Russian actors may have run an online disinformation campaign during the 2016 US presidential elections, but they likely learned their tactics from Americans. As part of our investigation, PBS NewsHour series producer Cameron Hickey tracked down one of these junk news pioneers, Cyrus Massoumi. He runs liberal and conservative junk news sites, which have millions of followers on Facebook. I continue my conversation with Cyrus on this episode of Miles To Go.
May 03, 2018•54 min•Season 1Ep. 13
Russian actors may have run an online disinformation campaign during the 2016 US presidential elections, but they likely learned their tactics from Americans. As part of our investigation, PBS NewsHour series producer Cameron Hickey tracked down one of these junk news pioneers, Cyrus Massoumi. He runs liberal and conservative junk news sites, which have millions of followers on Facebook. To find out more about the murky world of junk news, I sit down with Massoumi on this episode of Miles To Go....
May 02, 2018•55 min•Season 1Ep. 12
Top US intelligence agencies agree that Russia meddled in the 2016 US Presidential election using an organized campaign of online trolling and misinformation. The details of exactly how are harder to uncover. Jonathan Albright, data journalist and Research Director at Columbia University’s Tow Center for Digital Journalism, studies information flow in networks. Recently, he has been mapping how Russian propaganda spreads on the web. I sit down with Albright on this episode of Miles To Go.
Apr 25, 2018•41 min•Season 1Ep. 11
The Cambridge Analytica scandal has placed Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook at the center of the data privacy debate. But is Facebook’s ad-driven business model fundamentally incompatible with protecting users’ personal data? And, if so, what can be done to fix it? Miles O’Brien Productions team members Brian Truglio and Fedor Kossakovski hash it out on this special edition of Miles To Go.
Apr 23, 2018•33 min•Season 1Ep. 10
The uncontained engine failure of Southwest flight 1380 reminds us once again that commercial aviation is a business that does not always put safety first - and regulators seem reluctant to change that. Jennifer Riordan’s death could have been avoided if only the FAA did not have a “Tombstone Mentality.” My guest on this special edition: former FAA inspector general and aviation attorney Mary Schiavo.
Apr 19, 2018•40 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Long before Facebook, Twitter or even Google existed, the fact checking website Snopes.com was running down the half-truths, misinformation and outright lies that ricochet across the Internet. Today it remains a widely respected clearinghouse of all things factual and not. As part of my series for the PBS NewsHour on the rise and role of misinformation in our democracy, I spoke with Snopes.com managing editor Brooke Binkowski.
Apr 16, 2018•54 min•Season 1Ep. 8
How did the internet become a tangled web of misinformation? Miles speaks to danah boyd, Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research, founder of Data & Society, and Visiting Professor at New York University. boyd offers insight into the history of misinformation on the internet and the role social media plays in the proliferation of fake news. It's an interview we did for our upcoming series on "junk news" for the PBS NewsHour.
Apr 10, 2018•44 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Who or what determines what's in your Facebook Newsfeed? It's a complex algorithm that aims to put what interests you most at the top of the queue. Increasingly, Facebook is focused on trying to determine what content is fake, junk or misleading - and sending it to the bottom. But the purveyors of this content are a determined adversary. Miles speaks with their foe at Facebook, the Director of Analytics for the News Feed, Dan Zigmond. It's an interview we did for our upcoming series on "junk new...
Mar 30, 2018•22 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Miles catches up with Astronaut Scott Kelly and learns about what it’s like to spend a year in space. Kelly talks about the physical and emotional toll of his historic mission, the challenges of CO2, radiation exposure, what scientists are continuing to learn upon his return to Earth, and what's next.
Mar 14, 2018•28 min•Season 1Ep. 5
When you think of 3D printing, you may envision useless trinkets, a cheesy iPhone cover, or extruded cheese doodles. But that would be so 2014 of you! In this episode of Miles To Go, Miles sits down with John Hart, an MIT Engineering Professor and Entrepreneur who is leading the way to a new era in 3D manufacturing. If things go as he plans, it could change just about everything.
Mar 05, 2018•25 min•Season 1Ep. 4
Siegfried Hecker is a Metallurgist and Nuclear Scientist. He served as the director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory from 1986-1997 and is a professor at The Center For International Cooperation at Stanford University. One of the few people who have actually visited North Korea’s nuclear facilities, Hecker recently sat down with Miles To Go to discuss the development and capabilities of North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.
Feb 13, 2018•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 3
Eugene Tseng describes himself as the most “overeducated garbage man” in the world. An environmental engineer and lawyer who teaches at UCLA and Cal State Northridge, he has spent decades understanding what we throw away and what happens to it after the garbage truck picks up the bag on your curb. Obviously, it’s not a pretty picture, but it’s worse than you think. We all can do better. The first step: listen to this podcast… Oh, and of course we will ask him about the oddest things he’s found i...
Dec 07, 2017•38 min•Season 1Ep. 2
In July of 2017, an Air Canada passenger jet loaded with 135 passengers and 5 crewmembers nearly landed on a taxiway at San Francisco International Airport, where four jets were waiting to take off. At the last moment, the pilot aborted the landing, averting what could have been the worst aviation accident in history. How was this possible in this day of automation and super-accurate GPS navigation? Join Miles and Lars Perkins to find out.
Nov 07, 2017•44 min•Season 1Ep. 1
