Dwarkesh Patel
AI BOSSES, NO SHORT ANSWERS
THE DEAL
Dwarkesh Patel started cold-emailing economists as a bored UT Austin student during COVID, before the podcast even had a name.
AT A GLANCE
- EDUCATION
- University of Texas at Austin · Computer science · graduated December 2021Mercury
THE ARCHIVE
History · cartoons · headlines
THE TIMELINE9 sourced events
A $10,000 LISTENER GRANT AND TWO YEARS OF ALMOST QUITTING
Patel was a bored UT Austin student cold-emailing economists during COVID when the podcast started — before it even had a name. A listener's $10,000 grant kept it alive, Bezos gave it a jolt, and two years of nearly quitting later, obsessive preparation and the AI boom turned it into the scaling era's front-row record.
2020
HE BOOKS THE FIRST GUEST BEFORE THE PODCAST HAS A NAME
During COVID at UT Austin, Patel was bored, reading Bryan Caplan's The Case Against Education, and cold-emailed him. Caplan agreed to an interview before Patel even had a name for the show, became the first guest, and then recommended the podcast to Tyler Cowen.
SOURCES: Mercuryreported
Dec 2021
A LISTENER BUYS THE PODCAST SIX MORE MONTHS
Patel graduated from UT Austin in December 2021 with a computer-science degree and no job lined up. Around graduation, Anil Varanasi, one of only a few hundred listeners, asked what six months of full-time podcasting would cost; Patel said $10,000, and Varanasi funded the experiment.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-partyMercuryreported
2022
BEZOS TELLS HIM TO KEEP GOING
A couple of months after the first grant, Patel says a blog post drew public praise from Jeff Bezos. The attention bought the still-small show more time in Patel's own mind, even though he was still planning to wind it down and start a company.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-partyMercuryreported
2022 – 2024
FOR TWO YEARS, HE KEEPS ALMOST QUITTING
Patel says he spent roughly two years expecting to shut the podcast down, moved to San Francisco, and even hacked on basic GPT-wrapper demos. One more interview kept becoming another reason not to quit.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-party
2023
THE PODCAST MOVES INTO FRONTIER AI
Patel interviewed Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei about scaling, AGI, large models and the economics and safety questions surrounding frontier systems.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-party
Apr 18, 2024
ZUCKERBERG SITS FOR THE LONG VERSION
Patel interviewed Mark Zuckerberg about Llama 3, open models, energy constraints, AGI and the economics of ever-larger systems.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-party
Mar 25, 2025
THE INTERVIEWS BECOME A BOOK
Patel released The Scaling Era: An Oral History of AI, 2019-2025, organizing highlights from conversations with scientists, CEOs, economists and philosophers into a historical record of the boom.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-party
Dec 2025
HE DEFINES THE SHOW AS A RECORD OF THE REVOLUTION
Patel wrote that his goal was for the important debates of the coming technological transformation to happen on the podcast and to happen well.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-party
Feb 13, 2026
THE FRONTIER LABS KEEP COMING BACK
Patel hosted Amodei again for a detailed discussion of scaling, compute, economics, regulation and U.S.-China competition as the podcast continued functioning as an industry record.
SOURCES: Dwarkesh Patelfirst-party
MORE CARTOONS1 original cartoons