Recode Decode: Jessica Weisberg traces the history of advice in ‘Asking for a Friend’

Recode Decode: Jessica Weisberg traces the history of advice in ‘Asking for a Friend’

Writer and audio producer Jessica Weisberg talks with Recode’s Kara Swisher about her new book, “Asking for a Friend: Three Centuries of Advice on Life, Love, Money, and Other Burning Questions from a Nation Obsessed.” Starting in 1690s London, Weisberg examines how advice became a cultural force in America, and how professional advice-givers presaged the internet by creating the first platform for people to ask difficult questions anonymously. She discusses Ben Franklin’s “Poor Richard’s Almanack,” which made earnest advice more palatable through comedy; the bitter rivalry between twin sisters who both became advice columnists, using the pen names “Ann Landers” and “Dear Abby”; and how the once-strict views of parenting guru Benjamin Spock and other columnists mellowed over their long careers. Weisberg says Google and other internet forums are the new advice-givers for millions of people, and questions whether any one writer today could be as widely read and trusted as these predecessors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Yahoo CEO Jim Lanzone on reviving the web's homepage

Yahoo CEO Jim Lanzone on reviving the web's homepage

Jim Lanzone is the CEO of Yahoo. It's basically impossible to sum up Yahoo's story over the last 25 years, but the short version is that once upon a time, Yahoo paid Google to run the search box on it...

16 Mars 1h 17min

Anthropic doesn't trust the Pentagon, and neither should you

Anthropic doesn't trust the Pentagon, and neither should you

My guest today is Mike Masnick, the founder and CEO of Techdirt, the excellent and long-running tech policy blog. Mike has been writing about government overreach, privacy in the digital age, and othe...

12 Mars 48min

Hasbro's CEO lets AI Peppa Pig help design toys

Hasbro's CEO lets AI Peppa Pig help design toys

Hasbro might be a toy company, but CEO Chris Cocks has spent the last several years pushing it more and more into the digital media, gaming, and collectibles space. That makes sense, since adults have...

9 Mars 1h 12min

Prediction markets want to be the news

Prediction markets want to be the news

Today let’s talk about prediction markets, which continue to insert themselves into the news cycle and the news in increasingly weird, unsettling, and potentially illegal ways.  My guest today is Liz...

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Zillow's CEO on growth during a housing crisis

Zillow's CEO on growth during a housing crisis

Today, I’m talking with Zillow CEO Jeremy Wacksman. Zillow is one of those apps that really exemplifies what you might call the smartphone era of software: the company built a great mobile app for loo...

2 Mars 1h 5min

Inside Xbox's executive shakeup

Inside Xbox's executive shakeup

Today, we’re talking about the future of Xbox. Phil Spencer, a two-time Decoder guest who’s led Xbox for more than a decade, is stepping down. But in a shocking twist, his deputy long-assumed successo...

26 Feb 43min

Hank Green lets loose on YouTube, billionaires, and algorithms

Hank Green lets loose on YouTube, billionaires, and algorithms

Today, I’m talking with Hank Green, a longtime friend of Decoder and the co-founder and now former owner of Complexly, an online education company he started with his brother John in 2012. I say forme...

23 Feb 1h 11min

Money no longer matters to AI's top talent

Money no longer matters to AI's top talent

Today we're talking about the war for AI talent. Right now, the hottest job market on the planet is for AI researchers. And the vast majority of these people are concentrated into a small number of hu...

19 Feb 41min

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