Here’s a jaunty debrief from PopTech, a notoriously hard conference to describe, that always features obscenely talented entrepreneurs and changemakers.

In this episode, Kwaku Aning, Sarah Rose Siskind, and I share some of the great stories and great vibes from this year's conference, including:

FetusGPT, Sarah’s madcap experiment to train an AI on everything her soon-to-be-born baby is hearing from inside the womb
Why Colossal Biosciences is de-extincting the dire wolf and other “charismatic animals” (dodos and woolly mammoths are in the works) — and why de-extinction is an important goal that will help us solve lots of other problems along the way
“Shade-as-a-Service”, a new idea from climate champion and mushroom farmer Eben Bayer, the founder of MyForest Foods (maker of MyBacon, the top-selling non-meat bacon). The idea is to launch giant parasols into the atmosphere to cool the Earth below
Why Tibet and Taiwan are so key to the tech industry (not to mention global stability)
An exercise, from inventor and investor Pablos Holman, that could help you focus on what matters most to you — and could help you ignore the junk that’s clawing for your attention

Featured voices:

Sarah Rose Siskind, science and comedy writer and the founder of Hello SciCom, a STEM communications agency
Kwaku Aning, professional connector, founder/principal of RetroFuturism Consulting, and, according to Sarah, “homecoming king of PopTech”
Me (Dan Blumberg) — I’m the host of CRAFTED. and the founder of Modern Product Minds. HMU if you want to build something great. I love building from zero to one.

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Get psyched!… There are some big updates to this show coming soon!

PopTech Debrief: FetusGPT, De-extinction, Shade-as-a-Service, and Other Crazy, but Real Ventures

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