Alex and Ellis talk about using Claude to organize their digital lives, the rise of agent platforms like Dreamer, and a mysterious AI hardware sighting in San Francisco. Then they’re joined by Liz Reid, VP and Head of Search at Google, to talk about what it’s like running one of the most influential products on the internet during the AI boom. They discuss how AI overviews are changing search, the difference between Google Search and the Gemini app, whether agents could become the main users of the web, and how Google is responding to the rise of tools like ChatGPT. Liz also reflects on her two decades at Google, the early days of Google Maps, the challenge of fighting AI-generated slop online, and how she thinks about the future of the open web and search itself.
Chapters:
00:00 BERT, MUM, and early Google search AI
00:17 Introducing Google Search chief Liz Reid
00:56 Welcome and travel plans
02:34 South by Southwest plans
03:36 Sneakers and tech fashion
05:33 Using Claude to organize files and tasks
08:21 Dreamer and the AI agent marketplace
12:10 The viral AI orb mystery
14:16 Meet Google Search chief Liz Reid
21:43 AI Overviews and changes to Google Search
32:32 Hiring in the AI era
33:42 Agents reshape the web
35:11 Google adapts to change
36:01 Why Google is moving faster
38:29 Ideas that only work now because of AI
42:17 Search vs. Gemini north stars
45:36 Will Google’s AI products converge?
47:48 ChatGPT vs. Google Search usage
53:25 Personal intelligence and AI personalization
56:14 Fighting AI slop and indexing creators
01:04:35 Google I/O preview and closing thoughts
