- 6 minutes ago
Ashley Flowers ('Crime Junkie'), Ben Shapiro ('The Ben Shapiro Show'), Dax Shepard ('Armchair Expert'), Jon Favreau ('Pod Save America'), Keith Morrison ('Dateline') and Mel Robbins ('The Mel Robbins Podcast') join THR in our Podcast Roundtable presented by Spotify.
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00:00You guys don't have nightmares about the stuff you cover?
00:03Never.
00:04No, no, not at all.
00:05I think some people, like, I really, I say this about, like,
00:07I have nightmares about the stuff that you guys cover,
00:10and a lot of the stuff that I cover.
00:12Waking nightmares, sleeping nightmares, all of it.
00:30Welcome to the Hollywood Reporter's first-ever podcast roundtable.
00:54I'm Julian Sancton.
00:55Thanks, everybody, for being here.
00:56Some of you have been at this for 30 years.
00:59Some of you have been at this for a decade.
01:01Podcasting is a relatively new medium, but I want you to look back to when you started.
01:05Would there be something that would make you cringe?
01:07I mean, Dax, when you think back to those first episodes, what embarrasses you?
01:11Well, the very first episode of Armchair was with my wife,
01:15and I thought, well, this is a slam dunk.
01:16I'll get her in there and knock that out.
01:19And as soon as we got going, she was resentful at me
01:24because she had wanted to go to Michael's to get some fabric,
01:26and this was getting in the way of her trip to Michael's.
01:29And we were just bickering, and then she was suspicious I was going to try to out her
01:35to get some exclusive.
01:36And we just fought for two hours.
01:39And then we edited, and I was like, oh, boy.
01:41We're not going to sell many Samsung washer machines with this.
01:45And I played it for her.
01:47I'm like, I don't know.
01:48I mean, should we release this?
01:50And she's like, I kind of think it's the antidote to what people think about us.
01:55I actually think it's our responsibility to release this.
01:58So weirdly, that became an accident that we just decided to release.
02:04And then we wouldn't have guessed this, but people were like, they loved getting to see that side,
02:10like kind of a more real, authentic, vulnerable side.
02:14And that kind of informed which direction we ran in.
02:17So I would say, in my case, there was like a happy accident in that it was a disaster,
02:22and people liked that disaster.
02:24You couldn't pay me to listen to my first episode again.
02:27Not a chance.
02:28Why not?
02:29I think I don't even sound like the same person eight years ago.
02:33I think it was like a very like, I hope you like this, and I, please listen and tune in.
02:38Like, it's just, it's so new.
02:41And we edited on GarageBand.
02:42Like, everything about it was so raw.
02:47It's not what people would expect now.
02:49And I think, like, little me, I don't know.
02:52I think I would be harsh on her.
02:54Keith, do you think you found that distinctive voice of yours immediately?
02:58Oh, no.
03:00I'm 412 years old.
03:02It didn't come along until I was about 300.
03:04Who was the vampire that converted you?
03:06I forget his name.
03:09Looked a lot like you, actually.
03:11We didn't know how to do podcasts at Daylight.
03:13We didn't think we knew how.
03:15We do television shows.
03:16So when they came to me and said, we ought to do the, we ought to do a podcast.
03:21And we should do it about this show that we had done called The Thing About Pam because things kept happening.
03:28I said, this will never work.
03:29Who would want to listen to such a thing?
03:31And where would they hear it anyway?
03:32And, but, you know, they pay me, so I agreed to do it.
03:38And we had an outside company help us with it since we felt incompetent ourselves.
03:44And they weren't very good at it.
03:46And the next ones we started doing ourselves.
03:48But when I listen to it now, it's like, oh, yeah, I wish we could have done that ourselves.
03:54You know, that kind of thing.
03:55I think cringe is part of it.
03:56If you feel cringy doing it for the first time, you're doing it correctly.
04:01So our first episode, I really relate to you, too, because I was on the floor of my closet on my 54th birthday was when we released it.
04:11So it was a couple weeks before.
04:12We were so unbelievably naive about how hard this would be to come up with something to talk about and to not feel self-conscious.
04:21And it was the only place in my house, because the house is an old house in Vermont that has wood floors and everything echoes.
04:27So when I think about it now, and then the second episode, we didn't have one ready.
04:33And you and I were talking about this.
04:34Why did I agree to two episodes a week?
04:37Why did, because as soon as the episode's released on Monday, you have another one to do.
04:41Sure.
04:41And I was traveling for work, so we had to tape it underneath a comforter in a hotel room.
04:48Who among us hasn't.
04:49Right?
04:50And so if you are feeling cringy in the beginning, you're doing it correctly, because I think it's one giant mistake when you get started.
04:59You're mentioning the anxiety of recording so many episodes a week.
05:03I know, Ben, you record every day.
05:05You record very frequently.
05:08Mark Maron just hung up his hat, citing, among other things, burnout.
05:11I mean, does that ever occur to you?
05:14Do you ever think of doing the same thing?
05:15I mean, it definitely depends on the news cycle.
05:17It's a bad news cycle almost every day.
05:20But, yeah, I mean, it's difficult to, you know, get excited about doing the news when the news is bad, when the news is interesting, when there are fun things happening.
05:27There's more to cover.
05:28It makes it a lot easier, obviously.
05:30But, yeah, I mean, having to get up and generate content every single day, it's like anything else.
05:37I think that when people get into podcasting, they think, oh, this is going to be fun.
05:40And then just like anything else, it becomes a job.
05:42And a job is a job.
05:44You actually have to prep for it.
05:45You have to actually get ready for it.
05:46You have to get yourself up for it because it's a very high-energy thing to do.
05:50In particular, my show, I literally just talk for about an hour.
05:54And I have a very annoying voice and I speak quickly.
05:56And so that's like a lot.
05:57No, really?
05:58Oh, yeah.
05:59I mean, and somehow people listen to it, which has been a big shock, actually.
06:02Yeah, we spent most of 2016 telling people that there's no way possible that Hillary Clinton could lose the election.
06:12So looking back on those episodes, I think I would probably cringe just a little bit.
06:19But I do think I don't worry about burnout as much probably because my brain is broken and all I can think about is politics and news anyway.
06:29But when we started, we thought that we would just be doing this podcast as like a hobby for the 2016 election.
06:36And then Hillary Clinton would win and we'd go back to our jobs.
06:39And we're like, oh, this is fun.
06:41We talk about Donald Trump.
06:42A lot of interesting things to talk about there.
06:44It's a crazy race.
06:45And now it's like a monkey's paw situation where it's like 10 years later, still talking about Donald Trump every single day.
06:51Same kind of politics every single day.
06:53Podcasting didn't even seem like a really viable career then.
06:55I mean, when you started out, when most of you started out, podcasting was just kind of a side project, a hobby.
07:02Could you have imagined that at that point, that that would be your main thing, what you're known for?
07:06No, I say all the time I'm constantly waiting for someone to knock on the door of our studio and go, oh, my guys, we really messed up.
07:13You don't get to make money doing this.
07:16Like you're just shooting the shit here in your garage that you can't get paid for that.
07:20But, yeah, I think there's a crazy cosmic irony that I did not pursue this in any way to make money.
07:28And I'm a greedy pig.
07:29I wanted to make money as an actor and as a director and as a writer.
07:32And I was probably terrible to deal with in pursuit of that.
07:36And this was just, oh, I like being a guest on podcasts.
07:39I think I want to do this more.
07:40And then that thing turned it out to be the source of income is crazy ironic, in my opinion.
07:47And maybe there's a life lesson in that, that if you don't try, if you do something for the right reason, you might get rewarded.
07:53I don't know.
07:53I kind of had the opposite entry because.
07:55Cash grab for you.
07:57100%.
07:57Yeah, right out of the gates.
07:58Yes, cash grab.
08:00There's so much money in this.
08:01No, I had been, I have a production company that does a ton of content creation for corporations.
08:09And so we had done six projects for Audible behind their paywall.
08:14Lots of courses, of course, for LinkedIn, stuff for Starbucks, other big corporate clients.
08:18And I had gotten my first start in media in the radio business in 2005.
08:24And I always wanted to get back to audio.
08:26And so when I started seeing buddies of mine in the podcast space, I'd be like, oh, that freaking guy, Jay Shetty, that monk, he beat me to it.
08:36Like, now I can't get into it.
08:38And I kept holding myself, holding myself back.
08:40But I thought, nobody makes money doing this.
08:43And so if I'm going to do this, I'm going to study the industry for a year.
08:46And then I'm going to make a calculated bet, hire one person, because I thought in success we would be lucky if we could break into the top 100 once the first year.
09:00Because at the time, three years ago, there were already almost 6 million podcasts out there.
09:06And so you would have to be an egomaniac to think you could create something that would be worth people's time and profitable.
09:13And when we stepped into it in the floor of the closet and then started releasing and it just took off like a rocket, we were not prepared for how much work it takes to continuously put out something that is worth people's time and also have the relationship with the advertisers.
09:33So, you know, I thought it would take a long time for it to be a good business and at least a year for it to break even and was very surprised.
09:44Ashley, you're consistently in the very top of the rankings.
09:49You're frequently number two behind Joe Rogan almost always.
09:53Does it ever motivate you, I'm going to dethrone that guy?
09:55Oh, I'm coming for Joe.
09:57I'm coming for Joe.
09:58Yeah, I mean, dudes, but like I'll never put out the amount of content Joe Rogan puts out.
10:05I am on the same treadmill that everyone here is on and I would love to just hang out and smoke weed and talk for three hours.
10:12It sounds like my jam.
10:14It's just not my show and I don't think anyone would listen to me do it.
10:16You'd be surprised.
10:18Have you tried cocaine?
10:19Oh.
10:20That could be how you're a little different than Rogan, but also...
10:22My own take.
10:23I'll find my niche.
10:24I'll find my niche.
10:26Looking back, is there a specific episode that any of you wish you could take back?
10:33Sounds like you got one.
10:35No, I have several I would take.
10:37At the beginning when you're just like trying to fill the inferno that is the content inferno, it's like we have experts on Thursdays and, you know, we don't have access to tons of great experts at the beginning.
10:49And we ended up interviewing a few people that experts is really, we're playing it fast and loose with the term expert.
10:57And, yeah, I've had some charlatans come through.
10:59How do you react to that?
11:00I mean, do you just say, well, never again?
11:01Well, it's a discovery after the fact.
11:03Well, shamefully, it's like, oh, wait, that was, oh, that's bullshit.
11:06Oh, and that was bullshit too.
11:08Great.
11:08And we had them on, right.
11:09Okay, good.
11:10And I didn't know it was bullshit.
11:11Good.
11:12That's great.
11:12And, I mean, do you feel a responsibility to your listeners afterwards saying, you know what, sorry about that?
11:18I think I have thrown a couple guests under the bus.
11:21Yeah, just as an apology, not even to throw them under a bus, but just like, oh, yeah, I should have probably known more about that person.
11:27So, yeah, at the beginning, I think we had some.
11:29I mean, Mel, you have similar, you have experts from all ranges on your show.
11:34Have you felt that kind of?
11:36No.
11:36No.
11:37No, because I don't release something that I can't stand by.
11:39And we have a crazy rigorous, like, I'm not trying to, like, we just, I have a very different approach to it.
11:47So, we'll probably put 100 hours of work into every episode that goes out in terms of the number of people that are involved in the pre-production, how we book our experts, how we screen them, the post-production process, the listen-backs, the watch-backs.
12:02We do collaborative social media with Harvard, medical school with Mass General Brigham.
12:06And so, we have plenty of episodes that we have not released.
12:10We have people that have come on our show and said things that, you know, are absolutely reputable but may do something in their own life that I would not stand by.
12:22But I have not released anything on that show that I have felt has been questionable because we're not going for virality.
12:30We're going for impact.
12:31Yeah.
12:31And the trust of the information and the institutions that are collaborating with us is paramount in terms of why I do this show.
12:40Yeah.
12:40Yeah.
12:41And, Ashley, when you were starting out, you know, you were, you had your growing pains.
12:45How have you gotten beyond that?
12:46Yeah, I mean, when we started out, I mean, my background is in sales.
12:51I knew I had to make money but only because, like, I needed a job.
12:54Like, I was working full-time when I started and I just, I wanted to make, if I could make 60 grand like I made in my software company job, I would be perfectly fine.
13:01And so, like, in it for the love of it.
13:04But not a trained journalist, not a trained reporter.
13:09I also feel like that pressure of, like, I want to be the show that everyone knows and recognizes, but, like, how do we level up?
13:15And so now, I mean, we've got a team of 100 in Indiana and running, you know, investigative journalists.
13:24We've got them across the country running, you know, 50 stories at a time, which is even harder.
13:31Now, I mean, now, like, to your point, I mean, a single episode takes us three months to put together.
13:37So much for the scrappy quality of podcasting.
13:40I know. It's what I miss so much, but, you know.
13:43Well, those can be very satisfying, too.
13:45I mean, you spend a lot of time honing it and checking it and figuring out that, you know, what's right, what's wrong.
13:50Our bread and butter are people who say things which aren't true.
13:54And the delight is you discover that they're not true along the way.
14:00But it takes a lot of work and some very skilled people to make that happen.
14:05So that's just a joy to be part of.
14:09At the beginning of every story, you think, oh, God, another one of these horrible stories of people being really bad to each other.
14:15And it's like, do I really want to do another one of these?
14:18But by the time you're into it, the people are so fascinating.
14:23Even the bad ones, maybe sometimes, especially the bad ones, that you can't get enough of it.
14:30I find it hard.
14:31You guys don't have nightmares about the stuff you cover?
14:35Never.
14:36No, no, no.
14:37I think some people, like, I really, I say this about, like.
14:39Yeah, we do it all the time.
14:40I have nightmares about the stuff that you guys cover.
14:42Yeah, exactly.
14:43Yeah, that's right.
14:43Waking nightmare, sleeping nightmare, all of it.
14:46Oh, yeah.
14:46You've both been podcasting for, what, a decade now?
14:50How has the landscape changed?
14:52I mean, it's much more populous, obviously.
14:54There are many more podcasts and there are many more people who are listening to podcasts.
14:57And, you know, I think that that's obviously a wonderful thing.
15:00It also means that, you know, ideas that I don't think are wonderful sometimes get a very large audience and a very viral audience.
15:07Because, you know, when you have a bigger crowd, then it's not that hard to find a very sizable crowd within that bigger crowd that's willing to listen to something that actually is not true.
15:14And that's why, you know, for me, when I'm trying to do my podcast, I try to make clear what's fact and what's opinion.
15:21The sources that I use are generally reputable sources.
15:23And so I try to be very careful about the way even that I articulate things.
15:27If I want to die on a hill, I want to be a hill of my own making.
15:30I want to express myself the way I want to express myself.
15:32And so I'll tell my producers, if you hear me say something that sounds like it's, you know, not out of my mouth, please tell me.
15:37Because I'll go back and we'll try to cut that one phrase.
15:40But I think that that's been the biggest shift is, you know, as you have a giant crowd that goes to anything, that means that there's a niche for legitimately everyone.
15:47And in our space, in sort of the political space, where that has ramifications for real life, right?
15:52How people live and the policy that's made, that definitely has a downside as well as an upside.
15:57Right-wing podcasts have been ascendant.
16:00And at this point, it seems like there's a bit of a fracture.
16:03And can you comment on that?
16:05Sure.
16:06I mean, it's reflective of a fracture that exists on the right.
16:08I mean, I'll let John speak to what I think is a fracture on the left.
16:11I think there's always a danger in politics that your mainstream is captured by a radical fringe.
16:17And there's always an energy to the radical fringe that's very attractive to people who are mainstream.
16:21And mainstream people try to sort of foster it, use it as jet fuel for their movement.
16:25And political actors in particular will try to do that.
16:28And if you don't actually draw a moral line somewhere, then your movement is pretty quickly captured.
16:32And I see that fracture obviously has merged on the right.
16:35I've been worried about it for quite a long time, actually.
16:37I got into this because of the ideas.
16:39I actually, like, I've been in the political business since I was 17 years old.
16:42I'm now 41.
16:43So I didn't get in this because I was interested in being famous or being wealthy.
16:48And I'm glad that many of those things have happened.
16:50But if I get all of those things but my ideas don't succeed or if they're defeated by what I think are really terrible, horrible, bad ideas, then I haven't done what I sought to do when I first got into this industry.
17:00Yeah, I feel very similar and probably even more so as the time has gone by.
17:05I think you can get into audience capture really easily where you look at what everyone's saying about the episode.
17:11You look at what everyone, especially on your side of the political divide, is saying about it.
17:15And then you can, like, somewhat start changing the way you talk about certain things because you're afraid people might, you know, attack you and all that.
17:21And at some point, I just, like, you know, life is too short and I'm doing this because I care about the issues and I want to make a difference and I'm a political organizer, staffer at heart.
17:36And so I want to wake up every day and try to, like, help persuade people to see things the way I see the world, also being open to the fact that my mind can change as well.
17:45But that comes from me and from what I believe.
17:49And so I think the danger is if you let your audience and the sort of the beliefs of the crowd start pushing you in one direction or the other, that's when you, that's...
17:58Which is the difference about political areas of this particular industry.
18:02Like, in all the other areas of the industry, it's fine to let the crowd kind of push you into what they're interested in.
18:06If they're interested in health, you can follow health.
18:07If they're interested in entertainment, you can do an entertainment podcast.
18:09If you're in the political space and virality is driving you toward legitimately horrifying things, then it does take a bit of a moral line where you say, I don't care where the algorithm is driving.
18:20And even if somebody is getting bigger numbers by doing this terrible thing, I'm just not going to do that.
18:24I'm going to fight that.
18:26Ben, you have told your listeners to, if they want a balanced perspective, to listen to John's podcast.
18:32John, do you feel you have a responsibility to tell your listeners the opposite?
18:37Yes.
18:37Well, it's very funny.
18:38We did a show in Nashville.
18:41It was like 2018, 2019.
18:43And I remember after the show, we went to a bar and this big group of students came up to us and they're like, love you guys, love Pod Save America.
18:51Every single week, we listen to you and we listen to Ben Shapiro.
18:55And then we heard that throughout the years.
18:57There's a lot of young people.
18:58I mean, I literally say on my show that people are constantly asking, how do I find what's fact and what's opinion?
19:03And so what I will say, I say this repeatedly on my show.
19:05Listen to my show, listen to John's show, where we agree that's probably the common locus of fact and everything else is the opinion.
19:11And then you can determine whose opinion you think better fits the fact pattern and what's true and what's not.
19:16Why do you think that right wing podcasts have been so dominant in the top 25 podcasts or in the top of the rankings?
19:26Pod Save is actually kind of an exception.
19:28The pandemic, fear, uncertainty.
19:30There's so much research that shows that people are more inclined, whether it's the left or the right, to believe in conspiracy theory when they're already anxious and chronically stressed and it becomes a machine that kind of feeds into it.
19:44You know, I was just thinking that what's interesting about you guys, and it's refreshing to hear you talk about the sense of wanting to really find that line between fact versus opinion.
19:59You guys are also chasing stories and unpacking them, right, as people lean into them.
20:05When we're interviewing an expert, the responsibility is with the expert because we're not endorsing what they're saying.
20:13We're trying to distill down what they mean.
20:15And so I think it's fascinating the way you've brought these three different categories here because as you sit in the host chair, it's a very different role that we're playing versus you guys are playing versus you guys are playing.
20:29And I'm even surprised to see, because the climate, especially in the United States, is so divisive and fractured.
20:37But it's refreshing to see the two of you respect each other and have referred your audiences to one another because the public, I don't think we see that at all.
20:50That's because most of our public life is now mediated online.
20:54And there aren't enough spaces, and this is especially a post-pandemic issue where people are sitting around and talking to each other.
21:00And you realize when you meet the person in real life that, like, yes, you still don't agree at all, but also you're human beings and you can hang out and talk.
21:09Yeah, I was wondering how you guys feel like you've been changed by your show.
21:13Because I know for me, I will have an expert on from Harvard that is tackling this social science dilemma, and that person makes a really compelling argument, and they leave, and I'm like, yeah, I think they got it.
21:27And then three months later, I'll have their adversary on, who's from another university, who lays out another great argument.
21:35And what I have walked away with after eight years and a thousand guests is, like, there's nothing definitive.
21:42There is, like, this person's probably 63% right, and this person's 37% right.
21:48I don't think there's, like, this maybe illusion I had before doing this show that there was a right answer to any one thing.
21:55I realize, oh, no, everything's just this gradient or this nuance, and I can only have so much conviction about this is right.
22:03You know, I think when it comes to politics, obviously, and I'll see if John agrees with this, politics is an overlay for values, and I think that's why people feel it so deeply.
22:11They feel that what is happening politically is either an indictment or a confirmation of their value system.
22:17And so the reason I got into this area is because I care about values that I hold dear to me.
22:22Some of those values, I would suggest many of those values, there's actually a significant crossover with John, and what I hope with is most Americans.
22:29I think that's getting fractured and moving out because as people are siloed, as people don't have communal spaces, as Mel was saying, it's very difficult to even see the values you hold in common with someone.
22:40You just find whatever – it's kind of a roving mob looking for a point of coalition to attack, and I think that that's really a difficult part of the online space.
22:50As far as, by the way, why the right is dominant in this space, anytime there is a new media space, the right becomes quite adept at it quickly because for a long time there were basically three mainstream media networks.
23:02The right got good at talk radio.
23:03And then the left became very good at radio with NPR, and then podcasting started, and the right was like, okay, we're going to adjust to that.
23:09So usually the left catches up at a certain point when that becomes a mainstream medium.
23:14I was attracted to the podcasting as a medium because I think to your point, Dax, like the way that, you know, we see news sort of unfold online today, everything is black or white.
23:27There is like nuance, subtlety, complicated issues.
23:32Like there is no room for that.
23:33You get a headline.
23:34There's no room for that anywhere.
23:35To tweet.
23:35Well, there is some true crime.
23:37That's the bizarre thing.
23:38The things that don't really matter to the welfare of the nation, you can delve into it as deeply as you want in a way that we always wanted to do as reporters.
23:48But the stuff that's terribly important to our survival as a nation somehow.
23:53But again, because when it gets to values, I think people want either the clear confirmation or the clear denial of the thing that they think.
24:00And so our job is to say, one of the phrases I find myself using over and over on my show is two things can be true at once.
24:06And people have a very difficult time with that.
24:08They want the one thing to be true that they already think.
24:10And like I remember just, you know, doing cable news appearances and you've got five minutes to make a point and you will get questions like, so do you believe that or not?
24:19Yes or no.
24:19And everything is very black or white.
24:20And you get on a podcast and you can talk for an hour and have a very nuanced discussion about an issue.
24:26And I just think it's better for, at least in the political sphere, it's like better for the country to hear that nuance and to hear all the different angles on an issue.
24:35But you used a word a little while ago before we started this algorithm, which is, it's like, it's the monster in the room, I think, that we're not talking about.
24:45What have algorithms done to political discussion?
24:49Yeah, I mean, if they're designed to drive you to watch more of the thing, and I'm sure Mel can speak to this better than I can.
24:55If they're pushing you to watch more of the thing, it's a sugar rush, right?
24:59It's an endorphin rush.
25:00And so if you click on the thing, then the algorithm is going to feed you more of the thing.
25:04Well, and I also think it's two different conversations.
25:05There's podcast as a medium, and then there's the marketing of podcasts on social.
25:10And they have the research now.
25:14One out of every four things you interact with online is a bot.
25:17They have the research around the infiltration of information targeting certain people that came in to social media networks in the last three or four years.
25:25Because when you ask people, based on the research, how do you define success?
25:30And you give them 60 factors, and you're forced to rank one to 60, not either or.
25:35Of hundreds of thousands of people, people rank the top ten things.
25:41Eight of them are the same.
25:42But when we then are asked privately, well, Mel, what do you think these guys all think success is?
25:49I rank the stuff I put at the bottom for you.
25:52I think you want fame.
25:53I think you want money.
25:54And so there's this illusion.
25:56Again, we value a lot of the same things.
25:58Of course we disagree on how to make it happen.
26:00But it's now become the loudest, most extreme voices dominating everything.
26:06This is such a good point.
26:07And I think that it also goes to attribution of motivation, right?
26:11Meaning that the idea, the sort of emotivism, where it's, you know, if I assume that you and I want the same things, we're just having trouble on how to get there, then we're good.
26:20But that's not where we are politically.
26:22Well, you guys are even modeling it, by the way, because you asked him, well, what do you think?
26:26And you asked him, and you're referring people.
26:28And so you're modeling what, I mean, we're old enough to remember a time when people on either side actually got along and talked about things.
26:37And politics was very different.
26:39But what I was going to say is, if you think about where this is all coming from, it's coming from platforms that make money by people spending time on them.
26:46So the more that it's crazy, and you guys invented marketing to the curiosity gap, so you know what that's like in terms of how to create a headline, how to create interest.
26:56That's different, though, than long-form podcasting.
26:59I love podcasting because it's audio first.
27:03If you think about how intimate it is, the majority of our listeners are still audio.
27:08Well, you might even be in their ears.
27:11You're in their car.
27:12You're in their home.
27:13You could be working, and nobody's seeing what you're watching because it's not video.
27:17You're listening to it.
27:19And so there is an intimacy and a two-way conversation that is available to you in this format that is so incredible and so exquisite.
27:30And it allows you to consider different topics or to consider your own experience in a way that you're not having to broadcast to anyone else.
27:37Like, 10 years ago, I wouldn't be caught dead walking into a self-help aisle because I don't want to admit that I need help with my narcissist of so-and-so and buying the book.
27:46But I can select a podcast episode that I can listen to quietly, and it feels like this intimate, long-form thing that is totally different than every other medium that is predominantly visual and on display, which you feel separate from.
28:03That's why I love this so much, and that's why I got into it.
28:06The discussion, the exchange that we're seeing that you were talking about, that it's uplifting to see people from opposing viewpoints having an exchange and a discussion, that rarely happens.
28:17I mean, you guys aren't on each other's shows.
28:20One of these days.
28:21One of these days.
28:22You heard it here first.
28:23But there is the risk of, in the podcasting, the very siloed podcasting landscape that it can lead to an echo chamber environment.
28:33Obviously, I think the number one thing that everyone's looking for when they listen to a podcast is the authenticity of the person who's speaking.
28:39They want the authentic thing that that person thinks.
28:41Well, one of the problems with that is that when it comes to what's factual or not, that does not factor into authenticity.
28:47I know many, many deeply authentic people who think batshit loony things, right?
28:52And they are perfectly authentic in how they express those batshit loony things.
28:55And so if what you're looking for is authenticity, they can sell you on a really, really bad idea.
28:59And then, because you like that person, you resent any sort of fact check that comes up against that authenticity.
29:05And so once you start into sort of non-verifiable fact-based reporting or podcasts, then you can easily find yourself in that silo.
29:16And it's impossible, I think, at that point to get out of that silo without you feeling yourself challenged.
29:20Because then you feel your friend is being challenged.
29:22You don't actually feel that a political idea is being challenged.
29:25It's my friend told me.
29:27And I trust my friend.
29:28And my friend told me this crazy thing.
29:30But it's not crazy to me because they told me.
29:31They explained it to me.
29:33There's a family member.
29:33That's actually the relationship that people have with hosts like us.
29:36That's a huge responsibility that I think that we ought to take very seriously in what we do.
29:41And as we, like, our audience grew, I started feeling that obligation, which was like people know that we're former Obama staffers, that we have a political viewpoint.
29:50But I still want to make sure that we are giving people accurate, good information.
29:55And if we're not, because we're not always going to be able to, then correct our mistakes and change the next day.
30:00And so now we have, you know, a whole staff that will do the same thing if we're saying something wrong.
30:04It'll just tell us in our ear or afterwards that we have to change it.
30:07A lot of what you're talking about, though, was people identifying with a host and people, therefore, being changed by what the host is saying and kind of buying into that argument.
30:17And then, I mean, that's been going on for a long time.
30:21And in various, it doesn't matter whether it's radio or television or newspapers or whatever it is.
30:27But, you know, in America, what really began to make a difference was Christian radio and Rush Limbaugh.
30:36And those things were on radio.
30:38They were kind of the podcast of their time, and they really are very similar to a podcast.
30:42But it attracted people in the very same way.
30:46What was different and what is alarming and scary, I think, is when social media enters the scene and you get this algorithm doing its work.
30:55And the most extreme views get the most attention, you know, the viral nature of it.
31:01I want to potentially get in trouble and say we're ignoring the rise of the right-leaning, male-driven podcast.
31:09Why did that explosion happen?
31:12I think a big issue we have is 21% of the country is a group of young males who are plummeting in every metric we have.
31:22They have the highest suicide rate, they have the highest addiction rate, they have the highest gambling, they have plummeting college attendance.
31:28So you have an entire group that if it had any other name, we'd be like, guys, this group's failing, and we need to help, and we need a game plan.
31:38No one was offering one.
31:40And then a bunch of male podcast hosts stood up and said, hey, I think this is crap.
31:44And a lot of young men went, oh, someone does still care about us.
31:50And so if the left is mad about that, they should have had a plan for young men.
31:55I want to talk about Charlie Kirk.
31:58How did his killing and the fallout of that change the way, especially those of you who deal with political subjects,
32:05change the way you approach your podcast and also live events?
32:10Well, I mean, I knew Charlie for a very long time.
32:12I knew Charlie since he was 18 years old.
32:14I met him when he was like a kid going around at various political events and looking for donors for TPUSA.
32:20And, you know, obviously, I think that we have entered a new era in terms of the acceptability of political violence.
32:27I don't think that's relegated solely to what happened to Charlie.
32:30I think there's a lot of it in the air.
32:32I think it's been going on for a while.
32:33I've had full-time security, 24-7 security for approximately the last seven years.
32:38You know, I have four kids.
32:40My kids have security.
32:42Like, this is just kind of a normal part of life, unfortunately.
32:45Can that become normal?
32:47We try to make it as normal for them as humanly possible.
32:49I mean, they're friends with the security team.
32:51Does it feel good to have security?
32:52I mean, of course not.
32:53I think it's horrifying that I need security.
32:54But if I didn't have security, then I'd be in serious – I mean, I get legitimately hundreds of death threats a day.
32:59It's a massive, massive problem.
33:01And that, again, I think that there's a climate of acceptability.
33:04There are permission structures for violence that have arisen in our society.
33:08And, again, I will not say that it's relegated only to one side.
33:11I don't think that it's relegated to one side.
33:13I do think that it is more deeply embedded in one side than the other.
33:16I'm sure John would argue the opposite.
33:17But I do think that the sort of willingness to suggest that the system has failed you, thus the only solution to the system, is violent activity against representatives of the system.
33:28And whether you're talking about Luigi Mangione or talking about Charlie Kirk, I think that that's horrifying.
33:32And I think it's evil.
33:34And I think that it's one of the great plagues of our society.
33:37It's making things significantly, significantly worse in every possible way.
33:40Are you changing the way you're doing things?
33:43I would never have done outdoor events.
33:45No.
33:45Like what Charlie was doing, being in an outdoor event.
33:48My team had told me years ago, you can't do outdoor events like that.
33:52Yeah.
33:52I mean, we had always thought about making sure there was security at our events.
33:56Obviously, think about it more now.
33:59I was absolutely horrified and it really shook me up in a way that I hadn't even anticipated.
34:06But also, I mean, to Ben's point, sort of the reaction afterwards, and I felt the same after the Luigi Mangione incident as well, which has like, I just, the fundamental purpose of politics,
34:18the reason we do politics is so that we do not live in a violent society where everyone, where everything goes and everyone is just going to be, you know, feeling like it's okay to hurt the people.
34:31I mean, like we talk about these as incidents of individual political violence or political violence against individuals.
34:36But this is how civil wars start.
34:39This is how conflicts start, right?
34:40And this is how wars start.
34:42And so if you can't draw the line after there is an incident of political violence and say that is, not only is it just not okay, but like this is something that we actively have to prevent.
34:55And if it's on our side, we have to do whatever we can on our side to prevent it.
34:59If it's on the other side, we have to reach out to people on the other side to try to push them to do it.
35:03But it's sort of for me where all of the games and tactics and politics and all the arguments sort of like fall away.
35:11And it's just like, if we cannot agree on this, that we have to do everything we can to not excuse violence in this country, then like, I don't know what we're doing.
35:19I'm going to change tracks here a little bit.
35:22Ashley, you announced that Crime Junkie is leaving his longtime home at Sirius for Tubi.
35:27And now I think all of you have video elements to your podcast.
35:33I mean, at what point is podcasting now becoming the new TV?
35:37What goes into now creating an episode of the podcast, this narrative storytelling that lasts 40 minutes to an hour and 20 minutes?
35:45I mean, it's like making an episode of TV.
35:48But there would be different versions because, I mean, we've got the vodcast,
35:50but we're also working on a pilot episode of what would be like a more traditional TV show.
35:57I think it's going to become increasingly more normal to see it on, I think, the platforms.
36:04Why is there such an imperative for video when this is, you know, it's an audio native format?
36:08Because it's a business objective of the platforms that syndicate the product.
36:11So YouTube makes their money on advertising, and so they've gotten into podcasting to run ads that they can take a share of.
36:18Apple and Spotify, you can do both audio.
36:21Apple's not video yet, but they have a subscription model, so that's sort of their business model where they make more money on podcasts.
36:28And Spotify has now just launched their own video publishing platform and their own ad network.
36:35And so, you know, the main thing I want to say, though, to anybody that's watching that's interested in getting into podcasting is,
36:41if you want to compete at a global level, you've got to figure out strategies based on platform, which is a giant pain in the ass.
36:48It's a ton of work.
36:49It's also fun to figure out.
36:50I mean, our product, probably same as yours, Ash, it's different on audio than what we put out on video for YouTube,
36:57because totally different audiences and also different monetization schemes.
37:02But you can get into podcasting, and I'm going to go on record and say a podcast is still an audio-first format.
37:08I guarantee you the majority of our listeners, if we took all of our listener bases, would be, by and large, audio listeners.
37:15They're in their car.
37:17They're on a walk.
37:17They're at home.
37:18They're listening at work.
37:20That they are not yet fully converted to the show as a TV show, because I don't know about you guys,
37:26but we got into video because we were like, okay, we're going to record it.
37:30Might as well film it, and we can use this to market it, and we'll put it up on YouTube as just a longer-form version of it, right?
37:37We got into it because we're finding that the audiences are completely different.
37:41There are people who will never go to a podcast platform and listen, but they're watching.
37:45I was going to say it's super gendered.
37:47YouTube is predominantly male-driven.
37:50So you're looking at all the Manosphere podcasts that we're working.
37:55They were working largely on YouTube, and we have a predominantly female fan base, which I love and cherish.
38:02I'd certainly rather be approached by women in public than men.
38:06Same girl.
38:07But I very much would like young men to listen to what I talk about, and so for me, it's like, yeah, they're not coming to these podcast platforms.
38:19I must go to YouTube.
38:20It's as simple as where are they?
38:22I think one of the questions that's worth asking, actually, and it's kind of a fascinating one, is why it is that people will, and they do in large numbers, sit and watch two people talk to each other, like my dinner with Andre, for hours at a time.
38:33Something has changed.
38:34I mean, you're right that that is an audio format, but I do think that, to Dax's point, I think that there is a reflection of loneliness that's happening, where it's like people are just in their rooms, and they need to hang out with other people.
38:45And in the same way that when I was in law school, and it was like winter in Cambridge, Massachusetts, there's nothing going on.
38:50You just leave the TV on just to hear voices.
38:52I think that there's a lot of that going on.
38:54It's like I'm hanging out with my friends now, and my friends are, I want them in the room with me.
38:59And so people will just leave, you know, Joe talking with whomever his guest is for two hours on YouTube and watch it that way.
39:04Well, a lot of us came home from school, and mom had Oprah on.
39:08I mean, and so a lot of us grew up seeing the old school talk shows, Donahue, Arsenio Hall, Sally J. Raphael.
39:16Like, this is what we grew up on, and so I think it's migrated back to that from a video standpoint.
39:22But to your point, if you look at our data, somewhat like 40% of the people that are watching on YouTube are watching on a large screen.
39:30And that's a huge jump from where things were just two to three years ago.
39:34Dax, did you resist this at first?
39:37Yeah, I wanted nothing to do with video, and we went to Wondery.
39:40They said you have to do video on some portion of the show.
39:44And I said, okay, well, I can do video with the experts because it's not as emotionally driven.
39:49It's not as vulnerable or personal.
39:52But then we had a couple guests that were up for it, and then I found really quickly, like, oh, we paid no price for this.
39:58They were just as open.
39:59They were just as emotional.
40:00People cried just as often or laughed as much.
40:03You know, whatever it was, I was wrong.
40:05My fear was wrong.
40:06And I like the idea that, yeah, a lot of dudes are going to prefer to watch us than listen, and I like that.
40:13So for me, there's really been no downside other than the, like, logistical mess of making, you know, a show with seven video cameras and editing and all that crap.
40:21Dax, you've interviewed several of the people at this table.
40:25Sure.
40:25You've interviewed Keith.
40:26How do you think it went?
40:28Keith is a very hard nut to crack because he's very Canadian.
40:33You make the Canadians proud.
40:34Sorry.
40:35And he felt like it was very indulgent to talk about himself.
40:39And I had to keep saying, Keith, it's not indulgent when you're the guest whom we are dying to find out about.
40:46It's not indulgent.
40:47I'm forcing you to open up.
40:49But he, I still, we have a segment when we, our transitional element when we go to a commercial and it says, stay tuned if you dare.
41:02And that's Keith.
41:03I made him.
41:04I put him in a very awkward position and asked him to record that for me.
41:09And then we've used it for eight years and people love to guess who it is.
41:12And you weren't taking a percentage of the ad.
41:13Well, I sent him, I sent him cash in the mail one time, hidden in a box of crackers.
41:19Yeah, yeah.
41:20Yes.
41:21And he immediately forwarded that to a charity in his neighborhood.
41:25So I tried to give him money and he's too good of a person to accept it.
41:29Stop it.
41:30And it was untraceable.
41:31It was cash money.
41:33Terrible.
41:33I've never listened to that show.
41:35You know, I don't think I could because it's too revealing.
41:39Maybe.
41:40Yeah.
41:41I don't know.
41:41It's pretty common for people to appear on each other's podcasts.
41:44How do you decide what to save for your own show and what to share on somebody else's show?
41:49I mean, is there, do you kind of plan that or do you just see what happens?
41:53I don't worry at all about what content I'm like saving for us or sharing with others.
42:00I had like kind of a pretty profound moment when I was at the Groundlings and I was a comedian
42:07and I had written this sketch that ran for a long time at a theater.
42:10And then there was a sketch on Saturday Night Live that seemed nearly identical.
42:15And one of the people in the group wrote at Saturday Night Live and I was getting really
42:18spun out about it.
42:20And I like sharing with another member of the group there that I was like bent out of
42:23shape about this.
42:24And he said, if you think that's your last great idea, you should fight this to the end
42:29and go to court over this.
42:31But if you think you have unlimited great ideas, just keep it moving.
42:34And that was great advice to hear early on.
42:37And so I'm of that opinion.
42:39Like I'm better off just trusting that the well is bottomless.
42:43Although we're finding the bottom of it currently.
42:46But I have gotten through 50 years.
42:49I'm going to tell you, I think if you really want to reach young men, you should be doing
42:51a podcast on Twitch while you're gaming.
42:54Okay.
42:54I'll have to first develop a love for gaming.
42:57Okay.
42:57Because this is going to be a multi-step process probably.
43:00Do you guys think it'll stay, podcasting will stay weekly or will it move to, like TV
43:05shows have seasons and clearly for a reason?
43:07I think it depends on the host.
43:10Like the cool thing about this medium, and again, I would encourage anybody to get into
43:14it, is you can do whatever the fuck you want.
43:16Like it's, you could do a series, you could do eight things, you could do long form, you
43:22can talk for three hours.
43:24If people enjoy it, they'll keep listening.
43:27Like you got to ask yourself the famous Seth Godin question, who's it for and what's it
43:31for?
43:32And if you know who's it for and what's it for, then you know who you're serving.
43:36I think it's insane he wasn't nominated in this group is Revisionist History, I think,
43:42is like a master class in production and storytelling and research.
43:46It's phenomenal.
43:48But it's in Siri, you know, it has seasons.
43:51It's like, so that's my favorite show.
43:53And often someone will be like, oh, do you, the fourth episode of the news?
43:56And I'm like, wait, it's back?
43:58I'll miss my favorite show because it's not a weekly.
44:02So then I just get realistic about like, well, I could be making Revisionist History and
44:06people might bail out because it's a season.
44:08I think that's my fear.
44:09Like, I think it's at least a legitimate fear that you, like people will, the machine moves
44:14so fast and there is so many podcasts and so much content coming out that if you like
44:19take the summer off, like, is your audience going to be there when you come back?
44:24Yeah, I'm not willing to find out.
44:25Me neither.
44:26I'm terrified.
44:27Not an option for us.
44:28Yeah.
44:29You guys are daily?
44:30I keep thinking there's going to be like a slow season in politics one of these years.
44:34That's it.
44:34It's just never.
44:35Ashley and Keith, I'm sure you've thought a lot about this.
44:38Why is true crime so popular as a podcast genre?
44:42Well, it's popular generally speaking.
44:45It's a highly female audience.
44:47I think that probably you find the same thing too in true crime.
44:50Why is that, you think?
44:51I just had an expert last week that gave us the answer.
44:54What is it?
44:54Oh.
44:55So an impala who's afraid of getting eaten by a lion can only learn to avoid the lion
45:03by getting chased by it.
45:05But a human's unique ability is we can learn from someone else what they did when they were
45:09chased by a lion.
45:10Exactly right.
45:10And we have the ability to model out our fears so we can lay there and imagine we get attacked
45:15and when we do this, when we grab a stick.
45:17So if you look at the fact that true crime is, and it's not an accident that it's gendered,
45:24women are going to die predominantly from men.
45:27So what are they modeling?
45:29What do they want to hear?
45:30And their great curiosity is generally in those stories, what did the person miss about the
45:36attacker that they could learn to look for?
45:39Sure.
45:39It's the why of the attack.
45:41Because they probably live with the attacker and they're confused about.
45:45There's a lot of research about that.
45:47Sure.
45:47And there was this viral moment happening on TikTok, I think a couple years ago, and
45:52my female co-host asked me, because you were supposed to ask men when the last time they
45:57spoke about the Roman Empire was.
45:59And I felt like I was being very made fun of during this, because I was like, yeah, within
46:03a week, I'm sure.
46:04I was the prototypical dude.
46:07And I said, well, hold on, though.
46:09What is the most predictable way a young man would have died over the last 150 years?
46:15It'd be in a war.
46:16My grandfather was drafted for World War II.
46:18My father was drafted for Vietnam.
46:20I was 16 when the Gulf War broke out.
46:22And I was like, okay, here we go.
46:23This might be me.
46:24So yeah, if you're a young man, your odds of getting killed without any choice being made
46:30on your own is through a war.
46:32So yeah, we love war movies, and we love the Roman Empire.
46:35And so whatever thing you are likely to die from, you will likely model out or enjoy content
46:41or stories that help you prepare or mitigate that fear.
46:46And we have violence.
46:47UFC.
46:47Why is UFC so appealing to young men?
46:50All young men I know that grew up, the threat of physical violence was always present.
46:55In your elementary school, in your junior high, in your high school, at the bar, men are always
47:00like, am I going to get my ass kicked today?
47:02Sure.
47:02Is there a method I could employ that would help prevent that?
47:05Let's watch this UFC thing.
47:07And it's kind of safe because there's kind of rules, but it's also kind of like a bar fight.
47:11So yeah, I think it's all of us just playing with our fears and trying to find a strategy
47:16should we ever find ourselves in those situations.
47:18That is the answer I always get without the lion, yeah.
47:20That's right.
47:21Those are good answers.
47:22Makes a lot of sense.
47:22And it seems like men are the problem.
47:24True crime also poses a bit of an ethical dilemma about presenting these stories in
47:30an entertaining fashion without exploiting people's tragedies.
47:34I mean, how do you grapple with that?
47:35I mean, to me, this was a huge part of why when I got into it is I felt like there was
47:40a little bit of a different way to tell the stories and consume the stories.
47:44So when I started, I, as a consumer, even before the podcast, I was like, I felt a need
47:51to give back.
47:52How am I getting entertainment from people's worst times?
47:54I did a lot of volunteering.
47:55And so it was a foundational piece of creating our network.
48:01And what I say is like, I have to get people to care about this story in order for them
48:07to listen all the way through and take action.
48:08And so in creating our true crime content, I feel like what people really responded to
48:14is like how action-based it is.
48:16We cover a lot of stuff that's still unsolved.
48:18And we give people real ways to get involved.
48:22I mean, we are also done a ton philanthropically.
48:25I started a nonprofit that has funded a ton of salt, like DNA Solves, naming Jane and John
48:31Doe's.
48:32We partnered with over 260 nonprofits that we've funded.
48:36So that was, to me, a big mission because it felt bad as a consumer.
48:41And so I wanted to really try and understand, like, how could we create this content in a
48:45way that actually doesn't make the worst time in someone's life worse?
48:49It's making the world better.
48:51Well, that's right.
48:52I mean, we deal with things which are the worst time in certain people's lives.
48:56And it doesn't matter which side they're on.
48:58The people who do a terrible thing, it becomes the worst thing in their lives, too.
49:02But, you know, the victims, you have to be very, very careful with them.
49:07And launching a story, starting the reporting on it, is always a very hard time for me.
49:12I always have a kind of a crisis of conscience about whether we should be doing this at all.
49:18Especially, for example, if it's a kind of a Goldilocks story or a Little Red Riding Hood
49:23story where it's a little blonde girl.
49:25And so the whole world seems to be really interested in this little blonde girl because
49:29that's kind of a template for humans, I think.
49:32And the, you know, the less attractive textured skinned girl is not going to get the same attention
49:41and certainly not a boy.
49:42So, I mean, there are a lot of tropes that are at work in this and you're aware of all
49:46of them.
49:48And so when you head into covering a story, you know, you better damn well have your moral
49:53compass with you as you're doing it.
49:56And otherwise, you're just terribly irresponsible.
49:59And I think it's, you know, flirting with the edge of responsibility sometimes anyway to
50:05tell people's personal stories this way.
50:07I want to end with a lightning round of questions.
50:10What's your preferred podcast listening speed?
50:13One and a half.
50:14Really?
50:15Wow.
50:15At least two, maybe two and a half, depending on the speed of the normal talk.
50:18Oh my God.
50:19I feel like I now know how you make love and I'm not interested.
50:21That's a good tool I was not looking for.
50:25Oh, you're in a hurry, aren't you, John?
50:26We're going to have a slow compared to some guy.
50:28Oh my God.
50:28Where do you have to be, John?
50:30Wow.
50:31I got to look at all the information that's out there.
50:33That's right.
50:34But what you listen to, I would assume, mostly informational and political podcast.
50:37Yes.
50:38Yeah, same.
50:38No, I'm not enjoying anything.
50:39Right.
50:40It's just...
50:40It's time for that.
50:41It's input of data as opposed to enjoying the drama.
50:43That's a different thing.
50:44I was going to say, input of data, I'm like a 1.5.
50:47But if it's a show I love, I'm like, I want to listen to how it was made.
50:49If it's like a narrative style, I would never do that.
50:52I listen to Revisionist History on .25.
50:55I don't want it to end.
50:57Yeah, if it's a really smart host, I got to slow that shit way down.
51:00Slow Malcolm?
51:01So I understand what's happening.
51:02I can put off the gas.
51:03I can enjoy this longer.
51:05Who's your favorite podcast guilty pleasure that you'll admit to listening to?
51:09Not really guilty pleasure, but I listen to the real watchables.
51:11I don't know if anything's guilty.
51:13Yeah.
51:14I don't feel guilty.
51:15I listen to Dax.
51:16I listen to Dax.
51:16And I guess in conclusion, in 10 years, how do you think podcasting will have changed
51:23and will what you're doing now be relevant?
51:27It's fast.
51:27It's so fast.
51:28No.
51:29It'll be different.
51:30Totally different.
51:31I'll just say there's this kind of endless desire to categorize it like, if it's on video,
51:37is it not a show?
51:38It's like we're really kind of mired in what category and what definition and in 10 years.
51:45And to me, it's all kind of irrelevant.
51:48And I'm not sure who's even dying to know.
51:50Is it TV?
51:51I keep hearing that ask, but I don't meet anyone.
51:54It's like, I'm nervous whether this podcast thing is TV or not now.
51:57Nobody feels that way.
51:58And similarly, I don't know that any of us are like, in 10 years, you know, I don't
52:06believe that that's what we think about.
52:08I think we'll just keep showing up where the listeners are.
52:12And the ride could be over.
52:14I often think, as I hope all of us here do, is like, holy shit, did we get lucky.
52:18I happened, like, I came into it like you.
52:20We talked about this.
52:21I was going to name the show The Millionth Podcast because I was already insecure that
52:24there were already too many and I was late.
52:26And then, lo and behold, I'm in the right place at the right time for these big deals
52:31to happen.
52:32And in a time where millions and millions of people will consume this thing you make in
52:35your garage.
52:36Like, what a gift.
52:37It'll go away.
52:39I hope I'll be, you know, grateful enough to just go like, you got lucky, brother.
52:44You got to hit one of the hot streaks.
52:46And that's what it is for me.
52:48Like, I have nothing but gratitude.
52:49It could end.
52:50This has been, I can speak for me, entirely too good of a job.
52:54And suspiciously so.
52:57So if it ends up being like, yeah, it had to come.
52:59I mean, we were getting away with murder.
53:01I think one of the coolest things about it is to think about the long tail.
53:05And that, you know, given that at least for the show that I do, which the mission is really
53:10to help people create a better life and to give people access to research and information
53:17that can help them do it for free, that this, I love thinking that 50 years from now, somebody
53:23could bump into an episode because it's evergreen.
53:26And that hopefully whatever platform it's on, whether they're listening or they're watching
53:31or they're absorbing it through the chip in their head, that it helps them take the next
53:37step.
53:37And so I just love the fact that this is, when you think about the digital content and the
53:43fact that as entrepreneurs, if you set it up right, you own it.
53:47And you own the long tail and you own control of what happens to it, that it could live on
53:52beyond and really continue to make a positive impact, you know, in the way that you intended
54:00long before you're even still here.
54:04I think there's going to be plenty to talk about in Trump's fifth term.
54:09God, no.
54:09Our job will persist.
54:11I think that it's the same stuff that people have been doing since they were sitting around
54:15fires, you know, 10,000 years ago before the domestication of the dog.
54:20I mean, like some of us are going to be telling stories and some of us are going to be speaking
54:23with the village elders about, you know, how to make your life better.
54:25And some of us are going to be trying to debrief about the news of the day.
54:28That fundamentally isn't going to change.
54:30It's just maybe the method of consumption will change.
54:33Absolutely agree.
54:34I've been telling stories for almost 60 years.
54:36But they're all, you know, every year some different thing happens to the way they're
54:43consumed, but you still tell them.
54:47What's also cool, though, is that the medium's being recognized for the first time in a major
54:55global award show at the level of filmmaking and television.
54:59And to me, that is really cool because it does take a lot of work and it takes a lot of intention
55:06and it employs a lot of people.
55:09And both the art form and the impact is something that I do think is worthy of recognizing.
55:18And, you know, Dax can make a joke about taping it in the garage.
55:21It's still a world-class production.
55:23It still takes a tremendous amount of time and heart and post-production and pre-production.
55:30And there's the same machine that's behind it.
55:33And so I'm also really grateful that the listeners know this, but that the industry at large is
55:40seeing that this isn't just some eye-roll thing in somebody's basement, that this is truly
55:45something that is a professional production.
55:49It takes a lot of work, a lot of time.
55:51There's a lot of care that goes into it if you're doing something where you're competing
55:55at a global level, which we all are, and you're making an impact on people.
55:59And so I also am excited about that.
56:02And it'll be interesting to see what happens in the next 10 years.
56:05This has been wonderful, everybody.
56:07Thank you so much.
56:08I'm really thrilled with the conversation.
56:11Thank you, guys.
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