Taylor Lorenz’s Power User

Is AI destroying human literature? 
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You might have seen the viral videos of a "book guillotine" slicing the spines off thousands of books in a massive warehouse. Last week, the internet exploded after videos surfaced showing Anthropic cutting the spines off thousands of books to train AI models. Social media quickly filled with claims that AI companies were destroying rare books, erasing human knowledge, and building a future where artificial intelligence replaces libraries.
 
But is that actually what happened?
In this episode of Power User, I sit down with copyright attorney Derek Slater, who worked on the original Google Books project, to explain why Anthropic is actually scanning books and destroying physical copies afterward, how decades of copyright law (not just AI) created this bizarre situation, and how we can actually save the books!!
 
We discuss:
Why Anthropic buys books by the pallet

Whether rare books are actually being destroyed

How Google Books handled digitization

Why copyright law incentivizes destroying books

The Internet Archive lawsuits

Fair use and AI training

The future of libraries in the AI era

Why the viral outrage missed the bigger story

Nantucket's "No Influencers" Sign Started a Gender and Class War, Here's What It's Really About
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Last week, the internet exploded after a small Nantucket shop posted a simple sign reading "No Influencers." What started as a local controversy quickly became a national debate about influencer culture, old money, quiet luxury, class, authenticity, and the future of social media.
In this bonus episode of Power User, I'm joined by freelance reporter Andrea Domanick, co-host of The Culture Journalist podcast and newsletter, to unpack the most cursed discourse of the summer. We get into why this fight is not actually about one sign or one influencer, and who gets to define status, taste, and authenticity in America's most exclusive spaces. 
We explore:
The Four Winds Craft Guild controversy

Paige Lorenz and Dairy Boy

Quiet luxury and the old money aesthetic

The rise of influencer culture

Why "influencer" has become a loaded word

The history of influencer bans

Social media, class, and cultural capital

Why privacy has become the ultimate luxury

If AI becomes the foundation of search, education, government, and everyday life, the fight over who controls AI outputs could shape the future of the internet. 
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The Trump administration is making a major push to reshape AI in a way that could affect ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, and every AI company building the future by trying to ban "woke" AI. 
 
In this episode of Free Speech Friday, TechDirt's Mike Masnick joins me to break down the FTC's proposed AI policy, what it actually says, and how it will pressure AI companies to change their answers, withhold information, give misleading information, and what this battle means for free speech, censorship, AI regulation, and open-weight models.
We discuss:
• Trump's AI Executive Orders • The FTC's new anti-woke AI policy proposal • ChatGPT and AI censorship • Free speech and the First Amendment • OpenAI vs Grok • Open-weight AI models • Government regulation of artificial intelligence • The future of AI in America

The biggest fight in AI isn't about chatbots anymore, it's about who gets to control the future of artificial intelligence. 
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Is Anthropic trying to lock down AI before their IPO, or are open-weight models genuinely a threat to global safety? In this episode of Power User, Matthew Berman, co-founder of the tech media outlet Forward Future, breaks down the explosive debate rocking Silicon Valley and Washington DC.
 
After the release of China's powerful Kimi K3 open-weight model, OpenAI's autonomous hacking benchmark, and a growing push from Anthropic to restrict open AI models, Silicon Valley has erupted into one of the biggest technology battles in years. 
  
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Microsoft, Meta, Google, IBM, Hugging Face, Mozilla, Palantir, Dell and dozens of other massive technology companies have all come together to publicly back open weight AI models, while Anthropic argues against them. 
Whoever wins will control the future of the tech landscape for decades to come. 
I break down: 
What open weight AI actually is
How Kimi K3 changed the AI race
The OpenAI benchmark that escaped containment
The Hugging Face security incident
Anthropic's campaign against open models
Why Jensen Huang and all of Silicon Valley is pushing back
The growing debate inside Washington over regulating AI
Why this fight could determine who controls AI for decades

The Secret Court Case That Could Destroy Super PACs Forever
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You've been told that Citizens United created Super PACs… but that's not the full story. In this episode of Free Speech Friday, Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Lessig reveals the obscure lower court ruling (SpeechNow v. FEC) that actually unleashed unlimited billionaire money into American elections, and the groundbreaking legal strategy that could end Super PACs by 2028 WITHOUT overturning Citizens United.
Backed by an unlikely coalition including Mark Cuban and Reid Hoffman, Lessig and his group Equal Citizens helped Maine voters pass a historic ballot initiative banning Super PAC contributions. Now the case is headed to the First Circuit Court of Appeals on July 29, with famed Supreme Court litigator Neal Katyal arguing that nothing in the Constitution protects billionaires' "right" to buy elections. If the appeal succeeds, this case could reach the Supreme Court by 2027 and revive existing federal limits on campaign contributions nationwide.
We break down: ▶ Why SpeechNow v. FEC — not Citizens United — created the Super PAC system ▶ How the Menendez bribery indictment exposed the "no quid pro quo" myth ▶ The originalist argument designed to win over conservative justices ▶ Billionaire outside spending's explosion from 0.3% to 19% of election money ▶ The AI Super PAC trying to block Congress from regulating artificial intelligence ▶ Why an Article V constitutional convention may be the backup plan ▶ What happens if the First Circuit rules on July 29, and the road to SCOTUS
If you care about money in politics, campaign finance reform, and getting billionaire money out of elections, this is the most important legal fight you've never heard of.