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After recording about 90 episodes of “Exhausting Fork,” a weekly New York Instances podcast about expertise and enterprise, life is way the identical for its hosts, Kevin Roose and Casey Newton. That’s, aside from the occasional encounter with a fan, which is a brand new and generally startling expertise for them.
“Simply final evening, I used to be having dinner with two mates visiting from out of city,” Mr. Newton mentioned. “As I used to be getting back from the toilet, a person stopped me. At first, I believed I had met him earlier than as a result of I principally have face blindness. However then it emerged that he acknowledged me from our YouTube channel.”
For the reason that podcast’s first episode in October 2022, Mr. Roose and Mr. Newton have mentioned and debated subjects together with the looming TikTok ban by U.S. lawmakers, Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter and the professionals and cons of digital companionship. They’ve interviewed friends resembling Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada and Sam Altman, a co-founder of OpenAI.
Alongside the best way, Mr. Roose and Mr. Newton have tinkered with the podcast’s format, inviting listeners to ship of their questions, for instance. However their mission has remained the identical: to tell and entertain.
In an interview, Mr. Newton and Mr. Roose shared their objectives for the way forward for the podcast and their dream friends. These are edited excerpts.
How did you two first meet?
CASEY NEWTON My reminiscence of first assembly Kevin was that I had been invited to a celebration for his e-book “Younger Cash” on the residence of Evelyn Rusli, who’s a former Instances reporter. I bear in mind strolling in and being so aggravated that he was youthful than me and already on his second e-book. I don’t even actually bear in mind the encounter. I’m positive I mentioned hello. I might simply frequently run into Kevin through the years, and we developed a friendship.
KEVIN ROOSE I used to be a subscriber and massive fan of Casey’s e-newsletter, Platformer, which is a must-read out right here in Silicon Valley. Platformer is superb and likewise fairly critical, protecting subjects like content material moderation and tech laws. I additionally knew Casey had this different aspect to him. I knew that he had performed improv comedy. I knew that he was very humorous, sharp and fast-thinking, and that he was simply quite a lot of enjoyable to speak about these items with. So I puzzled, “May the one who writes this essential, very critical e-newsletter even be my podcast co-host?”
“Exhausting Fork” is sort of two years previous. What has been listeners’ suggestions to date?
NEWTON The standard e mail says that we use the phrase “like” an excessive amount of, there’s too many “ums,” an excessive amount of vocal fry. They ask why we speak about synthetic intelligence a lot.
ROOSE Casey is sandbagging. We get one of the best suggestions of any mission I’ve ever labored on in my profession as a journalist. We hear from lots of people who’ve actually good and good concepts. It is extremely humbling to work on a present wherein your listeners are smarter than you and have Ph.D.s in molecular biology or are A.I. researchers.
What’s the best problem of constructing the podcast?
NEWTON In addition to Kevin’s persona? The toughest factor is that generally there aren’t three issues I wish to speak about in an episode. There are quite a lot of tech exhibits on the market with this consensus by committee, like, “These are the three most vital tales of the week and we’re going to speak about them it doesn’t matter what, even when we don’t really feel like now we have a robust standpoint.” Kevin and I actually strive not to try this. We attempt to lead the podcast the place our personal curiosities go and solely speak about stuff the place now we have one thing to say.
What are your objectives for the way forward for “Exhausting Fork”?
NEWTON I wish to ensure that the present continues to really feel stunning and creative. One in every of my unique ideas for “Exhausting Fork” was that it ought to really feel like “The Value Is Proper” by way of video games and segments. You by no means know which segments or video games are going to seem in a given week. Proper now, we’re kicking round concepts on different kinds of segments that belong within the present and would really feel at residence with what we do and likewise allow us to discover extra creatively. We wish to develop the viewers. We wish to be the largest tech present on the planet.
ROOSE I wish to be the largest present on the planet, not only a tech present. I would like Joe Rogan to kneel earlier than us. That’s my purpose.
Who’s your dream visitor?
NEWTON It’s fascinating as a result of so most of the large names wind up not being wonderful interviews. However I’ll say that Sarah Jessica Parker responded to me on Threads and mentioned that she was a fan of the present. If we might get her to come back on the present, that will be a dream.
ROOSE Once we began the present, we truly we had a giant listing of dream friends. I checked out it the opposite day and now we have interviewed quite a lot of them, so I really feel very pleased with that. I might like to be invited on a ketamine bender with Elon Musk and interview him beneath the affect.
What’s your favourite factor about working collectively?
NEWTON Kevin was actually the one particular person I wished to do a podcast with. There’s one thing about the best way that he talks that’s so aligned with me. Kevin and I see eye to eye on a staggering variety of issues. Regardless that our factors of view are generally completely different on points, we see the world in the identical manner. So there’s consolation about entering into the studio with him.
ROOSE That’s the nicest factor you’ve ever mentioned to me.
NEWTON OK, don’t use any of that.
ROOSE Casey is an excellent journalist and a superb buddy. He’s the funniest particular person I do know, and he has an unusually robust ethical compass. It has been actually spectacular to me how Casey has not deserted his moral core within the pursuit of journalistic excellence. He’s nonetheless actually pushed by precept. I’m not going to say that’s uncommon, as a result of quite a lot of journalists are, however I really feel like he’s an particularly robust instance of that.
