Hey, it's Peter Kafka with a quick note for people who are coming to the sold-out Sam B. Live podcast next week. We're going to start a little bit earlier than we expected. We're going to start at 7 p.m. on the dot. If you want to get a drink, come at 6.15. Again, we're starting the Sam B. Live podcast a little bit early. Get there at 6.15 for for drinks and the show will start promptly at seven

it's going to be great we will see you there this is recode media with peter kofka that's me

i am part of the vox media podcast network here at box media new york headquarters i'm talking

to tony hale who Who is Tony Hale?

If you spend a lot of time listening to a podcast like this, you might know that Tony Hale used to be the CEO of Chartbeat. If you spend a lot of time reading Recode, you might know that Tony Hale is an occasional contributor and big thinker about the internet. Tony Hale's making a face of me. Tony Hale has a new job. He is the CEO of a new startup called Scroll.

I spent some time with Tony a year ago trying to explain what Scroll is. So I figured, it's a year. Let's hear from Tony himself, in his own words, what scroll is. Basically, the short version is you're going to save the internet, right? Or at least save journalism. That's the attempt. Yeah. I mean, well... How's it going? Is it saved?

Any day now, I think we should see the green shoots of recovery. I think... I forced you into talking about this a year ago, well before you're ready. It seems like you're about ready to start showing people what you're doing now. I've been like, I've been a little bit more open recently. Yeah, well, it's always frustrating when I see your name in

my inbox because... You're not the only person who says that most people are my family.

Okay. Yeah, it's, we, I think, had only just put the company together and we were trying to be

circumspect, even fly under the radar, and then suddenly you turn up and you're like, I've talked to everyone, I know everything. Come in here and tell me everything. Yeah, that's my trick. Yeah. I only know half of it. Exactly. And then I just kind of fill in the gaps like a fool. So yeah, that was a year ago. And since then, we've basically just been doing a lot of building, a lot of working with different people.

Let's tell people what scroll is.

Yeah, yeah.

So basically, the thing that I've been obsessed with for the last decade or so has been finding a business model that works for quality journalism.

I kind of think it's important for democracy

and a whole bunch of other stuff. Free press needs to be funded somehow. And we can, you know,

we have a long history of philanthropy and entrepreneurs buying things or from having businesses

that are unrelated to media supporting it like Kaplan did for the Washington Post for many, many years.

But in the end, it would be kind of nice to have a business model that pays for itself.

And a chart...

Used to have one.

Used to have one in terms of...

Or used to have a business model around selling paper that needed stuff printed on it.

...