Apple News In Conversation

Guest-hosted by David Greene: Maggie Nichols was the first athlete on the national team to report former USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar’s sexual abuse to the organization in June 2015. A year later, she was not selected for the U.S. Olympic team. She spoke with guest host David Greene about her new memoir, Unstoppable! Warning: This episode includes descriptions of sexual violence and re...

Guest-hosted by David Greene: The NFL accounted for 93 of the top 100 U.S. broadcasts in 2023, according to Nielsen ratings. But not that long ago, the league was reeling from controversies around head injuries, allegations of racism in its hiring practices, and players protesting police brutality. To better understand the NFL’s staying power, Apple News In Conversation guest host David Gree...

Guest-hosted by David Greene: College football and basketball are multibillion-dollar industries. But while some Division 1 coaches and athletic directors make millions of dollars each year, the players themselves are not paid by the schools they compete for. That may soon change. The NCAA is facing a slew of lawsuits that could lead to student athletes being treated and compensated as university...

Roz Chast started at the New Yorker in 1978, when there was only one other woman cartoonist at the magazine. Decades later, she is a celebrated figure in the cartoon world and has become well-known for her distinctive style and humor. Her latest book, I Must Be Dreaming , is an illustrated guide to Chast’s dreams and the inner workings of her mind. Chast spoke with Apple News In Conversation...

Have we been visited by extraterrestrial life? And how much does the government really know when it comes to UFOs? Garrett Graff’s latest book, UFO: The Inside Story of the US Government’s Search for Alien Life Here — and Out There , investigates these questions and more. The national-security reporter recently sat down with Apple News In Conversation host Shumita Basu to share h...

Journalist Tim Alberta was raised in the evangelical church and is a practicing Christian. But he’s grown increasingly concerned about how entrenched politics has become in the evangelical movement. In his latest book, The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism , Alberta lays out the state of the evangelical church today and its shift toward the cultu...

Esther Perel is the relationship expert many couples dream of scheduling a session with. Her podcast, Where Should We Begin? With Esther Perel , offers the next best thing. In it, she helps real couples work through their issues, often providing insights that are relevant to other relationships. Apple News In Conversation host Shumita Basu spoke with Perel about how she approaches her work, the ch...

This is an episode from our archives. Transitions can feel intimidating and destabilizing. But these moments can also be opportunities for growth, reflection, and self-discovery — especially when you have the right tools. In this episode of Apple News In Conversation , host Shumita Basu talks to Hidden Brain ’s Shankar Vedantam about why pivot points can feel so challenging and how to...

This is an episode from our archives. Rainn Wilson understands why so many people are rejecting religion today. But he argues that the core aspects of faith still have something important to offer us. Spirituality has brought him community, purpose, and joy — even as he’s struggled with depression, anxiety, and addiction. The actor explores these themes and shares what he’s learn...

Elizabeth Keating didn’t realize how little she knew about her mother’s life until after she had died. A trained anthropologist, Keating decided to develop a guide for interviewing and recording loved ones’ histories before it’s too late. Her book, The Essential Questions: Interview Your Family to Uncover Stories and Bridge Generations , offers a blueprint for these convers...

Holiday spending is expected to reach record levels this year. That makes for a lot of packages — and a lot of returns, donations, and junk. On Apple News In Conversation , host Shumita Basu speaks with The Atlantic ’s Amanda Mull, who reveals the strategies retailers use to get you to buy more stuff, and what you can do to have a more sustainable holiday.

Rachel Maddow is best known for her show on MSNBC. But she’s also a serious history buff. In her latest book, Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism , Maddow lays out the rise of a dangerous antidemocratic movement in the United States in the 1930s and ’40s and how Americans stopped that campaign from flourishing. Maddow spoke with Apple News In Conversation host Shumita Basu about...

In this episode from our archives, Apple News In Conversation  host Shumita Basu talks with Kate Mangino, a gender expert and the author of the book  Equal Partners: Improving Gender Equality at Home . Mangino points to research that shows women still take on the majority of household responsibilities in different-sex relationships — and she argues there’s a better way for pa...

What if the United States had lost the space race — and the Soviet Union had been the first to land a man on the moon? These are the driving questions behind the Apple TV+ series For All Mankind . The show explores the ripple effects of what coming in second could have meant for American culture, the feminist movement, geopolitics, and technology over several decades. And while fiction, it o...

David Remnick has reported on Israel and the Palestinian territories for many years. But his most recent trip to Israel was like nothing he’d seen before. In an article for the New Yorker , Remnick writes about visiting with survivors of the Hamas massacre, Israel’s assaults on Gaza, and what comes next. Below are excerpts from his interview with Apple News In Conversation host Sh...

Big tech companies first started working on artificial facial recognition more than a decade ago. But they chose not to release it, worried about who might use it and how. Then, in 2017, the small startup Clearview AI debuted its facial-recognition app and began marketing its tool to law-enforcement agencies. This week on Apple News In Conversation, host Shumita Basu talks to Kashmir Hill, a New Y...

After striking oil on their reservation, members of the Osage Nation became some of the richest people in the world in the 1920s. Then white Oklahomans began killing them for their wealth in a sinister and elaborate plot. These events are detailed by David Grann in his book Killers of the Flower Moon , which has recently adapted into a Martin Scorsese–directed movie for Apple TV+. Apple News...

Warning: This episode describes graphic content, including the death of children. The following interview is about the experiences of Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and mostly focuses on events that took place before the latest escalation of violence in Israel and Gaza. It looks at one particular perspective and does not aim to capture all of the complexities of the ongoing Israeli-...

The news coming out of Israel and Gaza this week has been fast-moving and devastating. It’s always hard, during a rapidly-changing news event, to know where to find accurate, contextualized information. It’s especially challenging in this particular war, where the history of conflict is so long, complicated, and emotionally-charged. For this week’s episode of Apple News In Conver...

In the United States, AR-15s grace bumper stickers, mugs, and politicians’ Christmas cards. They’re also the weapon used in some of the deadliest mass shootings in modern American history. Wall Street Journal reporters Cameron McWhirter and Zusha Elinson trace the rifle’s rise in their new book, American Gun: The True Story of the AR-15 . They spoke with Apple News In Conversatio...

Martinus Evans did not have an easy start to running. Weighing over 300 pounds, he set out to finish a marathon after a doctor told him to “lose weight or die.” He writes about his running journey in his new book, Slow AF Run Club: The Ultimate Guide for Anyone Who Wants to Run . In this week’s episode of Apple News In Conversation , Evans talks with host Shumita Basu about the l...

Walter Isaacson, author of the new biography Elon Musk , spent two years following the world’s richest man in an effort to understand what drives him. Isaacson joins Apple News In Conversation host Shumita Basu to explain what he learned about Musk’s reach and power, how his childhood shaped him, and why he has weekly meetings about colonizing Mars.

America has long struggled with how best to teach kids to read. But a new approach, called the science of reading, is gaining steam — and it’s proving successful. At the same time, many classrooms haven’t caught up to it, and some students are being left behind. In the latest episode of Apple News In Conversation , host Shumita Basu talks to Karen D’Souza, a reporter for Ed...

Growing up, Jennifer Senior thought her mom was an only child. But when she was 12 years old, she learned her mom had a sister, named Adele, who was institutionalized as a baby. Adele had spent almost her entire life separated from her family. Decades later, in 2021, Senior reconnected with her aunt and uncovered the dark history of institutionalizing children with intellectual disabilities. Senio...

When longtime LA Times columnist Steve Lopez reached his mid-60s, he started to think about retiring. But he wasn’t sure how to go about it — or if he should do it all. He gave himself one year to decide and spoke with many different people — Norman Lear and Mel Brooks, among others — about their thoughts on retirement. He wrote a book about his journey, called Independence...