On the Media

This has been a crazy season for internet hoaxes. This week, we investigated one we actually deeply enjoyed being fooled by -- about a social media bot for Pace Picante Salsa going insane and inadvertently revealing an entire world of corporate conspiracy. We talk to the comedian behind the hoax, Randy Liedtke, who has his own very funny podcast called The Bone Zone. Thanks for listening. If you like the show, you can subscribe to us on iTunes. Also, please check out all our previous episodes!

The men behind the games you see on Sundays, the journalist who played a crucial role in breaking baseball's color barrier,  and a loquacious former NBA star.

Hello! We are taking a week off the podcast to work on some special things that you will like a lot. This episode is a Best Of*, in case you have a friend who hasn't gotten a chance to check us out who you might like to share TLDR with. It also includes an answer to one of our show's enduring mysteries - just what the hell TLDR stands for. Thanks for listening, and if you like the show, subscribe to it on iTunes. If you want other people to hear it, please rate and review it! If you want to check out our previous episodes on our website, you can listen here. If you like our theme song, you can hear more by Breakmaster Cylinder here. *Yes, we know that it takes some pretty unmitigated gall to run a clip show two months after launching a podcast.

The media's annual reporting on rising Thanksgiving dinner costs, the NSA's chilling effects on journalists, and how things went viral before the internet.

Lulu is an app that lets women rate guys they've slept with. Was he willing to commit? Was he gassy? The ratings are anonymous, and men can't see their profiles. When Lulu launched earlier this year, people didn't like it, but it also seemed more like a thought experiment than a real social network women would use. Nine months later, the company says that one in four female college students is using it. This week, we talk about Lulu with Maureen O'Connor, who blogs for New York Magazine's The Cut. Thanks for listening, and if you like the show, subscribe to it on iTunes. If you want other people to hear it, please rate and review it! If you want to check out our previous episodes on our website, you can listen here. If you like our theme song, you can hear more by Breakmaster Cylinder here.

Why the media are already speculating on the 2016 elections, carrying guns as a form of free speech, and the unwavering obsession with JFK after all these years.

A peek inside Rupert Murdoch's media empire, the evolving NFL bullying story, and reporting on rape in India.

Before the Internet as we know it today, there were text-based bulletin board systems all over the country that people could dial into. One of those systems, M-net, happened to live in Alex's backyard, and it was his internet home base for the better part of a decade. Alex went back this week and found out that it's actually still running. Thanks for listening, and if you like the show, subscribe to it on iTunes. If you want other people to hear it, please rate and review it! If you want to check out our previous episodes on our website, you can listen here. If you like our theme song, you can hear more by Breakmaster Cylinder here.

The media start challenging Obama's "you can keep it" promise about health care, a man who challenged hackers to hack him, and a predecessor to "Nigerian" scam emails.

Up until this fall, there was a secret internet. You probably heard about one part of it, the Silk Road, but that was just one secret website among many. This week, we talk to Gawker's Adrian Chen about the rest of the dark part of the internet, and how it's been damaged by the Silk Road arrests. Thanks for listening, and if you like the show, subscribe to it on iTunes! If you want other people to hear it, please rate and review it! If you want to check out our previous episodes on our website, you can listen here.

A major credit bureau accidentally sells its data to identity thieves, the difficulty of reporting around DHS opacity, and the good and bad that comes with putting victims of tragedy in the media spotlight.

Millions of Americans don't use the internet at all. Some don't have access because of poverty, geography, or age. But some just never logged on. This week, Alex goes on a quest to find a unicorn -- someone who lives a life just like his, but entirely without internet.

The long term cost of the shutdown is ignored by the media, Glenn Greenwald's new investigative reporting outfit, and Brooke shares the results of her mail-order DNA test.

A close look at government transparency under President Obama. Also, Sherlock Holmes Becomes Julian Assange and a declassification engine.  

A look at the media coverage - both here and abroad - of the government shutdown, how social media is recreating the old television viewing experience, and California's attempts to legislate the internet.