Interview: News, AI and The Future Of Truth with the Atlantic's Nick Thompson

Mo News

@mosheh / tentwentytwo

Daily News, News, News Commentary

4.9 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 3 November 2025

⏱️ 66 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We’re living in a post-truth reality — where facts compete with memes, misinformation spreads faster than journalism, and artificial intelligence threatens to rewrite the rules entirely. Mosheh sits down with Nick Thompson, CEO of The Atlantic, to break down the urgent fight over what’s real, what’s fake, and who gets to decide. Nick explains why AI search could soon become the primary way people consume information — and why The Atlantic moved early to strike a precedent-setting deal with OpenAI to protect its reporting from being scraped without credit or compensation. They dig into collapsing trust in media, the dangers of deepfakes, and how ethical journalism can survive when powerful players — from Beijing to Washington — try to shape the narrative. Nick also chats about navigating covering the Trump administration, including how 'The Atlantic' broke “Signalgate." Plus: Nick opens up about his new book ⁠The Running Ground⁠, the story behind his ultramarathon obsession, and how endurance fuels leadership in the newsroom. Special offer: Mo News listeners can get 25% off a subscription at ⁠TheAtlantic.com/MoNews⁠. Mosheh Oinounou (⁠@mosheh⁠) is an Emmy and Murrow award-winning journalist. He has 20 years of experience at networks including Fox News, Bloomberg Television and CBS News, where he was the executive producer of the CBS Evening News and launched the network's 24 hour news channel. He founded the @mosheh Instagram news account in 2020 and the Mo News podcast and newsletter in 2022.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the Mo News podcast. It's Moschpununu here.
0:07.1	Today, we're looking at the intersection of AI technology, journalism, the future of media,
0:13.1	the future of truth in our society with a friend and former colleague who has incredible
0:19.2	insight. His name is Nick Thompson.
0:22.2	He's the CEO of the Atlantic.
0:23.5	You might be familiar with The Atlantic.
0:25.5	You might be a subscriber to the Atlantic.
0:28.8	We have a new exclusive discount for that from O News listeners. But the Atlantic has a really compelling story to tell about expanding its newsroom and
0:33.7	its coverage at a time when much of the industry is shrinking.
0:37.2	Nick and I go back
0:38.0	more than a decade to his days as our tech go-to when he was running Wired magazine and I was
0:43.8	at CBS News. And in addition to running the Atlantic now, he has an incredible LinkedIn account,
0:49.2	incredible daily insights into technology, society. I really recommend following Nick at the Atlantic now. He's
0:56.5	steering a 167-year-old institution into the era of AI. He was actually one of the first
1:01.9	executives to strike a deal with Open AI. And we talk about that. We talk about ramifications for
1:06.6	society. He's thought very deeply about all of this. And in addition to all of that, he also
1:11.7	is an ultramarathoner. He runs 50Ks, and he has a new bookout related to running. So we talk
1:17.4	about that. The book is called The Running Ground. We have a link to that in the show notes. So it is an
1:22.7	all-incompassing conversation. I think you will get a lot out of this conversation about truth and trust and also
1:29.4	running and how running relates to life. And what he has learned from it, I really enjoyed this
1:33.9	conversation. We could have gone on for more than an hour here. We'll probably have them back at some
1:38.2	point. But in the meantime, I want you to listen to probably as part one of our conversation with
	...

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