Mixed Signals from Semafor Media

Documentary filmmaker Alex Gibney joins Mixed Signals to talk about his four-hour film on Elon Musk. Max and Ben ask Gibney how he built an AI avatar of Musk using only his actual words when Musk refused to participate, what Elon’s first wife, Justine Musk, taught him about “gaslighting” as a management strategy, and why he thinks Musk’s political turn was less ideological than it was transactional and childlike. Sign up for Semafor Media’s Sunday newsletter: https://www.semafor.com/newsletters/media  For more from Think with Google, check out ThinkwithGoogle.com. Find us on X: @semaforben, @maxwelltani If you have a tip or a comment, please email us [email protected]

Actor and producer Kasey Esser joins Mixed Signals to explain the multi-billion dollar "microdrama" industry, and why he's become one of its biggest stars. Max and Ben ask Kasey how a werewolf Romeo-and-Juliet show that shot in just a week for a hundred thousand dollars became a global hit, what it's like to translate Chinese scripts for American audiences in real time on set, and how microdramas make all of their money. Sign up for Semafor Media’s Sunday newsletter: https://www.semafor.com/newsletters/media  For more from Think with Google, check out ThinkwithGoogle.com. Find us on X: @semaforben, @maxwelltani If you have a tip or a comment, please email us [email protected]

Liquid Death founder and CEO Mike Cessario joins Mixed Signals (with Semafor business editor Liz Hoffman filling in for Max) to explain how he built a billion-dollar water company by treating his ads like SNL sketches. Ben and Liz ask Mike why he thinks comedy is a more durable marketing genre than celebrity testimonials, why big companies almost never win when they sue smaller ones, and whether Liquid Death will fizzle out into the graveyard of buzzy consumer brands that came before it. Sign up for Semafor Media’s Sunday newsletter: https://www.semafor.com/newsletters/media  For more from Think with Google, check out ThinkwithGoogle.com. Find us on X: @semaforben, @maxwelltani If you have a tip or a comment, please email us [email protected]

Pangram founder and CEO Max Spero joins Mixed Signals to explain how his AI detection tool actually works, and why he thinks the escalating cat-and-mouse game between AI detectors and "humanizers" is a fight worth having. Max and Ben ask Spero about how Pangram can already distinguish Claude from ChatGPT, why he built a humanizer internally and refuses to release it, and what it would actually take for a fine-tuned personal AI to fool his model. Sign up for Semafor Media’s Sunday newsletter: https://www.semafor.com/newsletters/media  For more from Think with Google, check out ThinkwithGoogle.com. Find us on X: @semaforben, @maxwelltani If you have a tip or a comment, please email us [email protected]

Author Sir Salman Rushdie joins Mixed Signals to talk about why he made a documentary about the attack that nearly killed him, and why he's ambivalent about having done it. Max and Ben ask Salman how he and director Alex Gibney divided authorship of the film, and what he felt watching footage of the attack for the first time. They also get into what he's learned from decades of being both subject and strategist in his own media coverage, and why he's trying very hard to pretend AI doesn't exist. Sign up for Semafor Media’s Sunday newsletter: https://www.semafor.com/newsletters/media  For more from Think with Google, check out ThinkwithGoogle.com. Find us on X: @semaforben, @maxwelltani If you have a tip or a comment, please email us [email protected]