Ben Shapiro and Preet Bharara on the ‘Podcast Election’

Summary

The Journal Podcast Summary Episode: Ben Shapiro and Preet Bharara on the ‘Podcast Election’
Release Date: January 20, 2025

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Introduction: The Rise of Podcasting in Politics

In this special edition of The Journal, host Ryan Knutson delves into the significant role podcasting played in the 2024 election cycle. Joined by two prominent figures from opposing political spectrums—Ben Shapiro, a leading conservative podcaster, and Preet Bharara, a former U.S. Attorney and Democratic commentator—the discussion explores how podcasts have reshaped political discourse and campaign strategies.

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Podcasting as a Political Tool

Ryan Knutson opens the conversation by highlighting the term “Podcast Election,” referencing the extensive use of podcasts by political candidates. Notably, Donald Trump appeared on over 20 podcasts, including Shapiro’s, while Kamala Harris made eight podcast appearances.

Ben Shapiro emphasizes the medium’s transformative impact:

“Podcasts granted access to platforms that legacy media couldn’t, allowing President Trump to reach audiences without traditional filters” ([00:57]).

He criticizes Kamala Harris for underutilizing podcast opportunities, contrasting her limited appearances with Trump’s prolific engagements.

Preet Bharara concurs, noting the missed opportunities for broader political dialogue:

“We tried to get one of those two on. I figured one of them would have been futile, and it turned out both were futile” ([03:28]).

This mutual recognition underscores the strategic importance of podcasting in modern political campaigns.

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Authenticity and Long-Form Conversations

Bharara discusses how the intimate and extended format of podcasts enables deeper insights into a candidate’s character and policies:

“In the long form, it's hard to bullshit who you are… It gives people a better sense of who the candidate is” ([04:27]).

Shapiro echoes this sentiment, highlighting the challenge of maintaining authenticity in quick media formats:

“If you're always at the top of the iceberg, it's very morning, it's” ([05:09]).

The guests agree that podcasts foster genuine conversations, allowing political figures to express nuanced viewpoints beyond sound bites.

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Conservatives' Pioneering Role in Podcasting

A significant portion of the discussion centers on conservatives’ effective use of podcasting compared to the left.

Ben Shapiro attributes the conservative advantage to necessity and authenticity:

“Conservatives have done a better job at building and cultivating audiences in the podcast space because we had to” ([06:50]).

Preet Bharara adds historical context, comparing podcasting’s rise to AM talk radio:

“Podcasting started in much the same way as AM talk radio… It offered an immediate and diverse platform” ([07:00]).

They suggest that conservatives adapted more swiftly to the podcast medium, leveraging it to build strong, loyal listener bases.

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Challenges for the Left in Podcasting

Knudson and Shapiro explore why the liberal side has lagged behind in podcasting prominence.

Shapiro critiques attempts to mimic successful conservative models, stressing the importance of authenticity:

“Copycats, I don't think necessarily do very well… Different voices develop in different ways” ([08:31]).

He argues that simply replicating formats like Joe Rogan’s does not address the unique dynamics of left-leaning audiences.

Preet Bharara points out systemic issues within Democratic media strategies:

“The left gets more listenership when there's opposition, but when they have their own guy in the White House, they go camping” ([09:53]).

This indicates a lack of sustained engagement strategies compared to their conservative counterparts.

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Evolving Media Landscape and National Discourse

The guests discuss the broader implications of a polarized podcasting landscape on national conversations.

Ben Shapiro expresses optimism about increasing ideological diversity in podcasting:

“There is such a siphoned informational environment… Podcasting offers that ability” ([07:00]).

Preet Bharara raises concerns about echo chambers and the need for cross-ideological dialogues:

“There should be an openness… to hear people out, but you sometimes see on social media… that’s how we get stuck in our silos” ([12:43]).

They highlight the necessity for podcasts to bridge political divides, fostering more inclusive and comprehensive discussions.

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Economic Incentives and Authenticity in Podcasting

The conversation shifts to the financial aspects of podcasting and how economic pressures influence content.

Ben Shapiro differentiates between marketing and substance, maintaining that his show’s straightforward style resonates with listeners:

“By brutal, we just mean we're not shading it, we're not hiding it” ([18:13]).

Preet Bharara discusses the challenges of monetizing podcasts while maintaining quality:

“It's hard to make money in a podcast… There's a gap financially and economically between the model of radio and the model of podcasting” ([21:30]).

Both guests agree that financial sustainability remains a critical hurdle for widespread podcast adoption beyond established names.

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Future Outlook: The Continuing Evolution of Media Consumption

In concluding remarks, Shapiro and Bharara project the future trajectory of podcasting within the media landscape.

Ben Shapiro anticipates a significant shift away from legacy media, asserting:

“This election may have been the death knell of legacy media's trust… It was already going down” ([20:47]).

Preet Bharara envisions expansive growth for podcasting, emphasizing its low barriers to entry:

“Until every human on the planet has a podcast, we haven't hit maximum growth” ([21:30]).

They predict that continued advancements in social media integration and increased platform support will further entrench podcasting as a dominant medium for political and cultural discourse.

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Conclusion

This episode of The Journal underscores the pivotal role of podcasting in shaping contemporary political landscapes. Through the insights of Ben Shapiro and Preet Bharara, listeners gain a deeper understanding of how podcasts have become essential tools for political communication, audience engagement, and the ongoing evolution of media consumption. The dialogue highlights both the opportunities and challenges within the podcasting industry, suggesting that its influence on politics will only grow in the years to come.

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Notable Quotes:

• Ben Shapiro on podcasting’s impact:
  “Podcasts granted access to platforms that legacy media couldn’t, allowing President Trump to reach audiences without traditional filters” ([00:57]).

• Preet Bharara on podcast authenticity:
  “In the long form, it's hard to bullshit who you are… It gives people a better sense of who the candidate is” ([04:27]).

• Ben Shapiro on economic incentives:
  “By brutal, we just mean we're not shading it, we're not hiding it” ([18:13]).

• Preet Bharara on podcast growth:
  “Until every human on the planet has a podcast, we haven't hit maximum growth” ([21:30]).

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Attributions:

• Ryan Knudsen - Host of The Journal.
• Ben Shapiro - Conservative podcaster, co-founder of The Daily Wire.
• Preet Bharara - Former U.S. Attorney, Democratic commentator.

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The Journal is a co-production of Spotify and The Wall Street Journal. Special thanks to Ben Shapiro and Preet Bharara for their participation.

Transcript

[A]

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[A]

Welcome to a special edition of the Journal podcast. We're in Washington, D.C. today on Inauguration weekend, and we are here to talk about the rise of podcasting and the impact it had on the 2024 election. I'm your host, Ryan Knudsen, and I'm joined today by two other podcast hosts, Ben Shapiro and Preet Bharara. Thanks so much for being here.

[C]

Great to be here.

[B]

Thank you for having us.

[A]

So you guys both sit on opposite sides of the political aisle. Ben, you're one of the most well known conservative voices out there. You were previously editor at large of Breitbart. You co founded the Daily Wire. Now you have one of the top conservative podcasts with the Ben Shapiro Show. Preet, you are a former U.S. attorney appointed under President Obama. You served as chief counsel for Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer. And on your podcast. Stay tuned with Preet, you also make no secret about your politics, but I want to talk about the thing you have in common, which is that you're both podcasters in the podcast industry. So the 2024 election, as I'm sure you've heard, has been dubbed by some the podcast election. Both candidates spent a lot of time going on podcasts. Trump appeared on at least 20, including the Ben Shapiro show, and Kamala Harris went on at least eight. So I want to put this question just to both of you. What role do you think this medium played in the 2024 election?

[C]

Let me. I can take this first. I think it played a huge role. I mean, it granted access to, for President Trump places that he wouldn't have been able to reach before through legacy media without the same sort of filter. I think it was a big mistake for Kamala Harris not to take advantage of that a little bit more. Obviously, it was very controversial when she decided that she was gonna have a negotiation with Joe Rogan, and Rogan wasn't gonna have her on. Then he was gonna have her on, then he wasn't gonna have her on. I think that President Trump actually broke through a lot of perceptions about him as a person, because in a. In a long form podcast, you. You get the opportunity to sort of delve into what people are more. You get past the surface very often. And for President Trump, I think that was a really, really big thing. Plus, of course, the audience for podcasts is significantly younger than the audience for traditional media. So if you're talking about legacy media, legacy media, if you're talking cable TV, is probably 50 and up, largely at this point. And if you're talking about the podcast industry, it's largely 40 and under. And so I think that one of the big shifts in this election was how younger voters actually moved toward President Trump, a marked number, largely because they were exposed to him in a way that they hadn't been through kind of the short clips and the political framing. And I think a lot of the things that people like about President Trump tend to be more personal and culture driven in a way that I think benefited him a lot in this election cycle.

[A]

Preet, did you watch Trump or. Sorry, did you listen to Trump on any of his podcasts?

[B]

I listened to portions of it. So I'd like to say we have a moment of agreement on the eve of a new administration. Ben Shapiro and Preet Bharara agree about the power of podcasts. It's not new. We didn't have Kamala Harris or Donald Trump on our podcast this past season.

[A]

Did you try to get them on?

[B]

We tried to get one of those two on. I figured one of them would have been futile, and it turned out both were futile. So Joe Rogan and I are bonded forever in that same regard. Kamala Harris wouldn't come on either one of our podcasts. I think probably for similar reasons.

[A]

You wanted her for three hours, I don't know.

[B]

But back in 2020, we had a number of the Democratic primary candidates. Pete Buttigieg notably went on a number of podcasts, and obviously, as everyone knows, goes on media that does not necessarily associate itself with the liberal cause. I agree with Ben also, that the intimacy of podcasts, the relationship that people have with the podcast host, whether it's Ben or me or you or anyone else, translates into, I think, a greater intensity of feeling and listenership, not just with the host, but whoever their guest is. And in the long form, and particularly in the very, very long form, it's hard to bullshit who you are. Pretty much anybody can do it, whether they have half a brain or not. No offense to the legacy media on cable, but for six minutes or four minutes, if you're on a panel with other people or three minutes, you can pretty much get away with pretending to say what you think you mean. But your staff is giving you talking points on, you can't do that if you're an hour with Ben, and hopefully you can't do that if you're an arrow with me. And I think it gives people a better sense of who the candidate is. And if the candidate is good and allies with what the listenership, putative voters want to hear from a candidate about authenticity and their policy positions, well, then that's very good. If you're not, then he can go in the other direction.

[A]

Ben, when you had Donald Trump on your show, what were you hoping to get out of that conversation?

[C]

So the truth is I'd seen President Trump the prior week. So on October 7, he and I went to the grave of the Lubavitcher Rebbe and I brought along a hostage family that has a child who's an American citizen, who's still hostage in Gaza. And so we were sort of recapitulating what that was like. I wanted to talk to him about that. I wanted to talk about. It was, I think, two weeks before the end of the campaign. So what the campaign was going to include, it was a shorter podcast for what it was. I mean, it was about a 20 minute interview. If I'd had him there for three hours, we would have talked a lot more, I'm sure, about what it is like to be on the campaign trail. What are his deeper thoughts on issues like trade? Dig into that. I think one of the things that makes Trump sort of an interesting podcast guest is that it's not as though he has a thoroughgoing ideology. Right. As everyone has noted in this space, President Trump is not an ideologue. President Trump is a utilitarian pragmatist. And what that means is that he tends to shift and move his, his positions based on what he thinks will be effective. And, and that provides some rich fodder for, for digging. Now, it doesn't mean that people who are deeply ideological are boring. I'm, I'm deeply ideological. I'm pretty deeply ideological. But in, in order for somebody ideological to actually be interesting, they have to have thought through all of their positions all the way down to root level. So you can have a really interesting discussion about that. And I think politicians tend to live in that mid space where they have an ideology, but they haven't thought it all the way down to the bottom. And so they want to repeat those same five points that you're talking about as opposed to get at sort of the broader conversations that lie at the root of our politics. That really are interesting. When I had breed on, we talked about kind of the big issues at the bottom of the iceberg. And that stuff's interesting. You can do that. But if you're always at the top of the iceberg, it's very morning, it's.

[B]

Sometimes scary to dive down to the bottom because you don't know what you'll find. You know what will do to your views. That's why there's not a lot of consistency among a lot of people who are in public office.

[A]

There's a. It seems like conservatives have done a better job at building and cultivating audiences in the podcast space because we had to.

[C]

I mean, that's the actual reason.

[B]

It didn't begin that way. Like four or five years ago. People are. Maybe six or seven years ago, people were calling podcasting liberal talk radio. So something changed. Maybe it was Ben Shapiro.

[C]

I mean, I'll take credit for part of it, but I mean, it wasn't me. Only I think what happened is that just like AM talk radio, which became a very big business in the United States, started as an offshoot of the fact that legacy media was so dominant, podcasting started in much the same way. I mean, the reason that I got into podcasting is I was doing a talk radio show in Seattle and I was noticing that three or four thousand people were downloading it from all over the country. And I was like, well, if I've got that on like a local talk radio show in Seattle, maybe if I start posting this, it'll grow to a bigger audience. It kind of exploded in a way that we didn't think was going to necessarily happen. But the biggest thing about podcasting that has been, I think, such a revelation to people is that there is such a siphoned informational environment. There are not that many networks, right? We got MSNBC and you got Fox, you got CNN on the cables, and then you have the mainstream legacy networks and you have a few big newspapers. That's kind of it. And if you don't hear a voice there, and they don't tend to be particularly heterodox voices, if you can't get a voice there, where else are you going to get it? And podcasting offered that ability and also the immediacy of being able to react in close to real time to things that I think was another big. It's something we definitely embraced in this election cycle more than we have in past election cycles. We started doing these react series where something would break in the News, and five minutes later I'd be on the air anytime of day just reacting to what was going on. And I think that that actually meets with the news cycle somehow better than the 247 wall to wall cable coverage sometimes does.

[A]

So what do you think the left needs to do differently? I mean, people are talking about it needs a Joe Rogan of the left.

[B]

Yeah. Copycats, I don't think necessarily do very well. That goes against the entire grain of what we've been talking about, which is authenticity. If someone decides to try to manufacture in a laboratory or in this case a podcast studio, someone who sort of emulates Joe Rogan, but from the left, I mean, he'll tell you, and he has said, and people have said there was a liberal Joe Rogan, it was Joe Rogan. I don't know that I agree with that and I don't want people to get upset with me, but I think different voices develop in different ways. And the other point, I think that someone mentioned to me once about the difference in this business sphere, whether you're talking about cable television or podcasting, I think it's sort of similar. And I wonder what you think of this. Either or both of you. Good friend once told me who was a high ranking person at Fox News. The thing you got to remember about Fox News and conservative outlets is they make money and have listenership and viewership when there's a Republican in the White House because they get cheerleading and they get listenership and viewership when there's a Democrat in the White House because they're in opposition. And contrary to that, on the left, it seems that they get a lot of listenership and viewership when there's opposition, when there's Trump or someone like Trump in the White House. And then when they have their own guy in the White House, they kind of take it easy and they go camping.

[A]

I'm curious to get your take on the media landscape as it's evolving. It seems like the most prominent voices that are forming is on the right. On the left, there's sort of these two echo chambers. People are in that for their algorithms. You know, they sort of fed information that they are more likely to believe in. And a traditional media that tries to position itself as more neutral in the center or shrinking in its influence. What do you think that means for our national discourse?

[C]

So I think that there's a little bit too much worry over this. I think that there's a lot of talk about, oh, the legacy media, which was seeking an objective middle. I think the Reason that our industry exploded is because everybody didn't believe them. We all thought they were full of it. And when I watched MSNBC or just ABC News or 60 Minutes, I can identify the bias immediately in one particular direction. And I don't think that they're trying to be particularly objective. I think they live in their own little echo chamber. I think the thing about podcasting that's weird and what's interesting and strange and cool about the industry is that the spectrum of views is really broad. Like, where do you peg Joe Rogan, right? Where's Joe? I mean, like, he endorsed Trump. He's also endorsed the economic plans of Bernie Sanders in the past. He's somebody who's very pro ayahuasca, but he's also very anti crime. Like, he's kind of all over the place on the ideological maps. Where do you place him? For me, I would consider myself a pretty strict, down the line conservative. But conservatism has shifted definition so many times at this point that on some points I'm now heterodox. Right? I'm a free trader, for example, a party that seems to be significantly more friendly to tariffs. This sort of kind of ideological diversity does exist, and you're starting to see it, I would hope, on the left. I think one of the things that the left needs to do if they do wish to have a Joe Rogan is they actually need to allow perspectives that live outside of the sort of Nancy Pelosi wing of the Democratic Party. There needs to. Like some of my friends, I won't mention their names because then it'll get them on trumble on the left, because that's the way this works, that some of my friends who are in Congress who are on the Democratic side are pretty heterodox in many of their views, but they're scared to say what their views are because they know they're gonna get burned down by their own side. Well, in podcast land, that's the exact thing that would make them popular and interesting.

[B]

There's two things that I think on the liberal side, the Democratic side, and maybe some of this is relevant to the conservative side, but a liberal hosts or center. Liberal center left host or whatever you wanna call them should not be excoriated for bringing on people who are on the opposite side of the aisle. And I think on the part of some platforms, there is a worry that if I bring so and so on, are people gonna be upset, are they gonna cancel their subscriptions, et cetera. And also for people who are on the Left side to go on programs, to go on podcasts where the hosts are very, very different. I mentioned people to judge once. I'll mention him a second time. He does it with respect to Fox News. I believe he does it with podcasts also.

[C]

We tried to get Pete on. I will say, when he was running for president, we really tried very hard to get him on. I thought he was really more fascinating at the time than he is now.

[B]

But yes, too bad that he didn't get him.

[C]

Smart guy.

[B]

Yeah, but there should be, you know, there should be an openness on the part of everyone on every side to have people from the other side or whatever that means, or adjacent sides to come on and hear people out. But you sometimes see on social media, as soon as this podcast host has this person on, why are you platforming that person? Well, that's how we get stuck in our silos.

[A]

Did you try to get Kamala Harris on your show as well?

[C]

Did we? Actually, we did. Okay, so my producer, Mag Zanker, we did issue an invite. I mean, if she wasn't going to go on pre. She definitely wasn't going to go on my show. That's. That's for sure.

[B]

I think in her case, it was. I think it was. They made. I don't know. I'm not part of the campaign. I wasn't part of the campaign. They made a determination about use of time, which we can all second guess now. I don't know that it was necessarily in every case.

[C]

I mean, I think they made a determination about her inability to speak off the cuff in any sort of convincing and coherent way. And you saw that evident even in interviews with mainstream media outlets where she had a producer sitting over somebody's shoulder being like, looks like time's up. We gotta run.

[A]

What do you see as your role in the media landscape? I mean.

[C]

Well, I mean, for me, I'm a conservative. I got in this because I want to convince people in my point of view. I mean, I've never been dishonest about that. I say that openly. I've said that consistently. And what's funny is that then you'll have news guard or fact checkers be like, well, you said this because you're conservative. Like, that's not. You're not. You're not. That's not a gotcha. I say that I'm conservative. Like, of course I'm saying it from a conservative perspective. With that said, I think one of the best ways for me to defend my conservatism is to put it up against different ideas and then ask questions of those ideas. And sometimes there may be kind of weird crossovers that does happen from time to time, and at other times there's not a crossover. But, you know, in order for an ideology or any idea to really be interesting, you have to put it up against some sort of contrast.

[B]

Can you tell what my goal is? So I'm not quite a political podcaster. My podcast was born of my experience. And when I began podcasting in the fall of 2017, there's lots of legal news. There's a lot of news about the Mueller investigation, and I knew something about that. And it was in my wheelhouse that has expanded over time to cover politics and policy issues and all sorts of other things. But I try to be myself, which is. I'm not enraged. I'm not trying to enrage other people and their podcast that do that on the left and the right, but sort of assess as the best as I can. I have a point of view. I'm an opponent of Donald Trump, a critic of Donald Trump. I was a supporter of Joe Biden. I was a supporter of Kamala Harris. I've always voted Democrat. I voted for. I worked for Senator Schumer. But I do, as Ben says he tries to do, look at an issue, whether it's a withdrawal from Afghanistan or a crime bill or a particular course of actions taken by the special counsel, sort of calmly, in a measured voice, not too quickly, make my point of view known. And it's not always the point of view that other people have, to sort of be like a sane voice. Will I always get it right? Is my point of view the one to be taken as gospel? No, because I have a perspective, and I have the kind of innate bias that everybody has that has a perspective. But I try to call it as fair as I can see it. And I think and hope for audience members who keep coming back and for those who want to check us out, that's what we bring. Not just sort of necessarily predictable views, but a calm, rational assessment of the things as we see them.

[A]

I want to ask about the economics of this new industry. Economics, obviously, have shaped everything. The economics of the traditional newspaper business, let's say, over the last, in the 20th century, was to have as wide of an audience as possible. That's led to, in some ways, the rise of objectivity, because we're just neutral. We're just telling the facts so that we can have as many eyeballs on our newspaper, we can get as big of advertising dollars as we can get what are the economic incentives that push the industry in the way that it's forming now?

[C]

I mean, I try not to be led, in my viewpoint, by the economic incentives. I do think that there are some negative economic incentives for being nuanced and interesting, meaning there's some quick and easy money to be made by saying, I would say, inflammatory, conspiratorial things. I think that there's always a great audience for that. And. And the thing is, the country's so big that you don't need that, that big a chunk of the. Of the American audience to have a really big audience. Right. You can have hundreds of thousands or even millions of people watching you say crazy if. Because. Because it's a really, really big country. And. And so I think that there is an incentive to steer into some of that sort of stuff, depending on sort of how the algorithms push it.

[B]

And.

[C]

And people get very animated about that sort of thing. So if you want to talk about the JFK assassination every night, then you'll probably do big numbers. And that's something that I'm not willing to do. Right. Again, I got into this business because I actually care about the things that I'm saying, and the money came much later, much later. And I think that's true for pretty much everybody who takes their politics seriously. I mean, I worked for free. I wrote a syndicated column from the time I'm 17. I started to hit financial success point probably around the time that we started Daily Wire 2015. So by that time, I was already 31. I've been doing it for 10, 15 years already. So there are pressures, there are principles that I'm not willing to sign off on just in order to make the quick buck. And again, I think that goes back to the authenticity. The audience could sense that if I suddenly turn and I started saying conspiratorial stuff, people listen to my show.

[B]

Some people do that, some people do that. There are people who have been excommunicated from mainstream media. I won't name any of them who are very polemical in their podcast. And it serves them well in terms of audience.

[A]

Well, Ben, in the description of your show, it says of your podcast, ben brutally breaks down the culture and never gives an inch. Why brutal.

[C]

Well, I think, again, that goes to. When you talk about the marketing versus the content, if you look at my stuff on YouTube, there'll be a lot of Ben Shapiro destroys with facts and logic kind of stuff. There's the clickability factor of getting people to listen to the thing. Then there's the actual thing. If you listen to the show, I think that the show is when it says brutally, I think the idea there is that I'm not going to shade what I think is the truth, regardless of what I think my audience wants to hear, what the opposing audience is going to want to hear. And again, that means that sometimes I find myself crosswise with my audience. I mean, I can think of half a dozen times that's happened over the course of the last six months, probably. But I think that that again goes to the authentic point. By brutal, we just mean we're not shading it, we're not hiding it. It is exactly what it is. I don't mean brutal like I'm going to just sit. It'd be boring, by the way, if I got on there and I was like all day Kamala Harris is stupid or Joe Biden is stupid and senile.

[A]

But you think your show is as successful if it said Ben kindly breaks down the culture?

[C]

Of course not. Because people don't engage in politics in order to be kind. That's not what politics is about. I mean, it was Nixon who suggested that if you're looking for sympathy, get a dog. Politics is a rough and tumble place. It has been since the days of Machiavelli. And so this sort of notion that I'm going to break down politics in a non exciting, boring way, I think people confuse civility with boring. And I don't think those two things are the same. I mean, again, Preet and I can be perfectly civil with one another. And we can also say stuff that is pretty raw about the politics of the other, I think. And I think that's one of the things that we've lost actually is the notion that brutal and non civil are somehow. They go hand in hand. I mean, if you go back to the debates that were being had between William F. Buckley and Gore Vidal, those are pretty brutal. And yet they did that for several years running.

[B]

The dimension on which I wish these things were judged was not level of brutality or civility. Although those are interesting, but good faith, right? So if there's a very, very smart person who believes something different from me and they don't bullshit about my argument, they present like as lawyers are trained to do, right? And I know Ben is a trained lawyer as well. And you say I take your argument to be X or Y and this is why your argument is full of. And then they say their arguments and if it's done brutally or uncivilly, to me that matters less than they're engaging in the argument in good faith and from their perspective.

[A]

So where do you. Last question. Where do you see this going? Where do you see. Do you think this is sort of an anomaly where we are with podcasts and the way that the media is forming, or do you think that this is just the beginning of an even bigger change?

[C]

No, I think there's a sea change in the way that media is consumed and I think that the shifts in social media are part of that sea change. I'm very excited that Facebook and Zuckerberg have decided to actually release the throttle on political content on the outlet. I'm hopeful that YouTube is going to do the same. I mean, I think that there's been too much jiggering of the various levers that prevent people from actually seeing the stuff they want to see. And I'm excited that that's going to happen. Plus, again, I think the luggage of media, I think that this election may have been the death knell of legacy media's trust. I think that it was already going down. You can see this. It starts basically in 2015 and starts dipping and has never reversed.

[A]

Preet, what's your view on where things are headed?

[B]

Growth. I mean, I think until every human on the planet has a podcast, we haven't hit maximum growth. There's like no barrier to entry. And the other thing that people, since this is a business enterprise here, it's hard to make money in a podcast. Ben has been very fortunate. We've been very fortunate. There's some big name. Joe Rogan has been really fortunate. But a lot of people have really good, high quality podcasts that focus on a particular issue that's of interest to them and to a constituency of people. But because of the way that ads are sold and the amount of money that companies have so far that they allocate to podcasts versus television and print and radio, I still think, I think the heyday of podcasts as a business matter are still in the future. You know, when I first got into podcasting, I knew nothing about, I'd never listen to a podcast before. You know, that's how arrogant I am. You know, I don't know how many ads the typical hour long podcast has. I think we have like four minutes of ads. If you go beyond four minutes, people will find someone else to listen to. Listen to any kind of radio. I don't know what the number is, but it's a lot more than four minutes. And they pay more for whatever reason. And this is a wonderful thing right people love podcasts in part because they're not interrupted in the same way as talk radio is or news radio is. But that leaves a particular gap, financially and economically, between the model of radio and the model of podcasting. And I wonder if we're going to get over that at some point, because that would make it more lucrative for even more people to join.

[A]

Great. Well, thank you both so much for your time.

[B]

Thank you.

[C]

Thanks for having us.

[A]

The Journal is a co production of Spotify and the Wall Street Journal. Special thanks to Ben and Preet for being here today. We'll be back later this afternoon with a new episode of the Journal. Thanks for listening. See you then. Fox News was mentioned in this episode. And as a reminder, Fox News, parent company and the parent company of the Wall Street Journal share common ownership.