Newcomer Pod
A podcast about Silicon Valley, hosted by newsletter writer and independent journalist Eric Newcomer. Listen in for interviews with the dealmakers and builders who matter. Subscribe to newcomer.co for summaries of the episodes plus tech industry news, scoops, and analysis.
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This AI Was Trained on a Billion Video Game Clips. Now It Controls Robots.
How can billions of video game clips train AI to control robots? General Intuition CEO Pim de Witte explains why gaming data may be the missing ingredient for the next generation of robotics and AI agents. Pim de Witte built the world's largest RuneScape private server as a teenager before found...
John Coogan on Selling TBPN to OpenAI, Sam Altman & the Future of Tech Media
John Coogan, co-founder of TBPN, joins Eric Newcomer to talk about the acquisition that shocked the tech media world. John breaks down how TBPN went from two guys in suits to one of the most-watched live tech shows on the internet, why OpenAI came calling, what an editorial independence clause actua...
Taylor Lorenz Unfiltered on Social Media, Free Speech & the Surveillance State
Taylor Lorenz on why the social media panic is overblown and who's actually driving it. Taylor Lorenz, journalist and author of Extremely Online, joins Eric Newcomer to push back on the moral panic around phones, social media, and screen time. Taylor argues there is no such thing as social media...
The Goldman Sachs Exec on AI, Wall Street & the Firm That Went Bankrupt in 40 Minutes
The Goldman Sachs exec who automated Wall Street on what AI agents actually do to jobs, companies, and the future of enterprise software. Marty Chavez got his AI PhD in 1991 when there were exactly zero AI jobs. So he went to Goldman Sachs and spent decades building the machines that took over Wall ...
Ben Smith on Trump, Anthropic & the Collision of Government and Big Tech
Semafor's editor-in-chief on why Washington has decided Anthropic needs to pick a side. Ben Smith, co-founder and editor-in-chief of Semafor, joins Eric Newcomer to break down the collision between the Trump administration and Anthropic, and what it reveals about the new relationship between Was...
Aidan Gomez Unfiltered on AGI, China & AI's Biggest Risk
Aidan Gomez on AGI, China, and the Biggest Risk Facing AI. Cohere co-founder and Transformer co-author Aidan Gomez joins Eric Newcomer to discuss whether we've already reached AGI, why Chinese AI models are being underestimated, the future of enterprise AI, sovereign AI, and why relying on a han...
Christina Cacioppo Unfiltered on Fake Compliance, AI Security & Building a $4B Company
The CEO of a $4 billion compliance company on how her biggest competitor was faking it, and what that means for AI startup culture. Christina Cacioppo, co-founder and CEO of Vanta, joins Eric Newcomer to talk about the scandal that shook the compliance world. Her $4 billion competitor Delve was caug...
Ed Zitron Unfiltered on OpenAI, Anthropic & Why the Whole Thing Is a Con
Ed Zitron is back, and he's making his strongest case yet that OpenAI and Anthropic are running a deliberate con on the public. In his second appearance on the Newcomer Podcast, Ed Zitron sits down with Eric Newcomer to break down why he believes there is no real ROI in AI, how Sam Altman and Da...