Q&A: Steven Levy on AI and the Evolving Relationship Between Tech Companies and the Press

There was a time when Mark Zuckerberg didn’t regard mainstream media as the enemy,” Steven Levy, a veteran tech journalist, wrote in a column for Wired earlier this year. Levy was referring to an invitation to Zuckerberg’s home in 2018, while he was writing a book about Facebook. That sort of access now feels like something from another era. Zuckerberg has shut out journalists almost entirely, and also expressed open hostility to the industry. On an appearance on Joe Rogan’s podcast in January, during which he talked about discontinuing fact-checking, Zuckerberg dismissed the legitimacy of journalistic outlets, equating them to misinformation. As Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, and many of Silicon Valley’s most influential leaders have fallen in behind President Trump, they’ve replicated his strategy of discrediting sources of reporting that they consider unfavorable.