Interviewers Need to Get Out of the Way - Page 2

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snively

United States1159 Posts

July 24 2013 01:15 GMT

#21

i saw this one interview where the interviewer asked the same question twice

Mothra

United States1448 Posts

July 24 2013 01:38 GMT

#22

I think a good interviewer needs a quick wit and sense of timing as well. Conan O Brian is great at bringing the best out of his guests, and making jokes but still saving face for them (contrast to David Letterman).

wei2coolman

United States60033 Posts

July 24 2013 06:42 GMT

#23

I thought this was a slight dig at Hot_Bid.
5/5 would read again :D

Mordanis

United States893 Posts

July 24 2013 06:56 GMT

#24

Stallman's interview was pretty funnily done. At one point he's making a point about "extreme capitalism" and makes a reference to oil companies. 5 seconds later there's a caption saying "Stallman: fossil fuel companies driving us to diasaster". And then the part where the interviewer says that by having a computer means that you must be hooked on proprietary software, the look on Stallman's face is just priceless. That said, I don't necessarily think there is a problem with an interviewer being active or disagreeing or even speaking over the person they're interviewing. That interviewer simply didn't know what he was talking about and was holding onto his preconceptions despite being told otherwise by one of THE figures of the modern computing experience. Assuming the point of an interview is to directly show the mindset of one person to many, using the interviewer as a foil seems like a reasonable approach.

[]Phase[]

Belgium927 Posts

July 24 2013 09:27 GMT

#25

While I agree for the most part that interviewers' personalities shouldnt get in the way of the interviewee, there are some exceptions, which I feel deserve a mention. I do not agree with the view that it must be always right to let the interviewee be completely on the loose.

As an example I will bring up Maurice de Wilde, a belgian reporter. As examples, to counter the OP, I will use the interview of Leon Degrelle. I will give a brief explanation of what goes on in this interview, because I am not sure there will be english translations available.
A small fragment of the interview, for those who speak either French of Dutch : http://www.vrt.be/tijdslijn/de-nieuwe-orde

In this example I'd like to illustrate how an overwhelming personality of the interviewee can make for a propaganda speech, but how the interviewer can possibly rectify this by 'fighting back' so to speak. The interviewer can also, by using albeit 'sneaky tricks', force the interviewee into a situation where he or she will say more than actually intended, and end up confessing their own guilt, albeit unwillingly.

Degrelle was a collaborator in WWII, that had fled to spain. There had been interviews with Degrelle before, however they would often come over as some kind of propaganda speech : The interviewee would have such an overwhelming personality that his views would be imposed on the interview too much. Maurice however did not allow this, and made sure he got Degrelle to say what he wanted him to say by bringing evidence to the interview he had not mentioned before going into the interview. He brought papers proving Degrelle's wrongdoings. Once Degrelle was in the interview, all of the sudden confronted with said evidence, he had no way of getting out of it anymore.

So, in conclusion : I do not agree that a strong personality is always bad for the interview as a whole. I believe the case I brought up suffices to show that different kinds of interviews exist, and that for each situation, we should pick the right kind of interview. We could say that there are 'soft interviews' and 'hard interviews', both having advantages and disadvantages.
If we want, for example, extraction of information from a person that might not be so willing to share with us the truth, but only wishes to spread his or her own lies, then interviews of the second sort would do us much more good than the kind of interviews you have given as examples in the OP.

Let me just say that the way Maurice did things are frowned upon today. Nonetheless, I believe my point still comes across.

Incze

Romania2058 Posts

July 24 2013 14:51 GMT

#26

I could not listen to the whole first interview. To be honest, I lasted a few minutes before the interviewer just became too annoying. All the "mhm"s every few goddamn seconds are grating to say the least.
I liked the second one way more. She just let him talk and built on what he said previously.

Roe

Canada6002 Posts

July 24 2013 20:28 GMT

#27

Howard Stern is/was actually a great, underrated interviewer.

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