Inside a journalist’s year of using AI for (almost) everything
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In this episode of Fresh Air, host Terry Gross interviews tech journalist Joanna Stern about her year-long experiment detailed in her new book, I Am Not a Robot. Stern, a former Wall Street Journal reporter and now NBC News' chief technology analyst, spent most of 2025 outsourcing nearly every aspect of her life to AI—using AI to read her mammograms and ultrasounds, fold her clothes, respond to emails and texts, serve as a therapist and even a romantic partner. While AI proved remarkably effective in tasks like medical imaging and research, it also made glaring errors, such as falsely claiming her pet praying mantis was pregnant. Stern reflects on the emotional intimacy she developed with AI, which terrified her despite its helpfulness. She acknowledges AI’s growing superiority in coding, customer service, and administrative tasks, raising concerns about the future of entry-level jobs and the loss of on-the-job training for young professionals. Yet she remains hopeful that AI can augment human creativity and allow workers to focus on higher-level, human-centered work. The conversation also touches on AI-generated scams, deepfakes, and the unsettling ease with which AI can mimic human interaction. Stern’s experiment reveals both the immense potential and profound risks of AI integration into daily life. Her experience with AI in healthcare—where it detected subtle anomalies doctors might miss—suggests a promising future for diagnostics. But her emotional connection to an AI boyfriend and the eerie realism of AI-generated podcasts underscore the psychological and ethical dangers of over-reliance on artificial intelligence. Ultimately, she argues that AI should not replace humans but serve as a tool to free us from repetitive tasks, allowing us to focus on what makes us uniquely human: creativity, empathy, and judgment. The episode ends with a poignant reflection on the balance between technological advancement and human connection.
AI can outperform humans in specific tasks like medical imaging and research, but it can also make critical errors that have real-world consequences.
Emotional connections with AI, while comforting, can be deeply unsettling and raise ethical concerns about human intimacy and psychological dependency.
AI is increasingly capable of replacing entry-level jobs, threatening the on-the-job training that young professionals rely on to learn their craft.
AI should be used to automate repetitive, low-value tasks, freeing humans to focus on creative, strategic, and emotionally intelligent work.
The rise of AI-generated scams and fake content highlights the urgent need for digital literacy and critical thinking in the age of synthetic media.
…and 3 more takeaways available in PodZeus
Introduction: The Experiment Begins
Terry Gross introduces Joanna Stern, a former Wall Street Journal tech reporter and current NBC News chief technology analyst, whose new book chronicles her year-long experiment of outsourcing nearly every aspect of her life to AI. The episode opens with a brief news segment on geopolitical tensions in the Strait of Hormuz, setting a tone of rapid change and uncertainty, which mirrors the theme of technological disruption.
AI in the Body and Home
Stern describes the physical devices she wore and used throughout her experiment, including AI glasses, a recording bracelet, sleep bands, and neck pendants. These devices recorded her conversations, transcribed them, and provided real-time summaries, effectively outsourcing her memory and attention. She reflects on the surveillance implications and the surprising usefulness of passive listening.
AI in Healthcare: Mammograms and Ultrasounds
“AI is spotting cancers that humans would not spot at this point in time, cancers that either are very small and they wouldn't see or cancers that because they've looked at all of this data, the AI knows that this doesn't look right and it looks similar to another scan we've seen in our model where it did turn out to be cancerous.”
AI as Therapist, Lover, and Podcast Host
“It was one of the most terrifying experiences of the year. And we've talked about a lot here, right? AI looked at my breasts. AI drove me. I put my life in the hands of AI. But yet the thing that terrified me the most was the emotional connection that I could somewhat develop with a computer and that it was natural, that it was easy to talk about my problems.”
AI in Journalism and the Future of Work
“If you're taking away that doorway, how are people going to learn? How are people going to get hired? I think that is a serious problem, probably in a whole lot of different professions.”
“It was one of the most terrifying experiences of the year. And we've talked about a lot here, right? AI looked at my breasts. AI drove me. I put my life in the hands of AI. But yet the thing that terrified me the most was the emotional connection that I could somewhat develop with a computer and that it was natural, that it was easy to talk about my problems.”
“AI is spotting cancers that humans would not spot at this point in time, cancers that either are very small and they wouldn't see or cancers that because they've looked at all of this data, the AI knows that this doesn't look right and it looks similar to another scan we've seen in our model where it did turn out to be cancerous.”
“If you're taking away that doorway, how are people going to learn? How are people going to get hired? I think that is a serious problem, probably in a whole lot of different professions.”
Host
Guest
AI
other
Joanna Stern
person
Terry Gross
person
ChatGPT
other
David Attenborough
person
Wall Street Journal
organization
Life on Earth
media
NBC News
organization
Mount Sinai
organization
Gemini
other
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