Decoder with Nilay Patel

Nilay Patel is joined by Riana Pfefferkorn and Jennifer King to talk about Apple's new child safety features. Riana and Jen are both researchers at Stanford and between the two of them have expertise in encryption policies and consumer privacy issues. Guest Bio: Riana Pfefferkorn: http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/about/people/riana-pfefferkorn Jennifer King: http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/about/people/j...

On today’s episode I’m talking with Neal Mohan, the chief product officer at YouTube. And there’s a lot to talk about – YouTube is announcing a $100 million fund to begin paying creators who use YouTube Shorts, which is its competitor to TikTok. YouTube remains the default video hosting platform for the entire internet, in a way can feel almost invisible, like it’s a utility, like water, or electr...

This week Nilay Patel talks to Chuck Todd, the political director at NBC News and moderator of Meet The Press, the longest running television show in the country. Seriously: Meet the Press started in 1946, and Chuck is only the 12th moderator the show’s ever had. As streaming upends television, he’s expanding Meet The Press from a single weekly show where Chuck interviews politicians to an entire...

Nilay Patel encountered the name Blackstone on TikTok last year, just as the pandemic lockdowns were starting. He saw people posting videos smashing burgers and making pancakes outside on a griddle frequently with the caption “I finally got a Blackstone.” 20 minutes ago he hadn’t even heard about this thing, and now he was late to a trend? So he bought one. And hasn’t used his regular grill in ove...

We are back after our week off, and we’ve got a good one today. On this episode I’m talking to Thomas Ingenlath, CEO of Polestar, a new car company with close family ties to Volvo. We talked a lot about what kind of company Polestar is — it’s pretty small, and has the ability to rethink a lot of things about how a car company is organized, while having the ability to fall back on a larger company...

While Decoder is on vacation this week, we're sharing an episode of Land of the Giants, a podcast from our friends at Recode and Eater. Land of the Giants is a podcast that explores how the biggest tech companies rose to power, and what they're doing with that power. In this 4-part mini-season, they’re covering the world of restaurant delivery apps and exploring how big tech is transforming the bu...

Juul became a sensation — and a sensationally dramatic story. Lauren Etter, author of The Devil's Playbook: Big Tobacco, JUUL, and the Addiction of a New Generation, joins us to explain how a tech startup founded in a Stanford design studio to disrupt the smoking industry upended years of tobacco regulation in the United States, got a new generation of teenagers addicted to nicotine after years of...

Nilay Patel talks with Satya Nadella, the CEO and chairman of Microsoft. On Thursday, Microsoft announced Windows 11, which comes with an all-new design, a bunch of new features, and the ability to run Android apps. Nilay asks Nadella about how he thinks about Windows as a platform, what Microsoft’s responsibilities are, and how he thinks the various antitrust bills in Congress will affect Microso...

Nilay Patel talks with Jack Conte, co-founder and CEO of Patreon, the platform that allows people to pay their favorite creators directly with monthly subscriptions. Nilay and Jack talk about how Patreon’s model as “membership” works, what Patreon’s relationship is to Apple and the app store, and where the overall creator economy is going on the internet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit po...

Nilay Patel talks with Jahmy Hindman, chief technology office at John Deere, the world’s biggest manufacturer of farming machinery.  Nilay and Jahmy discuss what it means for our farming equipment to be run by computers, and how to fix the problems that arise because of it — like accessing reliable broadband, how the equipment should be upgraded, and who gets to fix it when it breaks. Learn more a...

Nilay Patel talks with managing director of Y Combinator Michael Siebel. YC is one of the most well-known and successful startup incubators in Silicon Valley. Michael is also a co-founder of Justin.tv, known now as Twitch, and he recently joined the board at Reddit after cofounder Alexis Ohanian stepped down and asked the company to replace him with someone who is Black. That means Michael is uniq...

Nilay Patel talks with head of global affairs and chief legal officer of Spotify Horacio Gutierrez to help understand why Spotify and so many other app developers are so frustrated with Apple. Horacio recently testified in front of Congress about Apple’s business practices, and just wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal calling Apple a “ruthless bully.” Horacio explains what he sees as the big...

Nilay Patel talks with Revathi Advaithi, CEO of Flex. Flex is the third largest electronics manufacturing company in the world, making everything from hair dryers to the Mac Pro to autonomous driving systems for electric cars. It can also do everything from simply assembling products, to actually designing and engineering them from scratch.  Revathi and Nilay focus on the global chip shortage, the...

This week we have Jim Farley, CEO of Ford Motor Company, to discuss their second big push into consumer EVs with the F-150 Lightning. We wanted to see how Jim sees our relationship to cars changing as they turn into what are fundamentally rolling computers. His answers surprised us — he hinted at one day being able to upgrade the computing systems of a car the same way you might upgrade or replace...

Nilay Patel talks with Kate Klonick, a law professor at St. John’s University Law School and one of the foremost chroniclers of Facebook’s moderation efforts.  Kate has been researching and studying Facebook’s Oversight Board from its inception: she embedded with the board as it was forming to write a definitive piece for The New Yorker called “Inside the Making of Facebook’s Supreme Court.” Nilay...

Nilay Patel talks with Harley Finkelstein, President of Shopify. Shopify makes software that allows businesses of all sizes to set up online stores, and from there it can handle everything from shipping orders to financing loans for expansion. The company went public in 2015, and as online commerce has exploded during the pandemic, it’s been on a tear ever since. Harley talks about competing with...

Senator Amy Klobuchar sits down with host Nilay Patel to discuss her new book Antitrust: Taking on Monopoly Power from the Gilded Age to the Digital Age and the flurry of antitrust hearings over the past year. Senator Klobuchar serves as chair of the Senate subcommittee on competition policy, antitrust, and consumer rights — and in that role, Senator Klobuchar held a hearing last week focused on t...

Since becoming CEO a few years ago, Anjali Sud has changed the nature of Vimeo’s business from indie entertainment streaming platform to a SaaS company offering tools for content creators. And it's paying off. Nilay Patel and Anjali discuss Vimeo’s rapid growth, going public, and what’s next for the company. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nilay Patel talks with Chris Milk, founder and CEO of Within, which makes the VR fitness app Supernatural. Chris has been making VR experiences for a long time, but Supernatural feels like his biggest hit yet — an app that makes people go out and buy a VR headset just to use. Chris and Nilay discuss how the company Within takes on music licensing, competition with Peloton, and the platform of virt...

Nilay Patel interviews two experts on different sides of the bitcoin argument: a bitcoin investor and bitcoin skeptic. The investor is Nic Carter. He’s a general partner at Castle Island Ventures, which funds startups that are building on top of the bitcoin infrastructure to make payments more accessible — basically, making sure bitcoin can function like a currency. The skeptic is Steve Hanke. He...

In a bonus episode of Decoder, Platformer editor and Verge contributing editor Casey Newton talks with Facebook's VP of Global Affairs Nick Clegg about his lengthy Medium post addressing some of the criticisms that Facebook has endured, as well as unveiling some changes the company is making to give users more control over their experience. Host of Decoder Nilay Patel taks with Casey before the in...

Nilay Patel talks with Tracy Sun, the co-founder and SVP of new markets at Poshmark, a fashion resale company that just went public earlier this year while riding the huge wave of e-commerce growth during the pandemic. Tracy has to manage regular e-commerce issues, like shipping logistics and customer service, as well as influencer economy problems, like burnout and the incessant need to grow foll...

Nilay Patel sits down with New York Times tech columnist Kevin Roose to discuss the impact of automation on our future — specifically, robotic process automation, or RPA. Kevin's new book, Futureproof: 9 Rules for Humans in the Age of Automation, is out and features a lengthy discussion of RPA, who's using it, who it will affect, and how to think about it as you design your career. Learn more abou...

Nilay Patel talks with Atlassian CEO Scott Farquhar about Australia's Media Bargaining Code, which requires social platforms and search engines to pay news publishers for linking to their work. They also discuss how to run a global company in an increasingly fractured world and why understanding public policy is now key to running a tech company. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoi...

Nilay talks with Twitter’s Head of Consumer Product, Keyvon Beykpour about what it took to reset the team towards growth, how he decides what to prioritize, and what the timelines for success look like on different projects. They also talk about moderation, of course. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices