Podcast / Tech Won’t Save Us / Jun 12, 2025

We All Suffer From OpenAI’s Pursuit of Scale

On this episode of Tech Won’t Save Us, Karen Hao on the danger that Sam Altman poses.

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We All Suffer from OpenAI’s Pursuit of Scale | Tech Won’t Save Us
byThe Nation Magazine

Paris Marx is joined by Karen Hao to discuss how Sam Altman’s goal of scale at all costs has spawned a new empire founded on exploitation of people and the environment, resulting in not only the loss of valuable research into more inventive AI systems, but also exacerbated data privacy issues, intellectual property erosion, and the perpetuation of surveillance capitalism.

Karen Hao is an award-winning journalist and the author of Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI.

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Paris Marx is joined by Karen Hao to discuss how Sam Altman’s goal of scale at all costs has spawned a new empire founded on exploitation of people and the environment, resulting in not only the loss of valuable research into more inventive AI systems, but also exacerbated data privacy issues, intellectual property erosion, and the perpetuation of surveillance capitalism.

Karen Hao is an award-winning journalist and the author of Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI.

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The Nation Podcasts
The Nation Podcasts

Here's where to find podcasts from The Nation. Political talk without the boring parts, featuring the writers, activists and artists who shape the news, from a progressive perspective.

How the US Weaponizes Technology in the Middle East | Tech Won’t Save Us
byThe Nation Magazine

Paris Marx is joined by Laleh Khalili to discuss how the United States uses its control of key technologies to shift global power dynamics, and how that specifically plays out in the Middle East.

Laleh Khalili is Professor of Gulf Studies at the University of Exeter and author of the forthcoming book Extractive Capitalism.

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Paris Marx

Paris Marx is a tech critic and host of the Tech Won’t Save Us podcast. He writes the Disconnect newsletter and is the author of Road to Nowhere: What Silicon Valley Gets Wrong about the Future of Transportation.

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