Gadget Lab: Weekly Tech News from WIRED
Technology
Misinformation lives everywhere. False accounts of events, doctored photos, and purposely misleading news stories are quickly shared and passed around on social media, usually by well-meaning people who don’t know they’re sharing incorrect information. It's a big problem in the best of times, but the stakes become much higher during a heated crisis like the current Israel-Hamas war. As the violence in and around Gaza has continued to escalate, people are turning to places like X (aka Twitter) for the latest news on the conflict. But they've been met with a flood of bad info—old videos, fake photos, and inaccurate reports—that researchers say is unprecedented.
This week on Gadget Lab, we talk with WIRED reporter David Gilbert about how misinformation and disinformation spreads across social media, and how recent changes made by X before the Israel-Hamas war have made the problem even worse. We also talk about how the proliferation of generative artificial intelligence tools is making fake photos and videos look more believable.
Show Notes:
Read David and Vittoria Elliot’s WIRED story about how disinformation is getting worse on X. Read David on the role misinformation played in coverage of the recent Gaza hospital explosion. Also read David’s story about how posts by X owner Elon Musk are seemingly making the platform’s misinformation problems worse.
Recommendations:
David recommends the book A Heart That Works by Rob Delaney. Mike recommends Bono’s memoir Surrender. Lauren would like you to send her workout playlists. (She prefers Spotify.)
David Gilbert can be found on social media @daithaigilbert. 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.
C’ES la Vie
Abortion Pill Orders Are Soaring
Live on Stage: Reid Hoffman and Fei-Fei Li
Oops, All Recommendations!
Taylor Swift’s Pro-Russia Doppelganger
Blue Bubbles Versus Green Bubbles
Journalists in Studio Getting Coffee
Geoffrey Hinton: ‘It’s Far Too Late’ to Stop Artificial Intelligence
How Three Teens Broke the Internet
Oh, the Humaneity
Happy 1-Year Muskiversary
23andMe and You
Business Wars: Living in an Artificial World
Searching for a Better Google
Meta’s Sound and Vision
Alexa Gets an AI Makeover
Your Life, Your iPhone
We Robloxed So You Don’t Have To
I Love You, I Hate You, Don’t Call Me
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Insight Story: Tech Trends Unpacked
Zero-Shot
Fast Forward by Tomorrow Unlocked: Tech past, tech future
The Unbelivable Truth - Series 1 - 26 including specials and pilot
Lex Fridman Podcast