Channels with Peter Kafka

Latest Episodes:

The inside story of YouTube Sep 08, 2022

Show notes

Despite YouTube’s massive influence, it's been chronically underreported on. But finally, Bloomberg’s Mark Bergen wrote the comprehensive, soup-to-nuts history of the site. His new book is called "Like, Comment, Subscribe: Inside YouTube’s Chaotic Rise to World Domination."

Recode’s Peter Kafka talks to Bergen about changes to YouTube’s recommendation algorithm, its various attempts to make original premium content, the rise of TikTok, and FЯED. Plus, how the entirety of YouTube almost got filed under a tab on Google’s failed social network.

Featuring: Mark Bergen (@mhbergen), Writer for Bloomberg Business and Author

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

More to explore: Subscribe for free to Recode Media, Peter Kafka, one of the media industry's most acclaimed reporters, talks to business titans, journalists, comedians, and more to get their take on today's media landscape.

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Why the Good Fight creators are glad they moved from CBS to streaming Sep 01, 2022

Show notes

Like other big deal TV creators, Robert and Michelle King are thriving in the streaming era. The duo behind the long-running CBS show The Good Wife is making two shows for Paramount+, with more on the way. As The Good Fight - a Good Wife spinoff - enters its sixth and final season, Recode’s Peter Kafka talks to the Kings about the move from broadcast to streaming, and why they spend a lot of time tweaking the Trump administration, but less talking about the pandemic. Plus: a very costly Bitcoin miscalculation.

Featuring: Michelle & Robert King (@RKing618), TV Writers & Show Runners

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Algorithms that give you anxiety and a Web3 project that doesn't suck. Aug 25, 2022

Show notes

Kyle Chayka writes about tech and internet culture for the New Yorker; he’s also the co-founder of Dirt, a newsletter — powered in part by crypto — about… tech and internet culture. He talks to Recode’s Peter Kafka about both of his gigs: They dive deep into his recent essay about “The Age of Algorithmic Anxiety”, and what humans mean when they say they’re upset with The Algorithm. Then Chayka describes the way Dirt is using Web3 tech — specifically, a DAO - to help run Dirt, and why he thinks there are genuinely useful/non-scammy ways to apply the blockchain to media companies.

Featuring: Kyle Chayka (@chaykak), Tech and Internet Culture writer for The New Yorker and Co-Founder of Dirt

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Home Box Office of the Dragon Aug 18, 2022

Show notes

In 2011, HBO changed the prestige television landscape with its expensive, ultra-violent, sex-filled fantasy epic Game of Thrones. Three years after that show’s divisive ending, HBO's hoping the world is ready to go back to Westeros with its GoT prequel, House of the Dragon.

The Ringer’s Joanna Robinson joins Recode’s Peter Kafka to talk about House of the Dragon and its competition, Amazon’s long-awaited The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power. Which fantasy show will rule them all? Is there room for both?

And then, we pivot from fictional carnage to real-life (figurative) carnage with a dip back into the streaming wars, and the Netflix of it all.

Featuring: Joanna Robinson (@jowrotethis), Writer and Podcaster at The Ringer

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Why the Democrats finally got on TikTok Aug 11, 2022

Show notes

Democrats have a complicated relationship with social media - sometimes they think it’s a huge help; other times, not so much. Which is why it’s interesting to hear from Nell Thomas, the chief technology officer for the Democratic National Committee, who previously worked on data science for… Facebook. Recode’s Peter Kafka talks to Thomas about how working for Facebook helped her understand the platform; how her current role at the DNC is supposed to help Democrats win elections; and how the DNC weighed the risks and benefits of joining TikTok.

Featuring: Nell Thomas (@nellwyn), Chief Technology Officer for The DNC

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Land of the Giants: Why Instagram Broke Its Square Aug 04, 2022

Show notes

This week, we bring you an episode of Recode and The Verge’s latest season of Land of the Giants: The Facebook / Meta Disruption. To check out the first two episodes, subscribe wherever you subscribe to podcasts!

This episode explores Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram in 2012. Mark Zuckerberg promised he would be hands-off with the company’s curated aesthetic and simple features. But as Facebook scaled the startup into a social media juggernaut, tensions flared. Instagram’s founders would leave, and it’s now a very different app than when it first started. But are the changes setting the company up to compete in the future? Or is Instagram losing the magic that made it great in the first place?

Hosted by Shirin Ghaffary (@shiringhaffary) and Alex Heath (@alexeheath)

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

B.J. Novak on “Vengeance”, podcasts and the downside of the streaming boom Jul 28, 2022

Show notes

B.J. Novak has starred on TV, written a best-selling kids’ book, and tried his hand at app-making. Now he’s written, directed, and starred in his own movie: Vengeance, about a self-obsessed podcaster, red/blue state divides, and much more. He talks to Recode’s Peter Kafka about making the movie during a pandemic, what it was like to be on The Office when it was on NBC and then on Netflix, and why streaming is a “wasteland for comedy.”

Plus! The New York Times' James Poniewozek explains why the January 6 hearings’ novel format has worked on TV and social media.

Featuring: B.J. Novak (@bjnovak), Actor, Comedian, and Writer

James Poniewozik (@poniewozik), TV Critic for The New York Times

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is the metaverse, when is it going to show up and who’s going to run it? Jul 19, 2022

Show notes

People have been talking about the metaverse for years. But they’re talking about it much more these days, spurred by Mark Zuckerberg’s full-fledged embrace of the… actually, what exactly is the metaverse again, anyways?

Investor, analyst and metaverse explainer Matthew Ball, who’s already tried explaining this stuff to Recode’s Peter Kafka, has written a whole book about it, so he’s back again: Ball talks about what he thinks the metaverse is really going to be, what it’s not going to be, how long it might take to get here and why you may or may not care about it.

Featuring: Matthew Ball (@ballmatthew), Investor, Analyst, and Author

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ken Auletta on the Harvey Weinstein story he wrote, the story he couldn’t write, and the one he’s publishing now. Jul 11, 2022

Show notes

20 years ago the New Yorker’s Ken Auletta wrote a seminal profile of famed and feared producer Harvey Weinstein - with one glaring omission. Now Auletta has written a book about Weinstein — Hollywood Ending — and this time he’s able to cover the full story. Auletta talks to Recode’s Peter Kafka about the two works, and why it took so long for Weinstein’s much-rumored sexual abuses to come out in the open.

Featuring: Ken Auletta (@kenauletta), Writer at The New Yorker, and Author

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Netflix has a huge hit with Peaky Blinders — and Caryn Mandabach owns it. Jul 07, 2022

Show notes

Caryn Mandabach produced some of the biggest hits in TV history — like The Cosby Show, Roseanne, 3rd Rock from the Sun, and That ’70s Show. Now she’s thriving in the Netflix era, with Peaky Blinders — a historical crime drama that just ended a six-season run and is a global success story. She talks to Recode’s Peter Kafka about the way the TV business has changed, and the risk and reward of owning your own shows.

Featuring: Caryn Mandabach (@mandabachtv), Executive Producer of Netflix's Peaky Blinders

Host: Peter Kafka (@pkafka), Senior Editor at Recode

About Recode by Vox: Recode by Vox helps you understand how tech is changing the world — and changing us.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected