Plain English with Derek Thompson

No matter how you look at it, Netflix is having a pretty bad year. Stock is down, growth has slowed, the company recently laid off roughly 1,000 people, and it dismissed its chief content officer and its head of film. After a decade of explosive growth and dominance over traditional entertainment, the company’s biggest challenge now may have less to do with its competitors in Hollywood than with TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube.

Derek Thompson welcomes Matt Belloni onto the show to discuss Netflix's shortcomings. The break down what’s eating Netflix, why every form of media seems to be converging on short-form video, and what Netflix’s struggles reveal about the future of entertainment.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel here:https://www.youtube.com/@PlainEnglishwithDerekThompson

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at PlainEnglish@Spotify.com.

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: Matt Belloni

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Additional Production Support: Ben Glicksman

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What exactly is effective altruism? Beginning in the early 2010s as a nerdy way to rethink the most cost-effective charity, the movement has since grown into a broader philosophy for thinking about just about everything in our lives, from the careers we choose to the technologies we build.

Today, Derek Thompson talks with Will MacAskill, one of the movement’s founders, about the origins and ideas behind effective altruism, its blind spots and controversies, the downfall of major funder Sam Bankman-Fried, and what it can tell us about this moment in history.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel here:https://www.youtube.com/@PlainEnglishwithDerekThompson

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at PlainEnglish@Spotify.com.

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: Will MacAskill

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Additional Production Support: Ben Glicksman

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The answer to whether AI is a bubble comes down to supply and demand. Is there enough demand to justify the enormous investment in chips and data centers? If businesses keep paying more for AI every year, the debt is manageable and the buildout will look visionary. If they don't, today's AI chips could be like trains built to serve towns that never materialized.

In a follow-up to Tuesday's episode, Derek Thompson talks with economist Ara Kharazian about who's actually paying for AI, why spending may be slowing, and what that could mean for the broader economy.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel here:https://www.youtube.com/@PlainEnglishwithDerekThompson

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at PlainEnglish@Spotify.com.

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: Ara Kharazian

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Additional Production Support: Ben Glicksman

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AI can analyze anything, write anything, solve almost any puzzle. But struggle strengthens our brains and sharpens our minds ... and removing it entirely may come with a dire cost.

Derek Thompson explores the paradoxes of AI with Ethan Mollick, whose new book, 'Co-Existence,' examines how AI is changing the way we learn and work. They discuss how AI makes experts more powerful while automating the junior work that creates them in the first place, why students perform better via AI but learn less, and whether some friction may actually be worth preserving.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel here:https://www.youtube.com/@PlainEnglishwithDerekThompson

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at PlainEnglish@Spotify.com.

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: Ethan Mollick

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Additional Production Support: Ben Glicksman

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A year and a half after 'Abundance,' Derek Thompson and Ezra Klein’s book about why America has become so bad at building things, the time has come for reflection. Some commentators declare the abundance agenda dead. If you know where to look, however, you might see a different picture.

Today, Derek is joined by Representative Josh Harder (D-California) to examine the surprising ways abundance-style ideas are gaining ground, from bipartisan permitting reform in Washington to new efforts to build housing and clean energy in states and cities across the country. Politicians from both parties increasingly agree that America is still making it too hard to build. So what would it take to turn these scattered victories into a new kind of liberalism that prioritizes outcomes over process?

Subscribe to our YouTube channel here:https://www.youtube.com/@PlainEnglishwithDerekThompson

If you have questions, observations, or ideas for future episodes, email us at PlainEnglish@Spotify.com.

Host: Derek Thompson

Guest: Josh Harder

Producer: Devon Baroldi

Additional Production Support: Ben Glicksman

Comcast Business. Get AI-powered threat detection for small business.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices