Decoder with Nilay Patel · Thursday, September 24, 2026
During an interview discussing Meta's new AI agent and Connect conference, host Nilay Patel highlighted Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg's recent interview on The Sours podcast. Patel criticized Zuckerberg's framing of Meta's glasses as equivalent to smartphones, arguing that their passive surveillance capabilities necessitate different social norms and etiquette.
“So I think it's very important to note that the entire tech industry really wants passive surveillance devices to fit into the same category as phones.”
“This is a physical action that is meaningfully different than having a pair of glasses on your face with a light and just passively recording someone.”
“So I think one of the reasons the entire tech industry is so eager to fit these passive surveillance devices into the same kind of mental framework of smartphones is so that no one has to question whether there should be a new social etiquette for these devices.”