FreakTakes

Eric Gilliam

Telling stories from the golden era of science and engineering. Each episode unpacks the story one great accomplishment from technical history. Check out my written posts on Substack: https://freaktakes.substack.com/ My Twitter: https://twitter.com/eric_is_weird

Episodes

  1. 18/07/2025

    An Interview with Jano Costard, Head of Challenges at SPRIN-D

    A FreakTakes interview with Jano Costard, Head of Challenges at SPRIN-D — known to some as “a German ARPA.” The interview will give listeners a peak inside the SPRIN-D experiment, from the perspective of one of its leaders.

    1h 37m

  2. 12/06/2025

    An Oral History Interview with ARIA CEO Ilan Gur

    An in-depth interview with ARIA CEO Ilan Gur. The interview unpacks the exciting metascience experiment that is ARIA, as well as some of the personalities, inspirations, and modes of thinking driving their work.

    1h 58m

  3. 09/01/2024

    Chuck Thorpe - How CMU Became an Autonomous Vehicle Powerhouse

    This video is a recording of an interview done with Chuck Thorpe for the FreakTakes Substack. Chuck was a long-time researcher and PI at Carnegie Mellon. He primarily engaged in computer vision research that would go into the earliest driverless vehicles. By the late 1980s, CMU's vehicles were able to autonomously make short trips around the Pittsburgh area. By 1995, a CMU vehicle drove cross country 98.5% autonomously. This all happened in a period when most universities were becoming worse at managing complex systems projects. This interview dives into how exactly CMU pushed against the grain and turned itself into an autonomous vehicle research powerhouse.

    1 hr

  4. 25/04/2023

    Tales of Edison's Lab

    Many have strong opinions on Thomas Edison. From great inventor to great fraud, the opinions run the gamut. But few truly understand what life was like in Edison's lab, how he viewed himself, and what his goals really were. This episode recounts tales from the icon's one true place of comfort: his lab. My writing: freaktakes.substack.com My Twitter: https://twitter.com/eric_is_weird

    57 min
  • 4 Episodes

About

Telling stories from the golden era of science and engineering. Each episode unpacks the story one great accomplishment from technical history. Check out my written posts on Substack: https://freaktakes.substack.com/ My Twitter: https://twitter.com/eric_is_weird

Information

  • Creator
    Eric Gilliam
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2025
  • Episodes
    4
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Eric Gilliam
  • Show Website
    FreakTakes