[0]: https://www.youtube.com/c/lexfridman
I don’t always agree with the viewpoints of the guests, but I do believe we hear more from the guests as theirselves, and they seem to provide less corporate speak than the typical interviews.
It’s become one of my favorite podcasts because there aren’t “sides” in the conversation. You might get a few perspectives but the main objective is to actually learn the guests perspective which is harder to find from interviews. I would assume guests would enjoy a interview format where they get to talk about their self and their activities for as long as they want with someone intelligent.
With that said, I almost can't understand the question. Basically it's a podcast that invites a lot of experts (some of them famous, some not so much) and has long discussions on "smart" topics. Lex is smart enough to at least seem to understand most of it, so the discussions are not as shallow as you might see them in other places.
I don't really like anything about him, but the things I don't like at least seem genuine.
Also, Lex's podcast has great academic and computer science guests that you don't usually get to have long-form conversations with. It's a high quality podcast with great production value for such a small operation.
Sure, he's a bit soft on guests sometimes, but you'd do the same if that person came over for dinner. I think of the podcasting world as a rejuvenation of the salons of the past. The nice thing is that you don't have to put up with small talk from people only out for themselves, as an observer separated by spacetime, we're given the freedom to be critical in our listening (or watching) choices.
It's very relaxing to get away from the sound-bite, shouting over each other, narrative pushing mainstream.
Personally, I find the guests TOO persuasive for about a day, until I figure out what I disagree with them about, then feel much better about things.
Example: His interview Donald Hoffman had be buy the argument hook line and sinker that Consciousness could be the underlying basis of reality. I spun out along that axis for a while, considering the implications. The next day it dawned on me that he actually had 2 messages.
A) Spacetime is not the basis of reality, there is something further down
B) Consciousness is the actual basis of reality, and here's a framework that could become a theory of everything.
I find myself in agreement with A, and disagreement with B, though I still think it's an interesting analytical tool for other purposes.
I'm learning to take this type of non-bite sized media into proper context. It's not easy at first, the knee-jerk response to nit-pick that is engendered from watching too much gotcha journalism takes some time to get over.
Member of elite institution (MIT) - check. Expert in hot field (AI) - check. Famous guests - check.
Anyone who checks these boxes can attract a large following for a podcast, youtube, etc.
MIT is perhaps the magic ingredient with the most brand power, through which he was able to attract initial famous guests. From there, snowball.
This is not to say that Lex is not hardworking, intelligent, consistent, etc. But being a MIT AI researcher is a vastly leveraged starting point.
I do think that many posts in this thread are overestimating how hard it can be to get guests on podcasts. Some connections may have helped during his early episodes, but many of the guests on his shows (just scrolling through the episode list) were probably quite easy to book given the audience that they would be speaking to. I see a lot of people who would be actively trying to talk about their subject. Groups like academics and tech researchers are heavily represented in early episodes. Then later you start getting people who might be a "challenge" to book, but only after there are years of a backlog of interviews.
He then also has several interviews with people with their own large podcast/youtube followings which are always a large boost. Just scrolling through his video history I see people like Joe Rogan, Dan Carlin, and Jocko Willink as an example.
His interviews also hit many different interests, not too narrow of a focus, which makes it easy to build an audience based on somebody looking for any number of topics for a podcast/youtube video. That certainly helps build listener numbers over the 4 years that the podcast has been ongoing.
I sometimes get annoyed when he doesn't push back on things but I suspect the problem every podcaster has is this: if you push too hard, some people won't go on your show.
Overall, I think he does a pretty good job, and if you have long commutes or other long periods of time where you can listen to something, you could definitely do worse.
To be fair, his interviews are also fairly technical and (arguably) well done, and you can't blame him for being strategic with growing his podcast. Still, there is no way he would have reached his level of popularity if he stuck to interviewing mostly academics. Anyway, now he has famous people on all the time with a sort of intellectual person flavor, so it's natural that he would be popular.
Fun fact: I used to co-run a small event at Stanford's AI Lab, called the AI Salon. We organized little discussion sessions around various topics, and usually had to email people to ask if they might be able/willing to do one of these (there were usually 2 invited people with some level of expertise on the topic). Lex was literally the only person who ever contacted us asking if we might want to have him as a guest. He also set up recording equipment for it (we never did this), though I don't think he ever released it.
Maybe his neutral, staid approach is non-threatening to famous people?
First and foremost, he’s a good interviewer. He knows enough about the topics being discussed to ask good questions but also has enough discipline to give his guests time to work through a question and makes it about them.
Second, and this is related to #1, his guests clearly respect him/his audience enough to give reasonably in-depth answers. I mostly listen to the interviews with the deeply technical folks, and I’m impressed by their willingness to offer long technical explanations. I don’t understand it all, but I appreciate it and haven’t found another show that offers quite the same thing.
Finally, he does long episodes. This gives everything room to breathe. For me at least, my favorite interview podcasts are the ones where guests are hanging around for awhile. It gives interviewer and guest time to get acquainted and also let’s them cover a lot of ground. When I am deciding whether to listen to a Marc Maron episode, for instance, I’m definitely wary of anyone that goes to close to 60 minutes because it feels more likely it was just another interview for that person.
I suspect that for many guests it’s key that he seems to create a seemingly pleasant and relaxed environment for them to talk at length with someone fairly knowledgeable about things that interest them. Very different to most interviews.
For others (Zuckerberg for example) I can only think that it’s their perception that he has an audience that they want to reach.
Edit: Just to add - all credit to Lex for apparently encouraging Andrew Huberman to start a podcast - I find the latter genuinely hugely engaging and informative.
How he attracts those guests? He has a successful podcast with many listeners.
It’s a positive feedback loop.
I like that he frequently talks about love and its importance for humans. He is also helpful by often asking successful people for early career advice. His passion for AI is often at the forefront.
He could be a bit more critical in his interviews but then again that might get him fewer famous guests.
Like Joe, Lex does some research before each podcast, but also like Joe, he can improvise discussions as needed on a variety of topics.
I think these, compared with some level of (Nerdy/Goofy) kind of charm and humor are his main advantages compared to most podcasters (and similarity with the successful ones.)
Now, here is how I think he differentiates himself from Joe:
Lex has a real academic background. He is able to follow must scientific topics at an intermediate level, and some at an advanced level. This can sometimes lead to interesting discussions on some relatively advanced topics.
In particular, it may be interesting for those who have general/broad interests in nerdy topics, without necessarily being an expart on the topic of the specific podcast.
Lex is even less confrontational than Joe. He provides a platform, and even if there is some pushback, it is not aggressive.
This is a draw for many academics (the dryer type) who would not fit Joe's podcast, as well as some nerdy business leaders who want to reach his audience (or perhaps, in some cases, just enjoy speaking with him).
1. Who else is landing guests like Zuckerberg?
2. Of those people, who has the willingness to ask questions such as "why do you think you are one of the most unpopular CEOs on Earth?" (paraphrasing)
3. Of the interviews that fit (1) and (2), how many are holding conversations free of a personal agenda? Lex's interviews are generally judgement-free. He's more interested in exploring deep questions than presenting one single political view.
So, even though he can come off as boring or monotonic at times, he's rather unique as an interviewer. That is what makes him successful.
Having grown quite a bit, it was retitled the “ARtificial Intelligence podcast with Lex Fridman”. hmmm…
Having grown further, it was retitled the Lex Fridman podcast, along with a precipitous rise in nonsense/cultural guests and regular indulgences into Lex’s ideas of romance.
Suffice it to say it was much better when it was a MIT-hosted forum for ideas and not a Joe Rogan show-wannabe. But hey, Joe Rogan (and now Lex) are popular. Go them. Our loss.
I found his demeanour a bit strange when I first came across him, but warmed up to it over time. For many of his guests, they've never done a better long form interview/conversation than what they did on Lex's show.
Maybe that's hard to understand for some of the scum in this site.
His interview with Joscha Bach is amazing.
Anyway, as someone mentioned above, he was on Rogan's podcast and fits the Rogan mold of influencer: interested in AI and machine learning, politically neutral, trains in Brazilian jiu jitsu, etc. In fact, I'd describe his style as being a more intellectual Rogan, haha (which is not necessarily a compliment). His popularity has skyrocketed after being on Rogan. However, I'm not sure about his popularity prior to Rogan.
One the most consistently good podcasts - or many podcasts actually - are those from the freakonomics "network", maybe especially People I (Mostly) Admire - for example interviewing Steven Pinker, Nathan Myhrvold, Susan Wojcicki, Daniel Kahneman etc etc
https://freakonomics.com/series-full/people-i-mostly-admire/
I'm not buying explanations like (1) people just like him, and (2) having been at MIT helps with connections - he's had way too many people at the top of various fields, and way too many billionaires and CEOs to be explained by either of these statements. You could argue that at some point you have a positive feedback loop where the calibre of past guests makes new guests more willing to be on the podcast, but I don't think this it either since he's had many high profile guests from the start.
As more and more quality interviews are hosted with non-household names, his podcast starts getting viewership, and that allowed him to get bigger names on, which then allowed him to get even bigger names on, and so on.
https://www.youtube.com/c/lexfridman/videos?view=0&sort=da&f...
Sure, he can get a bit philosophical, but to be honest the podcast wouldn't have grown to where it is now just on the guests alone.
- His conversations go on for as long as they need to, which many people prefer to shows with clear time constraints.
- Big name guests
- Many people are interested in artificial intelligence, Bitcoin, aliens, robotics, hacking, and tech in general.
- Some of his guests/topics veer away from the norm, which adds variety. My favorite is when he interviewed a cybercriminal: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cC1LFC0KFSw
- He is able to make his guests do most of the talking and isn't overly dominant in any conversation.
- There's absolutely no razzle dazzle to his show, which many people prefer and is something loathe about the rest of modern entertainment.
All that said, I believe YouTube also heavily pushes Lex's podcast. I used to watch every single episode of his show, but now I can't stand it because YouTube's suggestion algorithm got into a cycle where it relentlessly pushed his content in front of me. As I've mentioned before on HN, I could guarantee you that if I put on something totally unrelated like Spongebob Squarepants clips and fell asleep, in the morning I would wake up to Lex Fridman's droning monotone voice. Even after I unsubscribed to his channel recently, it took several days for the algorithm to catch on. Now it's back to pushing old JRE episodes in front of me, but at least that's something different for a change.
I can't imagine I'm the only one that experiences this. Maybe not with Lex Fridman, but perhaps something else. It's not even like I watch tech content on YouTube. Whether this is an error of the algorithm or the result of Lex paying off YouTube, I have no idea.
So I might as well inject my opinion here. I started to dislike Lex's show anyway, despite YouTube playing it like a broken record, because I realized that Lex is kind of a fake smart guy. I'll give him credit for creating a successful and often interesting show, and I'm sure he's by no means dumb, but if you pay close attention, many of the questions he asks his guests are totally inane and even ruin the current conversation. I think this is because Lex really has very poor conversational skills, which is also why he relies heavily on his canned questions he wrote down. He also used to, and still kind of does, play up his affiliation with MIT. Thing is, though he may have spoken there in some capacity, he's not a professor, and it's really not clear at all whether he's some kind of genius in the field. If he's at all competent in the field then where does he get all this time to podcast. I normally wouldn't have a problem with this at all and wouldn't care, but he really straddles the edge of being a fake guru.
One of the most obvious and perhaps notorious examples is his appreciation of Python. I remember him bringing it up frequently, sometimes inappropriately, yet he actually had little if anything nuanced to say about it. My impression is that he learned it because that's what's taught for use in data science and AI. That's all fine and good on its own, but who hasn't met that guy who learned just a single programming language and started acting like it's the one language to rule them all? Not only have many of us met that guy, but some of us have been that guy. I was that guy early in my career when I learned Ruby. That sort of fixation, I believe, suggests surface-level knowledge and a lack of real world experience.
But because of his monotone, sometimes mumbling delivery, I think people don't realize that most of what he says really isn't all that intelligent or nuanced. His style I think short circuits the brain in its passive listening state and people aren't truly comprehending what he's saying. He can seem profound because of his persona and his occasional weird romanticizing of otherwise unromantic ideas, but when you pay close attention you might agree that he's sounds like a poser.
I could be completely off base, though. Maybe it's just me who feels this way. I mention it because I do think his ability to play up his persona is a part of his success, but one might not want to closely examine it because they may find it to actually be very hollow.
To his credit, maybe that's why podcasting really seems to be his true calling. I think he wouldn't have time for it if research was actually his passion. His prosaic questions and responses may appeal better to those who sit outside the tech scene but are still interested in his content. I've met more than one "normie" who I discovered was listening to Lex's show, which initially surprised me. For that crowd, I think Lex allows them to feel smart while not overwhelming them with subject matter and discussion that's out of their league.
He asks open-ended questions with deep understanding
The reason I keep coming back to Lex is that his podcast is doing something no other does, which is just having a good faith conversation with interesting and highly intelligent people. No grift. No narrative. No ulterior motive (as far as i can tell?). Hell he doesnt even have ads in his videos. I cannot stress what a turnoff it is when an podcast pauses for 5 minutes to tell me about "athletic greens". Its not too bro-y (joe rogan) its not too edgy and psuedo intellectual (sam harris). It's just pure interesting conversation for 3 hours.
As an interviewer he's good at 2 things. One is getting at the "essence" of what makes his guests interesting, what is the beauty in their work. He does his research and he asks good questions. He also doesnt monologue too much, which is rare among podcasters. Second is that he draws out the human element of his guests. As a host he is humble and curious. He asks about love and death, suffering, and the meaning of life. No other podcast I know does that.
I think his shtick of a "robot looking for meaning and love" is novel and amusing. Especially given there's so much fear and dystopic thinking over the future of technology, I think it's the right way to think about AI. I'm sure a lot of what we see on screen is performative, and he's much more "flesh and blood" off camera, but that doesn't take away from the quality of the interviews.
Lastly, I'm a mere programmer. I'm not a scientist or in machine learning, which I think is where most of his critics come from. I've seen similar threads on reddit /r/MachineLearning that outright denigrate lex as "not a true scientist, didn't really go to MIT, blah blah". It just comes across as jealousy. But then I guess if you're already a science genius, you're not going to get much out of his podcast.
I think lex worked hard and deserves his success. He used his brand to build a platform, get high profile guests, improve his brand further, and so on. The conversations and guests are always interesting and unique, so overall his project is a net positive for me.
He's also a Putin simp which is a huge negative