Turn the Lens with Jeff Frick

Carolina Parada and the team have delivered Gemini Robotics, Google DeepMind's vision-language-action (VLA) foundation model. Gemini Robotics provides the general-purpose 'understanding' enabling robots to go from pixel to action. How do you teach a machine to understand the physical world well enough to move through it, manipulate it, and help people in it, when every case is a corner case, never experienced in training? Embodied AI. AI with arms and legs and the ability to interact with the real world. Gemini Robotics is designed to generalize across platforms, so it works for robots that walk, roll, fly, and swim, with any end-effector, be it a hand, gripper, pincher, or suction cup. Gemini Robotics is designed to generalize across tasks and skills to respond to just about any request that the robot receives. I sat down with Carolina to explore Google DeepMind's approach to embodied AI at the Humanoids Summit 2025, hosted and organized by ALM Ventures at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California. Carolina has been working on teaching machines to recognize and respond to the environment in more human-centric ways, starting with speech and voice, then computer vision, and now robotics. At the heart of her work is Gemini Robotics, a foundation model that takes the multimodal reasoning capabilities of Gemini and extends them into the physical world. It's a VLA, vision-language-action, model. Going beyond "how many cars are in this image?" to "dunk the ball" when playing with a basketball toy. Embodiment-agnostic, it can adapt to control any robot: manipulators, mobile platforms, and the quickly developing humanoids. Data, Constitutional AI, teleoperation, video training, good candidates for the top concepts covered. But what impressed me more was her description of bringing new people in to experience the robots, inevitably asking the robots to do things they've never heard before, or interacting in Japanese or another language, only to have the robot respond appropriately, creating 'delight, surprise, and joy.' That is a robot future I can get excited about. Please join me in welcoming Carolina Parada to Turn the Lens, in collaboration with Humanoids Summit and ALM Ventures. This interview is a collaboration between Turn the Lens and Humanoids Summit, and was conducted at the Humanoids Summit SV, Computer History Museum, Mountain View, California, December 12, 2025. Humanoids Summit is organized and hosted by ALM Ventures Carolina Parada: Embodied AI, Gemini Robotics, Delightful Surprise | Turn the Lens with Jeff Frick Ep 44 Learn more about Humanoids Summit at http://www.humanoidssummit.com YouTube https://youtu.be/BUH1CysZX6A Trancripit and Show Notes

Andra Keay, Managing Director of Silicon Valley Robotics, has been at the forefront of robotics research, commercialization, and policy for decades. A self-described "techno-pragmatist," Andra has her pulse on the robotics industry, in the San Francisco Bay Area and around the world. Importantly, she is conscious and intentional to try and get ahead of the big issues we face down the road with the societal shifts coming as millions of robots, humanoid and other form factors, populate more of our world and interactions. Andra is pro RoboTopia, and against an AI apocalypse. And robotics offers an insight into the world of AI, as they are AI with arms and legs, removed from the black box behind the screen, but out among us, where the consequences of a hallucination or miscalculation can have physical implications. Industrial robots were behind barricades and safely screens. Next gen Humanoids will work in homes, senior care facilities, factories, and other places with direct interaction with people. Andra is a frequent industry speaker, and in fact, we've shared a few panels together over the years, but this is the first time she's visited Turn The Lens so we could really get into it without restrictions. And the timing couldn't be better. Humanoid robots are having their moment. Figure just raised a $1B Series C, with a $39B post money valuation. Customers are moving from pilots to commercial engagements. Capacities are compounding at an exponential rate. Oh Yeah, and did I mention LLMs and their like have transformed the robot training paradigm. The next great wave of technological change is upon us. Humanoid Robotics, AI with arms, legs, and an ability to navigate the world, and do things. If you follow no one else, follow Andra to keep up on this part of our rapidly changing world. Subscribe to Robots & Startups on Substack. Andra Keay: Robo-Pragmatist, Humanoids, Technological Shifts, Laws | Turn the Lens with Jeff Frick, Ep42 #AndraKeay #Humanoids #Robotics #AI #TechnologyShifts #Automation #Ethics #RoboticsLaw #TurnTheLens #JeffFrick #FutureOfWork #Innovation #TechPolicy #Simulation #GenerativeAI #GenAI #RoboticsIndustry #FiveLaws #Society #Interview #Podcast #TurnTheLens YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lp46AO7aC_4&list=PLZURvMqWbYjk4hbmcR46tNDdXQlrVZgEn Transcript and show notes - https://www.turnthelenspodcast.com/episode/andra-keay-robo-pragmatist-humanoids-technological-shifts-laws-turn-the-lens-ep42

Trump 2.0 starts tomorrow. 2025 started 19 days ago. Remember Project 2025? Might be a good time to study up on the subject, at least the basics. Not ready to read the full 920 pages? Google NotebookLM can help. I encourage you to upload the PDF yourself, and start asking questions. Sharing mine to help get you started. This is the Podcast Google NotbookLM created from the source material. Project 2025: Briefing doc, FAQ, Study guide, Podcast | Turn the Lens podcast with Jeff Frick Try it yourself Google NotebookLM https://notebooklm.google.com/ Project 2025 - 920 page pdf https://static.heritage.org/project2025/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISWpI3YH4NE Transcript and Show Notes -

2,500 pages. How can you quickly and easily digest 2,500 pages of material? More than just a summary or table of contents, what if you could dive into the core issues, pull up a timeline, or even create a study guide? That's exactly what you can do with Google NotebookLM, a powerful new free AI tool that requires no training, coding, or even RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) expertise to put the power to work on any assets you please. Simply upload your documents, videos, and other digital assets, start asking questions, and let it do the heavy lifting. And if you prefer a podcast format, NotebookLM can even output a podcast style audio file for you to listen to, making content incredibly consumable. Your favorite podcast hosts explaining it all to you during your daily walk, run, or commute. Recently, a friend introduced me to NotebookLM. At the same time, Jack Smith dropped another 1,600 pages of evidence in four appendices related to the January 6th trial, full of dense assorted text material, tweets, book excerpts, interview transcripts, and pages of redactions to interrupt any sort of consumption flow. Add to that 165 pages in Document #252 and the 845-page January 6th commission report, and I had over 2,500 pages of information to put the NotebookLM to the test. So I uploaded all of it into NotebookLM and started asking questions. But what I've never seen before, and couldn't wait to try, was the ''generate a podcast.' feature. As a longtime media producer, podcast host, and guest, I was intrigued. How would it turn thousands of pages into a conversational podcast between a host and an educated guest? I hit "create podcast," and in less than 10 minutes, I had a 15-minute podcast ready to go. I added some simple talking head animation, to give a face to the voice, and hit 'play. (the male host sounds a bit like Leo Laporte, legendary long time tech podcast host). The result is simply amazing. The podcast is a very digestible way to consume the key points from the all those PDF files. It is an early version, and there are places where the sentence gets divided between the voices a bit more then necessary, but I think you'll be amazed. Jump to 03:54 to get to the start of the podcast, within a podcast. AI and GenAI are accelerating its impact on our lives faster than we realize. These tools are not novelties, they're reshaping the way we work, consume, and generate media, often making information more accessible. We must understand and familiarize ourselves (or master if you can) with them before they get even further ahead. Don't wait. Start integrating tools like this into your workflow today. Experiment. See what AI can do for you. We are getting supercomputers in the palm of our hands, that we can talk to, no coding required. Google NotebookLM: AI, Ingest, Create a Podcast | Turn the Lens with Jeff Frick Ep38 #AI #GenAI #NotebookLM #January6th #Podcasting #DataAnalysis #GoogleAI #AIInnovation #JackSmith #Vote #Automation #Supercomputing #TrialAnalysis #Jan6 #DigitalTransformation #TechTools #ContentCreation #Interview #Podcast #TurnTheLens YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi03_cHeuNQ&list=PLZURvMqWbYjk4hbmcR46tNDdXQlrVZgEn Transcript and Show Notes https://www.turnthelenspodcast.com/episode/google-notebooklm-ai-ingest-create-a-podcast-turn-the-lens-ep38

Jason Sacks joined the Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) 18 years ago, around the same time I began my youth sports journey with my oldest child as he entered kindergarten and joined AYSO, the American Youth Soccer Organization. When done right, youth sports provide countless character-building opportunities in each practice, game, and activity. To quote NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young, these character traits include teamwork, overcoming challenges, working toward a bigger goal, resilience, risk-taking, success, failure, self-confidence, mental toughness, self-control, respect for others, and more. Unfortunately, when done wrong, youth sports not only miss the opportunity to help kids grow but can also be negative and detrimental, with long-term harmful impacts. The Positive Coaching Alliance (PCA) is dedicated to getting it "done right" by improving the youth sports experience for kids, families, and organizations across the U.S. With a wealth of resources, actionable lessons, and tools, PCA equips coaches, parents, leagues, and schools with strategies they can immediately use to help deliver a better experience for kids. Please join me in welcoming Jason Sacks to 'Turn the Lens'. Jason Sacks: Youth Sports, Culture, Character | Turn the Lens podcast with Jeff Frick, Episode 36 Transcript and Show Notes - Click Here https://www.turnthelenspodcast.com/episode/jason-sacks-youth-sports-culture-character-turn-the-lens-ep36 YouTube - Click Here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzvyybqfUvs&list=PLZURvMqWbYjk4hbmcR46tNDdXQlrVZgEn #Kids #Youth #Sports #Coaching #Development #Character #Culture #PositiveCoaching #YouthSports #SportsDevelopment #CharacterBuilding #ParentalExpectations #PositiveCoachingAlliance #MultiSportAthletes #CoachingTips #YouthDevelopment #Tools #Teach #Development #HealthyCompetition #Sportsmanship #InclusiveSports #SportsLeadership #HonorTheGame #YouthMentorship #ParticipationTrophies #SportsPsychology #CommunityBuilding #GrowthMindset #SportsCulture #PCA #Interview #Podcast #TurnTheLens

Debate. There has been lots of talk lately about debates, winners, and losers. I didn't have any debate team friends in high school or college, and have not been to a real debate. If there are winners and losers, that would imply that there are rules, as victory in most competitions, from basketball to chess to Family Feud, is based on performance within the constraints, the rules, of the competition. If basketball players carry the ball, or travel, or employ moving screens, then it's no longer basketball (at least according the National Junior Basketball Association rules my kids played under). So I went to Anita Iverson, my OpenAI ChatGPT to find out more about the rules, procedures, and what determines winners and losers in competitive debate. Here's what I learned about debates from Anita. OpenAI ChatGPT 4 v4: Debate, Criteria, Responsibilities, Integrity | Turn the Lens with Jeff Frick Ep34 YouTube - Click Here Transcript - Click Here #Debate #Rules #Procedures #CodeOfConduct #Criteria #Responsibilities #Integrity #NSDA #WUDC #DebateRules #LincolnDouglas #Argumentation #Ethics #Evidence #EvidenceIntegrity #Rules #Regulation #Moderators #ModeratorsResponsibilities #CNN #Scoring #ScoringCriteria #Competition #PublicSpeaking #Cross #CrossExamination #EthicalDebating #ModeratorRoles #Judge #JudgingFairness #DebateFormats #CriticalThinking

Welcome back for another episode of 'Turn the Lens' with our ongoing conversations with ChatGPT. We've been hitting the heavy topics of ethics and explainable AI. And I think there are some real challenges there that, that we have to overcome. But I want to do something a little bit more fun. So in this episode, we're going to do a different type of project, not so heavy and deep, but hopefully, have some fun with ChatGPT and get some answers. So here we go. ‍YouTube - Click Here Newslwetter with Prompts and Replies - Click Here Episode Page - Click Here

(Trains are backing up, so had ChatGPT write this after ingesting the transcript, full disclosure, transparency) ChatGPT Join us for an enlightening episode of the "Turn the Lens Podcast" with host Jeff Frick as we delve deep into the evolving world of artificial intelligence with our special focus on OpenAI's ChatGPT 4 v2. This episode, titled "OpenAI ChatGPT 4 v2: Explainable AI, Audit, Ethics, Hallucinations, Transparency," covers a wide array of critical topics that are at the forefront of AI technology and its integration into society. In our discussion, we explore the concept of Explainable AI (XAI) and why transparency in how AI models make decisions is crucial for trust and accountability. We tackle the complexities of auditing AI, discussing the challenges of tracing AI decision-making processes, especially as they become more dynamic and less transparent. The conversation also covers the ethical dimensions of AI development, including the prevention of biases and ensuring fairness across AI systems. Furthermore, we discuss the phenomenon of hallucinations in AI—instances where AI systems generate misleading information—and the implications for users who rely on AI-driven decisions. Our expert guest provides insights into the ongoing efforts to make AI systems more understandable and the practical steps involved in auditing these systems. This episode is a must-watch for anyone interested in the intersection of technology, ethics, and policy, providing valuable insights into the challenges and advancements in AI governance. Tune in to expand your understanding of these pivotal issues and engage with us as we dissect the future of AI. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and leave your thoughts on our discussion at Turn the Lens Podcast on your preferred platform. OpenAI ChatGPT 4 v2: Explainable AI, Audit, Ethics, Hallucinations, Transparency | Turn the Lens Podcast with Jeff Frick Ep30 YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEvYnh2V7S4&list=PLZURvMqWbYjk4hbmcR46tNDdXQlrVZgEn #ChatGPT #AI #ExplainableAI #Audit #Ethics #Hallucination #Transparency #Leadership #Innovation #TechTalk #TechnologyTrends #AITransparency #AIethics #Ethics #DataScience #MachineLearning #ArtificialIntelligence #AIAudit #AIHallucinations #AITechnology #DeepLearning #ExplainableAI #GenAI #AGI #Audit #Hallucinations #Disclosure #Interview #Podcast #TurnTheLens