Techdirt

In the conversation about online speech, most of the attention tends to fall on the big social media platforms, while other intermediaries get overlooked — especially payment processors and other financial intermediaries. But that very thing is the focus of a new book coming out next week, Rainey Reitman's Transaction Denied. With launch events coming up on April 7th in Berkeley and April 9th in San Francisco, Rainey joins the podcast this week to talk all about the book and the vital role of financial intermediaries in online speech.

Preorder the book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/804543/transaction-denied-by-rainey-reitman/
April 7th in Berkeley: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/rainey-reitmans-transaction-denied-in-store-event-and-book-signing-tickets-1984829277800
April 9th in San Francisco: https://citylights.com/events/rainey-reitman-launch-party-for-transaction-denied/

Last month, Mike participated in the Cato Institute's Section 230 at 30 event to mark the 30th anniversary of the passage of Section 230. The event featured a series of fireside chats and panels that went deep on the past, present, and future of the all-important law, and you can watch videos of all of them on Cato's website — but for this week's episode of the podcast, we've got the audio of Mike's panel (moderated by Jennifer Huddleston and also featuring Jess Miers, Matt Perault, and Matt Reeder), all about how Section 230 and similar policies will apply to new technologies like decentralized protocols and artificial intelligence.

Cato Event Videos: https://www.cato.org/events/section-230-30-past-present-future-online-speech-26-words-created-internet

There's a notion that pops up in the comments here on Techdirt that Mike and our writer Karl Bode are deeply opposed in their opinions on AI and engaged in an epic ongoing debate. Alas, the truth is a little less spectacular: while they might have some differences of opinion here and there, they actually agree on most things, and would both prefer to hear (and have) more thoughtful and nuanced discussions about the technology without going to the extremes. By way of demonstration, Karl joins this week's episode of the podcast for a long conversation with Mike all about AI, its role in our society, the challenges it raises, and where things go from here.

The Vision For The Decentralized Internet by Techdirt

Two weeks ago, we ran a bit of an AMA experiment, with a call on Bluesky for fans of Techdirt to ask Mike any questions they might have. We got lots of great responses and now, as promised, Mike is delivering the answers on this week's episode of the podcast!