The most interesting conversations in American life now happen in private. This show is bringing them out of the closet. Stories no one else is telling and conversations with the most fascinating people in the country, every week from former New York Times and Wall Street Journal journalist Bari Weiss.
In our mission to analyse capitalism and technology from the experiences of workers, we would be remiss if we ignored a crucial form of labor that people – across the political and social spectrum – too often pretend does not exists unless they want to condem it: sex work. We’re happy to be joined by Liara Roux – sex worker, activist, and author of the new book Whore of New York: Confessions of a Sinful Woman – to talk about her time working with clients in Silicon Valley and the broader politics, perceptions, and platforms of sex.
• Pre-order Liara’s book: penguinrandomhouse.com/books/673854/whore-of-new-york-by-liara-roux/9781913462567/
• Follow Liara: twitter.com/LiaraRoux
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Hosted by Jathan Sadowski (twitter.com/jathansadowski) and Edward Ongweso Jr. (twitter.com/bigblackjacobin). Production / Music by Jereme Brown (twitter.com/braunestahl)
New language within a bill headed towards governor Pritkzer allows for rewording of government positions to make them more gender neutral. In Chicago, that means a change in title for the position from alderman to alderperson.
Today on Reset, we bring on a politics reporter and an alderman to speak on the significance of the change in language.
For more Reset interviews, subscribe to this podcast. And please give us a rating, it helps other listeners find us.
For more about Reset, go to wbez.org and follow us on Twitter @WBEZReset
Donald Trump says he’ll be reinstated as President this August as his former National Security Advisor calls for a military coup, Republicans continued their coordinated assault on voting rights, and Democrats win big in a New Mexico special election. Then, Stacey Abrams talks to Jon Favreau about the fight for democracy, her latest book, and more.
Corporations had a lot to say about racial justice last summer. They made statements. They donated millions to civil rights organizations. They promised to address their own problems with diversity and representation.
OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(08:18) – Shiba Inu story
(25:35) – Regulation
(29:48) – Crime
(34:54) – Proof of stake vs proof of work
(47:43) – Miner extractable value
(53:19) – Scaling
(54:42) – Bitcoin blocksize wars
(1:00:51) – Hard fork vs soft fork
(1:04:34) – Craig Wright
(1:11:18) – Scaling: Sharding
(1:18:07) – Scaling: Rollups
(1:26:30) – Polygon and other Layer 2 technologies
(1:34:11) – Merging PoS and PoW chains
(1:43:49) – Lessons learned from Ethereum 2.0 failure incidents
(1:52:35) – Bitcoin vs Ethereum
(1:58:30) – Dogecoin
(2:04:38) – Elon Musk
(2:07:15) – Chainlink
(2:10:35) – Charles Hoskinson and Cardano
(2:18:08) – AI safety
(2:23:07) – NFTs
(2:25:57) – Scams
(2:35:34) – Longevity
(2:44:55) – Does death give meaning to life?
(2:50:38) – Lex and Vitalik speak Russian
(2:54:29) – Meaning of life
(2:59:48) – Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History and WWII
Today’s episode looks at crypto in geopolitical context, focusing on:
A follow-up on the ransomware surge, with experts suggesting that it’s not about crypto payments but about the “ransomware-as-a-service” distribution model
A look at why a Russian opposition leader is moving his supporters to crypto fundraising exclusively
A review of a series of reports from Chinese state-owned media that, while trying to convince citizens to stay away, nevertheless reinforce they still have agency to own and trade crypto
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Image credit: Igor Kutyaev/iStock/Getty Images Plus
On June 1, 2021 the Supreme Court decided City of San Antonio, Texas v. Hotels.com L.P. The issue was whether, as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit alone has held, district courts “lack[] discretion to deny or reduce” appellate costs deemed “taxable” in district court under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 39(e). In a 9-0 opinion authored by Justice Alito, the Court affirmed the ruling of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. The Supreme Court held, “Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 39 does not permit a district court to alter a court of appeals’ allocation of the costs listed in subdivision (e) of that rule.” Charles Campbell, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Associate Professor of Law at Faulkner University’s Jones School of Law, joins us today to discuss this decision and its implications.
On this episode, Peter Meyer joins contributing editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss his career as a journalist turned educator and the innovative way he’s improving literacy in his low-income school district. To subscribe to his news quarterly, visit www.paideiatimes.org.
Researchers map where the riskiest areas are for viruses to jump from bats into humans. Also, synthetic bacteria with unnatural DNA, and the origin of the humble watermelon.
David Hayman of Massey University in NZ and colleagues have published in the journal Nature Food a study highlighting areas of the world where zoonotic transmission of coronaviruses are most likely to occur between humans and bats of the type most suspected of being the origin of the current SARS CoV2 virus. There are a lot of hotspots combining fragmented forest, livestock farming, human habitation, and populations of horseshoe bats. It is, as he says, just part of the evidence suggesting a natural origin in the areas of northern south-east Asia and southern China.
Jason Chin, Wes Robertson and team at the Laboratory of Molecular Biology have been tinkering with their work on synthetic organisms. By rewriting the dictionary of DNA itself, their new molecular alphabet is able to encode far more elaborate and innovative functions than even nature has ever produced. Publishing this week in the journal Science, their latest bacterium is even capable of being completely immune to viral infection. But as they describe, this could be just the start of what the new technology could deliver in terms of new materials and medicines.
Meanwhile, Susanne Renner has been tracking down some of human beings’ earliest genetic engineering. The selection and breeding of various fruits to produce sweet, sweet watermelon was long suspected to have originated in Africa, the question was where and when? Using a combination of genetic sequencing, ancient Egyptian art, and early modern paintings, she describes to Roland how what we now know as Sudan likely played a part in the story.
(Image: Horseshoe bat Credit: Getty Images)
Presented by Roland Pease
Produced by Alex Mansfield