Show Notes
White noise has a very precise technical definition, but people use the term loosely, to describe all sorts of washes of sound—synthetic hums, or natural sounds like a rainstorm or crashing waves—that can be used to mask other sounds. Twenty years ago, if you’d told someone white noise was a regular part of your life, they would have found that unusual. Nowadays, it’s likely they use it themselves or know someone who does. The global white noise business is valued at $1.3 billion; TikTok is full of people trumpeting its powers; and Spotify users alone listen to three million hours of it daily. Far more of these sounds already exist than any one person could need—or use. And yet, more keep coming. Looking out at this uncanny ocean of seemingly indistinguishable noises, we wanted to see if it was possible to put a human face on it; to understand why there is so much of it, and what motivates the people trying to soothe our desperate ears with sounds you're not really supposed to hear. In this episode, you’ll hear from Elan Ullendorff, who writes the illuminating Substack Escape the Algorithm; Stéphane Pigeon, founder of myNoise; Brandon Reed, who runs Dwellspring; and Mack Hagood, author of Hush: Media and Sonic Self-Control and host of the podcast Phantom Power. We’d also like to thank Dan Berlau, Sarah Anderson, and Ashley Carman. This episode was written by Katie Shepherd, Evan Chung, and Willa Paskin. It was produced by Katie Shepherd. We produce Decoder Ring with Max Freedman, and Evan is also our supervising producer. Merritt Jacob is Senior Technical Director. If you have any cultural mysteries you want us to decode, please email us at [email protected], or leave a message on our hotline at 347-460-7281. Sources for This Episode Anderson, Sarah. The Lost Art of Silence: Reconnecting to the Power and Beauty of Quiet, Shambhala Publications, 2023. Blum, Dani. “Can Brown Noise Turn Off Your Brain?” New York Times, Sep. 23, 2022. Carman, Ashley. “Spotify Looked to Ban White Noise Podcasts to Become More Profitable,” Bloomberg, Aug. 17, 2023. Carman, Ashley. “Spotify to Cut Back Promotional Spending on White Noise Podcasts,” Bloomberg, Sep. 1, 2023. Hagood, Mack. Hush: Media and Sonic Self-Control, Duke University Press, 2019. Pickens, Thomas A., Sara P. Khan, and Daniel J. Berlau. “White noise as a possible therapeutic option for children with ADHD,” Complementary Therapies in Medicine, Feb. 2019. Riva, Michele Augusto, Vincenzo Cimino, and Stefano Sanchirico. “Gian Lorenzo Bernini’s 17th century white noise machine,” The Lancet Neurology, Oct. 2017.
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More from Decoder Ring
Clowns have existed in various forms for thousands of years. From the big top to Bozo’s TV show, they used to be beloved figures of amusement and delight. What changed and made so many people suspect and fear them? In this episode, originally aired in 2018, Decoder Ring traces the history of clowns and clowning and finds that both the scary clown and the happy clown are over-simplifications that have more in common than it might first appear. This episode was produced and edited by Benjamin Frisch. Decoder Ring is produced by Max Freedman, Alesandra Tejeda, and Evan Chung, our supervising producer. Merritt Jacob is Senior Technical Director. Thank you to Benjamin Radford, Isaac Butler, Jim Bredesen, Andrew Kahn, Aisha Harris, and June Thomas. And special thanks to Daniel Royer for recommending this subject. If you have any cultural mysteries you want us to decode, email us at [email protected] or leave a message on our hotline at (347) 460-7281. Get more of Decoder Ring with Slate Plus! Join for exclusive bonus episodes of Decoder Ring and ad-free listening on all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe from the Decoder Ring show page on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/decoderplus for access wherever you listen. Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Few inspirational phrases are quoted more often than Mahatma Gandhi’s “Be the change you want to see in the world.” It shows up on t-shirts, bumper stickers, even tattooed on people’s bodies. Life coaches, leadership trainers, and American presidents constantly cite it. There is one problem with this quotation, however: Gandhi never said it. And the story of how the “be the change” actually came to be—according to its true originator—is stranger, more intricate, and more astounding than you could ever expect. In this episode, Decoder Ring’s Evan Chung speaks with Arleen Lorrance, the former Brooklyn high school teacher who actually brought “be the change” into the world in the 1970s. The surprising tale she has to tell involves grindhouse cinema, cosmic rays of light, and Vice President Al Gore. You’ll also hear from Diane Kennedy Pike, whose marriage to the controversial Bishop James Pike plays a pivotal and unexpected role in turning the quote into the inescapable maxim it is today. This episode was written and produced by Evan Chung, Decoder Ring’s Supervising Producer. It was edited by Willa Paskin and Max Freedman, who also produce the show. Merritt Jacob is Senior Technical Director. Special thanks to Keith Akers. If you have any cultural mysteries you want us to decode, email us at [email protected] or leave a message on our hotline at (347) 460-7281. Get more of Decoder Ring with Slate Plus! Join for exclusive bonus episodes of Decoder Ring and ad-free listening on all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe from the Decoder Ring show page on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Or, visit slate.com/decoderplus for access wherever you listen. Need to set up your Slate Plus feed? If you subscribed through Slate.com, check out our FAQ at slate.com/podcastfaqs for easy instructions. Members subscribed via Apple Podcasts get automatic access—no setup required. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
One of the many perks of subscribing to Decoder Ring Plus is access to every episode of Decoder Rings Back, our member-exclusive series where host Willa Paskin calls up a listener to answer their question about a cultural mystery directly.
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Podcasts are everywhere. They’re more popular and influential than they’ve ever been. But at the same time, what makes a podcast a “podcast” has never been more confusing.