Culture Gabfest

The Culture Gabfest, “The Paranoid Style in American Podcasting” Edition

Listen to Slate’s show about 9/11 conspiracy theories, the iPhone app Instagram, and Suits on the USA Network.

Listen to Culture Gabfest No. 155 with Stephen Metcalf, Jeremy Stahl, June Thomas and Julia Turner, by clicking the arrow on the audio player below or opening this player in another tab:

Don’t miss a single episode of the Culture Gabfest. Subscribe to the free Culturefest podcast in iTunes or directly with our RSS feed. You can also download this week’s episode here. And join the lively conversation on the Culturefest Facebook here:

In this week’s Culture Gabfest, our critics Stephen Metcalf, June Thomas, and Julia Turner speak with Slate social media editor Jeremy Stahl about his new Slate series on 9/11 conspiracy theories. Next, our critics take a verbal snapshot of the retro-photography trend and the popular iPhone app Instagram. For their final segment, the Gabfesters weigh in on the USA Network’s new law firm comedy Suits.

Here are some links to the things we discussed this week:

The first of Jeremy Stahl’s Slate series on 9/11 conspiracy theories.
The website of syndicated radio talk show host Alex Jones.
Conspiracy theorist Michael C. Ruppert’s website Collapse Network.
Popular Mechanics article “Debunking the 9/11 Myths.”
Former 9/11 “truther” Charlie Veitch becomes a conspiracy skeptic.
The influential 9/11 conspiracy documentary Loose Change.
The history of birtherism, at Slate.
The official site of Instagram.
Technology Blog TechCrunch on Instagram’s success.
New York Times photographer Damon Winter on Hipstamatic and photojournalism.
The Society Pages’ Cyborgology Blog article “The Faux-Vintage Photo,” by Nathan Jurgenson.
What happens when you take an already great photo and Instagram it? Mastergram!
The official website for the USA Network’s new show Suits.
The New York Times review of Suits.
Variety on USA’s summer lineup.

The Culture Gabfest weekly endorsements:

June’s pick: Amy Waldman’s novel The Submision; The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger, by Marc Levinson; and the podcast EconTalk.
Julia’s pick: The audiobook for Clash of Kings, Part 2 of popular fantasy series The Game of Thrones.
Steve’s picks: Timothy Snyder’s blog post “As Ohio Goes” at the New York Review of Books; NPR’s Fresh Air interview with Hollywood stuntman Hal Needham; David Graeber, author of DEBT: The First 5,000 Years, interviewed on The Brian Lehrer Show; and, finally, the Westerns of the 1970s—which is your favorite?

Outro: “The Rose” by Bette Midler.

You can e-mail us at culturefest@slate.com.

This podcast was produced by Jesse Baker. Our intern is Matt Sigl.

Follow us on the new Culturefest Twitter feed. And please Like the Culture Gabfest on Facebook.

Like Slate on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter.