As a widely respected journalist, best-selling author and creator/host of one of the most popular podcasts—Freakonomics Radio--Stephen Dubner is in a unique position to analyze the state of podcasting. He joins Adam to tackle this and other meaty topics like journalistic standards, the ethics of hosts doing their own ad reads, and why the medium has exploded in popularity. Learn how Freakonomics Radio was actually a kind of failure, compared to Stephen’s original plan. He also tells the origin s...
Mar 31, 2016•54 min•Transcript available on Metacast Adam sometimes likes to grab lunch with his friend, food writer and podcaster Zach Brooks (Food Is The New Rock). This time they brought along comedian and podcaster Jon Gabrus (High and Mighty), and an audio recorder to capture their conversation riding in the car to and from the San Gabriel Valley, and in the restaurant. They tackle topics like Chinese food, rock stars, Taco Bell, the word “foodie", and, of course, podcasting. Back in the studio Zach and Adam listen to that audio and fill...
Mar 17, 2016•1 hr 13 min•Transcript available on Metacast For this extra-special 100th episode of The Wolf Den, Adam talks with the very first MacArthur Fellow to be on the show, Jad Abumrad. Jad is the creator and co-host of Radiolab, a public radio show heard on more than 500 stations, and one of the most popular podcasts of all time. Jad and Adam talk about the creative process behind Radiolab, and the "gut churn" that Jad says was essential to create the show. Jad also shares his views on podcasting today, and the opportunities available ...
Mar 03, 2016•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast Just before The Wolf Den hits its 100th episode milestone, Adam takes a brief listen back to relive some highlights in what's been an exciting six years in the evolution and growth of Midroll, and podcasting. Adam shares early clips from podcast innovators like Marc Maron and Chris Hardwick, along with entrepreneurs who were influential behind the scenes. We also listen in on some of the important milestones in podcasting and Midroll history, as heard on the show, and get some keen insights on p...
Feb 18, 2016•56 min•Transcript available on Metacast Mishy Harman first heard This American Life on a road trip across the United States, listening to a compilation of shows provided by his college roommate. That binge inspired the Jerusalem native to co-create Israel Story, a radio show and podcast focused on the lives of people from his home country. On this episode of The Wolf Den Mishy explains how the show—one of Israel’s first podcasts—came together, and what it was like to go from novice producer to having a hit radio show. He also discusse...
Feb 04, 2016•41 min•Transcript available on Metacast Guy Raz is the host of NPR's TED Radio Hour, which has consistently been at the top of the iTunes charts since it debuted in 2012. He is Adam’s guest for an episode that no public radio or podcast fan should miss. Guy explains how the idea for the show came about, and why he decided to step away from hosting Weekend All Things Considered to join the TED Radio Hour. He talks about how he puts together different TED talks to form the themes behind each show, and why it’s so important for there to ...
Jan 21, 2016•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Brian Koppelman believes people who accomplish remarkable things do something differently than most other. The screenwriter, producer and essayist thinks they marshall the best of themselves in the low moments, as well as the high ones. Learning about these moments is what drives his podcast, The Moment. On this episode of The Wolf Den Brian tells Adam why he got into podcasting, who influenced his approach, and how he prepares for his deeply engaged interviews. He also explains his thoughts abo...
Jan 07, 2016•42 min•Transcript available on Metacast Reveal is a public radio show and podcast that features a kind of in-depth investigative reporting rarely heard in either medium. Susanne Reber, co-founder and executive editor of Reveal, and reporter and broadcast producer Delaney Hall join Adam to go behind the scenes of this popular program, produced by the Center for Investigative Reporting. Susanne and Delaney share how they find a balance between telling a captivating narrative and adhering to a strict standard of accuracy, and how the suc...
Dec 24, 2015•38 min•Transcript available on Metacast How does Paul F. Tompkins manage his email? Will there ever be another episode of the Pod F. Tompkast? What is it like to do more than 100 episodes of Comedy Bang Bang? All these questions, and more, will be answered on this episode of The Wolf Den, when podcasting’s über-guest subjects himself to the queries of host Adam Sachs. Paul explains why he still feels like he’s learning to do improv, and what he’s learned from working with great comedy podcasters. He also reveals the inspiration behind...
Dec 10, 2015•46 min•Transcript available on Metacast With all the podcasts and audio content being produced, how do we make it more searchable, findable, and shareable, and then preserve it for the ages? Pop Up Archive is a start-up aiming to address those challenges. Anne Wootton is the company’s co-founder and CEO, and she joins Adam to discuss Pop Up Archive’s services and approach to growing podcasting. She explains how the company transcribes audio into searchable text that’s also time-indexed, and what kinds of uses that data can be used for...
Nov 26, 2015•47 min•Transcript available on Metacast Learn the story behind Hillary Clinton’s headline-grabbing interview on Another Round, along with how Lena Dunham’s new podcast, Women of the Hour, came together. Plus there are many other juicy tidbits for podcast nerds on this episode, as Buzzfeed’s Director of Audio Jenna Weiss-Berman opens up to Adam on a cornucopia of vital topics in public broadcasting and podcasting. She explains why having a diverse staff starts with paying your interns fairly, and why that's good for both creating high ...
Nov 12, 2015•47 min•Transcript available on Metacast Learn the back story of how the case of Adnan Syed came to the attention of Serial producer Sarah Koenig from the person who first contacted her, Rabia Chaudry. Herself an attorney, Rabia now co-hosts her own podcast, Undisclosed, in which she and fellow attorneys Susan Simpson and Colin Miller examine new and existing evidence in the State of Maryland’s case against Adnan. Rabia tells Adam the story of how she contacted and worked with Koenig and explains how the idea for Undisclosed came toget...
Oct 29, 2015•32 min•Transcript available on Metacast Ryan Hoover is the founder of Product Hunt, a website and online community that has been described as Reddit for tech products. The site recently added a section dedicated to podcasts, and Ryan tells Adam what exactly Product Hunt is, how it got started, and how it works. Unlike many other sites, Product Hunt focuses on individual podcast episodes, rather than shows or series, and Ryan explains the motivation behind that emphasis. He also details how he wants Product Hunt to be home of conversat...
Oct 15, 2015•34 min•Transcript available on Metacast Adam goes deep into the business of podcasting with Erik Diehn, Midroll Media's VP of Business Development, touching on how Erik finds and signs new shows, how public radio came to dominate the top of the charts, and on the advertising technologies like programmatic buying and ad injection. Erik joined Midroll from New York Public Radio, so Adam asks him why he decided to make the jump last year from the nation's largest public radio station to a comparatively small podcasting startup. Erik then...
Oct 01, 2015•48 min•Transcript available on Metacast Go behind the scenes of the sponsorships that support top public radio podcasts—like This American Life, The Moth, and Serial—with Adam’s guest David Raphael, founder and CEO of Public Media Marketing. David recalls how his career in public media caused him to see an unfilled need among many shows, leading to the founding of PMM. He then explains the differences between selling broadcast sponsorships and podcast ads, both with regard to conforming to FCC standards, and with regard to the very di...
Sep 17, 2015•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast Lea Thau is one of the strongest influencers of the modern storytelling style that has taken off in radio, television, advertising, and, of course, podcasting. She is a Peabody Award-winning producer and director, the former executive director of The Moth storytelling organization, and now the creator and host of the podcast Strangers. On this episode Lea tells Adam why she left The Moth and how Strangers came together, explaining the show’s relationship to public radio station KCRW and the Publ...
Sep 03, 2015•1 hr 8 min•Transcript available on Metacast Get the inside scoop on Earwolf, Wolfpop, and now, Howl on this episode of The Wolf Den. Adam’s guests are Midroll Media’s Chief Content Officer Chris Bannon and Senior Producer Gretta Cohn. They shed some light on how they work with the networks’ hosts to develop and hone shows, as well as keep them fresh. Chris and Gretta both joined Midroll from New York Public Radio, so each explains the difference between their previous radio jobs and working in a comparatively fast-moving small startup env...
Aug 20, 2015•41 min•Transcript available on Metacast Marc Maron joins Adam for this instant-classic episode of The Wolf Den, recorded live on stage at Podcast Movement 2015. Marc shares his thoughts on having President Obama on his own podcast, WTF, and his take on the press coverage that only focused on the president using one particular word on that episode. He then tells the story of how he went from doing his show as “the alternative to suicide,” to having one of the most popular and respected podcasts around. Adam asks Marc if he was making a...
Aug 06, 2015•53 min•Transcript available on Metacast Breaking news: In a landmark deal for podcasting, Midroll Media has been acquired by E.W. Scripps, a titan of media and journalism, old and new. Adam sits down with Scripps' Chief Digital Officer and Senior Vice President of Digital Media, Adam Symson and Vice President of Digital Strategy and Business Development, JB Kropp to discuss the new partnership and what it means for the industry. The three discuss how the companies met, how they discovered they share the same vision for non-negotiable ...
Jul 22, 2015•40 min•Transcript available on Metacast Crissle West is the co-host of the enormously popular podcast The Read, and she joins Adam in The Wolf Den to talk about her experience in podcasting, and growing the diversity of voices heard in the medium. Crissle shares the story of how she met her co-host Kid Fury, started the show with the Loud Speakers network, and then settled into its successful format. She explains that when The Read started the only podcast she listened to was This American Life, in part because there were very few sho...
Jul 09, 2015•31 min•Transcript available on Metacast Hollywood meets podcasting with guest Franklin Leonard, founder and CEO of The Black List, and host of the Wolfpop show, The Black List Table Reads. Franklin tells Adam Sachs how The Black List began as an informal survey he did just looking for good scripts to read, quickly becoming an annual list of the best unproduced screenplays. In 2012 The Black List launched as a online script database letting screenwriters upload their work to be shared with and evaluated by industry professionals, and F...
Jun 25, 2015•47 min•Transcript available on Metacast One of the podcasting industry's leading observers, Nick Quah, is Adam’s guest on this edition of The Wolf Den. Nick is the editor of Hot Pod email newsletter, which, in less than nine months, has turned into the de facto industry journal for podcasting, becoming a must-read for just about everyone working in the industry. Nick tells Adam how listening to podcasts helped him get through a tough time, and explains what then motivated him to go from being a voracious podcast consumer to publishing...
Jun 11, 2015•39 min•Transcript available on Metacast Loud Speakers Network co-founder and CEO Chris Morrow joins Adam for an interview that is a must-listen for anyone who has wanted to know how a successful podcast network finds talent and develops shows. Loud Speakers is a hip-hop and urban focused network that started with the Combat Jack Show, hosted by Combat Jack (a/k/a Reggie Osse) who is regarded as the "Charlie Rose of Hip-Hop." Chris tells Adam the kind of shows and talent that Loud Speakers is looking for, holding up the hosts...
May 28, 2015•43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Adam’s guest is Kristoffer Triumf, host and producer of one of the most popular podcasts in Sweden, Värvet. This long-form celebrity interview show has been in production since 2012. Kristoffer talks about what influenced him to get into podcasting. Chief amongst those influences was Marc Maron’s WTF, particularly because of the fact that long-form celebrity interviews were uncommon in Swedish media. He then tells the story of how he started Värvet, and how he got Marc to be one of his first int...
May 14, 2015•23 min•Transcript available on Metacast Veteran podcaster Dan Carlin has been hosting the perennially popular Common Sense podcast since 2005, and in 2014 iTunes named his Hardcore History podcast the best classic podcast of the year. He’s Adam’s guest for this episode of the Wolf Den, detailing the evolution of his chart-topping podcasts over the course of a decade. His Hardcore History show, in particular, is known for having episodes that last as much as several hours, with an irregular release schedule. Dan discusses how this came...
Apr 30, 2015•50 min•Transcript available on Metacast Public radio veteran Alex Blumberg returns to The Wolf Den, nearly a year after he told then-host Jeff Ullrich about his plans for a new podcasting company. Now Alex is the co-founder and CEO of Gimlet Media, which produces the popular StartUp and ReplyAll podcasts. He documented the founding and the process of raising $1.5 million in capital on the first season of StartUp. Alex tells Adam that the events of the last year have been “shocking,” and recounts the ways in which things turned out how...
Apr 16, 2015•55 min•Transcript available on Metacast Comedian, television host, author, filmmaker and podcaster Adam Carolla joins Adam Sachs on The Wolf Den to discuss the business side of his many endeavors. Carolla recalls that the idea to podcast was born from the fact that his morning show on terrestrial radio was number two online. So, when that gig ended in 2009 he knew where there was a ready audience. He explains how that fit his overall business strategy, which is “somewhere between proactive and reactive,” seizing opportunities and then...
Apr 02, 2015•41 min•Transcript available on Metacast Adam's guest is Micah Rosenbloom, who joins for a lively discussion about the role of podcasting in entrepreneurship and venture capital. Micah is Managing Partner of the Founder Collective, an early stage venture capital firm that funded companies like Buzzfeed, Uber and Maker Bot. Podcast listeners may know him from his appearance on Gimlet Media’s StartUp podcast, in which he advised Gimlet founder Alex Blumberg to find a co-founder (he did). Micah talks about his first job out of college, wo...
Mar 19, 2015•43 min•Transcript available on Metacast Cracked Editor-in-Chief Jack O’Brien joins Adam for a repeat Wolf Den appearance. On his first time guesting (episode #32 in 2011) Jack met Jeff Ullrich for the first time, and didn’t even have a podcast yet. Now he hosts the Cracked Podcast, a successful Earwolf show. Jack explains how he became Cracked’s Editor-in-Chief and then the host of that podcast. He also reveals the user-focused strategy behind Cracked’s addictive and shareable articles and how that style gets translated to popular vid...
Mar 05, 2015•48 min•Transcript available on Metacast Semil Shah shares a valuable investor’s perspective on the business of podcasting for episode 73 of The Wolf Den. Semil is a venture capital advisor and investor, an active blogger and columnist, and was part of the team that developed and marketed the Swell podcast discovery and listening app that was acquired by Apple last year. Semil gives Adam his recommendations on the ideal podcast episode length, along with some tips on organizing and structuring a podcast, all of which come from listenin...
Feb 19, 2015•49 min•Transcript available on Metacast 
