As the increased use of artificial intelligence necessitates connectivity, it will continue to become inextricably linked to the digital network landscape. When people talk about artificial intelligence, they usually focus on algorithms, chips, or data centers. But there’s a less visible piece that determines whether any of it works in the real world: digital networks. AI doesn’t live in one place. It moves. It learns. It responds in real time. And all of that depends on the networks that carry data among devices, clouds, and people. In many ways, telecommunications and cable operators are the digital networks that make up the transportation system of the AI economy—the highways, railroads, and air traffic control that make intelligence usable at scale for businesses and consumers.

In this episode, Shane interviews Roger Entner, one of the most respected analysts in telecommunications and digital infrastructure. Roger is the founder of Recon Analytics. He advises companies on strategy and public policy in telecommunications, technology, AI, and media. Previously, he served as senior vice president and head of telecom research at the Nielsen Company. He’s spent decades studying how networks evolve, how policy shapes investment, and why connectivity is central to innovation. Compute may create intelligence, but networks deliver it, from mobile and broadband to the next wave of AI-driven services. His decades of experience in the telecommunications industry give him the depth of expertise to discuss the future of artificial intelligence in this space.

One of the most important cybersecurity laws in the country quietly expired last October with no sign of reauthorization on the horizon. Instead, the conflation between the 2015 Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has led to a political standstill that will only have negative impacts on American cybersecurity. What implications will not reauthorizing CISA 2015 have on national security? And how much risk are we taking on by letting protections for information sharing between the private sector and the government lapse?

In this episode, Shane Tews is joined by Caitlin Clarke, Cristin Flynn Goodwin, and James Andrew Lewis. In this conversation, they unpack how confusion between the 2015 information-sharing law and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) makes Americans vulnerable to foreign cyberattacks, how rescinded liability and FOIA protections are already slowing down cyber defense, and why speed matters more than ever as AI accelerates malicious actors.

How should we address the governance gap between central banks controlling money and the oversight of cryptocurrency? How can decentralized crypto networks and centralized monetary authorities collaborate? And what’s next for digital finance?

To explore these questions, Shane Tews is joined by Milton Mueller, Karim Farhat, and Vagisha Srivastava from the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School of Public Policy at Georgia Tech. Mueller is the cofounder and director of the Internet Governance Project at Georgia Tech, where he specializes in the political economy of the internet. Farhat is the assistant director of the Internet Governance Project, focusing primarily on the digital economy and cybersecurity. Srivastava is a PhD student working on internet fragmentation. They are also joined by Nicoletta Kolpakov, director of the Cirrus Institute. This group’s extensive knowledge makes for an engaging and informative episode.