Taylor Lorenz’s Power User

Before you call for more body cameras watch this!! 
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Body cameras were supposed to hold police accountable. So why is police violence still rising? Why are cops almost never convicted using body cam footage? And why are Democrats (the same politicians who just tripled the ICE budget) now demanding that ICE agents wear body cameras?
In this episode of Free Speech Friday, I sit down with Alec Karakatsanis, lawyer and author of the fantastic book Copaganda, to uncover the hidden history of police body cameras. While body cams are presented as a technological fix to deeply rooted institutional problems, they actually have the opposite effect.
We talk about how the multi-billion dollar police surveillance industry originally struggled to get funding for these cameras, how Steven Spielberg donated money to put cameras on cops, how the narrative completely shifted, and how Big Tech is cashing in.
Big Tech interest groups and reactionary non-profits are spending millions to push mass surveillance and censorship laws. My work is 100% self-funded. This series is not backed by any advertisers or tech giants. 
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(This episode originally aired February 2026)

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Some of Silicon Valley’s wealthiest tech elites have a radical new dream, to abandon modern democracy completely and build their own sovereign nations. At the heart of this movement is a millionaire VC named Balaji Srinivasan and his vision for what he calls the "Network State".
In this episode of Power User, I speak with freelance journalist Sam Venis about his firsthand reporting at Balaji's Network School. We expose what really happened inside Balaji’s experimental new government set up inside Forest City, a massive, abandoned ghost city in Malaysia. From aggressive NDAs and toxic black mold to clashes with local governments and authoritarian power trips, Sam breaks down his firsthand investigation into tech’s most bizarre and dangerous exit strategy.

Have you noticed surveillance cameras appearing in your community?
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For decades, the US-Mexico border has served as a proving ground for invasive, next-generation surveillance tech like AI surveillance towers, cameras hidden in traffic cones, license plate readers, drones, and spy balloons. 
Now, those same tools, autonomous AI watchtowers, hidden license plate readers (ALPRs), thermal imaging trucks, and military aerostat blimps, are moving into domestic US cities, suburbs, and neighborhoods. 
On this week's episode of Free Speech Friday, I’m joined by Dave Maass, director of investigations at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, to discuss his reporting on border surveillance and the expanding systems that track people’s movements.
Dave explains what he found during his latest trip along the border, how Anduril’s AI-powered surveillance towers operate, and why people living in border communities are caught in these systems. We also discuss Flock Safety, Axon, automated license plate readers, and the connections between local police surveillance and federal immigration enforcement.
Who can access the data? How is it used? And what happens when technology promoted as a way to catch criminals is used to investigate protesters or monitor ordinary people?
In this conversation, we cover:• AI border surveillance and the “virtual wall”• License plate readers concealed in roadside objects• Surveillance balloons, thermal cameras, and police drones• How military technology moves into domestic policing• Phone location data brokers and social media monitoring• Privacy, free speech, and the “nothing to hide” argument• Public records requests and community efforts to challenge surveillance
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Explore the Atlas of Surveillance:https://atlasofsurveillance.org

Why are so many people falling in love with ChatGPT, and what do sensational headlines about AI relationships leave out? 
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In this episode of Power User I speak with technology journalist Bridget Todd about AI companions, chatbot romance, emotional attachment, and the Big Tech companies behind these increasingly intimate interactions.
Bridget’s new audiobook, Love at First Prompt, explores how people use AI for friendship, romance, grief, and emotional support. In this episode, she shares what she learned from interviewing dozens of AI companion users and why the viral ChatGPT marriage story was MUCH more complex than it appeared.
We also discuss loneliness, AI girlfriends and boyfriends, privacy, chatbot sycophancy, and the risks facing vulnerable users. Who profits from artificial intimacy? Can AI offer comfort without replacing human relationships? And are proposed chatbot restrictions addressing the problems people actually face?
Bridget also discusses how AI figured into her own grieving process, and we talk about what the growing AI intimacy business means for adult content creators, human labor, and digital rights.

AI agents are rapidly becoming the next major way people interact with the internet. They can browse websites, research topics, compare prices, schedule reservations, respond to emails, shop and increasingly take actions on our behalf. But as your agent is going off and scanning websites, or gathering information from government services, should it have to reveal who you are?
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In this episode of Free Speech Friday, I speak with Shoshana Weissman, digital director and policy advisor at the Abundance Institute, about the growing fight over AI agents, online anonymity and identity verification.
 
We discuss the proposed Stealth Bot Prohibition Act, why lawmakers are looking at AI agents and web scraping, how identity requirements could affect journalists, researchers, developers and ordinary internet users, and what happens if every AI agent eventually becomes tied to a person's real-world identity.
We also talk about the difference between legitimate security requirements in areas like banking or healthcare and much broader systems that could create a new identity layer across the internet.
 
As AI agents become more powerful and more common, the rules being written now could determine whether they remain private tools acting on behalf of users, or become another way to track what people research, buy, read and do online.
Topics: AI agents, artificial intelligence, AI privacy, online anonymity, AI regulation, identity verification, web scraping, internet privacy, surveillance, government regulation, digital identity, the Stealth Bot Prohibition Act, the future of the open internet.