Hey there. It's Stephen Dubner. In 2019 we published an episode about the

boom in home DNA testing. The key information came from an interview we did with Ann Wajiski, the founder and CEO of

23 and Me.

A couple years after we published that piece, 23 and me went public, after merging with what's called a SPAC or a special purpose acquisition company.

It was backed by Richard Branson.

This looked to be a brilliant move. The company was valued at around $6 billion.

It entered the stratosphere because we all decided to take these tests.

It got very popular.

That is Rolf Winkler. He is a Wall Street Journal reporter who covers health technology.

And what is 23 and me worth now?

Right now the valuation is zero.

So today, on a bonus episode of Freakonomics Radio we wanted to replay

that original conversation with Ann Wajiski with updated facts and figures and

after that we'll speak with Ralph Winkler to hear about all the things

that went wrong with 23 and me and what might still go right. Thanks for

listening. Thanks for

listening. In 2018, police in Sacramento, California arrested a man who had been eluding them for decades.

The Golden State Killer, as he'd been known, was responsible for more than

a dozen murders and 50 rapes.

This morning, new details of the rigorous investigation that detectives Say brought down the golden state killer more than 40 years after his alleged killing spree began.

Detectives had uploaded a DNA sample from the suspect to an open source website called

Jedmatch. The site provides, in its words, DNA and genealogical analysis tools

...