I’d have to ask why even do the interview at all then. Like I can save everyone involved a lot of time and just imagine the interview if you’re not gonna ask a difficult question.

I assume it is PR. Previously, broadcasters and their journalists held some bargaining power in interviews such that in exchange for being able to access a broad population, the interviewee would be willing to subject themselves to the journalist’s questions.

The internet kind of obviated that role, so now there is no need for an interviewee to subject themselves to questions they do not want, because they can reach everyone they want at no cost by putting up a blog post on their website.

Bingo. Discard this so-called interview as a fluff piece. It provides no signal.

Sometimes the lack of an answer can be just as telling, making it still worth asking even if they won't answer the question directly.

A good interviewer would then ask follow up questions to either get a straight answer or highlight the absence thereof. Unfortunately, much of the mainstream tech "journalism" is just repackaged press releases written by people hoping to get hired by the very same companies that they "report" on. Thence the softball questions and toothless interviews all in an effort to not upset any potential future employers.