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Lyt når som helst, hvor som helst 

The Conversation

A show for curious minds, from The Conversation. Each week, host Gemma Ware speaks to an academic expert about a topic in the news to understand how we got here.

The Conversation Weekly

It’s the middle of the night in April 2023 in the East China Sea.

A North Korean-linked oil tanker sailing under another country’s flag suddenly goes dark. It stops transmitting its location and simply vanishes from the map.

Ten days later, the New Konk reappears on global tracking screens. It’s signal places it off the coast of southern China.

Except it’s not. It’s actually in a bay hundreds of kilometres away.

Commonly known as a “shadow fleet”, the New Konk is part of a clandestine network of vessels which are used to evade international sanctions.

See pictures of the ship and track its journey in a visual feature Justin Hastings and his team have written for us here.

This episode was written and produced by Isabella Podwinsk and Justin Bergman. Sound mixing is by Lloyd Barrett and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Ashlynne McGhee is our Head of Editorial Innovation and Misha Ketchell and Stephen Khan are our editors in chief. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Inside the booming ‘shadow fleet’ industry keeping rogue states afloat

It was 1967, and country musician Porter Wagoner was introducing a guest on his weekly TV show.

The camera cuts to a woman with big, blonde beehive, wearing a magenta mini dress with the same shade of lipstick to match. It was in that moment a star was born.

Her name was Dolly Parton. In the following decades after that performance, Parton went on to become the “Queen of Country”.

In this week's bonus episode of The Conversation Weekly, musicologist and Professor of Music at Hamilton College Lydia Hamessley explains the music that made Dolly Parton a global superstar.

If you're after more stories about the life and legacy of Dolly Parton, read them here.

This episode was written by Gemma Ware. Isabella Podwinski was the executive producer. Sound mixing is by Eloise Stevens and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Ashlynne McGhee is our Head of Editorial Innovation and Misha Ketchell and Stephen Khan are our editors in chief. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

The music that made Dolly Parton a global icon

In recent weeks, Ukrainian drones have targeted large warehouses across Russia, destroying millions of dollars of merchandise stored inside them.

These warehouses and logistics hubs belong to Wildberries, the Russian equivalent to Amazon. They're also taking aim at Ozon, Russia's second largest online retailer too.

Ukraine says it’s targeting these companies because they’ve been providing supplies to soldiers on the front line.

But as the war drags on well into its fourth year, is there anything that could put pressure on Putin to withdraw troops from Ukraine?

Read more from Matthew Sussex here. 

This episode was written and produced by Isabella Podwinski and Justin Bergman. Sound mixing is by Lloyd Barrett and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Ashlynne McGhee is our Head of Editorial Innovation and Misha Ketchell and Stephen Khan are our editors in chief. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Mentioned in this episode:

The Making of an Autocrat

Search "The Conversation Weekly" for our new series: The Making of an Autocrat.
Is America watching its democracy unravel in real time? In The Making of an Autocrat from The Conversation, six of the world’s pre-eminant scholars reveal the recipe for authoritarian rule. From capturing a party, to controlling the military, Donald Trump is borrowing from the playbook of strongmen thoughout history. This is the story of how democracies falter — and what might happen next.

How Ukraine is bringing the war home to Russia

🔁 Rerun: originally published 12/12/25. We're revisiting this episode as we take a quick break but we'll be back next week with a new instalment of The Conversation Weekly. 

Oecusse, a rugged, remote district of Timor-Leste in south-east Asia, is usually a pretty sleepy place. But in August, Oecusse was rocked by a large police raid on a suspected scam centre, later linked by a UN report to organised crime networks running scamming operations across south-east Asia.

And then in early September, a Facebook post by one of Timor-Leste’s highest political officials made some explosive allegations about a murky criminal underworld trying to get a foothold in the country.

In this episode, we speak to Michael Rose, an anthropologist and adjunct lecturer at the University of Adelaide who has lived and worked in Timor-Leste, about how Asia’s scamming gangs set their sights on Timor-Leste as their next frontier – and the movement to keep them out.

This episode was written and produced by Katie Flood and Gemma Ware with assistance from Mend Mariwany. Mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Gemma Ware is the executive producer. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

How Timor-Leste is fighting back against Asia’s scamming gangs

It's pretty grim when your main political opponent is a man with a bin for a head.

That's the situation that's faced Nigel Farage in the Clacton byelection in the UK.

Count Binface has pledged to nationalise the singer Adele, cap the price of ice creams and build at least one affordable house. 

It might sound surreal, but the count isn’t the first satirical candidate in election history. 

Historian Richard Toye argues we should take them seriously. You can read his analysis on our website. 

This episode was written and produced by Isabella Podwinski, Justin Bergman and Ashlynne McGhee. Sound mixing is by Michelle Macklem and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Ashlynne McGhee is our Head of Editorial Innovation and Misha Ketchell and Stephen Khan are our editors in chief. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Loonies and bins: Britain's long love affair with novelty politics

Balázs Bödö's first interaction with a shadow library was when, as a young professor at university in Budapest, he was faced with a dilemma: what should he teach his students? 

"Do I condemn my students to a second rate education and a second rate degree in the European Union? Or do I pirate the books and give them the education that they deserve?"

This episode was written and produced by Gemma Ware and Mend Mariwany. Sound mixing is by Michelle Macklem and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Ashlynne McGhee is our Head of Editorial Innovation and Misha Ketchell and Stephen Khan are our editors in chief. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Mentioned in this episode:

The Making of an Autocrat

Search "The Conversation Weekly" for our new series: The Making of an Autocrat.
Is America watching its democracy unravel in real time? In The Making of an Autocrat from The Conversation, six of the world’s pre-eminant scholars reveal the recipe for authoritarian rule. From capturing a party, to controlling the military, Donald Trump is borrowing from the playbook of strongmen thoughout history. This is the story of how democracies falter — and what might happen next.

The soviet origins of shadow libraries

Timothy Piatkowki was scrolling when a targeted ad landed in his feed. Cheap peptides! Straight from the factory! Naturally, he started a chat with the dealer and found himself deep in the world of a thriving grey market.

The more he found out, the less he realised we know about what’s really in these tiny drug vials being shipped around the world.

You can see screen grabs of Tim’s exchanges with the peptide seller in a fascinating visual story he’s written for us about the experience. Read it here. 

This episode was written and produced by Isabella Podwinski. Sound mixing is by Michelle Macklem and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. Ashlynne McGhee is our Head of Editorial Innovation and Misha Ketchell and Stephen Khan are our editors in chief. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

A window into the murky world of peptides

With growing evidence about concussion, repetitive head impacts and long-term brain disease, have we underestimated the risks of sport all along? How did we get here, what do we really know about head injuries and given the risks, is it time to rethink children’s participation in sport?

In this episode, we chat to Alan Pearce, a neuroscientist and Adjunct Professor at Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne who has been researching sports-related concussions for more than two decades.

This episode was written and produced by Isabella Podwinski. Mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. You can sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Save our brains: how dangerous is sport?

Three months ago, Andy Burnham’s desk was filled with the business of running Greater Manchester. Buses. Housing. Policing. This mayoral region in the north of England is home to 3 million people and Burnham, a former minister in the Labour governments of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, has been its mayor for nearly a decade.

But after a whirlwind ten weeks, Burnham travelled to Buckingham Palace on July 20 to meet King Charles, who appointed him as Britain’s new prime minister.

At the heart of Burnham’s plans for power lies Manchesterism, a political philosophy that centres on giving cities and towns outside London more political control. In this episode, we explore how running Greater Manchester shaped Andy Burnham’s politics with researchers Kirsty Fairclough from Manchester Metropolitan University and Philip Brown from the University of Huddersfield. They assess what Burnham achieved as mayor and discuss whether a philosophy designed around one city can work on a national level for the UK.

This episode was written and produced by Gemma Ware and Mend Mariwany. Mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Why Andy Burnham’s radical plan relies on the Treasury being a friend of devolutionThis is what Andy Burnham’s devolution plans need to consider – expert panelThis episode is part of a series on Manchesterism – a guide to Burnham's Britain

How Manchester shaped Andy Burnham, the UK's incoming prime minister

When Taylor Swift launched her latest album, The Life of a Showgirl, in October 2025, she recorded two short clips to promote it. One for Amazon Music began with “Hey, it’s Taylor Swift”. Another, for Spotify with “Hey, it’s Taylor”.

These two phrases may sound a little mundane, but they’re now at the frontline of a legal fightback by celebrities like Swift against AI deepfakes. In April, Swift’s intellectual property company, TAS Right Management, applied to the US Patent and Trademark office to trademark them as registered sound marks, along with a photo of her, from her recent Eras tour.

In this episode, we speak to intellectual property expert Graeme Austin, a professor of law at the University of Melbourne and chair of private law at Victoria University of Wellington to understand why Swift took this route, and the different ways celebrities are trying to protect themselves against AI deepfakes. And if you’re not a celebrity with a large legal team, what can you do?

This episode was written and produced by Gemma Ware and Mend Mariwany. Mixing by Michelle Macklem and theme music by Neeta Sarl. Read the full credits for this episode and sign up here for a free daily newsletter from The Conversation.

If you like the show, please consider donating to The Conversation, an independent, not-for-profit news organisation.

Can you own a voice? Taylor Swift’s latest legal move raises big questions for AI and copyrightFrom Taylor Swift to Bollywood, stars turn to the civil courts to fight deepfakesTaylor Swift trademarking her voice and likeness points to a new legal frontier in combating AI deepfakes

How celebrities like Taylor Swift are fighting back against AI deepfakes

Introducing The Conversation Weekly, the world explained by experts. Made by the team at The Conversation. Each week we talk to academics to help unpack the context behind the headlines – and hear from scholars carrying out brand new research about how the world works. Hosted by Gemma Ware in London and Dan Merino in San Francisco. 

Produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware, with sound design by Eloise Stevens and music by Neeta Sarl.

Trailer: The Conversation Weekly

Lyt når som helst, hvor som helst

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