New “Counterspeak” Episode Available Now

A new episode of Counterspeak, the monthly podcast of the American Booksellers for Free Expression (ABFE), is now available for download on BookWeb, Spotify, and iTunes. This installment features an interview with Barry Lynn, executive director of the Open Markets Institute in Washington, D.C., and National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) executive director Chris Finan.

Lynn previously spent 15 years at the New America Foundation researching and writing about monopoly power, and is the author of Cornered: The New Monopoly Capitalism and the Economics of Destruction (Wiley 2010) and End of the Line: The Rise and Coming Fall of the Global Corporation (Doubleday 2005).

Counterspeak is co-hosted by American Booksellers Association Content Director Sydney Jarrard and Director of ABFE, Advocacy, and Public Policy Dave Grogan. The podcast addresses issues pertaining to free expression and the First Amendment.

In this episode, Lynn discusses the mission of the Open Markets Institute to expose and reverse the political and economic effects of the extreme consolidation of power among American companies; the role he thinks big tech and anti-monopoly issues will have in the 2020 election; and the DOJ and FTC’s plan to coordinate antitrust investigations into Facebook, Amazon, Google, and Apple.  

Then, Finan talked about the NCAC’s response to the recent indictment of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange under the Espionage Act, characterizing this action by U.S. federal prosecutors as dangerous to the future of free speech.

Each month, Counterspeak features interviews with experts on the First Amendment and free speech, as well as discussions on relevant current events. A new episode is available on the first Wednesday of the month on BookWeb, Spotify, and iTunes. For more information, check out Counterspeak’s short introductory episode. You can now follow Counterspeak on Twitter or contact the podcast at [email protected].