The King Charles III Space Station is broadcasting almost live, with Aeron at ground control ready to cut the transmission at the first sign of blackpilling. Tom and Calum inaugurate a new format of news roundups and shorter interviews with a mixed report from the home planet: manufacturing is growing, the pubs keep disappearing, and Britain still needs to find itself an Antarctic patrol ship.
First through the airlock is Sam Hogg, better known as @discoplomacy, to make sense of an AI news cycle that now produces a week’s worth of developments before the Americans have even woken up. What does “pacing the frontier” actually mean? How worried should we be about Anthropic’s wet lab? And can Britain’s AI Security Institute turn its expertise into influence — preferably while sending Silicon Valley a substantial invoice? There is a defence of British eccentrics abroad, a discussion of the things a biologist knows that a chatbot doesn’t, and an unexpected detour into the post-Assad narcotics economy.
Then Jesse Heasman of Soapbox.vc arrives with reasons to be bullish about Britain. Venture money is flowing into chips, robotics, defence, satellites and companies that require actual factories. From DeepMind’s orbit around King’s Cross to the industrial spaces of southeast London, something appears to be happening. The questions are whether we can supply it with affordable electricity, keep the manufacturing here, and build something that survives whatever happens to the AI bubble.
Elsewhere, geothermal strawberries prompt a cautionary tale about playground equipment and the conservation of energy; the hosts discover a principled enthusiasm for protected bats; and a five-pound eBay purchase with a CIA backstory takes pride of place aboard the station.
The episode explores:
HMS Protector, Britain’s Antarctic presence, and why we might need rather more than one replacement boat
Lincolnshire’s geothermal greenhouses, data-centre waste heat, and the unhappy lesson of PlayPumps
Team Bat, Team Newt, and the importance of consistent principles
AI models that know they’re being tested, biological risk, and the limits of automating tacit knowledge
Britain as a finishing school for Anthropic executives — and why its expertise shouldn’t come free
OLIX, Cusp AI, Kraken and Open Cosmos: following the money into things Britain can build
Fuse Energy, expensive electricity, and the political work behind an industrial revival
Howard Hughes, a sunken Soviet submarine, and the station’s newest manganese nodule
Follow Sam at @discoplomacy and read Jesse at soapbox.vc.
Sponsored by Isembard. Interested in owning and operating a factory in Britain, America, Germany or France? Contact franchise@isembard.com.
