Kevin Roose and Casey Newton, the former cohosts of The New York Times’ Hard Fork podcast, have launched a new media company called Machine Gods Media. Their first show, also called Machine Gods, will be distributed through NPR. Roose said the partnership gives them broad reach without giving up ownership: “It will be a distribution partnership rather than a full acquisition, so we will still have some operating distance.”
Roose described a gap in current AI coverage that the show intends to fill. He criticized both the “genre of popular criticism” that dismisses AI as a bubble and the purely hype-driven coverage that ignores risks. The alternative, which he attributes to Newton, is “AI realism”: taking the technology seriously while acknowledging its dangers and keeping the tone entertaining.
A Bloomberg report said the pair had fielded offers of up to $5 million for the show. Roose declined to confirm the figure, saying only that NPR made “a good offer” and that they could have gotten more money elsewhere. He emphasized radio’s still-large audience and the chance to reach people beyond the usual tech press. The interview also touched on Roose’s new book, The AGI Chronicles, which he wrote without AI assistance despite its subject matter.