Hiding this article behind the PJ Media VIP wall will outrage Lex Fridman. He’s admitted a few times that he scours the Internet for articles about himself and repeatedly tortures his psyche by reading through (and blocking) critical tweets and comments. Well, sorry Lex: Go buy a VIP subscription.
Of all the commentators we’ve previously critiqued, Fridman is the most difficult to categorize. His guest-list, choice of questions, and subject matter seem to indicate a right-of-center sensibility: Elon Musk has chatted with Fridman multiple times, but his biggest guest — by far — was Donald Trump earlier this week. That was on the heels of Ivanka Trump in July and Jared Kushner 10 months earlier.
He’s largely sympathetic to conservative arguments, but is less a pundit than a soapbox for others: His show isn’t about him; it’s about his guests.
But who is Lex Fridman?
Well, he’s smart: He comes from a family of Russian academics. His father, Alexander Fridman (whom Lex has interviewed) and brother, Gregory Fridman, have taught at Drexel University. Lex Fridman was hired by Google in 2014 to research artificial intelligence but left to study “big-data analytics” at MIT’s AgeLab. In 2019, he released a much-hyped analysis of Tesla Autopilot. Shortly thereafter, he accepted a position in MIT’s Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He currently works as a research scientist at the MIT Laboratory for Information Decision Systems.
Outside of academia, nobody really paid much attention to Fridman. Musk helped draw attention to Fridman’s (favorable) study of Tesla Autopilot, but it wasn’t until Joe Rogan got in the mix that Fridman’s star really started to shine. The standup comedian, “Fear Factor” host, and MMA aficionado also hosts the world’s most influential podcast, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” and has been extremely generous about sharing his spotlight.
Perceptually, it seemed as if Joe Rogan took Lex Fridman under his wing. In return, he became Rogan’s acolyte. Suddenly, Lex began talking more and more about training in Brazilian jiu-jitsu, going on ayahuasca trips, and echoing Rogan’s fears about culture, fitness, and masculinity. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Rogan must be tickled pink.
After attaching himself to Joe’s orbit, the quality of Fridman’s guests began to skyrocket. There’s been Joe Rogan, of course — as well as disgraced actor Kevin Spacey, Head Facebooker Mark Zuckerberg, the Daily Wire’s Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro, physicist Sean Carroll, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, and Tucker Carlson. It’s a phenomenal guest list.
To entice a celebrity to appear on a show, you must always offer something tangible in return. (Since the days nights of the “Tonight Show,” it’s usually been visibility.) Lex Fridman offers his guests two important things: First, his show is popular enough to draw millions of eyeballs. According to the Boston Globe, he has 3.6 million subscribers. Many of his YouTube interviews have been viewed millions of times.
But the second benefit he offers celebs is probably more important: Fridman isn’t a combative interviewer. He’s not the kind of guy who’ll hold someone’s feet to the fire. Instead, his platform is an open-ended dialogue between friends. And that’s not necessarily a criticism; often, we can learn more by allowing someone to speak uninterrupted. Grilling each guest like you’re a D.A. and they’re a dirty, filthy liar on the witness stand isn’t the best way to discuss complex socio-political problems.
Still, his laissez-faire approach to interviews allows guests to say things that are entirely untrue — and to do so with minimal pushback. It’s an acceptable tradeoff when a guest is someone like a Jeff Bezos or a Matthew McConaughey, but when you’re interviewing a guy like Kanye West, it can go off the rails pretty quickly.
He dresses like a reject from “Men in Black.” In every podcast, his wardrobe is exactly the same: Black suit, white shirt, black tie. But instead of coming across as OCD-ishly weird, it’s actually kind of endearing. Fridman is at his best when he assumes the aura of a loveable, well-intentioned nerd. There’s no swagger or bombastic catchphrases. Fridman is a curious, introspective outsider who’s fascinated by the world and just wants to learn as much as possible. He’ll ask questions like, “What is love?”
There’s an innocence to him.
By the way, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with his format. With millions of subscribers, Fridman has undeniably scratched an itch in the marketplace. But, like anything else, it’s a tradeoff: There are limits to this approach.
His show is 100 percent dependent on the quality of his guest. If Lex is interviewing something interesting, it’s probably going to be an excellent show. And if he’s interviewing someone dull and awkward, then it’s going to be an ordeal to sit through. Lex lacks the chops to carry an interview on his own.
In this lens, he’s eerily similar to CNN’s Larry King in the 1980s and 1990s: He’s less a commentator than an interviewer. But whereas, in King’s day, this style was fairly common, nowadays, most hosts try to inject themselves into their conversation — it’s as much about them as it is about the guest. And there are very real tradeoffs to that kind of format, too.
There’s a role in media for someone like Lex Fridman. We can learn something different because of him… or rather, because of his guests.
GRADE: C
Prior Commentators Critiqued:
