Understood takes you deep inside the seismic shifts reshaping our world right now. From online porn and crypto chaos to the rise of tech oligarchs, deepfake AI, and the broken promises of the internet — we explore the stories that define our digital age with hosts and characters embedded in the heart of the action.
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Season 1 - The Naked Emperor: the rise and fall of bitcoin king Sam Bankman-Fried.
Season 2 - The Pornhub Empire: the story of how a Montreal-founded company came to dominate the adult industry.
Season 3 - Modi’s India: how one man rose from poverty to the peak of political power.
Season 4 - Céline: the surprising cultural, political and business alchemy that created a superstar.
Season 5 - Who Broke the Internet? The internet sucks now, and it happened on purpose.
Understood takes you deep inside the seismic shifts reshaping our world right now. From online porn and crypto chaos to the rise of tech oligarchs, deepfake AI, and the broken promises of the internet — we explore the stories that define our digital age with hosts and characters embedded in the heart of the action.
We value your input! Fill out our listener survey here.
Season 1 - The Naked Emperor: the rise and fall of bitcoin king Sam Bankman-Fried.
Season 2 - The Pornhub Empire: the story of how a Montreal-founded company came to dominate the adult industry.
Season 3 - Modi’s India: how one man rose from poverty to the peak of political power.
Season 4 - Céline: the surprising cultural, political and business alchemy that created a superstar.
Season 5 - Who Broke the Internet? The internet sucks now, and it happened on purpose.
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In 1998, the United States Congress tried to tame the wild internet with a new law: the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. But buried in its fine print was a provision that would end up giving tech giants ultimate legal protection and control, and stop innovators from fixing what's broken. Host Cory Doctorow traces how a law written for a different era led to the arrest of a researcher, became the playbook for Meta's enshittification, and lets platforms degrade your online life today — protecting them while they do it.
Guests in this episode include Seth Schoen and Pam Samuelson. Archival recordings feature Dmitry Sklyarov, Bruce Lehman, Al Gore, and Steve Sipress.