About 125 University of Michigan and Ann Arbor community members gathered at the Ford School of Public Policy Wednesday afternoon to watch Jeff Lawson and Kara Swisher record a live taping of the podcast “On With Kara Swisher,” which included an audience Q&A session. This event is the second event of Democracy’s Information Dilemma, a three-day symposium hosted by the Public Policy School and the Year of Democracy, Civic Empowerment and Global Engagement.
The event began with an introduction by Jenna Bednar, professor of political science and public policy and Year of Democracy co-chair, sharing the inspiration behind the symposium. She discussed how the abundance of accessible information shapes society.
“We are in a moment right now where, as a society, we have more access to information than we’ve ever had before.” Bednar said. “And given how important information is for us in our democracy, to be informed citizens and to be able to participate, this should be the best of times, and yet it’s not. And that’s the dilemma.”
Bednar then introduced Swisher, an award-winning journalist and podcast host who has covered developments in the technology world since its early stages, and Lawson, owner of The Onion and U-M alum.
Swisher began the podcast by discussing Lawson’s career. Lawson created his first startup — an online notes sharing website — during his time at the University. Though he left the school during his senior year, he came back several years later after selling the company to finish his degree. He then went on to create the cloud communications company Twilio, which he left in 2024.
Swisher then moved to discuss Lawson’s purchase of The Onion in April 2024. Lawson said the publication was in a poor state before his purchase of the app due to worldwide financial struggles and ownership problems.
“To be owned by private equity, whose goal is to extract cash while it is shrinking, it’s just layoff after layoff,” Lawson said. “It was basically on life support. And so (the goal) became saving, which I thought was important because I thought it’s an institution the world needs. … I feel like The Onion and satire and comedy is a way to drill down straight to the truth..”
Lawson described his plan for The Onion as a return to basics, which involved bringing back physical copies of The Onion newspaper, removing ads and focusing more on quality articles. He also explained his goals to resonate with a younger audience by investing into other forms of media.
“Our product is a parody of The New York Times, which young people aren’t reading,” Lawson said. “So we need to develop new properties that will actually centralize the media that young people are consuming. Our other product is the Onion News Network, a parody of CNN, which young people are not watching, right? So we need to develop new properties that will actually centralize the media that young people, especially today, are consuming, and that’s what leads us to info.”
In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Swisher said one of her goals for the podcast taping was to discuss Lawson’s purchase of The Onion.
“The Onion is a really important comedy site on the web,” Swisher said. “It always has been so and I want to know why he bought it. I just want to talk about that, and sort of the current state of entrepreneurship.”
The guests also discussed the result of the recent Wisconsin Supreme Court race and Elon Musk’s role in the election. Despite Musk funding over $25 million worth of advertising, voter messaging and offerings to individual voters in support of Judge Brad Schimel, the judge lost the race against liberal candidate Judge Susan Crawford.
“What I think we’ve shown is that … somebody coming in and trying to buy elections in such a transparent way is a turn off to more people than it is a benefit to the person who’s getting (the money),” Lawson said. “They don’t want to be thought of as pawns that can be bought for a price.”
In an interview with The Daily, Business sophomore Luke Hogan said he attended the event because he was a fan of Swisher and The Onion and enjoyed Lawson’s discussion on motivation.
“I think that connects as a business student and as just a young person growing up, just being okay with failure and taking risks and being innovative,” Hogan said. “I think that was a piercing idea that was just important for everyone here, that it’s the best time to fail.”
Daily News Contributor Carter Carino can be reached at carinoc@umich.edu.
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