El Podcast

E171: How the Internet Got Tamed: James Corbett on Media & Power

Episode Summary

Independent journalist James Corbett joins Jesse to trace how media, technology, and elite networks reshaped the information ecosystem—from early social media optimism to an AI-flooded, post-truth era. The conversation also covers the collapse of ad-based journalism, the rise of podcasts, political polarisation, philanthropy’s influence, and what crises may lie ahead.

Episode Notes

Independent journalist James Corbett joins Jesse to trace how media, tech, and elite power have reshaped the information landscape—from Time’s 2006 “You” to today’s post-truth, AI-saturated world.

GUEST BIO:
James Corbett is an independent journalist and documentary filmmaker based in Japan. Since 2007 he’s run The Corbett Report, an open-source intelligence project covering geopolitics, media, finance, and technology through long-form podcasts, videos, and essays.

TOPICS DISCUSSED:

• Time’s 2006 “Person of the Year” and the early optimism of user-generated media
• Smartphones, YouTube, and the shift to always-on, short-form video
• Legacy media vs podcasts, Rogan, and long-form conversation
• Adpocalypse, subscriptions, foundations, and “post-journalism”
• AI “slop,” dead internet theory, and human vs synthetic content
• Left–right vs “up–down” (authoritarian vs anti-authoritarian) politics
• Elite networks and foundations: Rockefeller, Gates, philanthropy as power
• Climate narratives, health framing, and energy demands of AI
• Future crises: hot war, financial bubbles, AI and labor, UBI and control

MAIN POINTS:

• The early internet briefly empowered ordinary people. Corbett’s own path—from teacher in Japan to reaching millions—shows how 2000s platforms genuinely opened space for bottom-up media.
• The smartphone changed how we think, not just what we see. Moving from long-form text/audio to short, swipeable video has compressed attention and pushed politics toward slogans and clips.
• The business model broke journalism before AI did. As ad money fled to platforms, outlets turned to paywalls, patrons, and foundations—pulling coverage toward causes and away from broad public-interest reporting.
• The real divide is power, not party. Corbett argues we miss the “up–down” axis—authoritarian vs anti-authoritarian—so we keep swapping parties but getting similar outcomes on war, finance, and surveillance.
• AI and automation are economic and political weapons. If AI displaces labor and the state replaces wages with universal income, whoever controls those payouts gains unprecedented leverage over everyday life.
• Long-form human conversation is still a resistance strategy. Despite dark trends, he sees deep, sustained, human-made media as one of the few ways left to think clearly and build real communities.

BEST QUOTES:

• On the shift since 2006:
  “We went from ‘You are the Person of the Year’ to ‘You are the problem’—from celebrating amateur voices to treating them as a disinformation threat.”
• On media form and attention:
  “I started in an era where you could play a ten-minute clip inside an hour-long podcast. Now if you go over two minutes, people think you’re crazy.”
• On politics:
  “Left and right exist, but the missing axis is up and down—authoritarian versus anti-authoritarian. Once you see that, a lot of ‘flip-flops’ make sense.”
• On AI and control:
  “If the state is the one feeding and clothing you after AI replaces your job, then the state effectively owns you.”