The anticipation surrounding GPT-5 created a dizzying buzz among tech enthusiasts who were obsessed with the idea that true artificial intelligence, known as AGI, was imminent.

This is Sarah Jeong, features editor at The Verge. I’m standing in for Nilay for one final Thursday episode here as he settles back into full-time hosting duties. Today, we’ve got a fun one. I’m talking to Cory Doctorow, prolific author, internet activist, and arguably one of the fiercest tech critics writing today. He has a new book out called Enshittifcation: Why Everything Suddenly Got Worse and What to Do About It. So I sat down with Cory to discuss what enshittification is, why it’s happening, and how we might fight it. Links: Enshittification | Macmillan Why every website you used to love is getting worse | Vox The age of Enshittification | The New Yorker Yes, everything online sucks now — but it doesn’t have to | Ars Technica The enshittification of garage-door openers reveals vast, deadly rot | Cory Doctorow Mark Zuckerberg emails outline plan to neutralize competitors | The Verge Google gets to keep Chrome, judge rules in antitrust case | The Verge How Amazon wins: by steamrolling rivals and…

A short history of labor.

World, meet Alex, Bill, and Mophat, three workers whose labor was essential to filtering violence and abuse out of ChatGPT.For the first time they’re ready to tell you who they are—and how the work unraveled their lives and their families.https://t.co/QXqCRAcOZX pic.twitter.com/8PjWjihMoD— Karen Hao 郝珂灵 (@_KarenHao) July 11, 2023