Trust Me, I'm Lying cover art

Trust Me, I'm Lying

Confessions of a Media Manipulator

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Trust Me, I'm Lying

By: Ryan Holiday
Narrated by: Ryan Holiday
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About this listen

 You've seen it all before. A malicious online rumor costs a company millions. A political sideshow derails the national news cycle and destroys a candidate. Some product or celebrity zooms from total obscurity to viral sensation. What you don't know is that someone is responsible for all this. Usually, someone like me.

I'm a media manipulator. In a world where blogs control and distort the news, my job is to control blogs-as much as any one person can.

In today's culture...
1) Blogs like Gawker, Buzzfeed and the Huffington Post drive the media agenda.
2) Bloggers are slaves to money, technology, and deadlines.
3) Manipulators wield these levers to shape everything you read, see and watch-online and off.

Why am I giving away these secrets? Because I'm tired of a world where blogs take indirect bribes, marketers help write the news, reckless journalists spread lies, and no one is accountable for any of it. I'm pulling back the curtain because I don't want anyone else to get blindsided.

I'm going to explain exactly how the media really works. What you choose to do with this information is up to you. Blogs & Blogging Content Creation & Social Media Marketing Marketing & Sales Media Studies Social Media Social Sciences Technology Public Relation Business

Critic Reviews

"Ryan Holiday is part Machiavelli, part Ogilvy, and all results…this whiz kid is the secret weapon you've never heard of."
—Tim Ferriss, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The 4-Hour Workweek

“A playbook for the dark arts of exploiting the media”
—Robert Greene, author of The 48 Laws of Power

"This book will make online media giants very, very uncomfortable. "
— Drew Curtis, founder, Fark.com

“Ryan Holiday's brilliant exposé of the unreality of the Internet should be required reading for every thinker in America.”
— Edward Jay Epstein, author of The Big Picture”


“The strategies Ryan created to exploit blogs drove sales of millions of my books and made me an internationally known name.” —Tucker Max, #1 New York Times bestselling author of I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
“Ryan has a truly unique perspective on the seedy underbelly of digital culture.”
—Matt Mason, Director of Marketing, BitTorrent

“Behind my reputation as marketing genius there is Ryan Holiday, whom I consult often and has done more for my business than just about anyone.”
—Dov Charney, CEO and founder, American Apparel

"...an astonishing, disturbing book"

—Financial Times


“In the world of the internet celebrity, Ryan Holiday is the smart and handsome type, like the Arthur Miller to the girl who uploads YouTube videos of herself naked and eating ice cream.”
—Ladygunn Magazine
"This is a dark book with an important warning to clients and PR people alike."

—Richard Edelman

"[Like] Upton Sinclair on the blogosphere."

—Tyler Cowen, MarginalRevolution.com
All stars
Most relevant
A series of seemingly insurmountable problems. Holiday dissects the changing pressures on the media that have led us to the state we're in today, where there's no such thing as agreement on the facts and every piece of media seems to be more spin than substance.

Incredibly depressing

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It's an incredibly in depth look at the world of news. What we believe news is and how it's manipulated. How people are lifted to superstardom while others are crucified by an endless stream of opportunistic bloggers bent on getting paid to produce baseless factless and poorly if any research. Don't be manipulated cajoled into a narrative it's mostly fictitious and if you think your safe from it by only reading "creditable" sources whatever they are there's a good chance in the race to be first to release the big one or provide additional breaking news that your might and probably are watching or reading crap. Presented by a talking head who knows enough to sit on TV and give 23 seconds of confirmation.

Very interesting

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Loved the story, a bit shocking to confirm most of what I suspected and realising I was only scratching the surface.

Mixed Feelings

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Narration was fine but I could not finish this book as I found the content very repetitive. The information conveyed could have been done so in far fewer words. I didn't learn a whole lot from this book so found it disappointing.

Content was repetitive and struggled to finish it

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