In this eye-opening conversation, we sit down with Alina Verbenchuk — entrepreneur, product leader, former YouTube and Google product expert, and co-founder of the music-industry technology platform Korda — to unpack a question that affects us all: How do platforms actually shape our world, and how can we use them without being used by them? 

Alina’s new book, How Platforms Work, takes us inside the systems, incentives, and design choices that power today’s biggest digital platforms. Drawing on her years building and scaling products at global tech companies, she reveals the hidden mechanics behind platforms we rely on for connection, knowledge, work, and cultural life — and shows why they behave the way they do. 

We’re living in a world unimaginable to our grandparents — and even our parents. Over the past two decades, platforms have exploded, granting us limitless access to knowledge, tools, and opportunities. Yet despite this abundance, we’re still learning how to navigate, control, and tame these forces instead of being pulled along by them. In this episode, Alina helps us understand not only what platforms are, but how we can leverage them on our terms, so that technology amplifies our agency rather than diminishing it.

Tune in to explore:

• The architecture of influence behind modern platforms

• Why access to limitless information doesn’t automatically make us wiser

• Practical frameworks for leveraging platforms instead of being leveraged by them

• What it really takes to build and shape platforms responsibly in the attention economy

Whether you’re a creator, a builder, a thinker, or simply someone trying to make sense of this digital age, this episode will change how you see the technologies that define our lives.

00:00 — Introduction

02:16 — The Real Question: Who Uses Who?

05:03 — Why “How Platforms Work” Had to Be Written

08:39 — The Biggest Myth About Algorithms

12:44 — The Unpleasant Truth: The Algorithm Is Neutral

15:31 — Stop Trying to “Hack” the Algorithm

18:42 — Why Short & Long Content Are Growing Together

23:11 — The Bell Curve of Attention

28:43 — Fame vs Fortune: What Creators Get Wrong

31:43 — Platforms Give Distribution. You Build the Relationship

32:35 — Yes, Platforms Are Attention Machines

36:09 — Train the Algorithm to Be Your Friend

38:52 — The Most Powerful Button on YouTube

40:04 — Cleaning Your Information Diet

42:35 — When Your Topic Becomes a Trap

43:50 — The Content You Never See (And Why)

47:51 — Inside the Machine: What Shook Me at YouTube

52:45 — Final Advice: Use the Algorithm. Don’t Let It Use You