Decoder with Nilay Patel

Today we're talking about the Tesla Takedown protest movement, which has emerged as a way for people to express how deeply unhappy they are with Elon Musk installing himself as a not-so-shadow president who is tearing the federal government apart, leaving confusion and destruction in his wake. Tesla's stock price is sinking, new car registrations and down, and hype around the company is fading rap...

I'm talking to Evan Smith, who started Altana in 2019 because he predicted the first wave of globalized manufacturing and trade would end, and that companies would want new powerful tools to adapt their supply chains as the world grew more complex. Here in 2025, that looks like a pretty good bet — even if the way it's playing out is more stressful and chaotic than anyone really wants it to be. The...

Today, I’m talking to Verge policy editor Adi Robertson about a bill called the Take It Down Act, which is one in a long line of bills that would make it illegal to distribute non-consensual intimate imagery, or NCII. This is a real and devastating problem on the internet, and AI is just making it worse.  But Adi just wrote a long piece arguing that giving the Trump administration new powers over...

Almar Latour is the publisher of the Wall Street Journal and also CEO of its parent company, Dow Jones — itself a part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Almar's been with the paper since the 90s, and now he's got insight into all the modern messes. He's made a big deal with OpenAI, while also suing Perplexity — all while building his own AI data products for Dow Jones customers. He's also a strong de...

So today I’m talking to Andy Hawkins, The Verge’s transportation editor, about what’s going on in the skies. Andy just edited a big piece for us by writer Darryl Campbell that helps put a lot of what’s happening in air travel right now in perspective. It has some very reassuring data points, but it also raises important questions about what we need to do next to reinstill confidence in air travel....

Panos Panay is in charge of devices and services at Amazon — that's everything from Alexa and Kindle to Ring, Eero, and even the Project Kuiper satellite internet service that's meant to compete with Starlink. He's led the team through giving Alexa a big AI infusion which is what drew him to Amazon after nearly 20 years with Microsoft. Like so many folks in tech, he sees AI as a platform shift tha...

This is Alex Heath, deputy editor of The Verge. I’m guest hosting today’s episode while Nilay is still away for a much-needed vacation. He’ll be back next week. But today, we’re diving into the bromance between Elon Musk and Donald Trump, and more specifically, how it’s impacting the changing right-wing political movement here in the United States.  There’s no better place to get that temperature...

Vimeo started many years ago as something of an artsier, more creative competitor to YouTube. Its last CEO, Anjali Sud, took the company through a pretty huge transformation into an enterprise software company, and we had her on the show to talk about that transformation a couple years ago. Now, her successor, new CEO Philip Moyer, not only has to decide what parts of that strategy are working, bu...

This is David Pierce, editor-at-large at The Verge. Nilay is off this week for a much-deserved break. So I’m filling in for him, and the Decoder team thought this would be a good opportunity to switch gears a little bit from the political apocalypse beat and talk about something completely different. So today we’re diving into the video game industry and discussing a particular set of very thorny...

The First Amendment, protecting free speech and free media, is a pillar of US law. It is, famously, the first one. We don’t usually tolerate government interference with speech. So it’s been disconcerting these first few weeks of the second Trump administration to realize suddenly, there’s a nonzero chance the government will punish our work. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr is absolutely determined to t...

Today, I’m talking with Senator Ron Wyden, a democrat and the senior senator from Oregon. He’s been in the Senate for almost 30 years, which makes him one of longest serving members of the institution. We scheduled this interview with Senator Wyden a while ago — he’s got a new book out called “It Takes Chutzpah: How to Fight Fearlessly for Progressive Change.”  But recent events made it vastly mor...

Today, we’re discussing a very big problem with extremely far-reaching consequences: Do we still have a functional federal government here in the United States? And how much of it has been handed entirely to Elon Musk?  If you’ve been following the news, you know there’s a lot here that’s unfolding very fast, but I wanted to know how all these changes are affecting the people who’ve so far been th...

Andy Hunter is the CEO of Bookshop.org, a website he launched in 2020 that lets local bookshops sell all over the country. He always meant it to compete directly with Amazon, and the timing of that launch right into the teeth of the pandemic meant it was able to start strong and grow quickly. Now Bookshop is selling ebooks, which is another market hugely dominated by Amazon. For Andy and Bookshop...

Today, we’re talking about DeepSeek, and how the open source AI model built by a Chinese startup has completely upended the conventional wisdom around chatbots, what they can do, and how much they should cost to develop.  We’re also talking about Stargate, OpenAI’s new $500 billion data center venture that’s supposed to supercharge domestic AI infrastructure. Both stand in stark contrast with one...

Today, I’m talking with Gary Smith, CEO of the networking company Ciena. You probably aren’t familiar with Ciena — the company isn’t really a household name. But every internet user has relied on the company’s products; Ciena makes the hardware and software that makes the fiber optic cables connecting the world light up with data.  That’s everything from local fiber networks for broadband ISPs to...

It’s been a messy couple of weeks for big tech companies as the second Trump administration kicks off an unprecedented era of how we think about who controls the internet. Right now, there's a major collision, or maybe merger, happening between billionaire power and state power, and everyone who uses tech to communicate — so, basically everyone — is stuck in the middle. I sat down with law profess...

Today, I’m talking with Matt Garman, the CEO of Amazon Web Services. Matt took over as CEO last June — you might recall that we had his predecessor Adam Selipsky on the show just over a year ago. That makes this episode terrific Decoder bait, since I love hearing how new CEOs will decide what to change and what to keep going after they’ve settled into their role. Links:  There’s no AI without the...

Hello, Nilay here. We’re still on winter break; we’ll be back with brand-new Decoder interviews next week, and with our Thursday shows later this month. I’m excited for what we’ve got in the pipeline. I think you’re going to love it. For today, though, we’re sharing an episode of Peter Kafka’s new show Channels – he’s talking to disinformation researcher Renee DiResta about what’s going on with sp...

The Decoder team turns the tables on Nilay and makes him answer your burning listener questions in our end-of-year wrap up special. We also reflect on the year’s biggest Decoder themes, discuss some of the most popular feedback we’ve received, and tease what we have planned for next year.  Links:  Here we go: The Verge now has a subscription | The Verge How The Verge Works | The Vergecast Intuit a...

Today we’re talking about antitrust policy and tech, which is at a particularly weird moment as we enter the second Trump administration. A lot of tech policy is at a weird moment, actually, but antitrust might be the weirdest of them all — the pendulum has swung back and forth on antitrust policy pretty wildly over the past few years, and it’s about to swing again under Trump. So I asked Leah Nyl...

Alex Heath, Deputy Editor at The Verge, guest hosts this episode of Decoder featuring a live interview with Arm CEO Rene Haas about the future of AI and the semiconductor industry. The two discuss his thoughts on the struggles of Intel, the rumors Arm is developing its own AI chips to rival Nvidia’s, and his thoughts on the incoming Trump administration.  Links:  What Arm’s CEO makes of the Intel...

We’ve been talking a lot this year about the changing internet, and what it’s doing to the media ecosystem — particularly journalism, which has taken a backseat to creators and influencers. But the tech platforms themselves have a lot of influence over what those creators and influencers make, too. If you’re a Decoder listener, you’ll recognize this as one of my common themes — the idea that the w...

There’s something strange happening these days in the podcast world — in particular, the way companies that deal in money have been using podcasting as not just an entertainment medium, but a unique kind of hybrid of marketing, thought leadership, and networking. Guest host David Pierce and Vulture podcast critic Nick Quah break it all down.  Links:  How Venture Capitalists Use Podcasts to Lure in...

Today, I’m talking with Mustafa Suleyman, the CEO of Microsoft AI. Mustafa is a fascinating character in the world of AI — he’s been in and out of some pivotal companies like DeepMind, which he cofounded, and Google. He landed at Microsoft through a unique not-quite-acquisition deal of his latest startup, Inflection AI.  As CEO of Microsoft AI, Mustafa now oversees all of its consumer AI products,...

AI investment is massive, but AI profits are not — and yet investors seem confident massive AI fundraising will one day translate into sizable AI profits. To break it down, Verge Deputy Editor Alex Heath guest hosts this episode of Decoder featuring Menlo Ventures partner Tim Tully and AirStreet Capital founder Nathan Benaich.  Links:  2024: The State of Generative AI in the Enterprise | Menlo Ven...