PODCAST · business
North Star Podcast
by David Perell
A deep dive into the stories, habits, ideas, strategies and methods that drive fulfilled people and create enormous success for them. The guests are diverse, but they share profound similarities. They’re guided by purpose, live with intense joy, learn passionately, and see the world with a unique lens. Each episode lets us soak in their hard-earned wisdom and apply it to our lives. Guests include Neil deGrasse Tyson, Seth Godin, and Tyler Cowen.
Episodes
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Mark Broadie: The Secrets of Golf
My guest today is Mark Broadie, a Golf Statistician and Professor at Columbia Business School. I first found Mark through his book Every Shot Counts, which transformed golf statistics and analytics forever. Marcus worked with many of the world's best golfers, including Francesco Molinari, and...
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Rob Henderson: An Internet Academic
Rob Henderson is one of my favorite up-and-coming writers. I like him because he's one of those people who doesn't fit into a category. He's a Ph.D. candidate in psychology, but I met him in a book club about technological stagnation. He's spent years in the academy, first at Yale and now at...
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Chrisman Frank and Ana Lorena Fabrega: How Childhood Education Will Change
This week, I have two guests. Both are affiliated with Synthesis, a new kind of online school where kids learn through games and simulations. One is Chrisman Frank, the CEO of Synthesis. The other is Ana Lorena Fabrega, who is their Chief Evangelist. Here's the backstory: A few years ago, Elon…
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Ash Fontana: Building Artificial Intelligence
Ash Fontana is an entrepreneur, investor, and author. As an entrepreneur, he was only of the early employees at an online investing platform called AngelList. From there, he became the Managing Director at Zetta, the first investment fund focused on artificial intelligence. Now, he's the author…
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Li Jin: Creating the Creator Economy
My guest today is Li Jin, the founder and managing partner at an early-stage venture capital firm called Atelier. She's known for her extensive writings about the Passion Economy. Her essays explore how people can make a living from their passions and creative skills. All of her writing is…
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Zena Hitz: Liberal Arts Thinking
My guest today is Zena Hitz, a tutor at St John’s and the author of an excellent book called Lost in Thought: The Hidden Pleasures of an Intellectual Life. Her book explores the meaning and the value of learning for its own sake, through images and stories of bookworms, philosophers, scientists,...
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Tiago Forte and Will Mannon: Building Cohort-Based Courses
I have two guests today: Tiago Forte and Will Mannon. Tiago is my business partner and the creator of an online course called Building a Second Brain. The two of us record a podcast like this every year to reflect on what we’ve learned about the online education industry. And this time, we…
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Gagan Biyani: Building Silicon Valley Startups
My guest today is Gagan Biyani, the current CEO of an education startup (where I’m both an investor and an advisor) that helps teachers run Cohort-Based Courses on the Internet and has students from around the world. Gagan also founded a multi-billion dollar online education platform called…
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Trevor Bauer: Playing Professional Baseball
My guest today is Trevor Bauer, who is arguably the very best pitcher in Major League Baseball. In 2020, he had the lowest Earned Run Average of any pitcher and won the National League Cy Young Award, which goes to the top pitcher in the game. I wanted to interview Trevor not only because he's an...
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Nik Sharma: Building DTC Companies
My guest today is Nik Sharma, the founder of Sharma Brands and an advisor to companies like Judy and Cha Cha Matcha. Nik is one of my very best friends and my go-to person for all things commerce. Since we first met, we've spent hours exploring the future of marketing and commerce together and...
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Kevin Kelly: Seeing the Future
My guest today is Kevin Kelly, who co-founded Wired Magazine in 1993 and served as its Executive Editor for the first seven years. As one of the most important futurists of our generation, he's published a number of books including The Inevitable, What Technology Wants, and New Rules for the New...
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Will Ahmed: Founding WHOOP and the Future of Wearables
Will Ahmed is the Founder and CEO of WHOOP, which has developed next-generation wearable technology for optimizing human performance and health. I found him through an excellent interview he hosted with Rory McIlroy, a winner of four major championships who was once the #1 golfer in the world....
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Seth Godin: Writing Every Day
My guest today is Seth Godin, the author of nineteen international bestsellers that have been translated into more than 35 languages. My all-time favorite is Purple Cow, which I discovered in college and became my nickname. This is my second interview with Seth, who has published an article every...
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David Nemetz: Founding Bleacher Report
My guest today is Dave Nemetz, the Founder of Bleacher Report, which was one of my favorite media companies as a kid. During his time there, Dave oversaw video, business development, and business operations. He helped grow the audience to more than 40 million monthly unique visitors before…
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Rabbi David Wolpe: Jewish Wisdom
Newsweek Magazine once called Rabbi Wolpe the most influential rabbi in America. He is the Senior Rabbi at Sinai Temple in Los Angeles and he's the author of eight books including one about King David and another gem called Why Be Jewish? I don't remember the last time I enjoyed preparing for an...
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Joe Henrich: What Makes Society Smart?
My guest today is Joseph Henrich, a professor at Harvard and an expert on the evolution of human cooperation and culture. I am a big fan of his book, "The Secret of Our Success" and he just published a new one called the Weirdest People in the World about people who fall under the acronym WEIRD:...
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Grant Sanderson: Math For The Masses
My guest today is Grant Sanderson, the man behind one of the world's largest math-focused YouTube channels: 3blue1brown. He has more than 3 million subscribers and his videos have been watched more than 150 million times. Before making videos he studied math and computer science at Stanford…
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Eric Jorgenson: Lessons from Naval Ravikant
My guest today is Eric Jorgenson, a Product Strategist at Zaarly and the author of the Almanack of Naval Ravikant: a guide to wealth and happiness. The book collects and curates Naval's wisdom from Twitter, podcasts, and essays over the past decade. Naval is the founder of Angel List, an angel...
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Morgan Housel: Writing for the Internet
Morgan Housel is a partner at The Collaborative Fund and a former columnist at The Motley Fool and The Wall Street Journal. He's the author of The Psychology of Money, where he shares 19 stories about the strange ways people think about money and teaches you how to manage it. I revere Morgan's...
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Claire Lehmann: Building an Internet Media Company
My guest today is Claire Lehmann, the founder and editor-in-chief of Quillette, a for-profit online magazine that publishes essays on topics like politics, science, and academia. We started our conversation talking about Quilette's business model and the niche it occupies on the Internet. Then…
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Balaji Srinivasan: Living in the Future
My guest today is Balaji Srinivasan, an angel investor and entrepreneur. When it comes to the future, he's the single most creative person I know because he's so technical, innovative, and polymathic. Talking to him is an experience unlike talking to anybody else, which I tried to replicate in…
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Nadia Eghbal: Open-Source Software
My guest today is Nadia Eghbal, an independent researcher and the author of Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software. She currently works on the writer experience team at Substack. She did a lot of her research at Protocol Labs where she studied the production and...
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Matthew Kobach: Social Media Brands
My guest today is Matthew Kobach, the Director of Content Marketing at Fast and the former Manager of Digital and Social Media at the New York Stock Exchange. Matthew and I met on Twitter, where he shares actionable strategies for building brands on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, and YouTube.…
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David Brittain: Designing iPad Apps
David Brittain is the CEO of Concepts, my favorite iPad app. It's marketed as a "flexible sketching" app and geared towards people in the early stages of the thinking process. I use it to visualize my ideas, many of which I share on Twitter and in long-form essays. People use the app for…
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Tyler Cowen: Production Function
Tyler Cowen is an economics professor at George Mason University. He runs the Mercatus Center, which bridges the gap between academic ideas and real-world problems. He’s published a new post every day for the past 17 years on his blog called Marginal Revolution, where he writes about economics,...
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Patrick McKenzie: Internet Famous
My guest today is marketer and software engineer Patrick McKenzie, who writes mostly about software-as-a-service businesses. He currently works for Stripe as a writer and an overall software business expert. I remember when I signed up for Stripe's Atlas program to incorporate my LLC, almost all…
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Will Mannon: Running an Online Course
My guest today is Will Mannon, the student manager for my online writing school called Write of Passage. Will oversees all aspects of the student experience with the exception of curriculum design. He’s at the frontier of thinking about live online learning, from how assignments should be…
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Sara Dietschy: From YouTube to Business
My guest today is Sara Dietschy, a YouTuber with more than 620,000 YouTube subscribers. This is the fourth interview I’ve recorded with her. It’s her second appearance on the North Star Podcast, and I’ve been interviewed twice on her podcast called That Creative Life. Sara makes a couple of…
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Austin Rief & Alex Lieberman: Morning Brew’s Secret Sauce
I have two guests this week: Austin Rief and Alex Lieberman, the founders of Morning Brew. Their business-focused daily email newsletter now has more than 2 million readers. These two gentlemen started the company in college while studying at the University of Michigan. It began as a simple idea…
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Tiago Forte: What's Next in Education
My guest today is Tiago Forte. He runs an online course called Building a Second Brain, which I took in August of 2017. I went from being overwhelmed by information to being in control of it. My writer’s block disappeared and my productivity skyrocketed. Tiago changed the way I thought about work...
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Michael Mayer: Building the Next Amazon
My guest today is Michael Mayer, the co-founder and CEO of Bottomless. This episode explores business from a variety of angles. Michael talks about how he thinks about marketing at bottomless, and the accumulating advantages that drive the company. He also talks about what he learned at...
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Matt Cooper: Online Education Platforms
My guest today is Matt Cooper, the CEO of Skillshare — a subscription-based online learning platform where people can take classes on-demand. The main categories are creative arts, design, entrepreneurship, lifestyle, and technology. Before joining Skillshare, Matt was the CEO of Visually, an...
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Jennifer Morrison: Being a Hollywood Actress
My guest today is Hollywood actress, producer and director Jennifer Morrison. She’s known for her roles as Dr. Allison Cameron in the medical-drama series House and Emma Swan in an adventure-fantasy series called Once Upon a Time. She also appeared in movies like Star Trek and TV shows like This…
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Alex Danco: Funding the Future
Today’s guest is Alex Danco, one of my favorite writers in the world. Back when I was in college and before I started writing, Alex was one of the first people who made me say “Wow I want to write like this for a living.” For years, he worked on the Discover team at Social Capital where he wrote…
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Ryan Singer: Design and Consciousness
My guest today is Ryan Singer, the head of Project Strategy at Basecamp. Ryan recently published a book called Shape Up where he describes his process for planning, designing, and executing projects at Basecamp. In this interview, instead of talking about Shape Up and the principles in the book...
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Andy Matuschak: Designing Education
My guest today is software engineer, designer, and researcher Andy Matuschak. He’s focused on Tools for Thought — which is a fancy way of saying that he works on technologies that expand what people can think and do. Before working as a researcher, he helped build iOS at Apple, focusing on...
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Chris Zarou: The Top of Hip-Hop
My guest today is Chris Zarou, the CEO of Visionary Music Group and the behind-the-scenes mastermind behind the success of Logic and Jon Bellion. I’ve been a fan of both his artists since my early days of college, so I’ve watched them both blow up with my own eyes. The episode begins with Chris’...
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Robert Cottrell: The Secrets of Reading
My guest today is Robert Cottrell, the founder of The Browser, which has become my go-to source for articles. Here’s how it works. Every day, he recommends five articles and includes a short summary for each one. They’re wild and random — but that’s what makes his work so exciting. For example,...
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Andy McCune: How Products Go Viral
My guest today is Andy McCune, an entrepreneur and creative who co-founded Unfold, a mobile design tool kit for storytellers that was acquired by Squarespace. He also runs an Instagram account called Earth (@earth on Instagram) with 1.1 million followers. Andy is one of the very most talented...
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Samo Burja: The Two Writing Cultures
My guest today is Samo Burja, the founder of Bismarck Analysis, a firm that analyzes institutions, governments, and companies for high net worth individuals. Samo is known for an idea called Great Founder Theory, and his research focuses on the causes of societal decay and flourishing. This is my...
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Tiago Forte: The Future of Education
My guest today is Tiago Forte, who runs an online course called Building a Second Brain. This episode is different than most of my podcasts. It’s less of an interview and more of a conversation. Tiago and I have collaborated closely for the past year. In February, we worked together to film and...
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Ryan Holiday: Timeless Lessons From History
My guest today is Ryan Holiday. He’s a writer, media strategist, and the author of ten books. He dropped out of college at 19 years old to apprentice under Ryan Greene, author of Mastery and The 48 Laws of Power. He worked at American Apparel and founded an agency called Brass Check. We begin…
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Cameron Porter: Invention On-Demand
My guest today is Cameron Porter, an investor and former professional soccer player. We begin the conversation talking about AlleyCorp, an investment firm in New York where Cameron is responsible for new company research and development and due diligence on seed investment. Then we move to...
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Emmett Shine: The Eyes of an Artist
Emmett pioneered the Direct-to-Consumer aesthetic. The bright colors, the flat design, and the sans serif fonts are a direct result of his work. At Gin Lane, he worked with brands like Bonobos, SweetGreen, Harry’s, Smile Direct Club, and Recess. Now, he’s switching gears. Emmett and his team...
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Adam Robinson: Searching for Secrets
In December, I went to a live taping of the Tim Ferriss Podcast at the famous 92nd Street Y in New York City. There was a surprise guest at the event named Adam Robinson, and after hearing him speak, I tapped my friend on the shoulder and told him I’d find a way to get him on the podcast. Adam...
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Renée DiResta: Information Warfare
My guest today is Renée DiResta, who spends her time investigating the spread of malign narratives across social networks. She has advised Congress, the State Department, and policymakers in understanding and responding to the problem of misinformation. In this episode, we talk about the history…
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Tren Griffin: The Love of Learning
My guest today is Tren Griffin, a Senior Director at Microsoft and the man behind an excellent blog called 25IQ. Tren is one of the most prolific writers I know. He’s written books about negotiation, entrepreneurship, and Charlie Munger. He published an article every week for almost six years…
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Mason Hartman: Building a Creative Society
My guest today is Mason Hartman. For years, I’ve admired Mason's perspectives on the culture, childhood, and the education system. I teach an online writing course called Write of Passage. So education – and especially writing education – is a subject that's close to my heart. We recorded this...
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Jeff Morris Jr.: Building a flexible mindset
My guest today is Jeff Morris Jr., the Director of Revenue at Tinder. We begin this episode talking about the future of education. Jeff recently completed an MBA at UCLA and wrote his thesis on the future of Lambda School, the San Francisco based education startup. We talked about the transition...
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Steve Cheney: The Next Internet
My guest today is Steve Cheney, the cofounder of Estimote. Before founding Estimote, Steve was the head of business and platform at GroupMe, which was acquired by Skype. I’ve been reading Steve's writing for more than half a decade, but this year, he picked up the pace of his publishing and now…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
A deep dive into the stories, habits, ideas, strategies and methods that drive fulfilled people and create enormous success for them. The guests are diverse, but they share profound similarities. They’re guided by purpose, live with intense joy, learn passionately, and see the world with a unique lens. Each episode lets us soak in their hard-earned wisdom and apply it to our lives. Guests include Neil deGrasse Tyson, Seth Godin, and Tyler Cowen.
HOSTED BY
David Perell
CATEGORIES
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does North Star Podcast have?
North Star Podcast currently has 90 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is North Star Podcast about?
A deep dive into the stories, habits, ideas, strategies and methods that drive fulfilled people and create enormous success for them. The guests are diverse, but they share profound similarities. They’re guided by purpose, live with intense joy, learn passionately, and see the world with a unique...
How often does North Star Podcast release new episodes?
North Star Podcast has 90 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to North Star Podcast?
You can listen to North Star Podcast on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts North Star Podcast?
North Star Podcast is created and hosted by David Perell.
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