alt Hacker NewsI'm not making a value judgement. There are analysts and opinion writers I enjoy reading and get a lot of value from. But hosting a podcast interview with someone is basically the opposite of shoe-leather reporting. I guess if you did "stitch incoming" every couple minutes and cut to Fridman calling someone else to have conversations with other sources about whatever claim his primary guest just made, you'd be getting closer.
My point is: some of the prevailing take on HN about journalism probably comes from the fact that we tend to pay much more attention to the Fridmans and much less to shoe-leather reporters.
That's all!
Much later: a funny thing I could point out here is that the same thing I'm saying about Fridman also applies to Ezra Klein, Thompson's "Abundance" co-author --- I like Klein a lot!
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You are touting "call up the authorities" and shitting sitting down and talking face to face with authorities, which reads like a value judgement.
I think there's journalistic value to showing a raw conversation on a podcast. It's closer to the primary source than calling them on the phone and writing down parts of the conversation.
If the interviewer is a bit credulous, then we can take that into account.
I don't need other opinions to be inserted in the same show, because it's not the only show I watch. I get different viewpoints from others. (And Klein's show happens to be a primary example of that)