Greetings! I am couch/bed-ridden as my entire family recovers from Covid-19 (the BEST Covid!) While I waste away, I think you'll enjoy this episode from my other podcast.

- Original Show Notes | August 15, 2025 -

https://haveenteredthechat.com/episodes/215-luke-plunkett-games-journalism-aftermath

If you've read a video game article on the Internet in the last two decades, chances are it was written by Luke Plunkett. His tenure at Kotaku spanned 17 years, and all the highs and lows of the digital media rollercoaster.

When the bottom eventually fell out, he and other games media refugees co-founded Aftermath, a worker-owned video game news and commentary site, whose business model eschews advertising, SEO, and clickbait in favor of — get this — reader subscriptions!

Luke joins us to discuss the evolution of games media, getting paid $10 to post pictures of cake on Kotaku in 2006, living on the opposite side of the world from his co-workers, and why we are entering a new and (hopefully) more sustainable era for online journalism.

Connect with Luke:

https://www.lukeplunkett.com/

https://aftermath.site/

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Depending on what state or country you live in, logging into Instagram, Reddit, or (dare we say) Corn Hub might prompt you to submit a government ID to proceed. This fresh privacy nightmare is thanks to a variety of "online safety" laws going into effect, or being upheld by courts. They are aimed at protecting minors from accessing harmful content online -- a laudable goal. But requiring all users to submit their face and address to tech companies comes with a host of privacy issues and pressures on free speech.

To explain what's going on, who might be affected, and what happens next, Matt sits down with Laura Riposo VanDruff, a partner at the law firm Kelley Drye & Warren who has spent much of her career focused on tech, privacy, cybersecurity, and AI litigation, and a decade of work at the FTC's Bureau of Consumer Protection, which is often the de facto government body that regulates these kinds of digital issues.

Connect with Laura and her work:

https://www.kelleydrye.com/people/laura-riposo-vandruff

https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-riposo-vandruff-1598b921/

Shout out to our Producer Tier Patreon supporters!

BowieBarks

Dominick Kerr

Evan

Jolene Jula

Robert Tortorelli

Sam

William

News items discussed in this episode:

https://www.npr.org/2025/08/14/nx-s1-5482925/scotus-netchoice

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/08/no-uks-online-safety-act-doesnt-make-children-safer-online

This show is made possible by listener support: https://www.patreon.com/influencepod

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Hey friends! I'm bringing an important conversation over from my other feed, as this story has huge ramifications for protected speech, the LGBTQ+ community, and how powerful companies can change what's allowed on the Internet. While certainly alarming, this conversation (and what has transpired since) has made me hopeful.

- Original Show Notes from July 25, 2025 -

Hundreds of NSFW games were removed from Steam last week after Valve quietly changed some policies around adult content. But journalists realized it was actually the payment processors — Visa and Mastercard — who refused to complete transactions around certain kinds of porn.

Digging deeper, it was revealed that a small Australian conservative activism group was taking a victory lap around Steam's porn purge, all in the name of "protecting children" from "harmful content." And they are targeting Itch.io next, which has already de-indexed many adult games.

So how did a tiny group of pearl-clutchers convince two multi-national banking conglomerates to censor the world's largest video game marketplace?

Games journalist Ana Valens attempted to answer this with two reported articles on Vice's gaming site Waypoint. But those articles were taken down by Vice's corporate owners, prompting Ana (and many of her colleagues) to immediately quit.

This week, Ana joins Matt to discuss this legally and ethically complex issue, why banks can now decide what art we're allowed to see on the Internet, the pressing threat for the LGBTQ+ community, and what we can (actually) do about it.

If this conversation inspired you to take action, please discuss it in our Discord, check out the links below, and follow Ana's work:

Both archived articles: https://archive.ph/USxe6 + https://archive.ph/x5cGQ

https://yellat.money/

Follow Ana on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/acvalens.net

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In August 2005, YouTube was a 6-month-old beta test, the iPhone was still years away, putting music on your iPod required a cable, and MuggleNet was *the* destination for news and conversation about Harry Potter. The books and movies were still coming out, and online fandom was taking shape in novel ways.

One of which was a “podcast” — it’s like a radio show, but you download it from the Internet and listen on your computer, burn it to a CD for the car, or dare we say load it onto your portable music player. Very few existed, but the excitement for them among niche communities was palpable. At the suggestion of a MuggleNet staffer/volunteer, MuggleCast was born. The show began as news segments about the books and movies: casting, release dates, trailers, and more. But its extremely likeable and relatable hosts (some of whom were teenagers at the time) quickly built a thriving fan community unto themselves. The show became a forum for granular, chapter-by-chapter literary criticism of the books, and lively discussion of their wider cultural impact. MuggleCast is about to celebrate its 20th anniversary, making it one of the longest-running podcasts ever (mere months behind the medium’s earliest adopters like Leo Laporte and “This Week In Tech).

Eric and Micah, two of MuggleCast’s four current hosts, join Matt to discuss their entry into the HP fandom, podcast production in the days of dial-up, that time Steve Jobs mentioned the show on stage, their commitment to inclusivity, reckoning with JK Rowling’s transphobic views, and why we need the anti-fascist themes of Harry Potter (and other fantasy fiction) more than ever.

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I'm taking the week off, but hope you'll check out my new improv comedy podcast for kids and families!

Listen to the first episode here, share it with the kids in your life, and subscribe wherever you get your favorite podcasts:

https://www.talesfromthecloudsea.com/

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Laina Morris was 20 years old when she entered a Justin Bieber fan contest in 2012. She uploaded a video of herself to YouTube singing a creepy parody song. She didn't win the concert tickets, but when she woke up the next morning, she had won a very different prize.

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When people post online, they usually declare their opinions. And in social media echo chambers, those opinions tend to be validated.

But the subreddit r/ChangeMyView *might* be the only place on the Internet where people come in good faith to have their opinions challenged — and perhaps even changed.

Topics range from movie fandom to food preferences to history to some of the most challenging ethical and political discussions of our time: abortion, global conflict, mental health, and of course our current U.S. leadership.

Someone posts their view, and commenters present their challenge. If the original poster is swayed — even slightly — they award a "!Delta" for the change. The result is a bastion of civil discussion about emotional and challenging topics, and the community of 4 million subscribers is held together by precise rules and moderation.

But in April, the University of Zurich conducted a social experiment on the subreddit shook the community to its core, and begs the question: Can AI be weaponized to change the views of millions on the Internet? And if so, how can we study that problem ethically?

This week, Logan MacGregor, a moderator of r/ChangeMyView, joins Matt to discuss what makes this community so special, and how it responded to this shocking experiment that violated its core tenets.

Read more about the response to the AI experiments here: https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1k8b2hj/meta_unauthorized_experiment_on_cmv_involving/

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Grace Helbig was cutting tape in her 2006 video editing class when the professor asked everyone to create accounts on a new website called "YouTube." That's where Grace found vloggers, jump cuts, and an emerging alt comedy scene. She became obsessed (in a good way) and immediately got to work.

What began as comedic vlogs and absurd sketches with her improv pals blossomed into a 20 year career of making the Internet laugh. But it wasn't without pitfalls.

Grace joins Matt to discuss how she's reinvented herself online many times, the deep sense of community she found within the "second wave" of YouTubers, memories from early VidCons, her battle with breast cancer and how it informed her new standup tour, and why being an Internet face can make you question your true identity.

Plus: Your questions for Grace, and a harrowing round of YouTube history trivia.

Follow and subscribe to Grace's work:

https://youtube.com/itsgrace

https://www.instagram.com/gracehelbig

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Video journalists Joss Fong and Adam Cole are rarely satisfied with the results of scientific inquiry. As self-proclaimed "earnest nerds," they are compelled to unpack the process — to learn HOW experts know the things they know. After more than a decade as science communicators at Vox and NPR, they launched their own home on YouTube called Howtown.

Their videos on how to measure animal sentience, how we really know the circumference of the Earth, and how hot sauces get so ... hot ... have captivated millions of curious viewers — even those who may not be fluent in evidence-based science journalism.

This week, Adam and Joss sit down with Matt to discuss their leap from established media to independent creators, the meticulous quality of their work, and the curiosity that compels them to create, even when the economics of the Internet felt grim.

Stop what you're doing and subscribe to Howtown: https://www.youtube.com/@Howtown/

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