The New Mainstream Media

There were so many human beings in so many historical situations. Some of them so much more terrible and dangerous than anything we face. Soldiers and seemingly lost causes and metaphorical soldiers and metaphorically seeming lost causes. Who just kept going with one thought i'm not gonna let the bastards win and sometimes that's all you need. I think i think that i think that should be that should be the new model right get rid of democracy dies in darkness. I'm not gonna let the bastards win. I am and it may and emphasize the eye and anyone who's watching you're the eye. I'm Charlie Wazelle and welcome to Galaxy Brain and happy new year. Hopefully you've all navigated the dead week successfully and had a happy and safe holiday season and and thanks for for joining us here as you start your new year. Today's episode is going to be a little bit different. I am joined by my colleague David from who. Has also joined me in launching a youtube show and podcast this year so we talked about. A whole bunch of different things but but mostly a lot of inside baseball about what it's like to enter this ecosystem how. Platforms like youtube are. Constantly pushing creators of all kinds towards more extreme ideas. Eyes tend to blame the algorithm. Data and I have a little bit of a debate because he is more on the personal responsibility side of the coin but it's a good conversation that i think. Really gets at what it's like to be making media here in 2025 2026 all the difficulties but there's one part of the conversation though. It's really stuck with me over the over the past couple days after we recorded it which is this idea of. First, jettisoning the phrase mainstream media particularly because as David notes. What we normally talk about and think about as the mainstream media is actually. It's sort of a misnomer now when you look at the broader media ecosystem and you see the Joe Rogans of the world the Candace Owens the. But before he was assassinated Charlie Kirk all of these different people Tucker Carlson. A lot of these folks on on the right but but also you know podcasters across the ideological spectrum. Who are independent there there are huge audiences here and these people are really able to. You know command news cycles and and they have a lot of power and and especially a lot of distribution and. What we think of as the mainstream media they professionalized media is is actually in a lot of ways. A little bit on it's on its back foot right there's a lot of distrust of these institutions there is a lot of. There are a lot of people who simply just don't pay as much attention to them as they used to or or or there is a backlash against some of them and and what what David talks about in this conversation that i think is is really interesting. Is the idea that the you know formerly what called mainstream media is actually in a position to be more insurgent now what we what we think of as the mainstream media should actually put a chip on its shoulder and and operate with a little more force and forcefulness and and not you know trying to come from from the. The the mushy middle you know both sides in 36,000 foot view and instead stand up for what it believes in stand up for. The idea of fact based journalism and and to treat it as as a bit of a radical act and that makes me think a little bit about an article i recently read this week in the Washington post. Where a publisher a one of one of the guests on on our show i think episode two. Gives an interview to the Washington Post about his year in journalism and says that he feels like reporters have forgotten that they have very cool jobs that they are essentially. These days like you know detectives right it's our job to you know hunt things down find new information. And and i think that that Pablo is really good at coming to journalism in 2025 and now i'm sure 2026 with this chip on the shoulder with a little bit of that you know insurgent understanding now he's part of he's an independent journalist he's not part of that that legacy media anymore. But i i think that this is something that is going to stick with me in 26 this idea to adopt a little bit of the mantle in a in a responsible way of. People who feel like they're not you know tethered to the the old traditions to really i don't know be a little bit more combative i think about trying to tell things truthfully and and announcing. You know all the like the crap that's that that's out there that's trying to mislead people i think there's there's a way in which you can you can get tied up in in legacy institutions a little bit and and and maybe even just lose sight of. Of the fact that we could be a little bit more pugnacious a little bit more combative and and that as journalists are jobs are jobs are cool our jobs are. Our our worth doing with with some pride and and and not apologizing for for all that kind of stuff so that's that's something that's that's really going to stick with me but this conversation but before we get to it i just wanted to do a little looking forward it's as you're listening to this it's. Now 2026 and i just wanted to set the set the table a little bit with not really predictions necessarily but but things that i'm i'm thinking about and looking at for for this coming year and i think the first one is that. If 2025 was really a year where politics became even more influencer heavy even more internet heavy meme heavy brain rot heavy a i swap heavy. I think that that is going to intensify in 2026 i think you know as we get move towards the midterms things are going to heat up and i think that politics is still really on this trajectory. Of. Just being terminally online the the memes the brain rot i i think back to this youtube channel that i found this fall. That is all a i slop generated videos of the sort of far right mega universe it's Elon Musk and Baron Trump and JD Vance Donald Trump and Melania Trump. And and all these characters the AI versions of them singing like opera songs about Charlie Kirk the the famous one of this is called we are Charlie Kirk but these videos are. In name right and they're absolutely stupid. They're sort of i it's hard to tell if they are parody or if they sort of Christian nationalist. Theme around them is is something that's actually being made by people who you know are trying to push a message it's sort of post irony it's so ironic. But they have tens of thousands in in some cases hundreds of thousands and and even even millions of views but i think a lot about. That kind of content and and that brain rot style that has pervaded politics as something that i think we're just going to see further and further intensify and and move into the main stream of culture and you're going to have a lot of journalists continue i think. At these legacy institutions to sort of struggle to put it into into context right like how much to take these things of face value versus how much to to just. You know think about whether it's just shit posting and and that brings me the next part which is this this inscrutable rise of political violence I think that this year we saw quite a bit of that from Charlie Kirk's murder to horrific shooting in Minneapolis. But we have seen a a number of incidences in in 25 of this memified political violence. This idea that that shooters are are really that there is an online culture there right that is very meme heavy that's very based in in in community and fandom around shooters and and and acts of violence and I think that. I think that we're going to continue to see that but again we're going to continue to see people especially the media really struggle with how to cover this because. As i've written this past year a lot of these people know these shooters know exactly the universe that they're dropping their acts of violence into right they know that people are going to search online for breadcrumbs and they can leave all these inscrutable memes and clues and things like that and that those things will be. Processed and interpreted by the internet in ways that only add to their fame so I think if there is something that I think. Broadly people in journalism who are listening can do is is to not necessarily take these things at face value to understand that this is a now somewhat mature online ecosystem of of people who are committing violence for the lulls kind of and it's. I think it's dangerous and I think if if we start covering that better in the media I think it actually you know might have some very. Small but important impact on on how these things are conducted or and whether people you know try to glorify themselves in this way. So I think we're going to continue to see that even though that's that's a bit of setting here these predictions aren't super uplifting. The next thing though sort of building on on what is going on online is is I think we're going to continue to see the decline of. Text in importance I think the short form video is still rising can still rise and I think that. It's something that is that is sort of interesting when I say the decline of text obviously one of the biggest producers of text now is is gender to be I right. These tools that people are using to generate a lot of text that that is flooding the web was synthetic information. I think that that that kind of text is going to increase a lot and it's going to it's going to you know dilute and continue to dilute that it's going to I think continue in education to sort of degrade the the value of actually writing the pros yourself writing the emails yourself writing the whatever yourself. And so I think that we're still in a period where this is going to decline I think I think it could sort of boomerang back right you could sort of hit hit the the trough there and then and then people are going to start to get really sick and tired. Of chatbot generated text and that sort of thing but I think that we are still going to have a year in 26 where we see a lot of anecdotes about kids. In schools reading less writing less I think there's going to be a lot of hand-ranging a lot of it probably very understandable about that and I think that. That there's we're still in this period of of of digital reversal on that where these these online tools are are causing a I don't know I think a bit of a crisis for for printed media or or text. For the time being building on that another thing I'm thinking about right now is you know generative AI and I don't know about I don't have a good take on the AI bubble the boom the bust what exactly happens this year I think there's going to be a lot of precarity a lot of people anxiously watching the market watching these companies watching their revenues and I think even people who. Don't love artificial intelligence and companies like open AI say I think there's going to be a lot of people watching to make sure that these companies are are continuing like the bottom's not going to fall out of these companies right I think a lot of people are going to watch anxiously because if that does happen you know that could lead to. Some some some market correction and and you know possibly trigger some some problems for Wall Street. But I don't know exactly what's going to happen with that I think you're going to see a lot of investment and data center spend in the same way continue I think that precarity is going to be there but where I do see some actual movement is in AI and politics I think that the. Political space is very primed for someone to take the mantle of the tech lash but in a very like AI specific way in a way that I think is both economic and populist in terms of the idea that you know some of this financing you know maybe unsustainable that you know the people who are going to be left holding the bag are going to be you know normal folks and retail investors and and. And that you know this is all. That these AI companies these tech companies are playing a very dangerous game and that Washington is sort of so you know supporting it or standing by so I think there's an opportunity for someone to come in there right something that I have thought about a lot is if there is a bubble burst. In the you know the generative AI world in the in the tech world that leads to trouble in the markets and there is some kind of backstopping from the federal government for the Trump administration where they say you know this is a national security issue and we. You know desperately need to make sure that you know we continue to compete with China on AI and we're going to do whatever we can to stop these companies backstop these companies. And keep the flow and bail them out. I think that could trigger a serious populist backlash a serious backlash on on people who who feel already like things are rigged and I think there's an opportunity for a politician to come in there and really take them mantle of that or a movement. Another former galaxy brain guest Max Reed has a great post on this on his sub stack about this idea of platform temperance and in a movement that is sort of rooted a little bit in in touching grass but also in you know finding a framework that's both that's economic that's cultural that's regulatory for approaching technology but not in the way of the you know the the late twenty tens tech lash which sort of didn't seem to work all that well and that brings me to the last thing which is. Another backlash and I think it's I think we're going to see in twenty twenty six. A a scrolling backlash that's sort of what I'm calling it I'm doing a little reporting on this and. I think there are a lot of indicators out there right now that. People are really tired of their phones. And tired of the algorithmic internet and tired of this. Idea of I am being manipulated all the time my attention is being directed towards things that I actually don't want to spend my time. Looking at or you know my time has not been used in a way that I feel very good about at the end of the day and I think we are seeing a lot of. You know very small indicators that that that culturally we're we're getting fed up with this I think you know one of the indicators and we'll see how this plays out over the second semester of the school year but. In New York the phone ban in New York public schools you know that there's some anecdotal reporting that's come out that that suggests it's it's been a very positive thing at least in schools right. There are a number of from concerts to clubs to bars and restaurants places that have become no phone zones and there's been a you know a broad anecdotal support for those types of spaces in that they are really helping people. You know shed this this device that is making them feel bad that is keeping them from. You know being as social as they may want to be and so I think that we're going to see that increase and continue and I think that there will be a culture that will build around it. There there is an article in the sub stack blog blackbird spy plane a couple of months ago that has sort of stuck with me that's basically like scrolling on your phone makes you look like a dork it's just not cool. And I think that I think that you know that type of. Cultural. Signifier that you know you you you look like an idiot you this is this is not an accessory that makes you look cool. I think that that's really coming for our phones and for that you know head head in your device behavior so that's something that I'm looking into and thinking about a lot as we hit 2026 but. That's it that's that's what I got for you just want to say as we as we enter the new year thank you so much for for joining on this experiment with galaxy brain i'm i'm having a really great time so far putting out these episodes I feel like it's helping me use a different part of my brain. And and this is something that that David and I get into here but thank you very much for for liking subscribing commenting sharing sending in your nice feedback and also your constructive feedback to it's been it's been a lot to take in and we got some big things going for for 2026 so. Onward upward and here is me my colleague Dave from but first a quick break. So the Atlantic is today presenting something a little different I will interview today my colleague Charlie was L who has launched his own new podcast on the Atlantic channel galaxy brain will be talking back and forth since the galaxy brain podcast is quite new i'm going to read a little introduction for those of you who don't know Charlie. He joined the Atlantic in 2021 and became a staff writer in 2022 this year he launched his new podcast galaxy brain. Charlie is a graduate of Hamilton College and he's the author of the 2021 book out of office unlocking the power and potential of hybrid work. And we're going to talk about some of the experiences challenges temptations of doing a podcast in this day and age especially for the Atlantic i'm happy to welcome Charlie Charlie congratulations on the new podcast thank you thank you for having me this is great. Alright so we're both kind of newbies i'm like a grizzled veteran with like a three or four month head start ahead of you so that makes me like yeah a frontline soldier but. We both we're both. familiar with being guests on podcast new to hosting yes and it's very different right it is is a is a whole different at least I've found it's completely different animal being on the other side if I if I had known how hard it was I would have been nicer to my hosts exactly exactly yes it's very difficult to construct a conversation. And and and have it actually you know have have a flow and end up in the right place and follow the tributaries of you know of a of a guests you know meandering mind it's it's it's definitely it's fascinating well so here's this thing I so in order to avoid meandering here's how I propose to channel the conversation so that we we achieve something that's I hope useful and interesting for listeners and viewers and maybe something we both ourselves will learn from because one of the things we've had to confront as we enter this is. Unlike old fashioned book writing or even print text based or even print journalism we don't know exactly what your readers want and what they read you know a lot about the podcast audience both video and audio and we also have the contrast examples of other people in the space who demonstrate what viewers and listeners want and don't want. And one of the things we had to confront is the tremendous appetite or apparent appetite for extreme content which flies in the face of what the Atlantic is always trying to provide which is balanced content how do we make sense of that how do we respond to that I mean I think you get a lot of response to if you do a show on was Hitler good yes but we're not going to do the was Hitler good yes show so but how do you cope with the massive incentives to do a show on was Hitler good yeah. Yes I see this as part of a of a bigger. Struggle right that I that I I write a lot about technology about media media ecology the ways that social media has worked or changed or transform society it's a lot of what the podcast is about and so there's there's always like a meta element to everything that I am both doing in my actual work and what I am reporting on and and they tend to feed each other. Right so I look at this as I look at podcasting especially video podcasting and the regular traditional podcasting as in many ways almost the traditional problems with internet based or digital media on steroids we are now because of the issues of discovery because of you know the advent of everything from generative AI to social networks to you know declining readership because a lot of the social platforms have a lot of the social media. So we're going to have you know given up on news to some degree we don't get that same bump from Google we don't get that same bump from Facebook etc it has pushed everything to be so much more algorithmically driven right we are really we try to make the best journalistic products that we can the most responsible ones but the end of the day we are also people who are interested in having that have an impact in the world to reach as many people as possible and these algorithms are really good. So we are tailored more and more and more to promote the most sensational thing the thing that outrageous the thing that shocks the thing that elicits the greatest response and the greatest response of all of those emotional reactions is outrage is fear is shock is anger right so I look at what we're doing right now as having to chase this type of viewership right we are in this attention economy we are basically forced to if we want to be the most people to interact with the thing that we have spent all this time laboring over we have to find a way to frame it right we are all I think a lot of this is like a marketplace right and every vendor is out there needing to you know get people and attract people and so you're you're constantly reaching there and and it's difficult because it pushes people to be the worst versions of themselves and we have to guard against that we can't you know succumb to that like say you know just a random person on the Twitter or X might yeah now you're blaming the algorithm a lot here which is a non-sentient collection of digits and that's convenient is it has no feelings maybe the user the listener the reader is a little bit to blame well there's a very interesting issue that I have always seen right with I hate to blame the reader because the reader is also in in some sense customer and we don't know what no one ever got anywhere by disrespecting the customer at least not in public right let's pretend we're private for a minute absolutely I think that this is a problem people's actual preference and their stated preference is always very different in all consumerism but especially with the news you you see a lot of people both online and in reader surveys of all kinds of different places where I've worked and they say that they want to read more about the you know the vegetables right like each your vegetables type stuff they want to read about climate change more anyone who has worked in a digital media in any case it has access to the metrics can see that stories about climate change very broadly speaking do not perform as well as stories about say Donald Trump or somebody who is constantly stoking outrage so there is this real reader preference stated versus actual right people are clicking on the outrageous things the thumbnail with people's eyes that are you know bulging out and stuff like that and not spending time with that really nuanced headline that is actually quote unquote you know boring but inside is is a very nutritional and dense and smart story well this is not a new thing this has been true as long as there is media I mean I remember a passage in Bruce great novel remembrance of things past where a character says who has a beautiful library full of the hand tool volumes which he never opens and he thinks what if every morning they were delivered to my front door in cheap paper copy of past calls ponces and in that leather bound addition up there which I open once every 10 years there was a description of the dress worn by the Duchess of so and so at the party last night so media is always sensational but but here's to my mind the difference is in 1975 there probably work as many people in the United States who wanted to read or proportionally as many people wanted to rate read read or consume Nazi based content as there were today or anti-Semitic content as there are today but either silently or even explicitly the heads of CBS ABC NBC New York Times Wall Street Journal Washington Post time news week that was that was the media said you know what they want Nazi content they want anti-Semitic content they're not going to get it we're not going to give it to them and we if we 10 people agree we're not going to give them Nazi content then then they have to get it from pretty obscure places but there was there was always that mark there was up there was money waiting for a hundred dollar bill lying on the sidewalk and no one picked it up and we have more competitive marketplace and somebody picks it up this is a little bit though why I blame the algorithms so fully right because the algorithms are also very powerful in terms of broadcasting and boosting the people who are willing to do that thing right that these people don't just come out of nowhere you know they like I think very broadly of the ecosystem that you and I are now a part of right which is YouTube YouTube's great innovation greatest success the thing that has driven it to be a place where you know people are like hundreds of ingesting hundreds of millions of hours daily of a video content is the recommendation algorithm the up next part of YouTube where on the right side of your page it feeds you another video after that recommendation algorithm as my reporting and other people's reporting has shown over the years brings people into a little like people call it the rabbit hole right where you watch something let's say it's just a world war two explanation video right a history podcast of a world war two that's not you know racist or anti-Semitic at all but they're talking about Hitler a lot they're talking about difficult subjects maybe the Holocaust something like that and then you get another video and that video is maybe just you know one tenth of one percent a little more extreme right or someone who's coming from a little bit more of a far right perspective fast forward you can get people down into this funnel and that is an algorithmic boost and that's why I think this is important I sometimes do go down world war two rabbit holes I'm interested in subject like every baby boomer and I find that with the algorithm as I keep going the other is me is increasingly technical content so what was the difference in a 16 inch and a 14 inch naval gun in war two why was the 16 why you know was the 16 inch gun in fact better gets more technical more specific more wonky and I think I'm telling the algorithm you know that's what I want so you know there is a kind of like we say oh we're making it a little more hitlery that yes that's the algorithm but that's the algorithm knowing you you're real self and it used to be that in like in 1975 CBS would say you know what you want stuff that's a little more hitlery than we're serving but you're not going to get it and now the consumer is driving things isn't he or she I think I think I think we're safe to say he's watching the world war two videos I so I agree with that in in part but I think that there are other elements here I was looking a little bit into and I you know we talked a bit about discussing this new media ecosystem and the extremism that it can that it can go towards and I started doing a little more I've been following her career you know somewhat closely but looking a little bit more into Candace Owens and listening to a couple of popular things that she has put out she's obviously in a very extreme voice on the right very conspiratorial and there's a there's a great column a week ago in the New York Times by Michelle Goldberg about Candace Owens and how how she has played into the the conspiracy theory that you know Charlie Kirk was not killed by the man who was arrested and and actually had a summit a media summit with Charlie Kirk's widow Erica Kirk but something that that that Michelle notices in in that piece and I think is very apt is that she Candace Owens draws a lot from the true crime genre which is an extremely popular you know genre of podcast and media now and and plays a little bit towards the digital sleuths on the internet so you know these are people who are you know vigilante investigators right they're taking all the information available on the internet trying to trying to follow the lead like they're you know a detective pursuing a cold case and she does a very good job at that at at bringing people along for the hunt right of information and giving them these breadcrumbs and telling them you know the stories not right and I think that that is that is a part of why people who are looking for that who are looking for you know to play this role of detective or who feel that you know we know we are looking for the world where you know we don't have the full story there's information out there I can piece it together because I you know I have the ability that is where I think the algorithm can intersect with a creator who is trying to manipulate and then it can lead you into a path that gets you into a place that's a little more you know as you put it hitler because I don't think people are necessarily broadly speaking just saying yeah that was good about World War II I I want I want some Hitler now right I think what it what it is is they believe there's a conspiracy that explains something that baffles makes if I go on the internet if I'm having trouble getting the little disc battery into my key fob my car key fob and I'm flummoxed in the written instructions aren't helpful and I go online to find a YouTube video those how do I get the disc disc battery into the key fob if there's someone they're saying leave it on the doorstep and the leprechaun overnight with a little bit of milk and the leprechaun will come and fix the key fob for you like you know what I'm skipping that one right that doesn't sound like it's going to work right so why don't people have that response like the police there's a killing the police have arrested somebody there is a suspect it may not be that person but the but the idea that there's some global collection of conspiracy of leprechauns who did it instead that's pretty unlikely as as it is they will save my key fob for me you know yes I take the point about the digital sleuth thing but at some level people have to have like a common sense meter don't they but what if instead right it was someone who was making a video who was saying you're getting screwed by your car company your car company nickels and dimes you on all of the things when you take it in for service they overcharge you though this big corporation you know they're owned by whatever shadowy people right who who have their own agendas in whatever who are using your money and you know they're funding their indulgent lifestyles and who knows what they're doing right when they take their private planes x y and z and this battery thing is actually a manifestation of this broader thing there's something bigger about the fact that your battery dies too early right on your key fob and that's the thing because it opens up this world to people where they say okay now now I understand like the the unlock in my brain for this y conspiracy theories are so popular now in culture they've always been popular obviously right the you know the the paranoid mind is is is a a fixture in all of history is but especially American history these these theories however strange or or stupid or completely implausible they might be on a given subject they give people an understanding of why the world feels unfair or wrong or bad right and in a moment where there are a lot of people who are struggling who are very disenchanted who feel that there is no predictable pathway to success or that the American dream is out of reach for them even something is small as the key fob conspiracy explains one small bit of why they feel like crap all the time yeah one of the things I have taken from the past from this Trump error the past decade of discussion is one of it's it's a it's a trope it's the same something we are supposed to say that things are increasingly difficult for people that they're not that it's understandable that there's a lot of resentment and anger I find myself maybe I'm just becoming crankier less and less patient with that I mean if you're an American in the year 2020 you live at the apex the summit of civilization never so much material prosperity never so much medical prosperity and and in particular the science of preserving life and health has never been better never approached what you have today so when you see people saying the my conspiracy theory is to reject the gifts of modern medical science and to subject my child to measles so you know what I don't believe it that you're having such a tough time all right anyway if you are having a touch of touch I think that doesn't excuse you and if you're if your response to having a tough time is to deny your child the measles vaccine then your tough time may be a result of your own deficiencies not something that society is do if you're going to do something that call us negligent potentially homicidal to your child you know you're to blame you're the problem it's it's not the bankers it's not deindustrialization it's not the crisis of modernity it's you dumbhead it's you vaccinate your child well first off I fully agree on that is if you are denying your your child vaccines or things like that that is that is on you I'm not I and I understand that there is this fatigue with trying to trying to rationalize the reasons why people are you know falling down these rabbit holes or doing ridiculous things I kind of hold it in my mind slightly differently in which is which is that I'm not seeing everyone is just these absolutely passive observers but I do see people as being relatively easily manipulated right when you combine this idea of I am frustrated I feel I feel bad I can't see you know the progress of you know modernity in this way when you combine that with really savvy manipulators and then a culture that forms around all of that right a tribalism that forms around this that okay it's not only that I'm denying you know I don't believe in vaccines I'm denying this it becomes a group a team a thing you know a cohort a sense of belonging and that is a very strong psychological bond and so it's not necessarily that I'm saying these people don't have any agency or that they can't be blamed for you know essentially endangering the lives of their children or doing whatever awful thing but I see this as like all of these systems making it very hard for people to break out of that mold to do to do the right thing to to go against the grain of those people so while we're talking about ages what are we going to do so here we are we're we're now co manufacturers of this reality and on in a very modest way but there we are we're we're part of it what do we do how do we be forces for good and effective forces for good rather than forces for ill or ineffective forces for good I think that's that that's really really difficult uh something okay something that are uh that are boss uh Adrian LaFrance who's the executive editor of the lannick said on a on a podcast I did with her recently which was about it was we were covering the the the the Epstein files the first dump of all this right and at the very end of the podcast I asked well what what the what the heck did we learn here right we there's all this information and one thing that she said about this the durability of the Epstein conspiracy theory is that people still want the truth right that is it also at the heart of all of this conspiratorial crap that we are dealing with there are a lot of people who have this impulse who want the truth who believe they're not getting the truth and that leads them down these these difficult paths but that is actually our job right we are purveyors of in you know in an ideal world of that we are trying to harness this we are trying to do that so you know I almost think in some ways that the whatever you want called the mainstream media you and me whatever it is we need to take that back I think more strongly than we do right we can be a little milk toast about this and say you know oh well I think we need to say like if you're on a hunt if you're trying to be a digital vigilante investigator then you need you need to be looking here for the truth which is here and we are the people who are going to you know do that job one of my New Year's resolutions is I am going to not only refrain from using but actually actively object to the phrase mainstream media because if many times more people watch Candace Owen or Joe Rogan then CNN or the PBS News Hour if conspiracy media get much bigger views than the Atlantic or even the New York Times they're the mainstream the crack pots are the mainstream and so I think one of the one of the great unlearnings we have there is a kind of a tapidity a lukewarmness that prevents what I would call the people are trying to be honest and a great passion that animates those who are either consciously or unwittingly or gallibly dishonest and so one of the I think we need to embrace and this is what I'm trying to do is an idea you know there's something a little countercultural about what we're doing yet we're doing what in 1975 would have been considered mainstream or fact-checking we're running things past lawyers if we make a mistake we correct them I died last week two weeks ago I made a mistake on air I said something based on the information we had available at the time about the Bondi beach killing that there was there were eyewitness reports that the police had been slow and I quoted those or site reference those and a week later when that turned out not to have been correct I corrected myself and that those those kinds of things those habits but we need to understand that those are not the mainstream the mainstream is paranoia conspiracy deception it is a countercultural act to stand up for integrity and truth and self-correction I love this because I fully do agree and I think that this this posture of you know having to apologize because you're a part of an institution or something like that I like the idea of of reversing that quite a bit I think it's it's very it's very strong I think I think to something that I have noticed that has been very very frustrating to me and I've talked about this on on a past episode a little bit is this idea that so many of the things inside let's just call them media institutions or professionalized media right that are that are there in order to build trust among among readers and and viewers or or credibility right the idea of of fact checking the ideas of editing right those things are have been truly weaponized against right like if you look at something I've I've always found about the the the right wing media as it's built up in the in the Trump era that's fascinating is the absolute lack of editing you know they will do live streams that are you know three four hours long there's Joe Rogan's not explicitly the right wing media but like his podcast as a template you know those episodes are often three hours plus long there's this idea of of no editing of no fact checking of no polish in any sense and the idea that behind it from them is we're giving you everything unvarnished right look at all these other people who are editing things what are they hiding where actually that's you know that's BS that's it's just quality control I think you should again not to be pedantic but this is not a problem just for right wing media there are left wing versions of this and there will be more that I think the extreme right got a certain head start and I think that made that will not endure if this is the future you know one of the things but you raised this point and it makes me think and this is something that again that the Atlantic can really contribute so when modern buildings begin to be constructed in the late 19th century you start with a steel frame and then you put on around it all this limestone and woodwork to conceal the the steel frame and the modern our architecture you know let's take all that limestone off and show people the steel frame will have the steel frame with the glass and they can see the integrity and honesty of the building and realize why the building stands up to all these many stories I think that's a little bit the way professionalize media that's a good term respond which is the steel frame was the structure of it was reporting and research and editing and fact checking and legal legal checking and then it was hidden behind you know the the writing that that that was the limestone and maybe we need to take the limestone off and show people a little bit more how the building works and bring people into the process and how we think why we choose stories the way we do why we choose not to do certain stories and how we do how we do our method maybe that's one of the things that we're doing this this very day to talk a little bit about you know every time we invite somebody we're making a selection who do we choose who do we not choose and in the podcast world you know that well such and such a person when he he or she appeared on such and such a show got so many hits and this other person who I'm thinking of inviting has never been on a show or when they are on a show they got many fewer hits I'm not nonetheless nonetheless I'm going with person number two and maybe I need to talk more with my audience about why I've chosen this person who is credible and knowledgeable and whom I believe has something to we're saying and not the other yeah this is this is always the tension here right because and I and this is a little bit too where I you know I do bring the algorithms in into play here I think that the algorithms are optimized for this like illiberalism this sensationalism this like and I think right now that is something that is there's far more prevalent on the right like the these algorithms are helping them in an outsized way so that's why I don't always know like you know when you say we're going to be seeing a lot more of this type of content from the left I think that that's true that that left is going to try to build out an ecosystem like this but it feels far less like it has a very specific political valence and much more of a valence of a kind of nihilism and I and that's obviously can be you know just as dangerous as anything well but it it's it's not nihilism it's it's um uh anti-institutional of a different kind and maybe that's one of the things we can't I mean I one of the things that um when you and I talked in advance about what we were going to do and I'm taking showing the cladding we did talk in advance about what the show would be some of the lessons we've learned from doing this but one of the I've tried some things that haven't worked and one of the things I've I've learned about this medium is it's it's not television it looks like television but it's not the way television interviews went or go to the extent there is still television is there would be somebody who is important who had something they didn't want to say on television and there would be a professional questioner whose job was to get the person who didn't want to say the thing to say that thing and if you watch like the Sunday morning shows this is the game and it's most classic form and afterwards that the politician can congratulate himself because he went on TV took 11 minutes of everybody's time and said nothing of interest and that that's a win for him and and I thought you know what that doesn't work anymore if you don't want to say something interesting I don't know why I'm asking people to spend 11 minutes or in my case 40 minutes with you I'm only going to ask you if you if you are going to play the game if you're if you say you know what I'm here to communicate so I've learned invite fewer politicians because they're still in that mode of the value to them is what they don't say and I've also sort of stumbled along and I didn't intend this but you get there's a lot of video that is about producing the 90 second clip where the people explode and yell at each other and if you watch the whole thing it's all like it's like a ritualized performance of building up to the moment of confrontation and the confrontation produces the viral video and I was I you know what I don't find that tremendously useful either that what I'm increasing and looking for is people have something they want to say they agree with me that it should be said we're not fighting each other about whether to say it and we're also not looking to have a confrontation we're looking we're looking at this as a kind of cumulative iterative building process that leaves the user maybe not shocked at the end but knowing something more than the user did when the user started this is why I've always in my career I rarely my version of this is rarely wanting to interview CEOs there's always been this big yeah have them on the thing they have everything to lose in this in this situation as you said they're playing a a prevent you know defes they're running out the clock whatever you want to call it right on the whole interview I I agree with that do you one thing I'm curious about since you have more experience in this realm is do you think about weeks and weeks of it weeks yeah I know hey on the internet those we're talking dog ears here right do you think about the the parasocial relationship like are you thinking about building a relationship with you know audience members people who are interested in in coming for you know for your thoughts but also just like investing in that that relationship with them in and and bringing them into your world into your mind into how you think it did you look at it that way or do you say no today like this is the subject I want people to learn about and I just think about it on that on that very granular episodic basis very much the former very much the former because I think when I think of this as being called counter cultural the podcast is this I'm saying this is a person you probably have never heard of I'm going to talk to you today but I think they're important I think and I think more important they're a good faith actor so even if we end up having some disagreements I don't think they're going to lie to you if that if I did they wouldn't be here and I'm not here to fight with them if I if I people I fight with I don't want this is my actual office this is where I write these are my actual books these are my actual personal souvenirs I if I weren't doing a show that the souvenirs would be arranged a little differently in the office and they are now I wouldn't have them all behind my head but they'd still they'd be in a different location in this actual room these are my actual paintings on the walls and the books behind me are not chosen because I'm trying to set they're not my books or something I'm trying to endorse it's just I my books are arranged by alphabetical order and you're getting you know the m's is we're in the middle of this so and and I do try to be quite expressive I talk about what I think I talk about the books I'm reading because what I have to accept is that the days of Walter Cronkite are gone the people were imitating Walter Cronkite don't have his ethic the people who are being watched are people who are building relationships and I think some of these relationships may leap the bound I mean I have many relationships that are not that began as parosocial that are now real people I may not see very often but who I correspond with in a candid way and I just think that's the way it's going to have to be because we can't leave the most powerful tools in modern media only in the hands of the devil servants I fully agree I mean this is those are my friends there I mean like it's it's it's a window it's a window into this I do find it I what I have found as as a challenge though is is trying to play the game a little bit with the platforms while also trying to do what you're talking about right because because the game not only does it reward the sensationalism all this different stuff it rewards having people on who have good YouTube channels already right I mean I if you if you bring out I brought on my first episode this YouTuber Hank Green right and now YouTube allows you to have a little collaboration thing so you guys can share your audiences with each other and it incentivizes that game of instead of bringing on the person who no one's ever heard of who's actually way smarter than everyone else here and can give you the conversation that is much more enriching you have to sort of try to play this game and and and similarly like trying to have a have have a a conversation about something that is that people might not think is that interesting it's not necessarily I mean it can it's not necessarily going to do as well as hold on let us jump on on the Epstein news right after that is you know my most successful episode is chasing the news is chasing the thing that YouTube's algorithm already knows is sticky and I've watched I I would love to know if you if you've seen this I because I cover this stuff I'm really interested in the dynamic of what I call platform dynamics how the different content spreads around and I have watched us upload some of these videos to YouTube and I've watched them start to move in a really interesting like like you know up up into the uh up into the right direction on the graph and then install immediately and it's you're watching and an algorithmic in that suppression because that's that's that's kind of ridiculous to say but you're watching something happen right it is it is moving and then it kind of stops either it's reached the audience of people that care in that sense or and I I find that I find that really hard because when we're talking about trying to do the work that we want to do in this good faith way in in a way that is is is hopefully you know giving people some some responsible tools to actually learn about the world in a way that we feel is credible and true I think it's really it makes me very frustrated to have to work against these powerful other forces that are goding you into being the worst version of yourself well that's that's that I share that feeling it's true but you still have to lean against the wind and one of the things I think a lot about I'm not I don't want to make this a two part as a political point I'm so I'm going to invoke Trump not to make a point specifically here about him but I think a lot of people look at the politics of the past decade and say it's you know it was about above all it was giant waste of time so in 2015 the United States had a series of very serious enduring problems climate change we mentioned public debt the educational performance of children from the least advantage backgrounds the problem of bringing China peacefully into the world of commerce and helping helping applauding that they're raising so many people at poverty not letting them push the rest of the world around but also try to stay out of a war with them too many many more and ten years later we've made zero progress on any of them it's just been a giant waste of time we're fighting about whether or not one ego maniac should put his name on the front of the nation's leading concert hall what what a stupid way to spend for the world's greatest power to spend a decade so I think that but what I also think is this for those of us who have been through this experience yeah we're no far we're we've made no progress over the past ten years on these important enduring chance questions but we've also learned something about defending things that are important and it's it's made many people better people many people become better versions of themselves many people have discovered things that were important that they didn't know and a lot of us have had the experience of saying you know we I mean I know for myself I'll speak very personally I was on my way out out of politics I had reached a certain age I'd had certain personal reverses I wanted out and it pulled me back and and I'm not entirely happy to be back in that way but but I do have this feeling of to some without being a megalimani with this because it's very small but it's true if everybody in each of our small degree we're needed we're doing something that's needed and in pushing back against the algorithm machine on this platform we're also doing something that's needed and that's a very valuable human experience and even if it fails it's still valuable I'm just I'm stuck on the idea of the non-apologetic counter-cultural we are the underdog in in some sense mentality that you've noted here and it's just very candidly like it's very empowering right because it allowed I think that there has been so much apologizing and or trying to remain overly deferential to again to people who are trying to tear the world down because this and it's our job to be the rational cool heads in the room right and I think that coming from the perspective of these other places are outperforming they have the bigger audiences and not trying to take the worse from them but trying to take that that kind of scrappiness that mantle of of you know being an insurgent trying to be an insurgent force and and I think that's that's really powerful I would I mean I would love for more stewards of let's call it again professional or or institutional media to to look at it that way because I think it's it's much more hard-headed it's much more combative it's much more it feels like it gives a purpose right I feel like in the second Trump administration the first Trump administration the media seem to have a pretty explicit purpose right like let let's shine a light on this thing hopefully it will restore uh you know the pillars of democracy right or or you know gird guard everyone uh in that way and I think that for for the most part broadly a kind of lost at sea nature right okay this guy won a second time what what is our function what do we do does what we do have any effect and I think there's been this grasping trying to find the purpose and I think that that is something of a purpose that people can use right to say let's come back so many human beings and so many historical situations some of them so much more terrible and dangerous than anything we face soldiers and seemingly lost causes and metaphorical soldiers and metaphorically seemingly lost causes who just kept going with one thought I'm not going to let the bastards win and sometimes that's all you need I think I think that I think that should be that should be the new motto right get rid of democracy dies in darkness not go the bastards way I and I and I emphasize the eye and anyone who's watching you're the eye I one of the things I I often point out if you have one of these and we all do you have more communication power in your hand than Walter Cronkite ever commanded so we all have to use it wisely be think about what you share think about what you trust think about whom you believe and encourage others to do the same and uh and that's why and and we're also going to encourage you to share what you do believe which is this program in Charlie's and and uh and uh and uh and to join us in being co-publishers because that's what we all are we're all co-publishers and I think one I have to say when when this is invoked you have all that communication power and one of the one of the best things you can do both for yourself but also for others is to know when not to use it to know when to step away from it you know because that is a huge problem Charlie thanks so much for making the time for me today and and congratulations on the new show we're co-publishing this threat uh this is an interesting experiment and let's may it flourish thank you absolutely thank you hey sayings breeze we get through so many snacks have you gone to think to help me save well we're always matching and lowering prices so hundreds of sayings breeze fresh fruit veg and everyday products are price match to Aldi and every week with netter you can save money on thousands of the products your family loves so you can snack away knowing you're saving money sayings breeze good food for all of us selected products Aldi price match not in an eye nectar prices require nectar account terms at sayings breeze dock who dot UK slash Aldi price match and netter dot com slash prices terms all right that's it for us here thank you again to David from for the David from show galaxy brain crossover if you liked what you saw here new episodes of galaxy brain drop every friday my colleague david's show drops every wednesday you can subscribe to the Atlantic's youtube channel and you can get both or you can subscribe to galaxy brain on apple or spotify or ever it is that you get your podcasts and if you enjoyed this remember you can support our work the work of all the journalists at the Atlantic by subscribing to the publication and you can do that at the Atlantic dot com slash listener that's the Atlantic dot com slash listener thanks so much happy new year and i'll see you on the internet this episode of galaxy brain was produced by Nathaniel from and edited by cladine abade he was engineered by dav grind our theme music is by rob 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