Sharp Tech with Ben Thompson

(Preview) Deep Research and OpenAI's Business Model, A Counterpoint on White Collar Concerns, The Future of Cognition and Companionship

(Preview) Should Apple Buy Perplexity?, What Apple Could Learn from IBM, Vision Pro and Its Vaporware

This podcast episode focuses on Apple's strategic approach to artificial intelligence (AI). The speaker analyzes Apple's decision to prioritize hardware and user interface over developing its own AI models, contrasting this with Microsoft's strategy. He suggests that Apple's strength lies in its hardware ecosystem an...

Apple History and Apple Psychology, How Apple Should Capitalize On Its AI Potential, Why It Probably Won't

(Preview) The Murky Future for the NBA, A Variety of Notes on Apple and AI, In Defense of Tech That Removes Friction

(Preview) YouTube Shall Inherit the Earth, NBC’s Peacock Strategy Then and Now, The Grim Future for Cable Networks

(Preview) Amazon Introduces an AI-Powered Alexa, Is OpenAI the New BlackBerry?, The Social Costs of Removing Friction

AI Promises and Chip Precariousness, Policy Recommendations and a Changing World, Concerns and Counterpoints

(Preview) Apple’s Answer to the UK, Encryption History and Privacy’s Future, Waiting for Drone Delivery in the U.S.

(Preview) Xi Jinping and China's Tech Companies, The Long-Run Implications of the Chip Ban, and a Pessimistic Outlook for Taiwan

(Preview) Experimenting With OpenAI’s Deep Research, Another ChatGPT Moment, Won’t Someone Think of the Entry-Level Employees?

This podcast episode features an interview discussing the capabilities of Deep Research, a new AI tool integrated into ChatGPT Pro. The conversation centers on two analyses of Apple's earnings generated by Deep Research: one with a user-provided prompt focusing on key aspects and another without specific guidance. Th...

(Preview) Apple Abandons Its Smart Glasses, Google as the Yellow Pages, LLMs and the Overton Window

The End of DeepSeek Week: Moneyball for AI, The Future of Compute Demand, Geopolitical Reality Checks, and More

This co-hosted podcast episode of Sharp Tech focuses on analyzing DeepSeek, a Chinese AI company, and its impact on the AI industry. The hosts discuss DeepSeek's efficiency breakthroughs, comparing them to the Moneyball strategy in baseball and the optimization techniques of console game developers. They then delve i...

(Preview) 72 Hours of DeepSeek Hysteria, What DeepSeek Means for Big Tech, Lessons on the Efficacy of Chip Controls

(Preview) The End of OpenAI and Microsoft, Risks and Rationale of the Stargate Project, DeepSeek-R1 and Bitter Lessons for the Future

(Preview) A Long Weekend for TikTok, Preparing for Trump and an Era of Upheaval, LeBron James as an iPhone

AI’s Uneven Arrival, TikTok’s Potential Departure, Xiaohongshu and the Delights of Cultural Exchange

(Preview) Meta’s Moderation Changes, Tech’s Evolving Political Calculus, The Importance and Difficulty of Maintaining Principles on the Internet

(Preview) What AI Could Mean for Aggregation Theory, o3 and Moore’s Law, More Questions Than Answers as Tech Enters 2025

Holiday Mailbag: The Next Intel, Google’s AI Revival, Modern Sportswriting, TSMC Mugs, Tutoring Takes, and Lots More

In this episode of Sharp Tech, Andrew Sharp and Ben Thompson engage in a lively discussion covering a range of topics. They kick things off by celebrating the Milwaukee Bucks' recent NBA championship victory. The conversation quickly shifts as a listener notes the striking parallels between the declines of Boeing and I...

(Preview) Google’s Willow Chip, Drones as a Platform and Anduril Follow-Up, Building Inside and Outside Silicon Valley

In this podcast episode, the hosts explore Google's latest innovation, the quantum computing chip named Willow. They highlight its advancements in error correction and speed but note that its immediate practical implications are minimal. The discussion then shifts to a comparison of Google and Bell Labs, debating wheth...