Channels with Peter Kafka

Jason Blum Built a Hit-Making Movie Machine. Does It Still Work?

Jason Blum built one of Hollywood’s smartest businesses: make low-budget horror movies, give filmmakers room, pay talent on the back end, and let the hits carry the misses. It worked so well that it b...

2026-04-22

I-download

Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz on Sam Altman’s Trust Problem

Sam Altman has spent years presenting himself as the face of AI: The guy warning that the technology could change everything, and the guy insisting that he should be the one to build it. Now we are fa...

2026-04-13

I-download

What Happens When a “Succession” Writer Takes on Silicon Valley

Jonathan Glatzer has written for shows like Succession and Better Call Saul. Now he’s got his own: The Audacity, a new AMC drama set in Silicon Valley.So why make a Silicon Valley show right now — and...

2026-04-08

I-download

Why We Need to Pay Attention to Elon Musk Again

Elon Musk has spent the last year being quieter than usual — by Elon Musk standards.That may be about to change in a very big way, as his SpaceX moves toward what could be one of the biggest IPOs in h...

2026-04-01

I-download

Why Prediction Markets Are Turning Everything Into a Bet

Prediction markets are suddenly everywhere: in sports, in politics, in the media business — and, depending on who you ask, they’re either a useful forecasting tool or just gambling with better brandin...

2026-03-25

I-download

How to Survive without Google: People Inc's Playbook

Lots of publishers are freaked out about “Google Zero” — the notion that one day, Google will stop sending them any traffic at all. That’s more or less already happened at People Inc., says CEO Neil ...

2026-03-18

I-download

Matt Belloni on the Oscars, the Ellisons, and Hollywood’s Next Chapter

Oscar season is supposed to be Hollywood’s lap. It is also, increasingly, a reminder of how shaky things are in Hollywood right now. And this one comes as one of the town’s most prominent players is a...

2026-03-11

I-download

The World’s Cup Is Coming to Trump’s America, with Roger Bennett

The World Cup is coming to the U.S (and Canada, and Mexico) in less than 100 days. Perhaps you’re an American who doesn’t care about soccer, and has given this news zero thought. That won’t be an opt...

2026-03-04

I-download

Netflix Walks, Paramount Wins, and the Ellisons Take Hollywood

Netflix shocked the world last year by winning a deal to buy Warner Bros. Discovery. This week it shocked us by walking away.In this emergency bonus episode, CNBC’s Alex Sherman walks us through the w...

2026-02-28

I-download

Brian Stelter on the Trump Media Shakedown Era

Brian Stelter puts its clearly: "All M&A runs through the Oval Office right now.” So how much does Trump matter in the Netflix/Paramount battle for Warner Bros. Discovery — and what does he want out o...

2026-02-25

I-download

Janice Min on Hollywood’s Crisis; Reed Duchscher on the Creator Boom

Janice Min and Reed Duchscher are both building new media companies in LA. But their perspectives are quite different: Min runs The Ankler, the trade pub that mostly focuses on the fate of Big Media c...

2026-02-18

I-download

How Odd Lots' Joe Weisenthal Turned Curiosity Into a Career, and a Hit Podcast

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 mo...

2026-02-11

I-download

Jeff Bezos Used To Be In Love with The Washington Post. What Happened?

Jeff Bezos used to be the savior of The Washington Post. He bought it for $250 million in 2013, and then invested money and energy into turning it around — and it worked.Now the Amazon founder is deci...

2026-02-06

I-download

Who is Josh D'Amaro and Why is He Disney's New CEO?

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 announc...

2026-02-04

I-download

Running a Newsroom in Minneapolis + How to Make a Game of Thrones For Less

In an ideal world, I wouldn’t be bringing you an interview with the editor of the Minnesota Star Tribune about her paper’s coverage of the killing of Alex Pretti in the same episode where I interview ...

2026-01-28

I-download

Chuck Klosterman on Why Football Owns TV (and Why It Won’t Forever)

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 writ...

2026-01-21

I-download

How to Build a Profitable Media Company in 3 years, with Semafor’s Justin Smith

News is a tough business. So how did Semafor, the news startup founded by Ben Smith and Justin Smith, figure out how to turn a profit in their third year of business? Excellent journalism certainly h...

2026-01-14

I-download

Inside Bari Weiss’s Rise: LA, Sun Valley, and the Mogul Network

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 ea...

2026-01-07

I-download

Craig Finn on Friendship, Fans and The Hold Steady’s Second Life

Craig Finn makes music — as the head of the Hold Steady, and on his solo records — about grown-up lives and bad decisions. Back in 2017, we talked about his life as a working rock musician — and how ...

2025-12-31

I-download

Podcast Pioneer PJ Vogt’s Second Act: Less Budget, More Control

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, ...

2025-12-24

I-download

Channels with Peter Kafka

Episodes (578 episodes)

Kaugnay na Podcast