Inside the Hive

Scientists are on the brink of creating super humans that are stronger than Chris Evans and faster than Usain Bolt. But should we? Jamie Metzl, author of the book “Hacking Darwin,” joins Nick to discuss the future of gene editing, why eradicating disease could ruin our ability to create art, and how China could be using CRISPR to breed a terrifying new type of super soldier. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Do Democrats need to find God before they can defeat Trump? Marianne Williamson, the controversial spiritual guru turned presidential candidate, joins Nick to explain how the left lost religion, why America needs a Department of Peace, and her plan to defeat the “dark psychic force” of the Trump administration. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Everything about Epstein’s alleged suicide seems fishy, from the the sleeping guard to his broken neck. Vanity Fair correspondent Emily Jane Fox and writer-director Lee Eisenberg join Nick to talk conspiracy theories, comedy in the age of Trump, and why a TV show about immigration might help us make it through the 2020 election with our sanity intact. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Breaking news. Push notifications. Email alerts. We live in a world where technology has become inescapable—and where tech CEOs profit from our addictions. Ryan Holiday, author of a new book on “Stillness,” joins Nick to explain how to turn off your phone, tune out Trump, and drop off the grid. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Is Mitch McConnell a secret Russian agent, or just an unpatriotic hack? Political reporter Abigail Tracy joins Nick to discuss how Republicans plan to win in 2020 and whether Warren, Biden, Buttigieg, or Harris can stop them. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

In this jam-packed episode, Emily Jane Fox joins Nick to reveal her most startling reporting about Jeffrey Epstein, Mueller, and Michael Cohen. Afterward, musician-turned-tech investor D.A. Wallach stops by to debate Nick about consumerism, dining furniture, and why we exist in the universe. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Recession! Inflation! Economic collapse! We’ve heard the doomsday predictions for Donald Trump’s economy, but will any become a reality? William D. Cohan, the Hive’s resident Wall Street expert, joins Nick to explain how and when the stock market might tank. Stick around to hear about Cohan’s new book, “Four Friends,” which explores the lives of four young men, including JFK Jr., who died too young. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

When the hell did American politics get so weird? Investigative journalist Anna Merlan joins Nick to talk about her new book, “Republic of Lies,” which details all of the conspiracy theories currently floating around the U.S., including Pizzagate, the Pee Pee Tape, secret CIA programs, and “Q.” Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Is there intelligent life elsewhere in the universe? What about in the White House? Bill Nye the Science Guy joins Nick to answer all of the questions that keep you up at night, including why we’re here, the odds that climate change will destroy civilization, whether humanity will ever fully explore the cosmos, and most important, why Trump is such a pathological liar. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The star of Silicon Valley (the HBO show) joins Nick to explain why he hates Silicon Valley (the industry), why so many CEOs appear to be sociopaths, and the reason he all but stopped using Twitter. Plus: the importance of comedy in the Age of Trump. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Is Fox News the most insidious organization in the history of journalism? Gabriel Sherman, author of “The Loudest Voice in the Room,” the definitive book about Roger Ailes—now coming to Showtime as a limited-series TV show—joins Nick to explain how Ailes changed the landscape of American politics and how Rupert Murdoch could help get Trump reelected in 2020. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Emily Jane Fox joins Nick to talk about the Theranos founder’s secret wedding, and who did and didn’t make the guest list. Plus: Fox takes us inside the clink with former Trump fixer Michael Cohen, followed by a discussion about the presidential race and why Joe Biden is to 2020 what Jeb Bush was to 2016. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

This week, Vanity Fair’s Abigail Tracy flips the script to interview Nick about Chinese spies in Silicon Valley, whether President Warren will annihilate Amazon, and why YouTube might be the worst company in America. Stay tuned until the end, when Tracy explains why Nancy Pelosi doesn’t want to impeach Donald Trump—and how Congress will make his life hell, anyway. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The grumpiest man on earth (or one of them) joins Nick to explain how decades of research have finally uncovered the key to happiness. (That answer is not what you think.) After uncovering the world’s best kept secret, Scott and Nick delve into Facebook, and why he thinks Mark Zuckerberg or Sheryl Sandberg will be arrested in Europe before the end of the year. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

With Trump blacklisting Chinese technology companies, will a new Iron Curtain split the digital world in two? Oz Woloshyn and Karah Preiss, technology journalists and podcast hosts, join Nick to explain why this is such an integral crossroads for Silicon Valley, in which technology could trap us in a terrifying surveillance state, or allow us to upload our thoughts and live forever. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

In 2004, Texas executed Cameron Todd Willingham, a poor, uneducated heavy metal devotee, for killing his three daughters in an arson fire. As numerous investigations and news articles have uncovered, he likely didn’t commit the crime. Academy Award-winning director Ed Zwick joins Nick to talk about his new film, Trial by Fire, and explain how broken death row is, after over a hundred people have been exonerated post-death for crimes they didn’t commit. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Gun laws in America have barely changed despite hundreds of mass shootings in America over the past decade. Yet when a gunman opened fire in a mosque in New Zealand, the country’s leaders banned assault rifles less than a week later. Shannon Watts, founder of Mom’s Demand Action, joins Nick to explain why America is so obsessed with guns and violence, why the NRA is so vulnerable right now, and how a grassroots movement is trying to change how easy it is to get an assault rifle in the United States. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Mayor Pete speaks seven languages, is deeply religious, fought in Afghanistan, and is smarter than Donald Trump in every way imaginable, but is America evolved enough to elect a gay president? Tina Nguyen, The Hive’s resident 2020 expert, joins Nick to explain why Elizabeth Warren is amazing, but might be too boring, how Beto O’Rourke ruined his bid with the worst announcement video in history, and why Joe Biden could be the Jeb Bush of the 2020 Democratic field. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Is America broken beyond repair? Nicolas Berggruen, the “homeless billionaire” who now runs his own think tank, joins Nick to discuss why we’re losing to China, how gene-editing could create a new species that destroys humanity, and why that may not be such a bad thing. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

It appears Attorney General William Barr wasn’t being truthful about the Mueller report. Abby Tracy, Vanity Fair’s resident expert on everything Russia-related, joins Nick to discuss all the bombshells, why Trump isn’t as innocent as Barr claimed, and what it all means for 2020. Plus: Nick’s salacious theory about the famed pee-pee tape. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Some say Hollywood is the weirdest, most-wasteful industry in earth. So what happens when Silicon Valley disrupts it? Will actors be replaced by CGI versions of themselves? Rob Fishman, a techie turned studio head, joins Nick to try to explain why Hollywood is so broken, and if it can ever be fixed. Plus: Vanity Fair’s special Wall Street correspondent, Bess Levin, explains why Jack Dorsey has truly lost his mind, what the arrest of Julian Assange means for Trump, and why no one can sit in a 220-degree sauna for 45 minutes without burning to death. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Has Donald Trump broken our minds, and is it possible to tune him out? Longtime White House correspondent Jessica Yellin joins Nick to discuss the 2020 horse race, why so much of the media sucks (on both sides), and how our collective obsession with Trump has destroyed our ability to make sense of what matters. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The airline industry is one of the most regulated in the world, yet a potential software bug on Boeing’s 737 Max may have killed hundreds of people. Should we be worried the same thing could happen with driverless cars, drones, and delivery robots in the not-too-distant future? Clive Thompson, author of the new book, “Coders,” joins Nick to explain what we can do to stop cyberterrorists or a rogue nation from using code instead of bombs to kill us all. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

For two years, Americans have assumed Trump colluded with Russia. Did the media lead us astray? Or did the Democrats? Or perhaps we’re just asking the wrong question. Emily Jane Fox joins Nick to explain why it’s actually a good thing that Trump isn’t a secret Russian spy, and how this actually might be the best thing to happen to the Democrats since the election of Donald Trump. And, finally, will the Mueller Report leak? And if so, when and by whom? Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Will the countless Democratic presidential nominees destroy each other before Trump destroys himself? Will a Republican take on Donald in the primaries? And will we finally see our first female POTUS? Jennifer Palmieri, the former White House Director of Communications for Barack Obama, joins Nick to talk about what’s going on in the race for the next President of the United States, and why she thinks the entire election will come down to one issue: abortion. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The Hive’s Abby Tracy visited AOC in her New York district and then spent some time with the freshman congresswoman in her apartment where she opens up about fame, Trump, and what’s next. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Facebook has gone from being a viral sensation to a virus people want nothing to do with anymore. This week, amid more bad news for the social network, Casey Newton of the Verge joins Nick to take him inside Facebook’s troubled moderator division, and later in the show, the venture capitalist Roger McNamee, who made his fortunes investing in Facebook, explains why he’s soured on the company that made him so rich. Nevertheless, he still believes its leaders, Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg, can save themselves, and in turn, the company. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Emily Jane Fox, the Truman Capote of the Michael Cohen saga, swings by the studio to discuss the backstory behind Cohen’s remarks; the checks; and what lies ahead for Trump’s former lawyer during his remaining months of freedom. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

In September 2017, Elizabeth Holmes was watching her company go up in smoke. There were government investigations, nightmarish legal bills, a dwindling bank account, and the evaporation of her credibility. Then she came up with an unorthodox plan to turn it all around....a wolf? Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

There is likely only one single issue the Democrats and Republicans agree on: the desperate need for prison reform. Jason Flom, the founding board member of the Innocence Project, joins Nick to explain what's currently happening with incarceration rates in America, and why so much of it is Bill Clinton's fault. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

“I am disgusted.”: Taped conversations reveal how money was being spent on Donald Trump’s inaugural events (a whopping $107 million), the general chaos of the process, the involvement of the Trump family, and how money was being funneled back to Trump’s own hotels. Emily Jane Fox, a reporter for The Hive covering politics and the .001 percent, joins Nick to explain why Trump’s inauguration could be his downfall, and which of the Trump kids (and in-laws) could go down in this latest scandal. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Adam McKay, the Oscar-nominated director of Vice, offers his unfettered opinions on Cheney, Bush, Trump, when the American train fell off the tracks and why his next movie might be the most important thing he ever works on. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

This week Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stirred up the Republican Party when she warned that that if we don’t solve the climate crisis in 12 years, the Earth could be doomed. Peter Brannen, author of “The Ends of the World: Volcanic Apocalypses, Lethal Oceans, and Our Quest to Understand Earth's Past Mass Extinctions,” joins Nick to explain why Cortez is correct, and how the past 400 million years on Earth can explain how we might be heading towards an overheated world that we can’t cool down. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

On the latest episode of Inside the Hive, Nick talks to West Wing supersleuth Gabe Sherman about Giuliani’s latest meltdown, if the painful shutdown will ever end, whether Trump will even make it to 2020, and what it will take for the Republicans to finally turn on their leader. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Are We Nearing the End of Human Civilization? Description: What if there was a simple calculation that could foretell when a company will go bankrupt, when artificial intelligence will become smarter than humans, and when human civilization will meet its eventual demise. William Poundstone, author of the upcoming book, The Doomsday Calculation, joins Nick to explain how such an algorithm does exits, can predict all of this and more, and why humans likely only have 760 years left in the universe. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

In this week’s episode of Inside the Hive, Nick games out Apple’s startling revenue news. (Is it China? Trump? Or flat-lining iPhone growth. Then The Hive’s Claire Landsbaum swings by to discuss The Reign of Pelosi 2.0, and what it means for the border wall, presidential indictments, and the president’s forthcoming annus horribilis. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

What will the Democrats do with their newfound power in the House in 2019? Will Snap sell to Verizon, Disney or Apple? Will Facebook be broken up by government regulators? What will Uber's valuation be when it goes public? When Robert Mueller finally releases his report, will Jared or Donny Jr. go to jail? And, will Donald J. Trump resign under pressure, or forge ahead into 2020 and possibly — gulp!— even beyond? Nick and Jon Kelly discuss all of this, and more, in the Vanity Fair yearly predictions episode of Inside the Hive. 2019 here we come! Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Being a tech company in Silicon Valley could be bad for your health, and the health of your company. Jason Fried, author of the book, "It Doesn't Have to Be Crazy at Work," joins Nick to explain why, as the CEO of a successful startup, he stays as far away from the tech epicenter as possible. He explains why technology has become more of a hindrance than a solution at the office, and home, when A,I. will really start taking jobs, and how evil Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook, and other social networks have become. Fried likens them to cigarette companies two decades ago, where the CEOs were fully aware that they were making something bad for our health and society, but did it anyway. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Michael Cohen is now going to jail as more federal investigations into Donald Trump open up. Will the people who voted Trump into the White House finally see him for who he is? Joel Stein, a journalist, author and comedy writer, recently spent a week with those voters in the most pro-Trump town in America, and he joins Nick to explain what’s really going on inside the mind’s of conservative Trump-lovin’ Americans. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Are we all going to be killed by rogue robots? Will war drones replace suicide bombers? Could artificial intelligence replace 90 percent of the workforce in the next decade? Martin Ford, a futurist and author focusing on the impact of artificial intelligence and robotics on society and the economy, joins Nick to explain why Trump might not lead to the end of civilization, but rather, a bunch of programmers in Silicon Valley could write code the destroys us all, and how quickly that could happen. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

While Donald Trump tweets like a two-year-old at investigators, it appears Robert Mueller has been a dozen steps ahead all along, ready to catch Paul Manafort lying to investigators, turning Michael Cohen against Trump, and even catching cunning Roger Stone in one of his many little lies. Abby Tracy, reporter for the Hive, joins Nick to explain what happened this week, what will happen when the Democrats take the house next year, and if Donald J. Trump will find himself in the center crosshairs of Mueller‘s investigation. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

While we’re all full on Thanksgiving turkey, a global food crisis, worse than anything we could imagine, looms in the distance. Sara Menker, founder and CEO of Gro Intelligence, joins Nick to explain how climate change, geopolitical chaos, and Donald Trump’s pointless trade war, could lead to starvation for billions in the next ten years if we don’t change the way we grow and distribute food. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Is the appointment of Matthew Whitaker the beginning of Donald Trump’s first constitutional crisis? Katie Benner, who covers the Justice Department for The New York Times, joins Nick to take us inside the Department of Justice, explain what is going on inside the White House, why Facebook is helping destroy democracy, and why Google got away with hiding workplace sexual harassment. Stick around to hear Nick and Jon Kelly discuss the latest scandal inside Facebook, and if Sheryl Sandberg is going to suffer any consequences for trying to hide the Russia scandal. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

While the Democrats celebrate the blue wave, we all seem to be ignoring the larger problem in America: inequality. Anand Giridharadas joins Nick to explain how elites are destroying the world, how philanthropy is a fallacy designed to keep the poor poor, on the rich richer, and how inequality in the U.S. is likely going to lead to a revolution, if it hasn’t already, and why Giridharadas believes the poor have been duped into voting for social issues (like abortion and gay rights) but in doing so, are voting against themselves economically. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Anthony Scaramucci candidly discusses it all: his eleven days in the White House, the Lizza call, Bannon’s self-fellating, Trump’s political instincts, the midterms, border separations, what the media gets wrong and his own alter ego, The Mooch. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

As Facebook’s scandals mount, and its mea culpas fall flat, some are wondering how society can rein in the company—regulation, intervention, God knows what. On this week’s episode, Sally Hubbard, who served in the New York State A.G.’s Antitrust Bureau, and now works at Capitol Forum, the influential and erudite beltway financial journal, explains why the government should break up Facebook, and why Mark Zuckerberg might be the most dangerous C.E.O. in the world. After the show, Ted Sarandos of Netflix discusses the future of Hollywood, and how Netflix will dominate the future of storytelling Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The TV lawyer-turned-political aspirant talks to Vanity Fair’s Emily Jane Fox about his political dreams, the Stormy Daniels of it all, and how he found himself in front of the audience of one. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

In this special episode, the award-winning stand-up comedian and creator of “Nanette” talks to Monica Lewinsky, social activist and Vanity Fair contributing editor, on how to deal with trauma in the public eye Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

On a special episode of Inside the Hive, taped during the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit, new WarnerMedia C.E.O. John Stankey tells Andrew Ross Sorkin about his plans for HBO—and the rest of his new portfolio. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

This week, Nick interviews Uber C.E.O. Dara Khosrowshahi on his plan to pivot the conpany’s culture, his relationship with Travis Kalanick, and the horrors posed by autonomous vehicles. Plus: Nick and Jon Kelly discuss the highlight’s of Vanity Fair’s fifth annual New Establishment Summit. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices