We are excited to introduce our new podcast, BEN AND GLENN'S AFTER HOURS: a new weekly podcast hosted by former 2020 Sanders organizer Ben Mora and journalist Glenn Greenwald, to discuss all matters political, journalistic, and cultural.
I stopped listening after the first three minutes. You need to start the show with the reason why I should continue to listen. Stress the main point or points that you are going to cover. Don’t bury the lede. Few listeners will care about your chit-chat. As soon as you open the mic, give substance, provocative questions or statements. Make me WANT to listen instead of making me endure small talk that I care nothing about.
I am a huge fan of Greenwald's reporting and his reporting integrity..... so I hung in until T=9m and threw in the towel at that point. I'm sure that both speakers have a lot to say, and I am interested in hearing it, but the first 9m of silly banter was just too much for me.
"but the first 9m of silly banter was just too much for me."
Ditto.
But the last half was pretty good.
They may be just yet finding their way. The last half was worth listening to. Too much silliness for an extended time gets old fast. But I'm willing to give it *some time.
Not every podcast will be a great winner. So decide for yourself what interests you and spend the time necessary. If not interested just click off until the next time. If you get skunked too many times just unsubscribe. I am sure Glenn will hit more homers than ground outs so I'll stick with him until he proves to be a singles hitter.
Glenn has substance, obviously, but he needs a top-notch producer who can teach him about hooks, pacing, and a million other things about producing a show that people will want to enjoy.
Again, I do appreciate the feedback, genuinely! I've always had a readership with strong opinions. But it's the first episode - you guys have to give it a chance to breathe and find its footing. It's not intended to be a cable-style interview. It's going to be substantive. But it's intended to endure over time as a weekly podcast so it also needs to have some conversation as a foundation for the more substantive political talk (and this episode has a good amount of that, just through the prism of introducing who Ben is and where he comes from).
I for one liked the casual nature of this conversation. The inside "baseball" of the Bernie campaign was interesting. Don't always need the "hair on fire" end of times hysteria utilized by many podcasts to keep listeners. I trust Glenn to give me a mix of great information and entertainment. Looking forward to the honest opinions of both of these very honest and intelligent commentators. Ideology seems not to be their point but an honest assessment of the actions of "leaders" and politicians regardless of their supposed positions on the political spectrum. The dishonesty and feet of clay are the hallmarks of politicians regardless of their Party. Glenn is only too happy to point these qualities out in an interesting and informative way.
I don't think anyone meant their feedback to be taken as dismissive of the forum..... I am certainly looking forward to future articles / podcasts. We are in *dire* need of honest coverage of the news..... so please do not be discouraged from future podcasts.
I genuinely appreciate the feedback. I knew this would be somewhat different content and therefore not everyone in my readership would enjoy it. We called it "After Hours" in large part to signify that: this is somewhat different than my standard fare of writing. That's the good thing about this Substack: it affords the opportunity to do a bunch of different things, and subscribers can consume the content they like and not the rest. This podcast isn't intended to be in lieu of my writing and journalism. That's always going to be the bulk of what I do. But there are a lot of people who won't read 3,000-word articles but do listen to podcasts, so it's a way of expanding the reach of what's done here. And Ben is not a clown: he's a super smart and interesting thinker about politics, as you'll see, so I do think it's more an extension of what I normally do here than a radical departure. But ultimately finding a way to talk about politics and journalism is natural conversational tone rather than one that is super-serious from the first word until the last is crucial. That's a big part of what explains Joe Rogan's success, for instance. We're not trying to copy that, but it just an experiment in finding ways to talk. I think you can tell from the split reaction here that there are a lot of people who will like it and some who won't - just hope people in the latter category give it a chance.
Complete agreement here. Online exposure to offhand, easy-going conversations among intelligent, knowledgeable, articulate people who share my opinions/ impressions/ suspicions about current events has helped me to own my somewhat outsider stance more comfortably, naturally, and easily. I suppose it's a form of modeling for those of us who haven't found a real-life group to let loose with. Hearing one's own worldview reflected in such a casual way supplements and completes the understandings we grasp from more formal, analytical, polemical speech. In fact, it's what we will need as we go forth to form a "movement" of sorts to change the screwed-up system we're living under. We need the sense of camaraderie. So thanks for contributing to it, Glenn.
"there are a lot of people who won't read 3,000-word articles but do listen to podcasts,"
Then there are lot of people who don't have 63 minutes to devote to following an aural presentation.
I would appreciate having the podcasts machine transcribed to a text version. Even if it is replete with mis-transcriptions, I'd still being able to get the gist and not have to spend an hour to find that I shouldn't have spent the time.
With a transcribed text, I could choose from many modalities, to scan, speed read, skip ahead and back, or even read deeply and completely, and still finish in less than 63 minutes.
As a podcast, in all likelihood I'll never listen to a one. If the podcasts are a success and continue, please do consider machine trancriptions.
OK. I accept a few minutes of explaining "who" Ben "is". And I understand that deciding how to go about it in an interesting way can be challenging. So, I will give the show time to "get its footing". But we podcast listeners and cable TV watchers are sick to death of the endless self absorbed talking heads thinking that we all are hangin on every syllable about their personal lives and their endless "witty" banter. The freedom, stability, and security of the Republic is being destroyed by an evil regime as each hour passes and we want accurate information, new information, and compelling insights into this information calmly and professionally delivered, and serious learned opinion regarding the political and cultural wars that are unfolding everyday.
I try to skip the opening chit chat on all the pods I listen to except True Anon. I wish there were a button to skip that stuff. The intro to Radio War Nerd is crazy long.
Where do I hear TrueAnon's podcast without having to subscribe to a further platform or service? Been out of touch in terms of podcasts because I thought they died in the 90s.
I’m not concerned about that. Joe Rogan does that with just about every interview but his subscribers know it will soon become interesting beyond pure banter. Glenn has established his cred enough for me to stay with it, and I’m interested to learn about Ben and why Glenn has chosen to pair off with him.
It’s amazing to me that you can listen to an hour long podcast for 3 minutes and feel confident enough to review it. You’d make a good video game reviewer.
Not to review it; not at all. I was sharing my reaction to it, and offering suggestions based on my knowledge and experience doing talk radio. My belief is that, should Glenn take my thoughts to heart, he’d have a much larger - and engaged - listenership
I appreciate the quick feedback. This podcast is a (mild) change of pace and I knew it wouldn't be for everyone, but I don't think you can just dive into a podcast, which depends on the ability of the two people to engage interesting discussions on a regular basis, without introducing who he is and establishing some rapport. Most episodes will have 2 or 3 clearly defined issues that we examine but the debut episode needed to make clear who he is and what we were doing.
Respectfully disagree. My guess is that people will tune in to hear your thoughts on an important subject. If there is rapport with the co-host, it will be self-evident as you two discuss the issue of the day. You have SECONDS to entice people to keep listening. Don’t squander it by meandering into this-and-that.
don't change a thing...follow you own instincts and proceed accordingly you got to this point in your carreer without input from random kvethchers and rando homophobes
Please! It took you longer than three minutes to backdoor brag about all the !lessons! you have to impart about doing media right. This latte is too hot TAKE IT BACK! Um OK Karen.
As a white, straight, middle-aged, civil libertarian former Republican, I really enjoyed this podcast and look forward to future episodes. I very much appreciate the different angles and perspectives, offered fearlessly, that we really need to begin to move forward together. I found myself agreeing with almost everything you both said. Plus it was just funny as hell.
Thank you very much. Can't wait for your future interview with Josh Hawley.
Glenn, don't listen to the shade. Ben is funny and you are funny. I think some folks lack a quality of humor (or maybe theirs is just different - yeah that's it, "different"). Let them read your more serious words exclusively if that's what they need.
I've always liked it when gay men bitch. There's a certain something there. It makes me infinitely happy and I always laugh. You and Ben make me laugh. Stop if you want to. But not because of any of these bupkes.
Was a bit wary after reading some of the comments, but my gay gene likely did help me get to the end. Not bad for a first show. I laughed, I cried, I hoped, I fumed... And then my edible kicked in and now once again all is right with the world... (Perhaps would be better if we could SEE you guys, idk...)
This podcast was excellent! Don’t listen to any comments telling you to get straight to the point or that we don’t care about chit chat, people who say this miss the point of a podcast entirely. Welcome to longform discussions, people! If you want quick and to the point then go watch the 6 o’clock breakdown on your local news station. I can’t wait for more episodes!
I’ll also mention I burst out laughing multiple times throughout, you two are hilarious and have perfect chemistry. “You wouldn’t be here sitting with me chatting; you’d be in some disgusting but very swanky lobbyist party... Instead you’re here with me with no health insurance.” LMAO
Right wing extremist checking in here. Absolutely enjoyed the entire episode. Sent it to a couple of my progressive friends. Heard back from one so far and it was great review.
Best wishes for success and I will be listening occasionally. Sorry, most of my podcast time is history, science and Christianity. But I’ll find some time for someone of Glenn’s character.
Glen, you're taking this personally and, probably understandably so. However, none of the criticism was ill-focused, in bad taste or poorly intentioned. You're a very straight (so-to-speak) shooter. Give your audience the same opportunity. Comments beat cancellations anytime.
Totally agree. As I said above, the feedback has been uniformly constructive and I appreciate it. I'm responding in part because I think engagement with critiques is respectful and important to do, but also to explain the thought process behind what we're doing.
Glenn I’m impressed with your ability to stay cool under what must be intense pressure from critics. Your responses to criticism are probably the most scrutinized of your content. We all come from censorship and bias, I’m sure I’m not the only one here who has trust issues with the news they turn to. Keep up the good attitude man. It’s well appreciated.
I don't have a smart phone. I clicked on the "add to podcast app" link on my laptop, which gave me the podcast URL I used to subscribe in iTunes. No idea how to download to desktop though.
I am a huge Greenwald fan. This is not adding to my admiration. Keep working on it. I hope it gets better. For example, figuring out what the point is? Then getting to it succinctly.
I $upport 2 independent media 'sources': you and Kyle. Do whatever the hell you want and have a blast. Don't cater too much to the audience because many of them are too smart to fall for that anyway.
Having said that, I'm assuming this was more of a first episode to establish rapport for the duo as podcast co-hosts, if that's what it's called. There is certainly a rapport there. Would've been delighted to be part of the convo at a party--that's the category this episode belongs to. Not going to repeat ad nauseum what others have said, so to contribute something more substantive:
I listened all the way through and still have to go look up who Ben Mora is. You gave us the funny stories (yes funny as fuck and sheds light on a lot of crap that happened) and we know he worked with Bernie, but why do I want to hear him shoot the shit with my most respected journalist in the world? Maybe establish that in episode 2?
I stopped listening after the first three minutes. You need to start the show with the reason why I should continue to listen. Stress the main point or points that you are going to cover. Don’t bury the lede. Few listeners will care about your chit-chat. As soon as you open the mic, give substance, provocative questions or statements. Make me WANT to listen instead of making me endure small talk that I care nothing about.
#toughlove
I am a huge fan of Greenwald's reporting and his reporting integrity..... so I hung in until T=9m and threw in the towel at that point. I'm sure that both speakers have a lot to say, and I am interested in hearing it, but the first 9m of silly banter was just too much for me.
"but the first 9m of silly banter was just too much for me."
Ditto.
But the last half was pretty good.
They may be just yet finding their way. The last half was worth listening to. Too much silliness for an extended time gets old fast. But I'm willing to give it *some time.
Not every podcast will be a great winner. So decide for yourself what interests you and spend the time necessary. If not interested just click off until the next time. If you get skunked too many times just unsubscribe. I am sure Glenn will hit more homers than ground outs so I'll stick with him until he proves to be a singles hitter.
I am more stubborn and hung in for 15 minutes and then stopped. OMG can I have those 15 minutes back please.
Glenn has substance, obviously, but he needs a top-notch producer who can teach him about hooks, pacing, and a million other things about producing a show that people will want to enjoy.
The chitchat is the point, más chitchat!!!
Nine minutes?! Wow! A typical listener might give him 10-15 seconds to be captivated, before moving on to something else
ΔV
Again, I do appreciate the feedback, genuinely! I've always had a readership with strong opinions. But it's the first episode - you guys have to give it a chance to breathe and find its footing. It's not intended to be a cable-style interview. It's going to be substantive. But it's intended to endure over time as a weekly podcast so it also needs to have some conversation as a foundation for the more substantive political talk (and this episode has a good amount of that, just through the prism of introducing who Ben is and where he comes from).
I for one liked the casual nature of this conversation. The inside "baseball" of the Bernie campaign was interesting. Don't always need the "hair on fire" end of times hysteria utilized by many podcasts to keep listeners. I trust Glenn to give me a mix of great information and entertainment. Looking forward to the honest opinions of both of these very honest and intelligent commentators. Ideology seems not to be their point but an honest assessment of the actions of "leaders" and politicians regardless of their supposed positions on the political spectrum. The dishonesty and feet of clay are the hallmarks of politicians regardless of their Party. Glenn is only too happy to point these qualities out in an interesting and informative way.
I don't think anyone meant their feedback to be taken as dismissive of the forum..... I am certainly looking forward to future articles / podcasts. We are in *dire* need of honest coverage of the news..... so please do not be discouraged from future podcasts.
I genuinely appreciate the feedback. I knew this would be somewhat different content and therefore not everyone in my readership would enjoy it. We called it "After Hours" in large part to signify that: this is somewhat different than my standard fare of writing. That's the good thing about this Substack: it affords the opportunity to do a bunch of different things, and subscribers can consume the content they like and not the rest. This podcast isn't intended to be in lieu of my writing and journalism. That's always going to be the bulk of what I do. But there are a lot of people who won't read 3,000-word articles but do listen to podcasts, so it's a way of expanding the reach of what's done here. And Ben is not a clown: he's a super smart and interesting thinker about politics, as you'll see, so I do think it's more an extension of what I normally do here than a radical departure. But ultimately finding a way to talk about politics and journalism is natural conversational tone rather than one that is super-serious from the first word until the last is crucial. That's a big part of what explains Joe Rogan's success, for instance. We're not trying to copy that, but it just an experiment in finding ways to talk. I think you can tell from the split reaction here that there are a lot of people who will like it and some who won't - just hope people in the latter category give it a chance.
Complete agreement here. Online exposure to offhand, easy-going conversations among intelligent, knowledgeable, articulate people who share my opinions/ impressions/ suspicions about current events has helped me to own my somewhat outsider stance more comfortably, naturally, and easily. I suppose it's a form of modeling for those of us who haven't found a real-life group to let loose with. Hearing one's own worldview reflected in such a casual way supplements and completes the understandings we grasp from more formal, analytical, polemical speech. In fact, it's what we will need as we go forth to form a "movement" of sorts to change the screwed-up system we're living under. We need the sense of camaraderie. So thanks for contributing to it, Glenn.
"there are a lot of people who won't read 3,000-word articles but do listen to podcasts,"
Then there are lot of people who don't have 63 minutes to devote to following an aural presentation.
I would appreciate having the podcasts machine transcribed to a text version. Even if it is replete with mis-transcriptions, I'd still being able to get the gist and not have to spend an hour to find that I shouldn't have spent the time.
With a transcribed text, I could choose from many modalities, to scan, speed read, skip ahead and back, or even read deeply and completely, and still finish in less than 63 minutes.
As a podcast, in all likelihood I'll never listen to a one. If the podcasts are a success and continue, please do consider machine trancriptions.
OK. I accept a few minutes of explaining "who" Ben "is". And I understand that deciding how to go about it in an interesting way can be challenging. So, I will give the show time to "get its footing". But we podcast listeners and cable TV watchers are sick to death of the endless self absorbed talking heads thinking that we all are hangin on every syllable about their personal lives and their endless "witty" banter. The freedom, stability, and security of the Republic is being destroyed by an evil regime as each hour passes and we want accurate information, new information, and compelling insights into this information calmly and professionally delivered, and serious learned opinion regarding the political and cultural wars that are unfolding everyday.
Ok. Good. Then I will keep listening
I try to skip the opening chit chat on all the pods I listen to except True Anon. I wish there were a button to skip that stuff. The intro to Radio War Nerd is crazy long.
Where do I hear TrueAnon's podcast without having to subscribe to a further platform or service? Been out of touch in terms of podcasts because I thought they died in the 90s.
I’m not concerned about that. Joe Rogan does that with just about every interview but his subscribers know it will soon become interesting beyond pure banter. Glenn has established his cred enough for me to stay with it, and I’m interested to learn about Ben and why Glenn has chosen to pair off with him.
It’s amazing to me that you can listen to an hour long podcast for 3 minutes and feel confident enough to review it. You’d make a good video game reviewer.
Not to review it; not at all. I was sharing my reaction to it, and offering suggestions based on my knowledge and experience doing talk radio. My belief is that, should Glenn take my thoughts to heart, he’d have a much larger - and engaged - listenership
a reaction base on three minutes of content tells us all we need to know
Glenn/Ben...this is excellent advice. AV nailed it.
I appreciate the quick feedback. This podcast is a (mild) change of pace and I knew it wouldn't be for everyone, but I don't think you can just dive into a podcast, which depends on the ability of the two people to engage interesting discussions on a regular basis, without introducing who he is and establishing some rapport. Most episodes will have 2 or 3 clearly defined issues that we examine but the debut episode needed to make clear who he is and what we were doing.
Respectfully disagree. My guess is that people will tune in to hear your thoughts on an important subject. If there is rapport with the co-host, it will be self-evident as you two discuss the issue of the day. You have SECONDS to entice people to keep listening. Don’t squander it by meandering into this-and-that.
+ 1
please tell us what format you are successully providing commentary on
News/talk
could you be anymore vague? and please do tell how you judge your success.
There is nothing more I can add. Sorry.
no apology necessary, your words tell us all we need to know.
don't change a thing...follow you own instincts and proceed accordingly you got to this point in your carreer without input from random kvethchers and rando homophobes
I made it to nearly 7 minutes. All the loud but kinda insecure laughter was -- yuck.
Please! It took you longer than three minutes to backdoor brag about all the !lessons! you have to impart about doing media right. This latte is too hot TAKE IT BACK! Um OK Karen.
this is fucking hilarious and I love it. don't listen to the people telling you to change it!!
I liked it. You commenters, you do know there’s a slider button that allows to to skip the bits you don’t like?
This was hilarious and good.
As a white, straight, middle-aged, civil libertarian former Republican, I really enjoyed this podcast and look forward to future episodes. I very much appreciate the different angles and perspectives, offered fearlessly, that we really need to begin to move forward together. I found myself agreeing with almost everything you both said. Plus it was just funny as hell.
Thank you very much. Can't wait for your future interview with Josh Hawley.
I can listen to Glenn all day. Love him
Glenn, don't listen to the shade. Ben is funny and you are funny. I think some folks lack a quality of humor (or maybe theirs is just different - yeah that's it, "different"). Let them read your more serious words exclusively if that's what they need.
I've always liked it when gay men bitch. There's a certain something there. It makes me infinitely happy and I always laugh. You and Ben make me laugh. Stop if you want to. But not because of any of these bupkes.
Was a bit wary after reading some of the comments, but my gay gene likely did help me get to the end. Not bad for a first show. I laughed, I cried, I hoped, I fumed... And then my edible kicked in and now once again all is right with the world... (Perhaps would be better if we could SEE you guys, idk...)
I totally would like to see them, too. Plus the images they refer too... Neera Tanden: Karen in the front, mullet in the back???!!!!!! OMG.
This podcast was excellent! Don’t listen to any comments telling you to get straight to the point or that we don’t care about chit chat, people who say this miss the point of a podcast entirely. Welcome to longform discussions, people! If you want quick and to the point then go watch the 6 o’clock breakdown on your local news station. I can’t wait for more episodes!
I’ll also mention I burst out laughing multiple times throughout, you two are hilarious and have perfect chemistry. “You wouldn’t be here sitting with me chatting; you’d be in some disgusting but very swanky lobbyist party... Instead you’re here with me with no health insurance.” LMAO
I really enjoyed it. This is the lighter and gayer side of Glenn, and I love it. Maybe you need to have the gay gene to appreciate it.
I don't believe I have any gay genes but I did enjoy it. Just felt like both of them were being themselves and having normal convo. Good stuff.
I do....plenty. And I LAUGH non-stop
I bet you think this song is about you.
always ...im a really Argentinean self-centered queen...LUT IT!
Stay fabulous, Enrique. :)
Me too... it's great to have two gay men coming from this particular political angle, beyond the psychotic neoliberal terror of most LGBT-run pods.
Right wing extremist checking in here. Absolutely enjoyed the entire episode. Sent it to a couple of my progressive friends. Heard back from one so far and it was great review.
Best wishes for success and I will be listening occasionally. Sorry, most of my podcast time is history, science and Christianity. But I’ll find some time for someone of Glenn’s character.
God bless you all.
Glen, you're taking this personally and, probably understandably so. However, none of the criticism was ill-focused, in bad taste or poorly intentioned. You're a very straight (so-to-speak) shooter. Give your audience the same opportunity. Comments beat cancellations anytime.
Totally agree. As I said above, the feedback has been uniformly constructive and I appreciate it. I'm responding in part because I think engagement with critiques is respectful and important to do, but also to explain the thought process behind what we're doing.
Glenn I’m impressed with your ability to stay cool under what must be intense pressure from critics. Your responses to criticism are probably the most scrutinized of your content. We all come from censorship and bias, I’m sure I’m not the only one here who has trust issues with the news they turn to. Keep up the good attitude man. It’s well appreciated.
your name is on it...it is appropriate to take it personally. I suspect you have a tough hide.
OTOH, people with no audience advising people with an audience how to do this kind of thing?
Not very compelling reading, either.
Is there a way to download this discussion?
I clicked on 'listen in podcast app' and got an email with a link to the URL address, which I used to subscribe in iTunes.
I was trying to download to my desktop not my phone. Maybe not possible.
I don't have a smart phone. I clicked on the "add to podcast app" link on my laptop, which gave me the podcast URL I used to subscribe in iTunes. No idea how to download to desktop though.
I am a huge Greenwald fan. This is not adding to my admiration. Keep working on it. I hope it gets better. For example, figuring out what the point is? Then getting to it succinctly.
Can’t hear Ben
Lose the giggles
Quit after 5 min when Still no content
Huge fan of and enormous respect for Glenn
...yes, he was....imagine, a world renown journalist...and a Gen Z 30 years younger...
I $upport 2 independent media 'sources': you and Kyle. Do whatever the hell you want and have a blast. Don't cater too much to the audience because many of them are too smart to fall for that anyway.
Having said that, I'm assuming this was more of a first episode to establish rapport for the duo as podcast co-hosts, if that's what it's called. There is certainly a rapport there. Would've been delighted to be part of the convo at a party--that's the category this episode belongs to. Not going to repeat ad nauseum what others have said, so to contribute something more substantive:
I listened all the way through and still have to go look up who Ben Mora is. You gave us the funny stories (yes funny as fuck and sheds light on a lot of crap that happened) and we know he worked with Bernie, but why do I want to hear him shoot the shit with my most respected journalist in the world? Maybe establish that in episode 2?