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I’ve also had a really hard time understanding why people praise him so much, I’ve tried multiple times to listen to his stuff and it’s just super disappointing

I’ve also had a really hard time understanding why people praise him so much, I’ve tried multiple times to listen to his stuff and it’s just super disappointing. Worse than most lay people in depth. For people interested in AGI there are many better sources (MIRI, Yudkowsky), for people interested in self-driving: Andrej Karpathy. Max Tegmark also has some great public facing physics writing. There’s so much great stuff out there, Friedman seems to get disproportionate attention. Personal attacks aside, I find him tedious to listen to and he often comes across as if he hasn’t done even cursory reading of his guest’s work. It often feels like a sophomore in college waxing about “big ideas” with little substance to back them up. Even at 2x speed I found the talks low signal.

josephg 5y ago
The one aspect of Friedman I really enjoy is the quality of his guests. I don’t know how he does it, but he seems to attract a lot of guests who I’ve never heard of, and yet are super interesting to listen to. For example, I loved his interviews with Joshua Bach and Jim Keller. I’d never heard of either of those guys before they went on Lex Friedman’s podcast and they’re both brilliant.
- teatree 5y ago
  A HN reader not knowing Jim Keller is a bit surprising. He is a well known name in tech communities.
  - macintux 5y ago
    It’s a big world.
  - caymanjim 5y ago
    I'm a moderate consumer of DIY engineering/repair/tech and science content on YouTube and I haven't heard of nearly any of the names in this thread. I don't aggressively seek out content. There's a lot out there to weed through. Most of my YouTube comes from mainstream pop science like Veritasium and Arvin Ash; science hackers like Nile Red and CodysLab; geeky DIY like Ben Eater; repair porn like My Mechanics; and whatever YouTube's recommendation engine throws my way based on those entry points.
    - teatree 5y ago
      Well, my bad. It was a wrong assumption on my part.

josephg 5y ago

The one aspect of Friedman I really enjoy is the quality of his guests. I don’t know how he does it, but he seems to attract a lot of guests who I’ve never heard of, and yet are super interesting to listen to. For example, I loved his interviews with Joshua Bach and Jim Keller. I’d never heard of either of those guys before they went on Lex Friedman’s podcast and they’re both brilliant.

teatree 5y ago
A HN reader not knowing Jim Keller is a bit surprising. He is a well known name in tech communities.
- macintux 5y ago
  It’s a big world.
- caymanjim 5y ago
  I'm a moderate consumer of DIY engineering/repair/tech and science content on YouTube and I haven't heard of nearly any of the names in this thread. I don't aggressively seek out content. There's a lot out there to weed through. Most of my YouTube comes from mainstream pop science like Veritasium and Arvin Ash; science hackers like Nile Red and CodysLab; geeky DIY like Ben Eater; repair porn like My Mechanics; and whatever YouTube's recommendation engine throws my way based on those entry points.
  - teatree 5y ago
    Well, my bad. It was a wrong assumption on my part.