Ben Johnson

Former Host, Marketplace Tech and Codebreaker

SHORT BIO

Ben Johnson is the former host of Marketplace Tech and the podcast Codebreaker. He joined Marketplace in 2012 and became the host of Marketplace Tech in early 2014.

Ben started his career in journalism in 2003, working as a features and general assignment reporter for the Day newspaper in New London, Connecticut. While there, he won a regional award for feature writing and was recruited to write a weekly entertainment column for the Tribune Media Service. In 2006, Ben relocated to New York City to be an entertainment and music reporter at the Staten Island Advance newspaper, where he soon moved into hard news, working the cops beat and as a weekend city desk editor.

In 2010, he began to work as a freelance web producer at the Takeaway, a national radio show produced out of New York’s WNYC Radio in partnership with WGBH, The New York Times and the BBC. Ben went on to be a freelance radio producer at WNYC, serving as the digital editor for the Takeaway while also doing live and features reporting for the station on everything from Occupy Wall Street to New York's last functioning ship graveyard. While working at WNYC, Ben started blogging for Slate Magazine's breaking news blog, the Slatest.

In 2012, Ben left WNYC to manage a partnership between Slate and YouTube, producing daily breaking news videos and other content for SlateV, the magazine's video department. He also wrote regularly for Slate's Future Tense blog and drew the extreme ire of his fellow Radiohead fans by asking the band to stop touring.

Ben doesn't like to brag about it, but over the years, he has interviewed Jay Z, Hillary Clinton, Luciano Pavarotti, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, Josh Homme, Biz Stone, Guy Kawasaki, Col. Chris Hadfield, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Neil Young and more. He enjoys and engages in ’80s movie references, plus pie baking and high-fives. His Twitter feed has never been polluted by a subtweet. His interest in swimming knows no bounds, especially if there is a high dive and a high-five involved.

 

Latest Stories (245)

Twitter files for IPO

Sep 13, 2013
The social media company publicly filed its IPO documents today, hoping to raise $1 billion in the largest Silicon Valley IPO since Facebook in 2012.

He's just your normal teenager. Except he's also a cancer researcher.

Sep 9, 2013
Jack Andraka is just a teenager. But he's already made revolutionary innovations in cancer detection.

It takes two to text while driving, according to court

Aug 30, 2013
A surprising ruling on texting while driving.

Shutting down the internet as a weapon?

Aug 29, 2013
Should shutting off the internet be used as a weapon against Syria?

Secret court judge reprimands NSA over privacy breaches

Aug 22, 2013
It might be cold comfort for those worried about government surveillance, but today we learned a federal judge reprimanded the NSA for breaking its own privacy requirements.

MIT Tech Review's new list of top young techies

Aug 22, 2013
This year's list is just out. It's full of game makers, health care hackers, engineers and people hoping to build new energy economies.

Wheel New York: Yelp for wheelchair access

Aug 22, 2013
A new app, Wheel New York, helps people map and review wheelchair accessibility around the big city.

Fighting dyslexia with shrinking screens

Aug 21, 2013
It turns out that reading on a computer screen -- even a tiny one -- might actually help people with dyslexia improve speed and focus.