e544 — Are We Bananas?

Photo by Masahiro Naruse on Unsplash Published 23 February 2026 e544 with Andy, Michael and Michael – Stories and discussion on rumoured AI devices, addictive predictives, listening through bananas (or mud), and what happens when VR platforms die? Plus the usual assortment or other things. This week’s episode kicks off with a check in on which tech giants are working on what devices, now? Apple stepping back from headsets but working on glasses and pendants, and OpenAI making some kind of smart Pod for your dumb Home? Then, there’s discussion of the challenges of privacy when LLMs get access to private email and chats. Oh, and if you’re not sure if your AI is an LLM or a sentience, then Anthropic can’t answer that. We hope you’re listening to the show in perfect digital quality, but we’re also interested to know if you’ve tried piping it to your ears through any kind of fruit – let us know. Meta’s fully backing away from VR for Horizon Worlds, and in case Blizzard ever stops making the client software for World of Warcraft, Michael tried an open source version. Finally, don’t let hackers get hold of your brainwaves! (it could happen) These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot. All rights reserved. That’s our story and we’re sticking to it. Selected Links AI Apple AI Glasses OpenAI and Jony Ive device Thank god Microsoft is shoving Copilot AI crap into everything. One gets the sense this isn't going to be an isolated occurrence. From Bleeping Computer: "Microsoft says a Microsoft 365 Copilot bug has been causing the AI assistant to summarize confidential emails since late January, bypassing data loss prevention (DLP) policies that organizations rely on to protect sensitive information." https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-says-bug-causes-copilot-to-summarize-confidential-emails/ — BrianKrebs (@[e-mail]) 2026-02-18T18:24:34.707Z HEADLINE: "Prediction Markets Are Sucking Huge Numbers of Young People Into Gambling" ALT HEADLINE: "All Our Incentives Lead to Bad Outcomes, and Prediction Markets Are Just One Example" https://futurism.com/future-society/prediction-markets-gambling — Mike Elgan (@[e-mail]) 2026-02-16T17:06:59.555Z Episode 80 on prediction marketsClaude isn’t sure what it isI gave Claude access to my pen plotter Audio Audiophiles can’t tell mud from bananas? AR/VR Meta ditching VR for Horizon WorldsOpen Source WoW client Makers Reverse engineering a sleep mask Bonus link Trek-o-rama