Bob Garfield

The Pew Research center recently disclosed that America is more divided along partisan lines than at any other time in the past 25 years. As a society, research reveals, we’re more divided by politics than we are by class, race, or gender. Developer Pascal Rettig has created a website called Political Screaming Match that's supposed to help fix by pairing visitors via telephone with someone on the other end of the ideological spectrum. Bob talks to Rettig about his invention.

Rebecca Gates - Suite Sails

Last month, the Association of American Publishers announced a milestone. 2012 is the first year that adult eBooks have outsold adult hardcover books. For the book industry, those sales are especially valuable because they bring in not just revenue but data. As you read from your Kindle, Nook or iPad, the device transmits all the details of how you do your reading – data that is beginning to shape the way books are written. Wall Street Journal reporter Alexandra Alter tells Bob that the new data is a big deal for an industry that has traditionally been unable measure its audience.

Buying a cheap knock-off is not just a problem with watches and hand bags—if you go onto Amazon's website to buy the latest bestseller, you might accidentally end up with an imitation book. Bob speaks to Fortune senior editor Stephen Gandel, who looked into the knock-offs on Amazon, and found a number of books that he says were clearly meant to confuse people by trading off of more popular titles.

Original Air Date - April 20, 2012

Bob reads from a few of your letters and comments.

The website Buzzfeed is a compendium of internet clickbait – a picture of an 800 pound shark, Mitt Romney looking goofy on a jet ski, 11 Ways To Get Inspired Right Now. But while the content may be trivial, but the website is quite lucrative, so much so that it's begun to hire actual journalists. Slate tech writer Farhad Manjoo decided to try to figure out how the site is able to produce such great content.

According to a transparency report released by Twitter on July 2, US law enforcement has requested information from the company 679 times this year.  Malcolm Harris had been fighting to keep New York prosecutors from accessing his twitter information. Earlier this week, a judge compelled Twitter to turn over data from Harris' account. Aden Fine of the American Civil Liberties Union talks to Bob about how this ruling could be detrimental to future tweeters.

The Hundred in the Hands - Recognize

Last Friday, a thunderstorm in Virginia temporarily crippled part of Amazon’s ‘cloud’ computing service. After a series of back-ups failed, popular sites like Netflix, Pinterest, and Instagram were unavailable for several hours. Bob speaks with Nicholas Carr about the benefits and risks of cloud computing.

Latin Playboys - Crayon Sun

Barry Becher, co-creator of the Ginsu knife and the master of the hard sell TV pitch died recently. In memory, we are re-airing an exploration of the world of television pitchmen by erstwhile OTM producer Mike Vuolo.

Weird Al Yankovic - Mr. Popeil

Bob talks to Buzzfeed founder Jonah Peretti about how the site works and how it decides how to credit previously existing work.

Quantic & Alice Russell - Una Tarde en Mariquita

When CNN incorrectly reported the fate of the individual mandate they fell into a long tradition of being first but not being right. Journalists have always wanted to report something first, but the benefits of doing so aren't clear -- especially for news consumers. Bob reports on the phenomenon and folly of being first.

When demonstrators from the Minneapolis occupy movement posted video depicting what looked like a series of unprovoked arrests, the Minneapolis Police Department posted their own video showing several warnings to the crowd. Bob talks to incoming police chief Janee Harteau about the department's decision to post video of their own officers at large public events.

The NBA finals, between the Miami Heat and the Oklahoma City Thunder, are going on this week and next. The Heat and the Thunder are singular because they have reached the championship series -- but are also singular because they are not plural. And for copy editors that presents a very serious challenge. Bob speaks with Deadspin Managing Editor Tom Scocca about the grammatical dilemma.

Mad Men's fifth season is over. From it's start, part of the show's allure has been the way it meticulously creates Manhattan in the 1960’s. Period specific language is part of that, but verbal anachronisms sneak in with surprising frequency. In this excerpt of the Lexicon Valley podcast, Bob Garfield and former OTM producer Mike Vuolo discuss the linguistic anachronisms in Mad Men.

It is not illegal to film police, but there have been several instances of citizens being arrested because the police didn't want to appear on camera. Bob talks to Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association, who has been doing workshops with police around the country about the right to film police in the line of duty.

The Replacements - Kids Don't Follow

When the conflict in Syria began it was relatively simple - a tyrant versus his people. After more than a year, it's become much more complicated. Bob speaks with BBC Middle East Bureau Chief Paul Danahar who recently returned from Syria about the propaganda both sides of the conflict are putting out and the usefulness of having more journalists on the ground in Syria.

The New York Times reported this week that the Assad family employs Western PR firms to polish its image for the rest of the world. A few years ago, Harper’s contributing editor Ken Silverstein went undercover and approached PR firms as a fake representative of a tyrant who needed to improve his image. He talks to Bob about what he learned.

On May 27^th a Pentecostal pastor who handles poisonous snakes as part of his religious tradition was bitten, and in the absence of any medical attention, he died.  One of those who witnessed his death and decided not to call for help was Lauren Pond, a photojournalist who had been documenting Wolford for over a year.  Bob talks to Pond about where journalistic responsibility and respect collides.

Four Tet - 128 Harps

When protesters try to make themselves heard at this summer’s presidential conventions they’ll likely be penned by police some distance from the candidates. Law professor Ronald Krotoszynski argues in a new book that that’s a violation of the 1^st Amendment, specifically the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances. He explains to Bob why protest is a form of protected speech and why proximity to the government officials you’re protesting is paramount.

Latin Playboys - Crayon Sun

This week the Wall Street Journal reported Facebook's plans to open up the social network to children under 13. As of now, preteens are not permitted to use the site, mainly because Facebook would have difficulty complying with COPPA, the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act -- the federal law regulating how companies can collect and use information about kids. Danah Boyd talks to Bob about COPPA's origins.

Fourtet - 128 Harps

The White House announced this week that they’d killed Al Qaeda’s number 2 operative, but, following standard operating procedure, would not tell reporters how they'd killed him. Why? Because they killed him by targeted drone strike, a program which is widely known about but still technically classified. The New York Times reporter Scott Shane tells Bob that the administration's coy attitude towards classified secrets is stifling public debate.