Podcasting is in crisis. Across the English-speaking world, the charts are dominated by men like Joe Rogan, Theo Von, Tucker Carlson and Chris Williamson, who platform dangerously fringe thinkers. They have flourished in the unregulated wilderness of Spotify and YouTube. But, here in the UK, the most prominent podcaster in this space – the softly spoken Steven Bartlett – is given a primetime position on Dragons’ Den, the BBC’s long-running show for entrepreneurs. It is a Faustian pact that demonstrates the internal contradictions eating away at the moral heart of the BBC.
In December 2024, the BBC’s Global Misinformation Unit published a thoughtful critique of Bartlett, accusing his podcast, Diary of a CEO, of sharing “harmful health misinformation”. They focused particularly on two guests. Firstly, Aseem Malhotra, a cardiologist who became notorious for his opposition to the Covid-19 vaccine rollout. And, secondly, Thomas Seyfried, an American research biologist who has argued for using a ketogenic diet to treat advanced cancer. Seyfried has referred to conventional treatments such as radiation therapy and chemotherapy as “medieval”, despite the near-total absence of evidential support for this thesis.
