Our smartphones rule our lives. We love them, we hate them. Somewhere deep down inside, we hope they never go away. But, if recent sales data is to be believed, we are also incredibly bored with smartphones—so bored in fact that we’re buying far fewer of them than we used to. This week, we talk about what the future looks like for smartphones. They’ll likely get more foldable, their voice features could grow chattier, and they might even come with a chip to recognize AI-generated nonsense and block it like spam. WIRED senior editor and noted techno-grouser Jason Kehe joins our conversation about the future of the phone and the future of our souls. Show Notes: Read Lauren’s interviews with five prominent technologists as they predict the phone’s future. The story is part of our WIRED 30 package celebrating our 30th anniversary as a publication. Recommendations: Jason recommends Anaximander and the Birth of Science by Carlo Rovelli. Lauren recommends swimming and not podcasting. Mike recommends Why Buddhism Is True by Robert Wright. Jason Kehe can be found on Twitter @jkehe. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The worst part of going to school is all the homework. Nothing strikes dread in a student’s heart quite like facing down a deadline on a seven-page essay. That’s why some of them may find it tempting to turn those hours of work into a task that can be breezed through in a matter of seconds by an AI-powered app. Generative tools like ChatGPT have wormed their way into the school system, causing panic among teachers and administrators. While some schools have banned the tech outright, others are embracing it as a tool to teach students how to tell the difference between reality and science fiction. This week, we're bringing you a special show about the perils and opportunities of AI in the classroom. This episode is a collaboration between WIRED and the NPR show 1A. It's the second episode in a series called “Know-It-All,” which focuses on all the ways AI is affecting our world. Show Notes Listen to every episode of Know It All: 1A and WIRED’s Guide to AI. Read more from WIRED about how chatbots are coming for the classroom. Pia Ceres can be found on Twitter @lapiaenrose. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The modern internet is powered by recommendation algorithms. They're everywhere from Facebook to YouTube, from search engines to shopping websites. These systems track your online consumption and use that data to suggest the next piece of content for you to absorb. Their goal is to keep users on a platform by presenting them with things they'll spend more time engaging with. Trouble is, those link chains can lead to some weird places, occasionally taking users down dark internet rabbit holes or showing harmful content. Lawmakers and researchers have criticized recommendation systems before, but these methods are under renewed scrutiny now that Google and Twitter are going before the US Supreme Court to defend their algorithmic practices. This week on Gadget Lab, we talk with Jonathan Stray, a senior scientist at the Berkeley Center for Human-Compatible AI who studies recommendation systems online. We discuss how recommendation algorithms work, how they’re studied, and how they can be both abused and restrained. Show Notes: Read all about Section 230. Read Jonathan Stray and Gillian Hadfield’s story on WIRED about their engagement research. Read more about the two cases before the US Supreme Court. Recommendations: Jonathan recommends the book The Way Out by Peter Coleman. Mike recommends the novel Denial by Jon Raymond. Lauren recommends Matt Reynolds’ WIRED story about how you’ve been thinking about food all wrong, and also getting a bag to make nut milk. Jonathan Stray can be found on Twitter @jonathanstray. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys. If you have feedback about the show, take our brief listener survey. Doing so will earn you a chance to win a $1,000 prize. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The promise of streaming TV was that you could watch whatever you wanted, when you wanted. And for a while, that was mostly true. But recently, streaming services have started to dial back the nice-guy stuff and reel in the freebies. Companies across the stream-o-sphere are tweaking subscription tiers, raising prices, and canceling unprofitable shows. Netflix has introduced an ad-supported tier to its formerly ad-free service, and even started cracking down on people sharing account credentials. And corporate shake ups at HBO Max have resulted in gobs of stuff being removed from that platform entirely. This week on Gadget Lab, WIRED senior editor Angela Watercutter joins us to talk about why the streaming ecosystem has grown so complicated and hostile toward its customers. Show Notes Read WIRED’s series about why we hate streaming. Listen to WIRED and 1A’s series about AI, Know It All. Recommendations Angela recommends the cinematic masterpiece Cocaine Bear. Lauren recommends Marc Maron’s stand-up special From Bleak to Dark on HBO. Mike recommends the film EO, which is about a donkey. Angela Watercutter can be found on Twitter @WaterSlicer. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The unstoppable march of artificial intelligence carries on. In mere weeks, AI has oozed into nearly everything we interact with on the internet, from conversations, to journalism, to how we look stuff up online. It's even got Google scrambling to reclaim its spot on the search throne after Microsoft implemented its own AI tools to miraculously make Bing feel relevant again. This week, we talk with WIRED senior writer Will Knight about how generative AI is changing how we search for information and create content online, and whether we should actually be freaking out about our new robot overlords. Show Notes Read more from Will about the very weird and occasionally horrifying world of generative AI. Follow all of WIRED’s ChatGPT and AI coverage. Recommendations Will recommends The Amazing Acro-Cats, which is a cat circus that is about to go on tour. Lauren recommends the CBC documentary Big Dating. Mike recommends the World Bollard Association Twitter account. Will Knight can be found on Twitter @willknight. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices