Everything Is Fake

4.8 (87)
TECHNOLOGY
WEEKLY SERIES

Jamie Bartlett asks why, in so many parts of modern life, fakery is no longer punished - it's rewarded. And why so many of us seem strangely unbothered by it.

EPISODE 1

Trailer

Have you noticed that more and more of the world feels, well, fake? Online there's a daily avalanche of dubious advice and information - about health, money, success, happiness - much of it delivered with total confidence and little regard for evidence. There's the fabricated reviews, inflated metrics and synthetic content. Influencers present themselves as authorities. The 'fake it till you make it' mantra has hardened into the business model. Everything is now content. Performed for likes, not tested for truth. Meanwhile, institutions once trusted to tell us what is true now compete for attention like everyone else - just as new technologies emerge that can generate convincing false information at scale. How did we get here? What can we do about it? And, well, do we really care? In this six-part series Jamie Bartlett sets out to understand how fakery stopped being a flaw and became the operating system of modern life. This isn't a series about individual liars or shysters. It's about the cultural conditions that made modern fakery not just possible, but incentivised, rewarded, and often indistinguishable from success. From the scripted spectacle of 1980s professional wrestling to the collapse of the global financial system, Jamie traces the incentives that normalised our fake world. Along the way, he's joined by his AI companion, Jimmy Botlett. The series builds towards one urgent question: in a future shaped by generative AI and synthetic media, how will we tell fact from fakery - and will we even care enough to try? Credits: Presenter: Jamie Bartlett Series Producer: Tom Pooley Sound Design: Rob Speight Production Coordinator: Neena Abdullah Original music: Coach Conrad Editor: Craig Templeton Smith A Tempo+Talker production for BBC Radio 4.

2 min
EPISODE 1

1. Fake it. Make it. Podcast it.

Jamie Bartlett is not Steven Bartlett. People mix them up more than you might think - but there is an important difference: Steven Bartlett is one of the most successful podcasters on the planet, and Jamie is not. So what does Steven have that Jamie doesn't? And what does the answer tell us about the world we now live in? In this first episode, Jamie digs into the origin stories of the UK's podcast kings - and discovers that in 2025, working out what's true, what's embellished, and what's just a really good story is harder than it sounds. He also builds himself an AI companion, Jimmy Botlett, because if he's going to get to the bottom of how fakery took over the world, he's going to need all the help he can get. Credits: Presenter: Jamie Bartlett Series Producer: Tom Pooley Sound Design: Rob Speight Production Coordinator: Neena Abdullah Original music: Coach Conrad Editor: Craig Templeton Smith A Tempo+Talker production for BBC Radio 4.

29 min

See All Season 2 (7)

4.8

out of 5

87 Ratings

Eye-opening listening

03/04/2024

Diva_187

Another brilliant podcast by Jamie Bartlett. It was an eye-opening listen into an industry that impacts billions of people. I would definitely recommend this!
Stop the overdramatising

09/04/2024

OJS63

This is a fundamentally interesting story and well researched. But can we have less of the background noise/music. It’s so unnecessary and annoying. Also I think there is a tendency to overdramatise everything. the story is good enough: it doesn’t need hyping.
Super gripping

12/02/2024

lnblank

Like anything Jamie does, this podcast is extremely well-researched, thought-provoking and makes you want to know more. I wish I good binge it like pretty much every single of his other pieces of work!
A fascinating listen

10/02/2024

Alex 7654567

An entertaining and informative insight into how we got the social media we have today, and the people who have the power to decide what is allowed on there.

Jamie Bartlett asks why, in so many parts of modern life, fakery is no longer punished - it's rewarded. And why so many of us seem strangely unbothered by it.