Elon's, the betting against him
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is profitable. You can go on Polymatter right
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now and bet on when the next Starship is going to launch and
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if it's going to launch in the timeline that Elon says.
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And will robots go to Mars this year?
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Well, Elon has bet against that himself.
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You can factor that into how you evaluate their next big
6:42
announcement. Can you just brush it off and be
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like, it might happen sometime, but the market's ready for you.
6:47
You can go do this yourself if you want to.
6:49
Maybe you can make some profit from it.
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Might be interesting. At least go check it out because
6:54
there's a lot of naysayers there and it's funny conversation
6:56
sometimes. So thanks for listening.
6:59
Everybody. Take care of yourself and each
7:01
other and I'll see you in the next one.
7:06
Open a eyes. GPT 5.2 model has started citing
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Grokopedia, Elon Musk's AI generated encyclopedia, as a
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source of its responses. Now.
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The Guardian ran tests last week and found ChatGPT reference
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Grokopedia 9 times across more than a dozen user queries,
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including questions about Iranian political structures and
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a British historian who helped convict A Holocaust denier.
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The citations appeared selectively surfacing an obscure
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topics while avoiding well documented misinformation
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subjects. Grocopedia launched just three
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months ago with 0 human Editors and critics have already flagged
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it for promoting debunked claims, setting neo Nazi forums
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and whitewashing extremism. Now, how did an AI encyclopedia
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built by one of Open AI's biggest rivals end up feeding
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answers back into Open AI's most popular chat bot?
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Now Gracopedia now holds over 5.6 million articles, roughly
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80% the size of English Wikipedia, and it accomplished
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that scale in a fraction of the time Wikipedia needed.
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Now today we're going to cover what the Guardians testing
8:16
revealed with specific false information Chatt GPD pulled
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from Gakapedia, why other AI assistants like Claude
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Anthropics Bot are also setting the platform, and what this
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means for the integrity of AI generated knowledge.
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Open AI has responded with a statement about safety filters
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and source diversity, while Xai simply replied with three words.
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I'll tell you about those later, right after this short break.
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The Open AI marketed GBT 5.2 as its most advanced model for
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professional work when it launched in December, but the
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Guardians investigation raises serious questions about where
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the professional grade information actually comes from.
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The tests revealed a clear pattern and how ChatGPT selects
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Grokapedia as a source, and the implications cut deeper than a
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simple citation problem. Users asking complex questions
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about geopolitics and history are receiving answers built on
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an AI generated foundation that has already been documented
9:15
spreading false claims. Now the guardians were testing
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focused on a range of topics to see when ChatGPT would pull from
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gracopedia versus other sources, and the chatbot did not say
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gracopedia. When asked about widely known
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misinformation, such as false claims about media bias against
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Donald Trump or debunk theories about HIV and AIDS, ChatGPT
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avoided the obvious traps. The system instead cited
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Gracopedia on obscure geopolitical and historical
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questions. The kind of query is where users
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are less likely to catch errors. Specific topics included
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salaries of Iran's paramilitary force, ownership of the mastas,
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a fan fountain, and connections between the Iranian government
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and telecom company MTN Iran Cell.
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Now, Chachibti made bolder claims about those Iranian
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government links than Wikipedia does.
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Those claims came directly from Grokopedia.
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The most troubling example involved Sir Richard Evans, a
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Cambridge historian who served as the key expert witness in the
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libel trial wrought by Holocaust denier David Irving.
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Evans personally examined his own Grokopedia entry and
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reported that it contained numerous false statements about
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his career and background. He told the Guardian that all
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the facts in his entry were wrong.
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The already runs pretty deep here.
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Evans spent years meticulously documenting how Irving falsified
10:41
evidence about the Holocaust and manipulated historical records.
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The High Court judge ultimately branded Irving a racist, an anti
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semite and falsifier of history based largely on Evans expert
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testimony. ChatGPT cited that same
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Gracopedia page when responding to user questions about Evans
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effectively laundering debunked information through Open AI's
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flagship product. The historian who exposed the
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Holocaust deniers lies is now having lies spread about him
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through AI systems that treat machine generated content as the
11:13
equivalent of peer reviewed scholarship.
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Now I've been going through all of our stats here at the show
11:21
and 39% of you are following the channel and I'm so grateful for
11:26
you. 61% of you have listened to the show before but haven't hit
11:32
the subscribe or follow button. If that's you, if you listen to
11:35
the show and you're into it, please take a second of your
11:38
time. You can hit the follow button.
11:39
I'm going to spend the next 10 years doing this.
11:42
So that's what you get from me, better content over the next 10
11:45
years. All I need is a second of your
11:47
time. So thank you so much for doing
11:49
that. Agrocopaedia launched on October
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27th, 2025 as Elon Musk's answer to what he calls Woke Pedia.
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The platform uses XA is Grok large language model to generate
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articles rather than relying on human editors.
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Users can suggest corrections through a pop up form, but they
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can't directly edit content the way Wikipedia allows you to.
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Musk position the project as a bias free alternative that would
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purge propaganda from public knowledge.
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The reality has looked pretty different though.
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Analysis found Gracopedia articles aligned with Musk's
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personal views on topics like gender identity.
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Test the controversies and Neuralink and the Guardian doing
12:29
their research here and multiple other outlets documented pages
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that promote white nationalist talking points, praise neo
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Nazis, cast Holocaust deniers and positive terms, and frame
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far right figures as victims of institutional suppression.
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The scale of Rockopedia's growth presents its own problems too.
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Platform reached 5.6 million articles by early 2026, jumping
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from 800,000 at launch to nearly 80% the volume of English
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Wikipedia in about 3 months. Human editors and Wikipedia
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spent over 2 decades building their corpus through careful
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research, citation and community debate.
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Grakopedia achieved similar volume by having an EI system
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scrape existing content, rewrite those articles, and generate new
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ones at machine speed. Symmetry is copied Wikipedia
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near the word for word under a Creative Commons license.
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While others introduced entirely new claims from questionable
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sources, researchers from Grokopedia cited neo Nazi forums
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and its reference lists. Problem that becomes
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exponentially worse when other AI systems start treating
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Grokopedia as a legit source. Now, Jet GBT was not the only AI
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assistant caught citing Grokopedia.
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The Guardians testing found the Anthropics Claude, my favorite
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AI right now, also referenced the platform when using
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questions about global oil production and Scottish beer.
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A little bit different, though. Anthropic did not respond to
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requests for comment. Because that's what they usually
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do. Big corporations do not respond
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because they just wanted to blow over.
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And the fact that multiple leading AI systems are pulling
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from an encyclopedia built by a competitor and built by an AI
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raises questions about how these companies curate and filter
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their web search sources. Open AI told the Guardian that
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Chat Chi PT aims to draw from a broad range of publicly
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available sources and viewpoints, adding the safety
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filters reduce the risk of servicing links associated with
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high severity harms. Elon Musk told the World
14:33
Economic Forum that chip manufacturers will soon produce
14:36
more AI chips than the electrical grid can handle.
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He dropped that morning during a conversation with BlackRock CEO
14:43
Larry Fink in Switzerland, stating that electrical power
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has become the fundamental bottleneck strangling AI
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deployment worldwide. Now, Musk predicted the
14:54
companies will be producing more chips than we can turn on,
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possibly by the end of 2026. He then rattled off a series of
15:02
additional predictions covering robo taxis, humanoid robots,
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space travel, artificial super intelligence, and even human
15:10
aging. His track record on forecasts
15:12
like these includes a Mars mission that was supposed to
15:14
launch in 2024 and a Starship that was supposed to reach orbit
15:18
in 2022, both of which missed their deadlines.
15:21
So how seriously should anyone take his latest round of
15:25
timeline promises when his previous forecasts have
15:27
consistently slipped by years now?
15:31
Musk also criticized the Trump administration's tariffs on
15:34
solar equipment from Asia, calling the tariff barriers
15:37
extremely high and claiming they make solar deployment
15:41
artificially expensive in the United States.
15:43
Now. That statement puts him in
15:45
direct conflict with the administration he currently
15:47
advises and will breakdown Musk's power grid warning and
15:52
what it means for AI companies racing to deploy new data
15:56
centers across America. Also examine his prediction that
16:00
AI will sue has human intelligence this year and
16:03
exceed the collective intelligence of humanity by
16:06
2035. We will look at his Robotaxi and
16:11
optimist robot timelines as well.
16:13
And these are against historical accuracy of these similar
16:18
promises and we'll get right into that after this very short
16:21
break. Now, Musk's electrical power
16:25
warning centers on a fundamental mismatch between silicon
16:28
production capacity and energy infrastructure investment. the
16:31
United States has been grappling with an outdated grid system
16:34
built on decades of underinvestment and aging
16:37
infrastructure that was never designed for this level of
16:40
concentrated demand. Tech companies and utilities
16:43
expected gradual growth in electricity consumption, not the
16:46
sudden vertical spike that AI training clusters require in two
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massive data centers in Nvidia's hometown of Santa Clara, CA Mesa
16:54
empty for years waiting for the electricity needed to power
16:58
them, according to energy experts who have studied the
17:01
regional grid capacity. Now, the demand surge from AI
17:05
training and inference workloads have exposed just how fragile
17:09
the American power supply really is.
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Tech companies increasingly rely on grid operators who cannot
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deliver consistent power at the scale these massive facilities
17:17
require for continuous operation.
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A single modern AI training cluster can consume as much
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electricity as a small city, and dozens of these facilities are
17:26
currently under construction or planned across the United
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States. In earlier this month, the Trump
17:32
administration had 13 bipartisan governors pressured operators of
17:35
PJM Interconnection, the country's largest grid serving
17:39
65 million people, to boost power supplies and hold an
17:43
auction allowing tech firms to bid on 15 year contracts to
17:46
build new power plants. Now, that proposal would
17:49
transfer the cost of electricity infrastructure away from
17:52
residential consumers and out of the data center operators who
17:55
are driving the demand increase. Interior Secretary Doug Bergbeck
18:00
framed the issue as a national security threat.
18:03
And they're racing against China saving.
18:05
The country needs to power AI infrastructure to compete in a
18:09
technology contest that will transform every job and every
18:12
company and every industry. Now, China has already solved
18:16
this problem through massive solar deployment that dwarfs
18:20
anything the United States has attempted.
18:22
According to the Global Energy Monitor Solar Tracker, China
18:25
operates nearly four times the solar power capacity of the
18:28
United States, with room to grow even further.
18:31
Including projects under development and construction,
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China is expected to reach 1.18 million megawatts of solar
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output, compared to America's 237. 1947 megawatts pales in
18:46
comparison. Musk claimed the entire United
18:48
States could run on a 100 mile by 100 mile square of solar
18:52
fields, which would represent a fraction of the available land
18:55
in states like Nevada, Arizona or even New Mexico.
18:59
He called solar by far the biggest source of energy on a
19:02
global scale and pointed to China's tremendous growth in
19:05
electrical capabilities as evidence the technology works
19:09
reliably when deployed at scale. Now, the contradiction in Musk's
19:13
position becomes obvious when you examine recent American
19:16
trade policy and his role in the current administration.
19:20
Tariffs on solar equipment from Asia took effect last May, with
19:23
import taxes reaching as high as 3500% on countries like Cambodia
19:28
following an International Trade Commission ruling.
19:31
Now, the Commission determined that imports from Malaysia,
19:34
Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia were detrimental to American
19:37
solar manufacturers and they could not compete on a price a
19:43
must. Called those terrier barriffs
19:45
extremely high and blame them for making solar economics
19:48
artificially expensive in the United States of America.
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He said this while serving as a senior advisor to Trump.
19:55
And that's when they implemented these exact policies.
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And he will continue to defend those people.
20:04
Now, the Trump administration has actively opposed pivoting to
20:07
solar. And strip subsidies for
20:09
renewable sources claiming they compromise your electric grid.
20:13
Despite Musk's public statements suggesting the opposite
20:15
conclusion that Trump offered a different solution during his
20:19
own remarks at Davos, he encouraged tech companies to
20:22
build their own nuclear plants and claimed his administration
20:25
would approve them in just three weeks.
20:27
Nuclear plant approvals historically take years, maybe
20:30
decades of environmental review, safety certification and
20:34
construction permitting before a single foundation is even
20:37
poured. And the Nuclear Regulatory
20:39
Commission process also takes probably 42 to 60 months, which
20:45
is required. And that timeline assumes no
20:47
challenges or design modifications arise during this
20:50
review. It could take up to 8090 months
20:53
if it's all said and done now. Trump's three-week claim appears
20:57
entirely disconnected from the regulatory and construction
21:00
realities from nuclear energy deployment.
21:03
Now, Musk did not endure it's this timeline during his own
21:06
remarks and instead continues emphasizing solar as the fastest
21:09
path to additional power capacity.
21:12
Now, I've been digging through our analytics here and 37% of
21:15
you have been following the channel for you.
21:17
I love you. I'm forever grateful for the
21:19
other 63% we haven't hit the follow or subscribe button.
21:21
I get it. You listen to a podcast a bunch
21:23
of times, you forget to hit the subscribe button or the follow
21:25
button. I've done it too.
21:27
I've been doing this for about 6 years, going to do it for the
21:29
next 10. All I ask from you is one second
21:32
of your time to hit that follow button.
21:33
Thank you very much. Now Musk's AI timeline
21:36
predictions drew the most attention and skepticism from
21:39
observers who have watched his forecast slip repeatedly.
21:43
He claimed AI will become smarter than any individual
21:45
human this year or no later the next year if development hits
21:49
unexpected obstacles. He projected that AI will
21:52
surpass the collective intelligence of humanity by
21:55
2035, creating what he had previously described as a
21:59
potential existential risk to human civilization.
22:02
Now the NVIDIA CEO offered a starkly different view earlier
22:06
this month, stating that researchers are nowhere close to
22:09
creating what he called God AI capable of general reasoning
22:13
across all domains. He said the technology excels at
22:17
discrete tasks, but achieving general intelligence operates on
22:21
biblical scales, on galactic scales that current
22:24
architectures cannot even get close to.
22:27
The gap between Musk's aggressive timeline and his
22:30
skepticism shows just how uncertain these forecasts
22:33
remain, even among the experts, the people that are building the
22:36
underlying hardware and software for these things.
22:39
And Musk's robo taxi predictions have followed a familiar path of
22:43
deadline extensions that stretch back nearly a decade.
22:46
Tesla finally launched a limited robo taxi service in Austin, TX
22:49
in 2025, but each vehicle still carries a human is sitting in
22:53
the passenger seat, ready to take control.
22:56
And that launch came after years of Musk promising fully
22:58
autonomous vehicles were imminent, including 2019 claim
23:02
that Tesla would have 1,000,000 robo taxis on the road by 2020.
23:07
Now with Davos, Musk moved the goal posts again.
23:09
Let me test this. Robotech without human monitors
23:12
company is currently working to expand service to states with
23:15
more permissive autonomous vehicle regulations, including
23:19
Arizona, Florida, and Nevada, where regulators have created
23:24
friendlier frameworks for testing.
23:26
Whether very widespread materializes by December remains
23:30
an open question, given the consistent pattern of delays on
23:33
this specific promise. Let's talk about Optimus
23:36
humanoid robot next. It's a similar treatment by
23:40
Musk. He first stated that there were
23:43
promises of Optimus in 2021, initially showcasing basically a
23:47
person in a robot suit before revealing an actual prototype
23:50
hardware. He recently said Tesla would
23:53
manufacture thousands of Optimus units in 2025 for internal
23:57
factory use before selling them externally.
24:00
Reports indicate the company still struggles to make
24:02
Optimus's hands work properly for the fine manipulation tasks
24:06
required in manufacturing environments.
24:08
Musk predicted the billions of AI powered robots would
24:12
eventually outnumber humans and saturate all human needs to the
24:15
point where scarcity effectively disappears.
24:18
He said consumers would reach a point where they could not think
24:21
of anything left to ask a robot for because goods and services
24:24
would be so abundant. Never has to have.
24:28
They never have to go to work. Everything works for you.
24:30
He also announced Optimist would go on sale to external customers
24:34
late next year, adding another specific deadline to his
24:37
collection of promises. Now SpaceX predictions follow
24:40
the same trajectory of optimistic timelines, meaning
24:42
engineering reality. Musk promised in 2020 in that a
24:46
crude mission to Mars would launch by 2024.
24:50
That deadline came and went without a mission.
24:52
He said Starship would reach orbit by 2022, though the
24:55
company did not achieve that milestone until last year after
24:58
multiple test failures and redesigns.
24:59
They didn't get a full orbit, though, that Davos.
25:02
Musk repeated his promise that Starship would become fully
25:05
reusable by the end of this year, with both stages returning
25:08
intact for reflay. He claimed full reusability
25:12
would cut space cost travel by a factor of 100 and eventually
25:16
make space freight competitive with airplane freight prices on
25:21
a per pound basis. Now Musk concluded his
25:26
appearance with something resembling self-awareness about
25:28
his forecasting habits and the optimism bias that drives them.
25:32
He offered was sound like a personal mission statement,
25:34
saying it is better for quality of life to err on the side of
25:37
being an optimist and wrong than a pessimist and right.
25:46
The European Commission launched a formal investigation into Elon
25:49
Musk's X platform today over the Grok AI chatbot's ability to
25:53
generate sexually explicit deepfake images of women and
25:57
children. Now, the probe comes after Grok
26:00
users created roughly 3,000,000 sexualized images in just 11
26:04
days, according to research from the Center for Countering
26:07
Digital Heat, with an estimated 23 thousand of those images
26:11
appearing to depict minors. Now, if X is found to have
26:14
violated the Digital Services Act, the company could face
26:18
fines reaching 6% of its total global revenue.
26:22
Now, what safeguards did X failed to implement before
26:24
rolling out a tool that produced 190 explicit images per minute?
26:29
The investigation will examine whether X properly assessed and
26:32
mitigated risks before deploying Grok in the EU and whether the
26:36
platform's response to the crisis came too late.
26:39
We'll cover the specific allegations against X, the
26:41
regulatory firestorm now spreading across multiple
26:44
continents, and the statement from the E US henna Vicanin.
26:48
But calling those deep fakes a violent form of degradation.
26:52
And we'll get right back into that after this short break.
26:56
Now, the European Commission announced Monday that it is
26:59
opening a wide reaching investigation of the X under the
27:01
Digital Services Act, the block sweeping rule book for keeping
27:05
Internet users safe from harmful content.
27:07
And the PRO focuses on whether X conducted proper risk
27:10
assessments before adding Grok's image generation capabilities to
27:14
its platform, and whether the company took adequate steps to
27:17
prevent illegal content from spreading across the EU.
27:21
Now the scandal erupted in late December 2025 when XAI rolled
27:25
out a one click image editing feature for Grok that allowed
27:28
users to alter photos with a single prompt.
27:32
Within days, users discovered they could digitally undress
27:35
real people, including celebrities, politicians and
27:39
ordinary social media users, by uploading the photos and
27:42
requesting Grok to generate explicit versions.
27:45
Bloomberg research found that ex users utilizing Grok posted more
27:49
non consensual naked or sexual imagery than users of any other
27:53
website during this period. The feature XEI marketed as
27:58
Spicy Mode became a factory for harassment at scale.
28:02
Unlike competing AI image generators from Open AI, Google
28:05
Grok appears to have launched without adequate safeguards to
28:08
prevent the creation of intimate and nudified images of real
28:12
people. Hannah Verkinen, the E us
28:15
executive vice president for tech sovereignty, security and
28:18
democracy, issued a blistering statement alongside the
28:21
investigation announcement. She called sexual defects of
28:24
women and children a violent and unacceptable form of
28:27
degradation. Is stated directly that the
28:29
investigation will determine whether X met its legal
28:32
obligations under the DSA or whether it treated the rights of
28:36
European citizens, including those of women and children, as
28:39
collateral damage of its ServiceNow.
28:42
The Commission also revealed it is extending a separate
28:45
investigation into X's recommendation systems that
28:48
began in December 2023, examining whether X's algorithm
28:52
is disseminating illegal content, including sexual child
28:57
abuse material. That expansion signals the Grot
29:00
controversy has exposed deeper systemic problems with how X
29:03
moderates contact across its entire platform.
29:07
Now X responded to the investigation by pointing to
29:09
measures that it implemented in mid January after the global
29:13
outcry peaked. They got caught, so they did
29:16
that. And the company said it takes
29:18
action to remove high priority volatile and other sexualized
29:23
content and non consensual nudity, and that it takes
29:26
appropriate action against accounts to violate its rules
29:30
now. X also stated it reports
29:31
accounts seeking Child Exploitation materials to law
29:34
enforcement is necessary. A European Commission official
29:37
acknowledged these measures during a briefing, but told
29:40
journalists the company had not properly assessed the risks
29:43
before launching this chatbot. The official, who asked to
29:47
remain anonymous, said the Commission has quite a few tools
29:51
at its disposal and that he find was possible.
29:54
Now what we are after is changing the platform's
29:56
behavior. They stated.
29:58
Now I've been digging into the stats of the show, 37% of you
30:02
are following the channel. I love you, thank you.
30:05
And 6063%, I got my math right there around that amount.
30:09
It's actually went up now. So there's more like 39% people
30:14
following and 61% of you aren't following.
30:17
So we're we're growing people. This is great, but you just
30:21
haven't hit the follower subscribe button if you're not
30:23
following already. And I've been doing this for
30:25
about 6 to 8 years. Somewhere in that time frame, I
30:28
actually looked back the other day, over 1000 episodes of this.
30:32
I'm going to be doing it for the next 10 years.
30:35
All they ask from you is one second of your time.
30:38
Hit the follower subscribe button on whatever platform
30:40
you're on right now. I'll be gratefully, gratefully
30:42
blissed to have you here. Thank you so much and let's get
30:46
back into this deep concerning topic that's going on right now.
30:51
This investigation from the EU adds to a mounting pile of
30:55
regulatory actions against X and XAI across multiple
30:58
jurisdictions. California Attorney General Rob
31:01
Banta announced an investigation on January 14th and followed up
31:05
with a cease and desist letter demanding XAI immediately halt
31:08
the creation and distribution of deep fake images.
31:12
Bonta cited an analysis showing that more than half of the
31:14
20,000 images generated by XAI between Christmas and New Year's
31:19
depicted people in minimal clothing, with some appearing to
31:21
be children. Disgusting.
31:24
California Department of Justice gave XAI 5 days to provide
31:28
confirmation of steps it was taking to address the issues in
31:32
a coalition with 35 state attorneys general also sent a
31:35
letter demanding XEI take additional action to prevent
31:38
Grok from generating non consensual intimate images and
31:41
child sexual abuse material. Now, the United Kingdom's media
31:46
regulatory regulator Ofcom launched its own formal
31:49
investigation on January 12th under the Online Safety Act, and
31:53
UK Prime Minister Kier Starmer called the Grok generated images
31:58
disgusting and unlawful, saying X needed to get a grip on the
32:01
application. Ofcom has the power to impose
32:04
fines of 10% of worldwide revenue for breaches of its
32:07
rules, and could potentially seek a court order forcing
32:10
Internet service providers to ban X entirely in Britain.
32:14
Now, when asked whether X could be banned, Business Secretary
32:18
Peter Kyle responded yes, of course, though he noted that
32:21
power rests with Ofcom. Indonesia banned Croc outright
32:25
on January 10th, and Malaysia followed suit on January 11th
32:28
before partially lifting its restrictions.
32:30
France, Germany, Australia have also opened their own
32:33
investigations into the platform.
32:35
Now, the timeline of X's response reels a company
32:38
scrambling to contain damage rather than prevent harm and
32:42
damage. When criticism first emerged in
32:45
early January, Musk mocked the outcry on his X account, as he
32:49
usually does. The company initially responded
32:51
by limiting explicit image generation to just paying
32:55
subscribers and moves Starmer condemned as an effort, a front
32:59
to victims and not a solution. By January 14th, after
33:03
investigations had launched in multiple countries, X finally
33:06
announced it would prevent all users from using Grok to create
33:09
images of real people in revealing clothing.
33:11
The company also said it would Geo block the feature in
33:14
jurisdictions where such content is illegal.
33:18
So while all of this was going on, I wanted to see if X was
33:23
actually doing this, if they were stopping and limiting the
33:27
image generation for all users. I'm a paying customer of X, so I
33:33
should not have had asked Grok. I asked X to generate a picture
33:38
of of the President of the United States in a string
33:43
bikini. And guess what?
33:45
4 seconds later, there you go. We had Donald Trump in a string
33:50
bikini and it was disgusting. And by the way, it was pretty
33:52
gross and weird. So I was like, you know what?
33:55
Maybe, maybe it was a fluke. Let's try it on Elon.
33:59
Tried it on Elon, same thing happened.
34:02
That also was not very flattering, but just to show you
34:06
that there are ways around this and you could make sexually
34:09
explicit images of people without their consent very
34:15
easily. Mine were in a bikini.
34:19
So not that big of a deal, right?
34:21
But it was about another person, which is not the right thing to
34:26
do. You're not supposed to make
34:26
those images of other people. So even though they did restrict
34:30
people from doing it, there's still ways around it.
34:33
Now let's get back into the story and see what kind of fines
34:39
and legal, regulatory actions are going to be taken.
34:45
This financial exposure for X is pretty big.
34:48
EU already find the platform $140 million in December over
34:52
its deceptive design of the blue verification check mark.
34:56
Of course, X has not paid that fine yet, according to EU
34:59
officials, though the company still has time to settle it.
35:02
The DSA violation in this new investigation could result in
35:05
fines up to 6% of global annual revenue.
35:10
The UK's online strategy Air Safety Act carries similar
35:14
penalties of up to 10% of worldwide revenue.
35:17
Multiple civil lawsuits have also been filed, including one
35:20
from Ashley Sinclair, the mother of one of Elon Musk's children,
35:24
who alleges Grok generated sexualized images depicting her
35:28
as a child in a bikini as an adult in sexually explicit
35:32
poses. Disgusting.
35:34
Now the Grok investigation arrives at a tense moment in
35:37
transatlantic relations. US Secretary of State Marco
35:39
Rubio responded to the December EU find by saying the block is
35:43
attacking American companies, and a State Department official
35:46
warned that nothing is off the table when it comes to free
35:48
speech. The EU has made clear that its
35:51
focus is changing platform behavior rather than simply
35:54
collecting fines. The Digital Services Act gives
35:57
regulators the power to impose operational requirements, demand
36:02
specific changes to product features, leave it suspend
36:04
services that repeatedly violate European law.
36:08
No other X will face such drastic measures.
36:11
Depends on the investigations, findings and the company's
36:13
willingness to implement meaningful safeguards.
36:22
New financial filings just revealed what Elon Musk probably
36:24
didn't want you to see. X, formerly Twitter, of course,
36:29
lost 58% of its revenue in 2024. Now documented an official UK
36:35
regulatory filings that dropped this week that we spent the last
36:39
two years hearing about advertisers fleeing, about the
36:42
rebrand chaos, about whether Musk's social media gamble would
36:46
pay off. Now we have the answer, and it's
36:48
brutal. This is particularly fascinating
36:51
because 2024 was supposed to be Musk's victory lap.
36:55
He became the most politically influential tech billionaire in
36:58
America, practically lived at Mar a Lago with Donald Trump,
37:03
helped shape a presidential administration as well.
37:06
His visibility had never been higher, and yet X was bleeding
37:11
out. And I've also got some news on
37:14
the EU launching a formal investigation into Grok over
37:17
deep fake porn. Plus a genuinely surprising
37:20
partnership between Tesla and Warren Buffett's company, and
37:24
we'll go right into that after this very short break.
37:29
So let's talk about what a 58% revenue decline actually means
37:33
for X. When Musk bought Twitter in late
37:35
20/22 for 44 billion, a lot of people thought he overpaid for
37:40
it. Now, the bull case was that he'd
37:42
unlock value by cutting costs, removing what he called bloat,
37:46
and turning the platform into an everything app.
37:49
And the bear case was that advertisers would flee, the
37:52
platform would become toxic, and the whole thing would spiral out
37:56
of control. Now, these UK filings suggest
38:01
that the bears were right. Now, these are specifically UK
38:04
revenue numbers, but they're a proxy for the broader health of
38:08
the company because the UK is a major advertising market.
38:11
And when brands have pulled back, they're pulling back kind
38:15
of everywhere. It's a it's a litmus test.
38:19
And here's what's interesting about this.
38:21
Musk has been adamant publicly that X is doing fine.
38:25
He's pointing to engagement numbers, to new features, to the
38:28
premium subscription tier. But engagement revenue are
38:33
completely different things. Get 1,000,000 of people
38:36
scrolling and still watching your ad business collapse.
38:39
Advertisers don't just want your eyes on the product, they want
38:44
it to be safe and they want predictability.
38:47
They want to not wake up to headlines about their logo
38:49
appearing next to something that makes their PR team cry tears of
38:54
sorrow. And X under Musk has been the
38:58
opposite of predictable. The timing makes this even more
39:02
striking. Throughout 2024, Musk was
39:04
everywhere, posting constantly, engaging with political figures,
39:09
hosting Twitter Spaces with presidential candidates.
39:12
If personal brand translated directly to business success, X
39:16
should be printing money. Instead, the opposite happened.
39:20
The more visible Musk became, the more nervous advertisers
39:23
got. There's a lesson in there
39:25
somewhere about the difference between attention and trust.
39:29
Now, I trust that you are subscribed to this channel.
39:33
I've been digging through the analytics of the show and
39:35
noticed that 39% of you are following the show and I am
39:38
forever grateful for you. And the other 61% of you have
39:42
probably listened to a few episodes, just forgot to hit the
39:45
subscribe or follow button. So if you could do that right
39:47
now, that'd be great. I've been an independent
39:49
journalist covering Elon and Space Flight and tech for the
39:51
last seven years. I'm going to continue for the
39:54
next 10. And all I ask from you is one
39:56
second of your time. I'm extremely grateful for you
39:59
to be here. Thank you for joining this
40:01
community. Now let's move on while X deals
40:06
with its revenue crisis. Back in the day, another Musk
40:11
venture just landed in regulatory crosshairs.
40:14
The European Union announced a formal investigation into Grok,
40:18
Musk's AI chatbot, through XAI over concerns of deep fate
40:22
pornography. This isn't a sternly worded
40:25
letter or a tweet from some EU commissioner.
40:30
It's a formal probe under EU digital services regulations,
40:34
and it carries real teeth. The issue is that Grok has been
40:38
notably less restricted than competitors like ChatGPT or
40:41
Claude Must position this as a feature, not a bug.
40:45
He's been critical of what he calls overly censored AI,
40:48
arguing that other companies are too cautious, too politically
40:51
correct. Grok was supposed to be the edgy
40:54
alternative. The problem is that edgy and
40:57
generate sexualized deepfakes are different, and the EU isn't
41:01
interested in debating philosophical approaches to AI
41:04
freedom. They passed the AI Act, they've
41:06
been the most aggressive regulator on the planet when it
41:09
comes to tech, and now they're coming for Grok.
41:12
This matters beyond just the regulatory fine that came.
41:16
The EU is a massive market. If Grok gets restricted or
41:20
banned in Europe, that's a significant chunk of potential
41:23
users gone, and it creates a template for other regulators
41:26
around the world. The UK might actually follow
41:29
Australia. So making noise about AI
41:32
regulation in the US probably not going to happen there.
41:35
But once one major jurisdiction acts, others tend to pile on.
41:39
So this isn't just a European thing.
41:42
This is about whether Musk's approach to AI, which is
41:45
basically move fast and let's figure this out eventually, can
41:49
survive contact with actual governments.
41:52
And what strikes me is the Pattern X is struggling because
41:56
Elon prioritized his vision of free speech over advertiser
42:00
comfort. He didn't think of the business
42:02
model, he just did what he wanted to do.
42:04
Grok is in trouble because Musk prioritized his vision of
42:07
uncensored AI over regulatory expectations.
42:11
There's a consistency to it. He genuinely believes these
42:14
institutions, advertisers, regulators are all wrong.
42:17
And he's right. Maybe he is, but being right and
42:21
being financially viable aren't always the same thing.
42:24
Now, let's kind of move into something more positive here
42:28
because this week also brought news that Warren Buffett's
42:31
company willpower test the semi trucks.
42:34
Warren Buffett, the guy who famously avoids tech stocks, the
42:37
guy who said he doesn't invest in things he doesn't understand.
42:40
The guy who's been skeptical of Tesla, specifically that Warren
42:45
Buffett's operation is now partnering with Elon Musk.
42:49
How? The deal involves Berkshire
42:50
Hathaway's energy subsidiary providing charging of structure
42:54
for Tesla Semi deployments. This is significant for a few
42:58
reasons. First, it suggests that Tesla
43:00
Semi is finally moving towards serious commercial scale.
43:03
The truck has been in development limbo for years,
43:06
with production starts and stops questions about battery range.
43:09
Skepticism from the trucking industry getting a Buffett
43:12
company involved signals that serious old school money
43:17
investors see a real business model here. 2nd, it's a
43:21
validation of Tesla from someone who has historically been
43:24
allergic to the company. Buffett and Musk occupy
43:27
completely different corners of the business world.
43:30
Buffett is patient capital, long time horizons, dozens and dozens
43:36
of years in the making, boring industries.
43:39
Musk is move fast, blow rockets up, sleep at the factory, do
43:44
whatever you got to do to make this thing work.
43:46
The fact that Buffett's team looked at Tesla Semi and said
43:49
yes we want it tells you something about how the industry
43:51
views that tech now. And 3rd, this is exactly the
43:55
kind of institutional partnership Tesla needs as it
43:58
tries to diversify beyond consumer vehicles.
44:00
The Tesla Semi targets commercial fleets, logistics
44:04
companies, enterprises with massive fuel budgets.
44:07
Those customers aren't swayed by Twitter posts or cyber truck
44:10
aesthetics. They want proven tech and
44:12
reliable infrastructure. Having Berkshire Hathaway's
44:15
energy arm involved checks both of those boxes.
44:19
So here's where we are with the Musk empire as we close out
44:23
January 2026. Today, X is hemorrhaging money.
44:26
Back in the day, even as Musk's personal influence peaked, his
44:31
AI company faces a formal EU investigation that could reshape
44:34
how Grok operates in major markets.
44:36
But Tesla? His oldest company just locked
44:40
in a partnership with one of the most conservative, credibility
44:42
focused investors on the planet. The empire is simultaneously
44:46
expanding and contracting depending on where you look.
44:49
Question for the rest of this year is whether Musk's political
44:52
capital can translate to business stability or whether
44:56
the financial cracks, enacts and regulatory pressure on Grok will
44:59
eventually matter more than how many times that Elon posts in a
45:03
day. 75 countries. That's how many nations sent
45:08
representatives to 1 conference this week not to talk about
45:11
nuclear weapons or climate change or trade deals.
45:14
Talk about space junk. The Saudi Space Agency hosted
45:18
the second annual space debris conference.
45:20
If you want to sign. The commercial space industry is
45:22
actually growing up. This is the time.
45:25
The gold rush phase launch fast, grab your orbit, figure out the
45:29
mess later is giving way to something more sobering.
45:32
A global reckoning with what we've left behind up there in
45:35
the companies building mega constellations like Starlink,
45:38
They are the elephant in the room.
45:40
So today I want to walk through these stories that, taken
45:43
together, paint a picture of where Space Flight is right now.
45:47
We've got the debris problem demanding attention.
45:49
We've got NASA pushing ahead with Artemis 2 getting ready to
45:52
send humans around the moon. And we've got nuclear propulsion
45:55
tests that could reshape how we think about deep space travel
45:59
entirely. Growth and accountability happen
46:02
at the same time. And that's what a maturing
46:04
industry looks like. That's what the Space Flight
46:06
industry looks like right now. We're going to get into that
46:09
right after this very short break.
46:13
So let's start with this debris conference.
46:15
The numbers here are massive. 75 countries showed up.
46:20
The event was organized by the Saudi Space Agency, but it had
46:23
backing from the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs
46:27
in partnership with the International Telecommunication
46:30
Union. Here's what Artie Holimany, the
46:35
director of UNOOSA, said. Global cooperation among
46:39
international organizations, governments, industry and
46:42
academia in addressing space debris challenges is no longer
46:45
merely A desirable objective is become an absolute necessity.
46:51
She also said that leading space faring nations must develop
46:54
concrete plans to address accumulated legacy debris.
46:59
Legacy debris is a polite way of saying the stuff we've been
47:02
leaving up there for decades. All the junk.
47:05
Now why does all this matter though?
47:07
The International Telecommunication Union manages
47:09
satellite orbit allocations. They're the people who
47:13
coordinate who gets to park where in space.
47:17
When they show up at a debris conference, signals that orbit
47:20
management and debris are now in the same conversation.
47:23
They were kind of a side thing. That debris thing was for a
47:26
while, but now it's all coming together.
47:29
Can't talk about where new satellites go without talking
47:31
about what's already cluttering up those lanes.
47:35
Now. Space is huge.
47:37
And here's where SpaceX comes into the picture, even though
47:41
they weren't mentioned by name. Starlink has thousands of
47:44
satellites in low Earth orbit. They want to get hundreds of
47:47
thousands into low Earth orbit. Thousands more are planned for
47:50
the next few years. Amazon's working on their own
47:53
consolation. China is doing the same thing.
47:56
It's getting uncomfortable up there really fast.
47:59
And more objects mean more collision risk.
48:02
If something happens to 1 satellite, if one SpaceX
48:05
Starlink satellite breaks, a piece from that Starlink
48:10
satellite could destroy numerous satellites.
48:12
Could be a chain reaction. More collisions equal more
48:16
debris, and more debris means more collision risk.
48:19
It's a feedback loop that keeps people up at night From the
48:23
UNOOSA. They also featured something
48:27
called the Debris Solver Competition at that conference,
48:31
20 projects showcasing innovative solutions for
48:34
actually cleaning up space junk. We're not just wringing our
48:39
hands with the problem, just saying like, hey, there's debris
48:42
up there. Who cares?
48:43
It's space. It's not down here.
48:45
There's engineers and people that want to make money,
48:48
entrepreneurs actively working on fixes for this.
48:53
They want to make Nets, harpoons, there's lasers,
48:56
robotic arms. If there's space junk, there's
49:00
going to be money to be made. It's like having a garbage
49:04
person pick up your garbage in front of your house.
49:06
There's somebody there that does that.
49:08
There's a business that makes a lot of money doing garbage
49:11
pickup, and so these entrepreneurs want to do too.
49:14
They want to pick up the garbage in space.
49:15
They want to haul it someplace else.
49:18
So some of these ideas sound crazy, right?
49:22
Sound like science fiction, But so did Spacex's reusable rockets
49:26
for about 10 years ago. Now, something else crazy is
49:29
that I've been digging into the analytics of the show, and 37%
49:32
of you are following the channel and I am forever grateful for
49:36
you. The other 63% haven't hit the
49:39
follower subscribe button. It's OK.
49:41
Sometimes you listen to a show you're not subscribed.
49:43
Sometimes you listen to a few episodes and it's cool, but
49:47
eventually you do come around and hit the subscribe button.
49:49
That's what I do all the time. I'd listen to a show four or
49:52
five times and I'm like, oh wait, I should subscribe.
49:54
So I don't have to search for this anymore.
49:55
Just comes into my feed and that's going to help us out
49:58
tremendously. So all I ask from you, after six
50:02
or seven years of already doing this, I ask one second of your
50:05
time. So thank you for that for
50:07
hitting the subscribe or follow button.
50:09
So there's a reckoning going on too.
50:13
There's an execution with what NASA is actually doing right now
50:19
about this. Artemis 2 is moving forward very
50:23
soon. February, NASA announced they're
50:25
pushing ahead with what's called a wet dress rehearsal for the
50:28
mission. And a wet dress rehearsal is
50:31
essentially a full simulation of launch day.
50:34
You load the rocket with propellants, that's the wet
50:36
part, Run through the entire countdown sequence and stop just
50:40
before ignition. They do everything they need to
50:42
do before launch, and then they just don't launch the rocket.
50:45
It's how you find problems before they become catastrophic.
50:48
If there's any leaks, they find them before the actual launch
50:51
day. This is huge because Artemis 2
50:54
is the mission that sends humans around the moon for the first
50:57
time since Apollo 4 astronauts. A loop around the far side of
51:01
the moon and the first crude flight of the Space Launch
51:04
System and Orion capsule working together.
51:07
And that's after Artemis 1 proved the hardware could make
51:10
the trip on crude. This is the next step.
51:12
And then Artemis 3 should have people stepping on the moon
51:17
surface again. Now, there's also a Utah
51:20
connection worth mentioning here.
51:22
The solid rocket boosters, the power SLS during liftoff are
51:25
manufactured there. Utah has been part of NASA's
51:29
human spaceflight story since the space shuttle days.
51:32
So we talked about Artemis. We're talking about supply
51:34
chains and expertise that span across the country, and the
51:38
University of North Dakota is also involved in supporting this
51:42
mission. When you see university is
51:44
embedded in NASA programs, it's something about the depth of
51:48
those efforts. Together, the university and
51:50
NASA working hand in hand, it's huge.
51:53
They're not just building rockets, though.
51:55
They're working all across the nation, pulling in academic
51:59
research, industry partners in multiple states.
52:03
So the Artemis 2 mission needs to get through the orbit that
52:09
the debris fields are in now. They will plan that properly so
52:13
nobody gets hurt, but the Artemis missions going forward
52:18
will need to clean up some of this garbage.
52:22
Artemis 2 may face delays if the wet dress rehearsal doesn't work
52:27
out as planned. The heat shield issues from
52:29
Artemis One took a lot longer to resolve than anybody wanted to
52:32
talk about. In getting through this
52:34
rehearsal successfully would be signal that the program is way
52:39
back on track. So let's go beyond the moon
52:42
here. NASA is testing advances in
52:45
space nuclear propulsion. This all matters because it's
52:48
all tied into the orbit of all the space debris.
52:53
This is going to be a technology that could genuinely change the
52:58
game for deep space exploration. Chemical rockets are great for
53:02
getting off Earth. They produce tremendous thrust,
53:05
but once you're out in space, they're inefficient for long
53:09
journeys. You burn through fuel really
53:12
fast, and you can only carry so much of it.
53:15
And once that fuel is gone, the fuel is gone.
53:18
You can't get more. Nuclear propulsion is a whole
53:23
different beast. Nuclear thermal rockets heat
53:26
propellant to extreme temperatures using a reactor,
53:30
generating far more efficiency per unit of fuel.
53:34
And the result of that is that you could cut the transit time
53:36
to Mars significantly. Some estimates suggest getting
53:40
there in three to four months instead of 7 to 9.
53:44
That's huge for safety. Less time in transit means less
53:47
radiation exposure for astronauts.
53:50
Fewer things can go wrong if you shorten the time frame.
53:54
And NASA has been researching this for years.
53:56
But recent tests suggest real progress there and it's not
54:01
going to be ready next year, but we might be talking about it,
54:05
getting ready for a Mars mission that are currently on the
54:09
drawing board sometime in the 20 thirties.
54:12
So this is the context here. We're serious about becoming a
54:14
multi planet spirit planetary species, which is something both
54:18
NASA and SpaceX talk about constantly.
54:21
We need propulsion systems that can handle the distances
54:24
involved. Chemical rockets can get us to
54:26
the moon. Nuclear propulsion might be what
54:29
gets us to Mars and beyond any practical time frame.
54:34
Now we have to talk about one more thing.
54:36
Rocket Lab, a small company that's sort of pseudo competitor
54:42
to SpaceX, their Neutron rocket experienced a test failure
54:47
recently. We don't have all the details
54:49
yet, but analysis seems to be maintaining confidence in the
54:53
company despite this set back because they're going to fix it.
54:57
It's notable because Rocket Lab is one of the few companies
54:59
seriously competing against SpaceX in the medium lift
55:03
market. Neutron is their answer to
55:05
Falcon 9. But, you know, test failures.
55:09
They're part of the rocket development programs.
55:11
SpaceX blew up plenty of prototypes on their way to
55:14
success. And now look at the Falcon 9.
55:16
Hundreds of launches, hundreds of landings.
55:18
The question is always whether a company can learn from the
55:21
failure and move on. And Rocket Lab has had a strong
55:24
track record with their smaller Electron rocket, so I'm not
55:27
going to count them out. But this business is hard, and
55:31
they will learn from their mistakes and they'll move on
55:34
from it. So where does this all tie
55:36
together? The same week that 75 countries
55:39
gathered to talk about cleaning up Earth orbit, NASA was testing
55:43
the nuclear engines and preparing to send humans back to
55:46
the moon. This is progress, and it's going
55:50
to be a little bit longer, but we're going to get there.
55:53
And they're simultaneously pushing boundaries and dealing
55:56
with consequences the same exact time.
56:00
The early years of any industry are about proving the tech that
56:03
actually works. And now the middle years are
56:06
scaling it, and we're heading into the later years of this.
56:13
So they need to sustain it. Commercial spaceflight is
56:16
entering that third phase. The launches will keep coming.
56:20
Hundreds of SpaceX Starlink flights will happen every year.
56:24
Starship will fly and it'll take thousands of Starlinks into
56:30
orbit, amongst other things. Starlink will grow, but so will
56:33
the other competitors, and so will the conversations about
56:36
responsibility. Question for SpaceX and every
56:39
other player in the industry is whether they can keep doing this
56:44
and keep launching without somebody there to clean up their
56:47
mess. And who's going to pay those
56:49
people in those jobs to clean up this mess?
56:52
We're going to have to find that out in the future.
56:54
Is it going to be the country's or will the will the companies
56:59
be taxed for clean up over the time that they have their
57:03
satellites in orbit? Tik Tok's algorithm broke over
57:08
the weekend. Users open the app Sunday and
57:10
found their hyper personalized feeds replaced by generic videos
57:15
on repeat. Now the company says a power
57:17
outage at AUS data center triggered A cascading systems
57:21
failure. Creators watching their view
57:23
counts dropped to 0, earnings vanishing from all of their
57:27
dashboards. The timing here is critical.
57:31
This happened just days after TikTok finalized this deal to
57:34
spin off its U.S. business into a new entity controlled by
57:37
American investors and more importantly, Trump supporting US
57:44
American investors. So is this a technical glitch or
57:47
is this something bigger that we should be really paying
57:50
attention to? Now we're going to break down
57:53
exactly what happened to that data center, why the algorithm
57:56
failing matters more than a typical outage, and what this
57:59
tells us about the new TikTok. USDS joint venture also going to
58:04
look at a public fight between Elon Musk and billionaire
58:07
investor Vinod Khosla over accusations of white
58:11
nationalism. Plus, new data showing Tessa's
58:14
brand value dropped in 2025 because of Musk's politics.
58:19
Now, that part connects directly to the TikTok story in ways you
58:22
might not expect, and we'll go right into that after this very
58:27
short break. So let's start with what
58:30
actually happened to TikTok on Sunday.
58:33
A power outage hit one of the company's U.S. data centers.
58:36
The company confirmed the outage caused a cascading systems
58:39
failure. Now that means one system going
58:42
down triggered failures in connected systems like dominoes,
58:45
spreading the damage across the apps infrastructure.
58:48
If you've ever seen a circuit breaker trip and knockout power
58:51
to half of your house, this is the software equivalent, but
58:55
affecting millions of people, not just you and your family.
58:58
And the problem showed up immediately in ways users could
59:01
feel. People reported trouble logging
59:04
in. Video uploads failed.
59:06
But the stranger system from the algorithm itself, Tik Tok's
59:10
recommendation engine, the thing that makes the app feel like it
59:13
actually knows you, started serving random, generic content.
59:17
Some users saw the same few videos repeating in their feeds
59:19
over and over. For an app that built its entire
59:22
business on hyper personalized recommendations, this is a core
59:26
failure. It changes how users experience
59:29
the product at the most fundamental level.
59:32
At the foundation, creators got hit the hardest.
59:36
New uploads showed 0 views and 0 likes.
59:39
Earnings dashboards went blank. People thought they lost
59:43
hundreds of thousands of dollars.
59:45
Tiktok said this was a display error caused by server timeouts,
59:49
and the actual engagement data remains safe.
59:51
But for creators who depend on real time metrics to understand
59:54
their audience and make changes on the fly, several days of
59:57
broken data feels like flying completely blind.
1:00:02
Now. The time he makes this more than
1:00:04
just a technical story, of course.
1:00:06
TikTok finalizes deal to spin off the US business just days
1:00:09
before the outage. The new entity, TikTok USDS
1:00:12
joint venture, will be controlled by US investors, most
1:00:16
of them Trump supporters. Users had already noticed the
1:00:19
company pushing new terms of service and new privacy policies
1:00:22
immediately after the deal closed.
1:00:24
And then then the algorithm broke.
1:00:26
People are connecting the dots, whether or not those dots
1:00:29
actually connect, and then raises questions the company you
1:00:33
will need to answer, even if the outage was entirely unrelated to
1:00:37
ownership. Now, the US joint venture has
1:00:41
said it plans to retrain Tik Tok's recommendation algorithm.
1:00:45
That algorithm is the actual product of TikTok.
1:00:48
There's nothing better than the TikTok algorithm on the market
1:00:52
right now. And if you have to retrain that,
1:00:54
that's not actual TikTok. That's something else.
1:00:57
It is what makes TikTok different than every other video
1:00:59
platform. If the current outage is giving
1:01:02
us a preview of what a broken or retrained algorithm looks like,
1:01:06
we're not going to like it. Generic videos on repeat is not
1:01:09
the experience that made TikTok the most downloaded app in the
1:01:12
world for years. Company said Monday had made
1:01:15
significant progress on recovery, but warned US users
1:01:18
might still have technical issues posting the videos.
1:01:22
You know, I've been digging through the analytics of the
1:01:23
show and I've seen 39% of you have followed the channel or
1:01:28
liked it. For you, I'm forever grateful.
1:01:30
And the 61% of you have listened to an episode before or have
1:01:36
not, and you're new here, but you haven't hit the follower
1:01:39
subscribe button. I get it.
1:01:40
I do it all the time. If you're not going to hit the
1:01:43
follower subscribe button after the first one, I've done that
1:01:46
too. Sometimes it takes 3 or 4
1:01:48
listens, four or five episodes. But I'm just asking you for a
1:01:51
favor. I've been doing this for seven
1:01:53
years. I'm going to be doing it for the
1:01:54
next 10. I ask you for one second of your
1:01:56
time, hit the follow button. If you want to leave a five star
1:02:00
rating on whatever app you're on right now.
1:02:03
I'm extremely grateful and blessed to have you in this
1:02:05
community. Now let's get back into some
1:02:07
Elon news and let's shift here. Completely different story.
1:02:11
They happened over the same weekend.
1:02:13
Elon got into a public fight with Vinod Khosla.
1:02:16
He's a billionaire venture capitalist, Co founder of Sun
1:02:19
Microsystems and one of the most influential investors in Silicon
1:02:22
Valley. He accused Musk of promoting
1:02:25
white nationalism. Musk fired back on X with a
1:02:28
personal response. He said his partner's half
1:02:31
Indian. He said his son's middle name is
1:02:33
Sarkar, that is a name with Indian origins.
1:02:37
Accusations of racism or white nationalism against ACEO can
1:02:40
affect the companies they lead. It's not abstract, happens all
1:02:44
the time. You have data showing it is
1:02:46
already happening to Elon. A recent report found Tesla's
1:02:50
brand value dropped significantly in 2025 due to
1:02:54
Musk's political activities. Brand value measures how much
1:02:57
the company name itself contributes to sales and
1:03:01
customer loyalty. Like Tesla.
1:03:03
We all know what that is. That's very, you know, they're
1:03:06
very powerful and loyal. People are going to continue
1:03:10
buying Teslas like Subaru. For me, I, it's a great car.
1:03:13
I love Subarus. I want a Subaru next time.
1:03:16
You know, when that number falls down, though, Subaru's CEO was
1:03:21
called a white nationalist. I'd be like, probably going to
1:03:23
look someplace else. It puts pressure on everything
1:03:26
from pricing to employee recruitment.
1:03:29
I would not work for somebody who's a white nationalist.
1:03:31
That's a scummy kind of person, right?
1:03:33
I don't want to work for that guy, but let's see.
1:03:37
Let's see what's up with Musk. Khosla Exchange is showing that
1:03:41
Musk's public persona has become inseparable from his brands.
1:03:46
Now it's not just an EV company, you know, it's not just Tesla
1:03:51
and Elon. It is Elon.
1:03:56
SpaceX is Elon, X is Elon. XAI is Elon.
1:04:02
When Musk gets into political fights, those fights follow him
1:04:06
around and follow his companies around limits how the companies
1:04:10
can position themselves to different consumer groups.
1:04:14
The TikTok story in the Musk story share something important.
1:04:18
Both show how leadership decisions ripple outward into
1:04:21
user experience and brand perception.
1:04:23
Tik Tok's new ownership structure is forcing technical
1:04:26
changes that users can feel directly in their feeds.
1:04:29
Musk's political choices are forcing brand changes that show
1:04:32
up directly in the data. Neither situation is purely
1:04:36
technical or purely political. They mix together in ways that
1:04:40
affect real people, making real decisions about which real
1:04:44
products that they use. And the bigger pattern is about
1:04:49
controlling consequences. Tik Tok's US users are
1:04:52
discovering what it feels like when the infrastructure behind
1:04:55
their favorite app belongs to someone new with different
1:04:58
priorities. Tesla customers are discovering
1:05:01
what it feels like when the CEO behind their favorite car has
1:05:05
political positions they disagree with.
1:05:07
And in both cases the product experience changed because
1:05:10
something changed at the top.