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NYC Tech Week, Meet Your AI Overlords (Lovingly)

NYC Tech Week, Meet Your AI Overlords (Lovingly)

Question our existential existence together in our new series AI EXPLAINED

Rob LeFebvre & Kevin Johan Wong
June 13, 2025

AI EXPLAINED

Presented By:

Newsletter Issue #1 – “Live from within the Algorithm”

At last, we’ve emerged from our air-conditioned war rooms and into the sticky, over-caffeinated molasse of NYC Tech Week. The panels are loud, the coffee is worse, and the sidewalks are chock-full of slow-paced walk-and-talk networking events that seem all the rage. In other words, we're home, or New York has returned to being the semblance of home.

But first, why are you finding Rob and I in your inbox? For weeks, we've been building towards this moment. Covering either the topic of the century or documenting our demise as we slowly unleash our AGI overlords. And we at TechTimes are going to digest this in the only way we know how, by espousing our thoughts through writing. We’re reporting from the intersection of brains, capital, and latent LLM dread these last two weeks. From fringe gatherings in Fort Greene to rooftop product demos in Soho, we ask: how does AI show up when everyone’s performing futurism in real-time?

This issue of AI Explained newsletter is presented in partnership with Plaud.ai — creators of the world’s smallest voice recorder and the smartest AI notetaker. Whether you’re in meetings, on calls, or mid-rant in the shower, Plaud captures it, cleans it, and turns it into gold. Check them out → or if you're looking to join in the story and get a free Plaud.ai device, fill in the form here →.

🎤 Voice AI is the new quiet power

n the world we live in, every small decision can set off a chain reaction, much like dominos, influencing the significant events in our lives. Drawing inspiration from the domino effect and some of my old works that have captivated millions of viewers until today, I have redesigned this collection. I am thrilled to share it with you. If you enjoy it, feel free to tag me in your Instagram stories and share your feelings about this collection with others

Photo by Milad Fakurian on Unsplash

We started out by covering the invisible revolution of voice AI. It's probably the most pervasive, precisely because it's the most natural. You probably didn’t notice it, but it’s quietly rewiring how meetings get transcribed, how customer support sounds, and even how we “chat” with banks, airlines, or, depending on your tax bracket, therapists.

But as TechTimes reports, at least voice AI isn’t about replacing people, it’s about reformatting how we work. From sales teams automating post-call summaries to hospitals deploying ambient listening tools that auto-fill charts, AI is here to stay. And when will voice AI make its way into the world of fast food? We're deep in the America matrix, baby.

CHECK OUT THE FULL PIECE HERE →

👩‍💻 The humans behind the machines

Photo by Drew Patrick Miller on Unsplash

Everyone at Tech Week is talking about autonomous agents, but here’s the thing: your favorite AI tools? They’re not as autonomous as you think. Not even close.

We wrote a piece that exposed the vast, often unseen layer of human labor behind AI output, from prompt engineers tweaking tone to reinforcement learning trainers nudging models away from unhinged replies, to thousands of microtaskers quietly labeling the internet at scale. It’s not just machine learning, it’s people learning how to make the machines behave.

On the more humorous side of unintentional human-in-the-loop AI are Builder.ai and Amazon's "Just Walk Out" stores. And it’s not just GPT wrappers. Remember Builder.ai? Touted as a no-code, AI-driven app factory, until it came out that its ‘automated’ build process was powered by a sprawling network of real-life Indian developers, writing code the old-fashioned way. Think The Wizard of Oz, but everyone’s in a WeWork in Bangalore.

Then there’s Amazon’s “Just Walk Out” stores, which promised cashierless magic through computer vision. Turns out that the seamless retail experience was powered by offshore teams in India watching surveillance footage and manually confirming whether you picked up a pack of gum or just stood near it contemplatively. “Autonomous checkout” has never looked more like a late-night call center shift.

So yes, the bots are here, but behind them is an invisible layer of freelancers, contractors, and highly specialized ghostwriters, ensuring your virtual assistant doesn’t book your flight to the wrong continent or tell your landlord you love them. Read more on our deep dive here.

READ MORE ON OUR DEEP DIVE HERE →

TL;DR for the Doomscrollers:

NYC Tech Week is a chaotic, well-dressed preview of AI’s cultural UX
Voice AI is silently reshaping work by automating tasks like notes and meeting recaps.
You can sell a chatbot, but you'd better give it feelings (and fonts)

💌 P.S.

We’re working on something. If you’re building AI that speaks with people, not just at them, drop us a line. We’ve got a platform for you (literally and figuratively).

Until next time,

AI EXPLAINED team