Strictly Q&A

5 Questions: Talal Ansari and "Welcome to America: Now Spy on Your Friends"

5 Questions: Talal Ansari and “Welcome to America: Now Spy on Your Friends”

"I think it opened the eyes of people who are so far removed from this kind of world," the BuzzFeed News writer says of his piece about FBI agents pressuring…
5(ish) Questions: Dana Priest and the "terrorism industrial complex" post 9/11

5(ish) Questions: Dana Priest and the “terrorism industrial complex” post 9/11

The investigative journalist and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner reflects on 30 years at The Washington Post and navigating national security concerns
5(ish) Questions: Phoebe Zerwick and "The Last Days of Darryl Hunt"

5(ish) Questions: Phoebe Zerwick and “The Last Days of Darryl Hunt”

The writer talks about how her reporting on a wrongfully convicted man changed his life -- and how she had to write the ending, however unhappy
5(ish) Questions: Josh O'Kane and "The Ballad of Fogarty's Cove"

5(ish) Questions: Josh O’Kane and “The Ballad of Fogarty’s Cove”

The Globe and Mail reporter talks about his Nova Scotia story exploring the love of a place, and the sorrow over leaving when it cannot sustain you
5(ish) Questions: Legendary editor Gene Roberts reflects on a lifetime in journalism

5(ish) Questions: Legendary editor Gene Roberts reflects on a lifetime in journalism

As filmmakers seek funding for a documentary about the newsman who transformed The Philadelphia Inquirer in the 1970s and '80s, he talks about how his reporters zigged instead of zagged…
5(ish) Questions: Nathan Thornburgh talks mind-blowing drugs and Anthony Bourdain

5(ish) Questions: Nathan Thornburgh talks mind-blowing drugs and Anthony Bourdain

The co-founder of the unapologetically longform travel-food-politics site Roads & Kingdoms talks about teaming up with the chef-raconteur and reporting while under the influence of the hallucinogen ayahuasca
5 Questions: Anne Helen Petersen and the white supremacists who came for Whitefish

5 Questions: Anne Helen Petersen and the white supremacists who came for Whitefish

The BuzzFeed writer talks about the contradictions of a small Montana town and the West, and why she seeks understanding, not empathy
5(ish) Questions: David Grann and "Killers of the Flower Moon"

5(ish) Questions: David Grann and “Killers of the Flower Moon”

The author and New Yorker writer talks about his book on a sinister campaign against Osage Indians who had become fabulously wealthy from oil -- and what the murders, and…
5(ish) Questions: Iran’s "Blogfather" talks algorithms, hyperlinks and the lost art of communication

5(ish) Questions: Iran’s “Blogfather” talks algorithms, hyperlinks and the lost art of communication

Hossein Derakhshan spent six years in an Iranian prison cell; when he came out, the online world had changed -- for the worse, he believes
5(ish) Questions: Rania Abouzeid and "The Jihad Next Door"

5(ish) Questions: Rania Abouzeid and “The Jihad Next Door”

The Beirut-based writer talks about the dangers of reporting her Politico piece on extremists in Iraq and Syria, and why on-the-ground reporting is vital