PODCAST · technology
Ctrl-Alt-Speech
by Mike Masnick & Ben Whitelaw
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly news podcast co-created by Techdirt’s Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation’s Ben Whitelaw. Each episode looks at the latest news in online speech, covering issues regarding trust & safety, content moderation, regulation, court rulings, new services & technology, and more. The podcast regularly features expert guests with experience in the trust & safety/online speech worlds, discussing the ins and outs of the news that week and what it may mean for the industry. Each episode takes a deep dive into one or two key stories, and includes a quicker roundup of other important news. It's a must-listen for trust & safety professionals, and anyone interested in issues surrounding online speech. Follow us on Instagram, YouTube, and Bluesky. If your company or organizat
Episodes
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No Good Feed Goes Unpunished
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week’s episode, Mike is joined by Mike McCue, founder and CEO of Flipboard, and a long term Silicon Valley exec and entrepreneur. Together, they discuss: Reddit is...
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Like Herding Chats
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: The Official Sonic Discord Server’s Launch Went About As Poorly As You’d Expect (Kotaku) Vladimir Putin's Forkiverse (Search...
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Going to the Ballot Bot
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week’s episode, Ben is joined by Katie Harbath, Meta’s former director of public policy for global elections and now founder of technology policy firm Anchor…
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Some Assembly Required
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: Trump dismisses concerns about AI risks at UN, says he won't rein it in (PBS News) A.I. Gone Rogue? Trump Proposes Not New…
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No Child Left Online
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: What is in the EU's planned KIDS Act? (Reuters) Proposal for EU KIDS Act - 'EU Keeping Internet Digital Spaces Accountable and...
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Duty of Careful What You Wish For
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: Australians will be able to switch off social media algorithms under planned legislation (BBC News) Australia’s social media…
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License to Spill
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: FBI Probes Service Selling 153M+ Drivers Licenses (Krebs on Security) Introducing ChatGPT for Teens: Built for learning, backed...
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Move Fast and Settle Things
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: Meta Just Paid Nearly $17 Billion To Make Sure It Gets To Write The Kid Safety Rules For Every Other Social Media Platform...
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School of Hard Blocks
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by Chris Messina, inventor of the #hashtag in social...
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Watermark My Words
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: Claude will apply invisible watermarks to AI text and images (The Verge) Claude-inspired copypasting (LinkedIn) Anthropic...
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In the Modi for Takedowns
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: India summons Meta executives over briefly restricted Modi Facebook post (Reuters) ‘No explanation given’: Arvind Kejriwal…
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Zuck Starts Throwing His Weights Around
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: The U.S. Is About to Design an AI Regulator. Here’s How to Get It Right (Council on Foreign Relations) Mark Zuckerberg Says…
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Live at TrustCon 2026
Our third annual Live at TrustCon recording of Ctrl-Alt-Speech! Ben was back this year! Mike and Ben were joined live on stage with Kat Duffy, senior fellow for digital and cyberspace policy at the Council on Foreign Relations and Zoe Darme, Director for Trust, Knowledge and Information Products…
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Spotlight: PwC’s Dan Hays on the future of Trust & Safety
In this sponsored Spotlight episode of Ctrl-Alt-Speech, host Ben Whitelaw speaks to PwC’s Dan Hays at TrustCon about the firm’s recently published Trust & Safety Outlook report. They discuss: How AI is simultaneously creating new risks and reshaping the tools used to address them; What the rise…
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Putting Some Meat On The Bans
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Niklas Eder, co-founder and co-CEO of User Rights…
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Sell Me Lies, Sell Me Sweet Meta Lies
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: ‘It’s not like we knowingly have bad ads’: Meta on ad fraud, teen safety, and why AI will not replace agencies (The Media…
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Making the Best of a Ban Situation
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Cori Crider, executive director of the Future of...
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Teaser: The Ctrl-Alt-Speech Reading List
In a special bonus episode for our Patreon supporters, Mike and Ben discuss some of their favorite must-read books about online speech, platform power, and content moderation. This free teaser covers their first two picks: It’s Complicated by Danah Boyd and Behind the Screen by Sarah T. Roberts.…
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Close Your Apps and Think of England
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Jen Weedon, a T&S veteran of Meta and Niantic. She...
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Cupertino d'État
In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: Tech bosses threatened with prison if they fail to protect children (The Times) Apple and Google given three months to ban nude images on children's devices (BBC News) Keir Starmer’s social media ban for under-16s could backfire, experts warn...
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Generous to a Default
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: New 13+ Content Settings for Teen Accounts Expanding Globally on Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger (Meta) Meta Expands Safety...
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Deus vs. Machina
Become a Ctrl-Alt-Speech supporter to get extended episodes of the podcast plus the chance to submit stories for us to cover. In this week's episode, Mike and Ben cover: The Boring Internet (Terry Godier) Orkney Library & Archive (Bluesky) Silicon Valley takes its AI pitch to the pope (Politico)...
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Message in a Bottleneck
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by civil liberties lawyer Jennifer Granick. Together they discuss: Kickstarter rolls back its mature content policy after outcry (Engadget) Apple gives update on the App Store…
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The Human Element in the Room
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by First Amendment lawyer Ari Cohn. Together they discuss: Pennsylvania sues AI chatbot as state lawmakers wrestle with stricter regulations (Pennsylvania Capital-Star) Children...
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Age Against the Machine
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by Jess Miers, law professor at University of Akron School of Law. Together, they discuss: AI Chatbots: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) OpenAI’s Sam Altman apologizes to...
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Celebrating 100 Episodes & Launching Our Patreon
In this special episode, Mike and Ben reflect on 100 episodes of the podcast, followed by an important announcement: we’re launching a Patreon and making some changes to Ctrl-Alt-Speech! Starting on May 28th, Patreon members will get early access to extended weekly episodes with in-depth coverage...
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The Silence of the LLMs
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: The Darkest Web (BBC) Federal agencies skirt Trump’s Anthropic ban to test its advanced AI model (Politico) Anthropic Opposes the Extreme AI Liability Bill That OpenAI…
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Honey, I Shrunk the Kids’ Internet
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Fadzai Madzingira, a digital policy expert with a decade of experience at Meta, Salesforce, Ofcom and currently Twitch, where she leads the policy, outreach and education…
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Age Old Questions
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: It's official: Australia's teen social media ban isn't working, yet (Crikey) Social Media Minimum Age - Compliance update (eSafety Commision) Blunder from Down Under...
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For Meta or Worse
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: How London become a T&S hub (Everything in Moderation) Everyone Cheering The Social Media Addiction Verdicts Against Meta Should Understand What They’re Actually Cheering…
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Money for Nothing and Clicks for a Fee
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Gamblers trying to win a bet on Polymarket are vowing to kill me if I don’t rewrite an Iran missile story (Times of Israel) Maybe Turning War Into a Casino Was a Bad Idea?...
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Writing Some Wrongs
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Grammarly turned me into an AI editor against my will and I hate it (Platformer) Grammarly has disabled its tool offering generative-AI feedback credited to real writers...
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The (Content Moderation) Eras Tour
In a special episode of Ctrl-Alt-Speech, Ben and Mike discuss (with apologies to Tay-Tay) the three eras of content moderation in the media and what comes next. Their conversation builds on Ben’s essay in the soon-to-be-published Trust, Safety, and the Internet We Share Multistakeholder Insights…
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Let Fly the Claudes of War, with Casey Newton
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Casey Newton, founder and editor of Platformer and co-host of Hard Fork, a podcast that makes sense of the rapidly changing world of tech. Together, they discuss: After a…
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Panic! At The Discord
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Dr Blake Hallinan, Professor of Platform Studies in the Department of Media & Journalism Studies at Aarhus University. Together, they discuss: On Section 230’s 30th Birthday, A...
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FAFO: Claude Goes High Brow With Its Super Bowl Ad & "Constitution"; OpenAI Scrambles
In this special bonus for Ctrl-Alt-Speech listeners, we're cross-posting an episode from the Future Around And Find Out podcast hosted by Dan Blumberg with guest Kwaku Aning. This week Dan and Kwaku dig into: The uncanny valley that is AI agents and Moltbook—the "Reddit" that agents built for...
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C'est la Vile Content
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: House Judiciary Releases EU X Fine Details (House Judiciary X Account) New Report Exposes European Commission Decade-Long Campaign to Censor American Speech (House…
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Think Globally, Stack Locally
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike is joined by Konstantinos Komaitis, Senior Resident Fellow for Global and Democratic Governance at the Digital Forensics Research Lab (DFRLab) at the Atlantic Council. Together, they...
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This Episode is Broadly Safe to Listen To
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: My year with a flip phone (Financial Times) Claude’s Constitution (Anthropic) From the CEO: What’s coming to YouTube in 2026 (Youtube) BBC to show programmes on YouTube in...
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We’ve Hit Grok Bottom
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: UK, Canadian watchdogs press on with probes into Elon Musk's Grok chatbot (Reuters) Musk’s xAI limits Grok’s ability to create sexualized images of real people on X after...
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Spotlight: Five Years of the Oversight Board, from Experiment to Essential Institution
In this sponsored Spotlight episode of Ctrl-Alt-Speech, host Ben Whitelaw talks to Oversight Board co-chair Paolo Carozza (Professor of Law and Concurrent Professor at the University of Notre Dame, Indiana) and Board member Julie Owono (Executive Director of Internet Without Borders and research...
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Making Our 2026 Bingo Card
In the first Ctrl-Alt-Speech episode of 2026, Mike and Ben look forward at the year ahead and begin building a bingo card of things that might happen. They discuss a short list of possible squares, ask for listeners to contribute more ideas, and go few a through suggestions that have already come...
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Have Yourself a Very Meta Christmas
In the last Ctrl-Alt-Speech of the year, Mike and Ben round up the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation with the following stories: Meta shuts down global accounts linked to abortion advice and queer content | Global development (The Guardian) Facebook is…
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Censors & Sensibility
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Resonant Computing Manifesto Support Techdirt’s Uncompromising Coverage, Get Our First Commemorative Coin (Techdirt) US Ambassador Slams EU Tech Rules as Musk’s X Hit With...
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Stuck in the Middleware with Youth
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Vaishnavi J, former head of youth policy at Meta and founder and principal of Vyanams Strategies, a product advisory firm that helps companies, civil society, and governments...
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Spotlight: Building Better CSAM Detection with Resolver’s George Vlasto
In this sponsored Spotlight episode of Ctrl-Alt-Speech, host Ben Whitelaw speaks with George Vlasto, head of the Trust & Safety division at Resolver, as the organisation marks its 20th anniversary. Their conversation looks back at two decades of Resolver’s work supporting platforms and…
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You Can't Antitrust Anyone These Days
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Meta wins FTC antitrust trial over Instagram, WhatsApp deals (CNBC) Commission eyes further simplification of tech rules after DSA review (Euractiv) Inside Europe's 'Jekyll...
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Deviation from the Teen
In this week’s roundup of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Ben is joined by Kenji Yoshino, who has the excellent title of Chief Justice Earl Warren Professor of Constitutional Law at New York University School of Law and the Director of the Meltzer...
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New Blocks On The Kids
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: It’s Cool to Have No Followers Now (New Yorker) Introducing Safe for Work? — all about T&S jobs (Everything in Moderation*) Kids Turn Podcast Comments Into Secret Chat…
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Chat Bot Your Tongue?
In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover: Character.AI is banning minors from AI character chats (Financial Times) Strengthening ChatGPT’s responses in sensitive conversations (OpenAI) Senators propose banning…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly news podcast co-created by Techdirt’s Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation’s Ben Whitelaw. Each episode looks at the latest news in online speech, covering issues regarding trust & safety, content moderation, regulation, court rulings, new services & technology, and more.
The podcast regularly features expert guests with experience in the trust & safety/online speech worlds, discussing the ins and outs of the news that week and what it may mean for the industry. Each episode takes a deep dive into one or two key stories, and includes a quicker roundup of other important news. It's a must-listen for trust & safety professionals, and anyone interested in issues surrounding online speech.
Follow us on Instagram, YouTube, and Bluesky.
If your company or organizat
HOSTED BY
Mike Masnick & Ben Whitelaw
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Ctrl-Alt-Speech have?
Ctrl-Alt-Speech currently has 127 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Ctrl-Alt-Speech about?
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is a weekly news podcast co-created by Techdirt’s Mike Masnick and Everything in Moderation’s Ben Whitelaw. Each episode looks at the latest news in online speech, covering issues regarding trust & safety, content moderation, regulation, court rulings, new services & technology, and...
How often does Ctrl-Alt-Speech release new episodes?
Ctrl-Alt-Speech publishes regularly with 127 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Ctrl-Alt-Speech?
You can listen to Ctrl-Alt-Speech on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Ctrl-Alt-Speech?
Ctrl-Alt-Speech is created and hosted by Mike Masnick & Ben Whitelaw.
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