Inside The Hive With Nick Bilton

Its been the craziest week in recent Silicon Valley memory--Facebook's stock fell of a cliff; Elon Musk went after one of his critics; and Robert Mueller started looking into Trump's Twitter feed. Nick explains what all of this means in the here and now, and answers a very serious question down the line: what would it take for Zuck to move on from Facebook? Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Technology has a history of starting out with good intentions, and eventually being leveraged for quite the opposite. On this week’s episode, Adam Fisher, author of Valley of Genius, joins Nick to explain how Silicon Valley--an industry created to advance war research and governmental capacities--was co-opted for commercial, and often sinister, purposes, from election-meddling operatives to racist trolls. Fisher also explains what Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Dorsey, and Elon Musk can learn from their predecessors, before they destroy the world. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

On the face of it, it seems like America is currently more divided than anytime since the Civil War. But back in 1968, America was embroiled in chaos, torn over the war in Vietnam, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., and later, the murder of Robert Kennedy, the brother of JFK. Marc Smerling and Zac Stuart-Pontier, the team behind Crimetown and The Jinx, join Nick to explain how the murder of RFK, in 1968, might have been a government conspiracy, and why it changed the shape of America forever. Also: Vanity Fair’s Abby Tracy explains what’s going to happen with Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s Supreme Court pick, and what the Democrats can do to stop the court from overturn Roe vs Wade. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Are Tom Arnold and Michael Cohen, as one recent tweet could have been construed to suggest, teaming up to take down Donald Trump? The famous comedian and Trumpworld scold joins Nick to explain how he plans to take down the president, what it was like being married to Rosanne, and how he recently tried to fight Cohen outside the Regency hotel.  Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

A few years ago, a chance encounter between Christopher Steele, of the now-famous Steele Dossier, and an FBI agent who was working on a gambling case at Trump Tower, opened the door to a multi-year investigation into the massive corruption taking place at FIFA, the soccer federation. Ken Bensinger, author of the new book, “Red Card: How the U.S. Blew the Whistle on the World's Biggest Sports Scandal,” joins us to tell a wild and crazy story that involves the mob, British spies, a 450-pound informant who gets around on a mobility scooter with a parrot on his shoulder, Vladimir Putin, Robert Mueller, a soccer-obsessed IRS agent in Orange County, and tangentially, none other than Donald Trump. We also discuss if Putin might have already fixed who will win this year’s World Cup. Hint: Russia. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

While Americans watched in horror as innocent children, as young as 9-months-old, were torn from their parents arms, Ivanka Trump was posting photos of her and her children, as happy as could be. Is she oblivious? A mean girl? Or is she unable to speak publicly about how she really feels out of fear of her father? Emily Jane Fox, author of the new book, Born Trump: Inside America’s First Family, joins Nick to talk about what Ivanka and her brothers, Donny Jr. and Eric, are really like in person. She offers salacious and wild stories about how these children grew up, about whether they liked each other, and if they really care about how their dad is ruining the country. Also: Nick and Jon Kelly talk about how Russia is planning to disrupt the 2018 and 2020 elections, and why Bob Iger is happy spending tens of billions of dollars on Fox. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Robby Mook, former campaign manager for Hillary Clinton, joins Nick this week to discuss how Russian is planning to drive more discourse in our democracy, and the 2018 election. Mook also discusses how the Republican party is simply a rubber stamp for Trump, afraid of what he might do or say to them; and who the Democratics will elect in 2020. Finally, Mook talks about the best and worst times during the 2016 campaign, and what he and his old boss, Hillary, still text each about. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Silicon Valley is notoriously full of founders who exaggerate, intentionally lie to the media, and dupe investors, and even Congress. But there are few stories that rival the fraud behind Theranos, the blood-testing company once worth $10 billion, and now worth nothing. John Carreyrou, author of a new book, "Bad Blood," joins us to explain how the company's CEO, Elizabeth Holmes, defrauded everyone who came into her orbit, how she might still end up behind bars, and he answers the question on everyone's mind: Is Holmes a sociopath? Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Should it be legal to sell mild drugs, like weed and magic mushrooms, on the Internet? What about heroin? Handguns? AR-15s? Even murder-for-hire? Nick Bilton sits down with Tom Conrad, former product director of Snap and co-founder of Pandora, to discuss Nick's book, “American Kingpin;” if Silicon Valley CEOs are moral at heart, or more concerned with their profits and their legacy; and if Ross Ulbricht, the founder of the Silk Road website, is any different from other CEOs in tech. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Why are we here? Is there a God? A reason to it all? How, and why, did the universe begin, and how, and why, will it end? Sean M. Carroll, a cosmologist and physicist specializing in dark energy and general relativity, joins Nick to answer the questions that plague us all, including, if there's a chance that somewhere out there in the cosmos, there is another extraterrestrial Donald Trump ruling over a planet of little green aliens.   Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Donald Trump has always been a blatant liar, making up stories about his worth to how many people were at his inauguration, but do people actually like it when Trump lies to them? Amanda Carpenter, author of a new book, "Gaslighting America: Why We Love It When Trump Lies To Us," joins Nick to talk about why Republicans, and evangelicals, still love Trump, even after all these lies, how Trump actually pulls off these outright deceptions, and why they are only going to get worse in 2020 as Trump does everything possible to try and maintain control of the White House. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Comedian and commentator, formally of The Onion and The Daily Show, Baratunde Thurston, joins this week to talk about whether Kanye West poses a bigger threat to civilization than Trump, how white men in Silicon Valley could destroy the future for everyone, especially African Americans, and why the future probably isn't as bad as Nick thinks it is. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

As of late, tech giants like Facebook, Twitter, Amazon and Google, are being perceived as evil for taking advantage of our deepest, darkest secrets and fears with one goal: to make us click on more invasive ads. Tristan Harris, who has been described as "the closest thing Silicon Valley has to a conscience," is trying to change that. But can an industry worth trillions of dollars, with some of the biggest egos in business, ever change to do the right thing? Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

The only reason that magic tricks actually work, according to the world famous magician and puzzle-maker David Kwong, is that “people want to believe.” The same theory applies to politics, fake news, and the entire tricks that Trump used to win the White House. Kwong joins us this week to share fascinating stories about magicians playing an integral role in war efforts, clandestine government operations, and yes, politics. In part two of this week’s show, Nick talks about his latest feature in Vanity Fair, about Russian, Chinese and domestic spies working in Silicon Valley. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Is Trump making it more difficult to be African American in the U.S.? Does Ben Carson secretly dislike people of color? Is Donald Trump a true racist? Jamil Smith, a writer for The New Republic, Time, and now, Rolling Stone, joins us to explain why, 155 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, black men are arrested for just sitting in Starbucks coffee shop, why President Obama could have done more to speak out against these issues, and why we’re all so sick and tired of hearing about James Comey. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Since the Cambridge Analyitca scandal broke just a few weeks ago, Facebook has seen its stock fall by $100 billion, and Mark Zuckerberg was forced to go before Congress. But what happens next to the 2.25-billion user social network? Will it be regulated? Or will it be broken up? Kevin Roose, NYT Tech columnist, joins us to explain what happened on the hill this week, and what will happen next in Silicon Valley. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Will America finally vote a women into the White House in 2020? Will she be a Democrat or a Republican? Does it even matter? Could Stormy Daniels be the scandal that topples Trump? Jennifer Palmieri, former Director of Communications for the Hillary Clinton 2016 presidential campaign, and author of the new book, “Dear Madam President,” joins us this week to talk about all these topics, and what life in the Obama White House was like, how it felt to lose to Trump in the 2016 election (“surreal”), and the fear of knowing that Russia was trying to break our democracy, and change the outcome of the 2016 election.  Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Stormy's in, Hope is out. Bolton's hired as Shulkin is fired. How does FLOTUS feel POTUS? Emily Jane Fox joins us to explain what's going on inside the Trump's chaotic White House. Then, Nick Bilton and Jon Kelly talk about all the problems at Facebook, and if a company that just lost $100 billion in value because of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, can survive in the longterm. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Ryan Holiday, author of the new book "Conspiracy," tells the inside story of how Peter Thiel took down Gawker Media and Nick Denton, how the tech billionaire's relationship with Donald Trump isn't what it used to be, and why we should kind of — just a little bit — feel sorry for Thiel, even though he is one of the most disliked people in Silicon Valley. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Will robots kill us all? Will a rogue A.I. shut off the power grids? Could we lose track of what is real, and what is not, in a permanently augmented reality? My guest today, Kevin Kelly, has spent his entire career (accurately) predicting what tomorrow will look like, and quelling the fears that come with each new technology. He offers a prediction of what culture, society and politics will look like over the next thirty years, and if humanity will survive a technological apocalypse. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices