Ep. 14 — The ABCs of NFTs and their role in digital journalism and the creator economy / Zach Seward, Co-founder & CEO, Quartz.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Email | RSS
Over the past seven months, non-fungible tokens or NFTs have captured the world’s imagination and hype cycle, especially after the digital artist known as Beeple sold an NFT, which is a blockchain-verified proof of transfer of ownership, for one of his prints, for a record $69 million. Since then, demand for these types of collectible digital art has exploded. Artists, writers, and entire industries are trying to tap into this lucrative new art form and create all kinds of NFTs for movies, albums, photographs, even a single tweet. At the forefront of the NFT effort in the digital newsroom is the business publication, Quartz, which sold the first news article converted into a non-fungible token or NFT. Since then, the New York Times, Time Magazine, and other news outlets have followed suit with their own NFT offerings. Joining me to talk about NFTs and the media landscape is Zach Seward. He’s co-founder and CEO of Quartz. Seward is widely recognized as a leader in digital journalism, cited in publications, such as Forbes, Crain’s New York Business, Digiday, and FOLIO. Prior to joining Quartz, Seward was a reporter at the Wall Street Journal, covering education and health, and then served as the newspaper’s first social media editor. Before the Wall Street Journal, Seward was an assistant editor at Harvard’s Nieman Journalism Lab, covering the media industry. Read the Transcript Download the PDF Chitra Ragavan: Over the past seven months, non-fungible tokens or NFTs have captured the world’s imagination and hype cycle, especially after the digital artists known as Beeple sold an NFT, which is a blockchain-verified proof of transfer of ownership for one of his prints for a record $69 million. Since then, demand for these types of collectible digital art has exploded. Artists, writers, and entire industries are trying to tap into this lucrative new art form and create all kinds of NFTs for movies, albums, photographs, even a single tweet. Chitra Ragavan: Hello, everyone. I’m Chitra Ragavan, and this is Techtopia. At the forefront of the NFT effort in the digital newsroom is the business publication, Quartz, which sold the first news article converted into a non-fungible token or NFT. Since then, the New York Times, Time Magazine, and other news outlets have followed suit with their own NFT offerings. Joining me now to talk about NFTs and the media landscape is Zach Seward. He’s co-founder and CEO of Quartz. Seward is widely recognized as a leader in digital journalism, cited in publications, such as Forbes, Crain’s New York Business, Digiday and FOLIO. Prior to joining Quartz, Seward was a reporter at the Wall Street Journal, covering education and health, and then served as the newspaper’s first social media editor. Before the Wall Street Journal, he was an assistant editor at Harvard’s Nieman Journalism Lab covering the media industry. Zach, welcome to Techtopia. Zach Seward: Thank you so much for having me. Chitra Ragavan: Well, tell me how you made the journey from journalism to digital journalism and over to Quartz and why you got it started. Zach Seward: Yeah. I helped start Quartz back in 2012. Before that, as you were just saying, I was at the Wall Street Journal. My boss there was this guy Kevin Delaney, who was the managing editor of WSJ.com. He gets hired away by Atlantic Media in the very beginning of 2012 to launch a new business news site for Atlantic Media. That company then published the Atlantic Magazine, a few other titles. They had this theory, which proved correct, that there was some white space for a digital-only global business news publication that would go after advertising that was largely locked up with the Financial Times and the Economist, which by dint of that, not being a very competitive market. It gotten complacent and certainly had the burden of having to focus on print. Zach Seward: And so, we came in, digital-only, totally free, focused on what a business news organization could be if it was not U.S.-centric and focused on its readers on their mobile phones, a few other tenants that we can get into. We’re able to grow really quickly, largely on the back of both social media and email at the beginning. We ultimately were sold by Atlantic Media in 2018 to a Japanese media company, Uzabase. We were under their ownership for the last two years until the very end of last year, 2020, which made a whole lot of turbulence in the whole media industry. Uzabase put us up for sale, and in a twist that I’m also happy to talk at greater length about, I and Katherine Bell, our editor in chief, ended up buying the company from Uzabase in a management buyout. Quartz is now a completely independent media company, about a hundred people in the company, newsroom of 50 people all over the world covering global business news and trying to chart on a path now as a totally independent media company. Chitra Ragavan: Well, congratulations. I think that’s really good news. Zach Seward: Thank you. Yeah, it’s been fun. Chitra Ragavan: How does your approach differ from your competitors when you take on business areas that you want to do explanatory journalism on? Zach Seward: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah, there’s a few differences, but the most important, I think, and one that’s been core to Quartz editorial approach from the beginning is how we organize our newsroom and our coverage for readers, whereas in most newsrooms, the coverage is divided up into beats, the telecom reporter, the commodities reporter, the education reporter. We divide our coverage up into what we call obsessions. So with obsessions, we’re not trying to identify or take the entirety of the global economy and divided up into small chunks so that we can comprehensively cover everything. We’re instead saying what are the most important macro trends in the global economy that we’re paying attention to and think our readers ought to be paying attention to. Zach Seward:
Ep. 13 — The Exoplanet Revolution, Technosignatures, and the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence / Adam Frank, Professor of Astrophysics, University of Rochester.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Email | RSS
After decades of secrecy, the US Government last week shared a new report about unidentified flying objects or UFOs and the possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence. The bottom line: more studies are needed, the report said, raising more questions than it answered. Renowned astrophysicist Adam Frank says there’s little evidence to show a correlation between UFO sightings and extraterrestrial intelligence. In May, Frank wrote a guest essay in the New York Times titled, “I’m a Physicist Who Searches for Aliens. UFOs Don’t Impress Me.” But he argues that the groundbreaking work done over the past thirty years in identifying exoplanets, combined with clues from astrobiology and technosignatures, could help us find signs of life if they exist outside our solar system. A professor of astrophysics at the University of Rochester and a leading expert on the final stages of evolution for stars like the sun, Frank won a NASA Grant a year ago to fund his study of so-called “technosignatures.” Technosignatures are clues of past or present technology used on other planets. This is the first NASA non-radio technosignature grant ever awarded and represents an exciting new phase in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. A self-described “evangelist of science,” Frank is a frequent commentator on NPR. He also is the co-founder of NPR’s blog 13.8 Cosmos and Culture. His most recent book is called, Light of the Stars: Alien Worlds and The Fate of the Earth. Read the Transcript Download the PDF Chitra Ragavan: After decades of secrecy, the US government has shared a new report revealing what it knows and doesn’t know about unidentified flying objects, or UFOs. But renowned astrophysicist, Adam Frank, says, “There’s little evidence to show a relation between UFO sightings and extraterrestrial life and intelligence.” In May, Frank wrote a guest essay in the New York Times titled, I’m A Physicist Who Searches For Aliens. UFOs Don’t Impress Me. Hello, everyone. I’m Chitra Ragavan, and this is Techtopia. Joining me now to talk about his search for life on other planets is Adam Frank. He’s a professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Rochester and a leading expert on the final stages of evolution for stars like the sun. Chitra Ragavan: Last June, Frank won a NASA grant to fund his study of so-called technosignatures. Technosignatures are clues of past or present technology used on other planets. This is the first NASA non-radio technosignatures grant ever awarded and represents an exciting new phase in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. A self-described evangelist of science, Frank is a frequent commentator on NPR. He also is the co-founder of NPR’s blog, 13.8: Cosmos and Culture, and his most recent book is called Light Of The Stars: Alien Worlds And The Fate Of The Earth. Adam, welcome to Techtopia. Adam Frank: Thank you so much for having me. Chitra Ragavan: In your recent New York Times guest essay you write, “There are excellent reasons to search for extraterrestrial life, but there are equally excellent reasons not to conclude that we have found evidence of it with UFO sightings.” What’s wrong with our current thinking in linking UFOs with extraterrestrial life? Adam Frank: Well, the biggest problem is that with a UFO by definition is something that’s unidentified. Then the question is how do you go from something you don’t know, you don’t know what it is, you don’t understand what it is, to then making conclusions about what it is. The point I was making in that article was as interesting as these things are, and they are interesting, there’s just nothing close to the kind of data a scientist would need to be able to reliably and verifiably conclude that these were … this extraordinary conclusion these were actually alien spacecraft that had ventured across the vast distances between the stars and were showing up here to investigate us, and they want to be secret, but they’re not really very competent in remaining secret. Right? There’s just that link is just completely unwarranted. Chitra Ragavan: Yes. And of course you’ve got all of the science fiction where all of these aliens are wearing human clothes, and they speak in English, and they seem to like Detroit a lot for some reason, so I guess … Adam Frank: Right. Well, as I always like to say, if it sounds like a science fiction story, it probably is. The problem with the way people link these sightings with the conclusion that it’s something from another world, which to even find microbial life on another plant would be the most extraordinary discovery in the entire history of science. So, you’re going to need pretty strong evidence for that. But to make this even larger leap that we’re being visited by advanced creatures, it almost always ends up sounding like a science fiction story, because really if they’re visiting, why don’t they just land on the White House lawn and be like, “Yo. We’re here. What’s up”? Chitra Ragavan: The US government recently released videos taken by Navy and Air Force pilots, and you’ve seen them as well, of these so-called unidentified aerial phenomena, the new term for UFOs. These pilots, and we actually had one of the pilots, Alex Dietrich, on our podcast, they’ve given highly credible accounts of what they have repeatedly seen. What do you make of their accounts and observations and your reasoning as to why they don’t automatically assume that these are alien species checking up out is correct? Adam Frank: The problem with, first of all, always with personal testimony is that there’s not a whole lot you can do with it as a scientist, especially to try and ascertain whetter or not what they’re seeing has anything to do with aliens. Right? What do I really need if I want to say I’ve detected something that must be aliens? I would need detailed data from lots of different angles at lots of different wavelengths with lots of different sensors to tell
Ep. 12 — A 64-year old non-fiction book, Flying Saucer Pilgrimage, has new resonance today in light of an upcoming U.S. government report on UFOs / Bryan Cunningham, Executive Director, UCI Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Email | RSS
UFOs are back in the news. After decades of secrecy, the American public and especially UFO-believers are waiting for a report from the Defense Department to Congress this month. The report is expected to reveal what our military, law enforcement, and intelligence agencies know, and don’t know, about unidentified aerial phenomena or UAPs. That’s the government’s fancy new terminology for UFOs. The upcoming report would have been a wish-come-true for Bryant and Helen Reeve. Between 1953 and 1955 — one of the most prolific periods in U.S. history for UFO sightings — the Detroit couple traveled 23,000 miles over that two-year period conducting a detailed “oral history” of so-called “saucerers” — those who had witnessed flying saucers. The Reeves documented their oral history in a fascinating book called “Flying Saucer Pilgrimage,” published in 1957, describing in great detail their interaction with these UFO “contactees.” I had the pleasure of talking to their grandson, my friend Bryan Cunningham about the prescience of some of their assertions in light of the upcoming report, and how their extraordinary UFO journey influenced his life and career in national security and intelligence. Cunningham is executive director of the UC Irvine Cybersecurity Policy & Research Institute. He’s an international expert on cybersecurity law and policy, a former White House lawyer and adviser, and a media commentator on cybersecurity, technology, and surveillance issues. Read the Transcript Download the PDF Chitra Ragavan: UFOs are back in the news. After decades of secrecy, the American public and especially UFO believers are waiting eagerly for a report from the defense department to Congress this month. The report is expected to reveal what our military, law enforcement and intelligence agencies know, and most importantly, don’t know about unidentified aerial phenomena or UAPs. That’s the government’s fancy new terminology for UFOs. Hello, everyone. I’m Chitra Ragavan, and this is Techtopia. Chitra Ragavan: The upcoming report would have been a wish come true for Bryant and Helen Reeve. Between 1953 and 1955, one of the most prolific periods in US history for UFO sightings, that Detroit Michigan couple traveled 23,000 miles over a two-year period, conducting a detailed oral history of so-called sorcerers. Those who had witnessed flying saucers. The Reeves documented their oral history in a fascinating book called Flying Saucer Pilgrimage, published in 1957. Here now to tell us more about Bryant and Helen Reeve and their extraordinary UFO journey is the grandson, my friend, Brian Cunningham. Cunningham is executive director of the Cybersecurity Policy and Research Institute at UC Irvine. He’s an international expert on cybersecurity law and policy, a former White House lawyer and advisor, and a media commentator on cybersecurity, technology and surveillance issues. Brian, welcome to Techtopia. Bryan Cunningham: Thank you, Chitra. It’s wonderful to be here. I don’t know if I’m the only person who’s appeared on both of your excellent podcasts, but I’m happy to be one of them. I really like the Techtopia approach. It’s been great so far. Hopefully I won’t ruin it today. Chitra Ragavan: Oh, it’s an honor and privilege, Brian. 67 years ago, on December 16th, 1954, your grandparents, Bryant and Helen Reeves, wrote a letter to president Dwight Eisenhower and they were not happy with him. What was their beef with the president and what was their advice to him? Bryan Cunningham: It’s fascinating for me to read this telex in the book as an intelligence officer. Just think about the fact for a second, that this was literally using the Telegraph. And as they say in the book, I think they were sending it from Mexico and they paid 52 pesos to send it, but what they were really doing and if they were alive today, what I’m sure they would have done is they were filing a freedom of information act request. There was no legal mechanism for them to do that in 1954. So in some ways we’ve come a long ways. Bryan Cunningham: What they essentially were saying to president Eisenhower was, “We deeply admire you, great war hero. You should overrule all of the Luddites in the Department of Defense that work for you and release everything the government knows about UFOs. We have a constitutional right to know,” they said. And furthermore, the air of secrecy that the US government, in their view, was putting around the subject matter was so different from what a lot of other countries were doing in terms of talking about it openly, that it actually made people much more fearful than they needed to be. I would say finally, this piece of mail has been answered with the new report. Chitra Ragavan: For you personally, it must be fascinating because you are in the national security space, you’re an expert on surveillance, but also on civil liberties and privacy. The fact that they were asking president Eisenhower, be transparent, be open, do your duty to your citizens, it must be really eerie almost to see that given where you are today. Bryan Cunningham: Well, I have multiple minds about this entire subject, which is perhaps appropriate given some of the metaphysical philosophies that my grandparents discussed in the book. As a trained intelligence officer, I’m supposed to focus on the facts, and just the facts as Joe Friday would have said on Dragnet. But part of what people don’t realize about intelligence analysis is that in most cases is much more art than science because by definition, if you are the president, you have to turn to your intelligence services to explain something to you. It means you don’t know everything about it. So we’re trained also to be very comfortable with putting ourselves out on a limb and interpreting uncertainty. So to me, the fact that my grandparents were pretty candid and repeated in saying, “We don’t know everything, we probably don’t know much of anything, but we’re trying to connect the dots with the information that we do have,” is very consistent with what
Ep. 11 – How Covid-19 is reshaping cities and smart cities / Michael Proman, Managing Director, Scrum Ventures.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Email | RSS
COVID-19 virtually overnight changed the tone, tenor, and texture of cities, bringing the global economy to a slow grind and forcing people to retreat into bubbles, silos, and pods, and remote work — connected mainly through social media and Zoom. Now, as we slowly start to get a grip on the virus and think about reopening society, what will the long-term impact of the pandemic be on cities and on the evolution of Smart Cities? My guest today has some of those answers. He’s Michael Proman, Managing Director at Scrum Ventures, an early-stage venture firm that has invested in more than 80 startups across a range of industries in the U.S. and Japan. Proman worked in global marketing and development at Coca-Cola and the National Basketball Association prior to starting (and ultimately exiting) his initial startup, OptionIt. He has helped lead multiple startups to acquisitions and continues to play an active role in mentoring and advising founders across multiple industries. Proman is a contributor to TechCrunch and his most recent piece is titled: Will COVID-19 spur a smart rebirth for cities? Read the Transcript Download the PDF Chitra Ragavan: COVID-19 virtually overnight changed the tone, tenor and texture of cities, bringing the global economy to a slow grind and forcing people to retreat into bubbles, silos, pods, and remote work connected mainly through social media and Zoom. Now, as we slowly start to get a grip on the virus and think about reopening society, what will the long-term impact of the pandemic be on cities and on the evolution of smart cities? Hello everyone, I’m Chitra Ragavan, and this is Techtopia. My guest today has some of those answers. He’s Michael Proman, Managing Director at Scrum Ventures, an early-stage venture fund that has invested in more than 80 startups across a range of industries in the U.S. and Japan. Chitra Ragavan: Proman worked in global marketing and development at Coca-Cola and the National Basketball Association, prior to starting and ultimately exiting his initial startup, OptionIt. He has helped lead multiple startups to acquisitions and continues to play an active role in mentoring and advising founders across multiple industries. Proman also is a contributor to TechCrunch. His most recent piece is titled, Will COVID-19 spur a smart rebirth for cities? Mike, welcome to Techtopia. Michael Proman: Chitra, thanks for having me. Chitra Ragavan: When COVID-19 hit, we saw this incredible change across major metropolitan cities, such as New York, reeling from the impact. Real estate values going down, and commerce grinding to a halt, people scrambling indoors. As someone who specializes in the future of cities and so-called Smart Cities, I’m sure you were watching with both interest and some concern about what the future would bring. What were your thoughts as you saw all of this unfold? Michael Proman: Well, I think like everybody, I think the immediate thought is, oh my goodness, right? The world is coming to a grinding halt. I’ve been working in a remote environment for 12 plus years, so the idea of transitioning my work into this virtual bubble of Zoom and Microsoft teams and all these other virtual channels, that didn’t really faze me personally. But of course, a lot of my colleagues who are based in the Bay Area, they’re in the epicenter of some of the transformation taking place in some of these urban communities. Having lived in places like New York previously and having friends still there, I can understand and certainly empathize with both local businesses that were facing arguably some of the darkest days that they’ve ever had. I think there was this collective sense of, yeah, this is going to be rough, but let’s figure this out. I think people just dug in, and it’s pretty amazing the progress that has been made here in the last 12 or 14 months. Chitra Ragavan: Over the past year and a half, what was the biggest change that surprised you perhaps, or even shocked you? What were you seeing that you didn’t expect? Michael Proman: Well, I think this was to me a unified effort, right, of public sector, private. You have innovators, whether it be in the pharmaceutical industry, of course, kind of getting us to where we need to be on vaccines. I think everybody just kind of grabbed an oar, so to speak, right. I think the thing that surprised me the most and through SmartCityX, which is a big initiative that I oversee within Scrum, we work with a lot of municipal leaders. I think everyone’s first reaction to government or public sector and municipalities is that, they’re slow, bureaucratic, and can’t get things done. I was, I wouldn’t say shocked, but I was I think just as surprised as a lot of folks that that wasn’t the case here. I think people really said, you know what, we’re going to reinvent and redefine how it is we do things. Michael Proman: We’re surrounded by a lot of the best municipal leaders within SmartCityX. Just getting that front row seat from them has been eye-opening for me to see how cities have really taken a much more proactive stance in getting us back to where we need to be. Chitra Ragavan: What is SmartCityX? Michael Proman: Great question. At Scrum, we work with startups, right? We invest in startups. SmartCityX is, I wouldn’t call it an accelerator per se, right? It is a community of what we would consider best in class, stage agnostic startups in the case of what we’re aiming at. We look at six core pillars within smart city, right? There’s consumer products and services, there’s mobility, there’s smart buildings and infrastructure, there’s energy resources and sustainability, connectivity. Then the last piece is what we call social innovation, right? Technologies that make cities more equitable, more diverse, more inclusive. In defining those six core categories, those buckets, we’re able to go out and curate startups from around the world that speak to
Ep. 10 – The data-driven transformation of Hollywood and the television industry / Anjali Midha, CEO & Co-Founder, Diesel Labs & John Mass, Executive Vice-President, Content Partners.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Email | RSS
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, the entertainment industry was being upended by the rapid pace of streaming and other technology. Then COVID-19 hit, shuttering movie theaters, shutting down the world, and driving people into their homes and in front of our television screens, where we’ve largely remained over this past year. The pandemic has been a giant wakeup call to an already disrupted industry, which increasingly, is turning to data-driven insights, to figure out how to survive, and how to evolve in the post-pandemic streaming era. This week, I have two amazing guests to talk about the data-driven transformation of Hollywood and the entertainment industry: Anjali Midha is CEO & co-founder at Diesel Labs. The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based startup delivers cutting-edge content analytics to help media decision-makers address some of the toughest questions confronting the industry today, such as what to produce, where to distribute it and where to market it. My second guest is John Mass. He’s the executive vice president at Content Partners, a Los Angeles-based investment company and leading independent owner in the world of major-studio distributed films, television shows, and related media. Since its inception, Content Partners has invested more than one billion dollars in this marketplace, with more than 500 studio-release films and more than 3,000 hours of television. In this fascinating conversation, Anjali and John share their insights into where Hollywood and the television industry are heading in the post-pandemic era and their predictions as to what’s in, what’s out, who’s in, who’s out, and outline the shape of things to come including the future of movie theaters and movie watching. Read the Transcript Download the PDF Chitra Ragavan: Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, the entertainment industry was being upended by the rapid pace of streaming and other technology. Then COVID-19 hit, shuttering movie theaters, shutting down the world and driving people into their homes and in front of their television screens where they’ve largely remained over this past year. Hello, everyone, I’m Chitra Ragavan. And this is Techtopia. The pandemic has been a giant wake up call to an already disrupted industry, which increasingly is turning to data-driven insights to figure out how to survive and how to evolve in the post-pandemic streaming era. Chitra Ragavan: Joining me now to talk about the data-driven transformation of Hollywood and the entertainment industry are two amazing guests. Anjali Midha is CEO and co-founder at Diesel Labs. The Cambridge, Massachusetts based startup delivers cutting edge content analytics to help media decision makers address some of the toughest questions confronting the industry today, such as what to produce, where to distribute it and where to market it. Chitra Ragavan: I’m also joined by John Mass. He’s executive vice president at Content Partners, a Los Angeles based investment company and the leading independent owner in the world of major studio distributed films, television shows, and related media. Since its inception, Content Partners has invested more than $1 billion in this marketplace with more than 500 studio release films and more than 3000 hours of television. Anjali and John, welcome to Techtopia. Anjali Midha: Thanks so much for having us. John Mass: Thank you. Chitra Ragavan: Talk about disruption, did either of you ever imagine that something as destructive as a global pandemic would descend on the world, and what’s it been like to see the effects on the entertainment industry? Anjali Midha: Well, I definitely did not see the pandemic coming. I think being in our shoes, starting a company that’s studying the interactivity and the development in the media industry was tough enough as it was, thinking ahead about what were we going to see in the next three to five years. Pandemic was definitely not on the dart board, but it has been a fascinating year in terms of actually, I think accelerating a lot of the change that we’re expecting in the media industry. It’s sort of speeding up because we’re seeing people at home, we’re seeing accelerated change in terms of how movies will be distributed, not just this year, but in the years to come. I think a lot of what we were probably going to see over the next five, 10 years, we’re going to now have that happen in the next year or two. John, I don’t know if that jives with your perspective as well, but interested to hear. John Mass: No, absolutely. I think you have to look at… certainly it’s been a devastating year. So much obviously loss of life, which is the saddest component of this, but also businesses have really been shook. But at the same time, I think there’s been a lot of advancements. As you said, things like PVOD and TVOD in the film business, shortening the windows of the licensing of different content from theatrical to various forms of television has happened. I think in many ways it won’t ever go back to where it once was. Those windows will stay very short. Some studios will continue to release both in theaters and on, as loosely defined, television or at home as possible. I think that’s good for the business. Innovation and change is good, and something like the pandemic has certainly accelerated and changed that. John Mass: The same time, I think we’re seeing the theaters coming back, the reopening. There seems to be a real demand for people to get out and go to movie theaters. I don’t think 2021 will approach 2019. I think 2022 will be a much better guide as to what the theater business will be. But suffice to say, it’s certainly going to be much better than 2020. I’m glad. I think there’s nothing like going to a movie theater and I hope people do go back. Chitra Ragavan: Oh, I totally agree. I just love being in a movie theater. Nothing really quite compares to that. If you look at the transformation of the entertainment industry, even pre COVID, John, what have been the most