Channels with Peter Kafka

If Joe Weisenthal didn’t exist, the internet would have to invent him. Because Joe Weisenthal is built for the internet — more specifically, an internet personality: Knows a lot, curious about even more, often right, happy to be wrong, always has something to say about anything.That persona/personality did wonders for Joe in the early days of Business Insider — which, not coincidentally, were also the early days of Twitter, where Joe really took off. Then he took his talents to Bloomberg, and since then has turned himself into a successful business/finance podcaster: Along with co-host Tracy Alloway, they’ve turned “Odd Lots” from a project no one at Bloomberg paid attention to into a genuine hit.Discussed here: Why Joe is still at Bloomberg, instead of doing the indie media route that could make him a gazillion dollars; what makes a perfect podcast guest; and Joe’s semi-secret country music ambitions. Plus, something smart you can say about tariffs, if you’re in a place where people are talking about tariffs.Bonus content! This pod also includes a conversation with filmmaker Adam Bhala Lough, who wanted to make a movie about OpenAI’s Sam Altman, but couldn’t. So he made a fake Sam Altman instead, which is why his movie is called Deepfaking Sam Altman. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In February 2020, Disney CEO Bob Iger finally announced his successor: Bob Chapek, who ran the company’s parks business. That didn’t work out.Now Iger is running it back: This time around he’s announced that Josh D’Amaro, who runs the company’s park business, is going to succeed him.So: Who is Josh D’Amaro, and what has he done to prove himself CEO-worthy? Why does Iger (and the Disney board) think this one will work? And what happens to all the Disney businesses D’Amaro doesn’t have any background in - you know, the movies and TV shows you think about when you think of Disney?We have an excellent guest to walk us through all of this: Puck’s Julia Alexander, who has been covering Disney for years — and also worked there for a year doing strategy stuff.Julia’s argument in a nutshell: Disney doesn’t know what’s going to happen to the business of making things like movies and TV shows. But it knows people are going to keep coming to its parks and cruises, so it hired the guy that knows that business. Is that the right call? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Football isn’t just the biggest show on TV — at this point, it’s basically the only reason some TV networks exist. So it’s a very worthy subject for Chuck Klosterman, the provocative and prolific writer, to tackle in his new book, which is called… Football. The big Channels idea here is to talk about football’s dominance in American media and culture, and What That Means — and how that might end, one day. And we most definitely get into that. But when you have Chuck Klosterman in studio, you talk about as much as you can. So in this this one, we also get into: Why football is a “completely mediated,” made-for-tv-even-if-accidentally experience — and why “the only seat” is basically your couch How video games helped rewire the way fans understand (and even play) football How gambling created a “fake game” that sits on top of the real one Why the concussion panic faded even though the hits didn’t Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

How, exactly, did Bari Weiss become the head of CBS News? We know that David Ellison, who bought Paramount last year, hired her — and bought The Free Press, the publication she started a few years earlier. But how did she get on Ellison’s radar? And why are so many media moguls, like Ellison, huge fans? New York magazine’s Charlotte Klein knows. She recently published an excellent profile of Weiss that tracks her ascent over the last few years, and I wanted to talk to her about it. It’s a story about networking, talent, and timing, and I think it tells us a lot about where we’re at right now. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

PJ Vogt helped invent modern narrative podcasting with “Reply All.” Now he’s running “Search Engine” with a much smaller team and a lot more control. We talk through what he gave up this time around, what he gained, and how he actually makes the show each week. I loved this conversation when we recorded it earlier this year. And I think it’s just as relevant now, as media talent — and lots of people in other industries, too — are figuring out how to think about money, ownership and scale. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I chat with lots of media reporters. Lachlan Cartwright is a different beast: An Aussie who started out working for Rupert Murdoch’s tabloids in London and New York, and then on to the National Enquirer — yes, that National Enquirer — back when it was catching and killing stories on behalf on Donald Trump. Now Cartwright runs Breaker, a must-read New York media gossip newsletter and podcast, and spends his time staking out Sulzberger family barbecues, knocking on doors at 4:45 a.m., and writing about the people who run the news. We talk about how tabloid training shaped the way he reports; what he saw and did during his Enquirer years — and how he thinks about that period now; and why he believes there’s still a business (and an appetite) for smart, funny, deeply-inside media gossip. And then I put him to work, dishing on the big under-covered stories we will be talking about in the next year. Cheers! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The last time I interviewed PBS CEO Paula Kerger was 2019: Donald Trump was President, and Republicans were trying to defund public media — as they had been trying to do for decades. That didn’t happen then, but this year it did, and now Kerger is trying to fill a $1 billion funding hole. So far, she says, PBS and its member stations have held up ok — no one has had to shut down, yet. But while Kerger holds out hope she can convince Congress to start funding public TV again, it’s worth talking about why federally funded public media was created in 1967 — and whether it still makes sense to continue that setup in 2025. And if federal funding is permanently off the table, what will PBS do — and not do -- in the future? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices