Freakonomics Team Launches Podcast

Podcast Launched

The "FREAKONOMICS" team -- journalist STEPHEN J. DUBNER and UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO economics professor STEVEN D. LEVITT -- have launched "FREAKONOMICS RADIO," a new podcast featuring the best-selling authors and NEW YORK TIMES bloggers offering their views of economic issues and their unique explanations for practically everything. The debut edition, "What Do NASCAR Drivers, GLENN BECK, and the Hitmen of the NFL Have in Common?," includes interviews with all of those named in the title.

On the TIMES blog, DUBNER writes, "I have always loved radio. There’s something magical about the combination of listening intimacy and the technology of widespread transmission. Some of my firmest memories are radio memories: as a kid, listening to WGY in SCHNECTADY, N.Y., on snowy mornings to find out if school was closed; hearing the CLASH’s 'Train in Vain' for the first time and thinking it must have been a mistake, that no radio station could ever play a song so raw and great; learning to D.J. in college and sending coded messages to a girl I needed to get with.

"It is amazing to me that, as much as media has changed in recent decades, the fundamental appeal of radio remains intact -- and, in some ways, is much stronger. Technology has helped the cause; podcasts are a radio lover’s heroin."

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