The Big Read

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Canva CEO Melanie Perkins: “She has a desire for worldwide domination.” AI generated art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

The Unsinkable Melanie Perkins: After 100 Rejections, the Canva CEO Faces Her Greatest Threat Yet

By Annie Goldsmith · Oct 6, 2023 9:00am PDT · 8 comments
In little more than a decade, the expectations placed on 36-year-old Melanie Perkins have gone from negligible to near impossible. Perkins, CEO and co-founder of Canva, a rapidly-growing graphic design platform and one of tech’s most highly valued private companies, was a complete unknown from Perth, Australia, when she appeared on... In little more than a decade, the expectations placed on 36-year-old Melanie Perkins have gone...
Two children of San Francisco from opposite sides of the tracks: Mayor London Breed and philanthropist Daniel Lurie. Art by Clark Miller; Breed photo by Getty Images.
The Big Read

Daniel Lurie Started Tech’s Favorite Charity. Can He Save Its Favorite City?

By Jon Steinberg · Sep 29, 2023 10:00am PDT · 11 comments
At 11 a.m. last Tuesday, a San Francisco icon stepped up to the podium at the century-old Potrero Hill Neighborhood House. With the Financial District’s half-vacant towers gleaming in the distance and the golden September sun streaming through the windows, the venue seemed stage-designed for a biopic: the room where a political star... At 11 a.m. last Tuesday, a San Francisco icon stepped up to the podium at the century-old Potrero...
Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

Europe Has Figured Out How to Tame Big Tech. Can the U.S. Learn Its Tricks?

By Chris Stokel-Walker · Sep 22, 2023 11:00am PDT · 23 comments
Late last month in Belgium, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) had a pressing question for Paul Tang, a Dutch politician and member of the European Parliament. How had they done it, she asked him. How had the EU managed to bring big tech to heel? The liberal Massachusetts senator, alongside Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), had stopped off in... Late last month in Belgium, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) had a pressing question for Paul...
Gigafund co-founders Luke Nosek and Stephen Oskoui. Art by Clark Miller; Oskoui photo courtesy Gigafund.
The Elon Musk Investors With Dreams of a New Social Order
By Julia Black · Sep 15, 2023 9:31am PDT · 5 comments
Gigafund co-founders Luke Nosek and Stephen Oskoui. Art by Clark Miller; Oskoui photo courtesy Gigafund.
The Big Read

The Elon Musk Investors With Dreams of a New Social Order

By Julia Black · Sep 15, 2023 9:31am PDT · 5 comments
In February 2021, a Mormon film producer named Jeffrey Harmon returned home to Provo, Utah, raving about an exclusive gathering he’d just attended in Austin, Tex. He’d been invited by an old friend, Stephen Oskoui, who ran Austin-based venture capital firm Gigafund alongside Luke Nosek, a founding partner of Founders Fund and a... In February 2021, a Mormon film producer named Jeffrey Harmon returned home to Provo, Utah,...
Art by Clark Miller.
The Big Read

The Instant Oral History of ‘Trench Foot Burning Man’

By Annie Goldsmith, Margaux MacColl, Natasha Mascarenhas, Akash Pasricha and Erin Woo · Sep 8, 2023 11:00am PDT · 1 comment
Burning Man 2023 began on Sunday, August 27, as it normally does: with several days of blistering sunshine, pounding bass and playa dust. Then, between Friday and Saturday, a surprise deluge hit northwest Nevada—dumping two months’ worth of rain in 24 hours—and things really began to get interesting. Justin Kan, general partner... Burning Man 2023 began on Sunday, August 27, as it normally does: with several days of blistering...
Midjourney CEO David Holz has bucked the tide among AI founders by boxing out venture capitalists. Midjourney art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

‘He Doesn’t Need VC in His Life’: How Midjourney’s Founder Built an AI Winner While Rejecting Venture Capital

By Kate Clark · Sep 5, 2023 6:15am PDT · 6 comments
Ever since David Holz founded Midjourney in mid-2021, venture capitalists have been practically begging him to take their money. On top of cold-calling and emailing Holz incessantly, some have asked his inner circle for “warm” introductions. Others have preemptively sent him term sheets. A lucky few have landed meetings with the... Ever since David Holz founded Midjourney in mid-2021, venture capitalists have been practically...
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo engaged in a high-wire act of diplomacy during her four-day trip to China. Photo of Raimondo via Getty Images. Collage by Clark Miller.
The Big Read

‘Excited and Terrified’: On a High-Stakes Trip to China, Gina Raimondo Confronts a Complex Future

By Jessica E. Lessin · Sep 2, 2023 6:00am PDT · 15 comments
A former ambulance driver was whizzing me through the rainy streets of Shanghai to meet an eight-car motorcade and—hopefully—U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. She’d been a hard person to wrangle during her three-day diplomatic trip to China, and I had been given the smallest of windows for a face-to-face interview: just 15... A former ambulance driver was whizzing me through the rainy streets of Shanghai to meet an...
Art by Clark Miller.
‘Don’t Put Your Head in the Sand’: Stars Are Quietly Inking Deals to License Their AI Doubles
By Julia Black · Aug 18, 2023 9:00am PDT · 2 comments
Art by Clark Miller.
The Big Read

‘Don’t Put Your Head in the Sand’: Stars Are Quietly Inking Deals to License Their AI Doubles

By Julia Black · Aug 18, 2023 9:00am PDT · 2 comments
In 2008, while working with Will Smith on the set of a film that never ended up getting made, Remington Scott had an epiphany. The visual effects director was watching Smith stand in a photogrammetry booth, with dozens of cameras capturing the actor’s facial features from every possible angle. “Every single major star on that level,... In 2008, while working with Will Smith on the set of a film that never ended up getting made,...
After presiding over the largest cutbacks in company history, Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat made it clear to CEO Sundar Pichai last February that she was ready for change. Photos Getty
The Big Read

Is Ruth Porat’s New Job at Alphabet a Coronation or a Last Dance?

By Anita Raghavan · Aug 12, 2023 6:00am PDT · 6 comments
In February, after Alphabet had put the finishing touches on the technology giant’s 2023 plan, CEO Sundar Pichai and Chief Financial Officer Ruth Porat sat down to brainstorm about the future of the organization and its people. One of the people the two discussed was Porat herself, according to sources familiar with the conversation. The... In February, after Alphabet had put the finishing touches on the technology giant’s 2023...
Andreessen Horowitz general partner Katherine Boyle wants "American dynamism" on the lips of both lawmakers and founders. Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

American Dynamo: An ‘Iconic’ Andreessen Horowitz Investor Is Turning Heads in Defense Tech

By Margaux MacColl · Aug 11, 2023 9:00am PDT · 3 comments
On November 16, 2022, Silicon Valley came to Washington—specifically, to the airy, upscale Italian restaurant Piccolina da Centrolina, where the evening’s co-host, Andreessen Horowitz general partner Katherine Boyle, was waiting. It was the night before Andreessen’s American Dynamism summit, and Boyle had helped convene around... On November 16, 2022, Silicon Valley came to Washington—specifically, to the airy, upscale...
Federal Trade Commission chair Lina Khan has recently turned regulators' attention to the deceptive use of "dark patterns" by tech companies. Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

Lina vs. the Dark Arts: The FTC Wants Big Tech to Know It’s Watching

By Nancy Scola · Aug 4, 2023 9:00am PDT · 7 comments
Lina Khan was hauled before the House Judiciary Committee one morning in mid-July to discuss a favorite Republican topic of the moment: the 34-year-old chair’s supposed mishandling of the Federal Trade Commission and its $430 million budget. Seated at the sprawling witness table next to a bevy of Deer Park water bottles—a sign of the... Lina Khan was hauled before the House Judiciary Committee one morning in mid-July to discuss a...
Art by Clark Miller
How Blind Became the App Silicon Valley Bosses Love to Hate
By Paris Martineau · Jul 28, 2023 6:00am PDT · 16 comments
Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

How Blind Became the App Silicon Valley Bosses Love to Hate

By Paris Martineau · Jul 28, 2023 6:00am PDT · 16 comments
Alex Shin was pretty sure he’d just screwed up the deal. It was early 2021, and Shin was pitching a couple of investors from the venture capital arm of Cisco Systems on the idea of investing in Blind—an app used by millions of workers at tech companies and employers to anonymously gossip about compensation, the horrors of dating in... Alex Shin was pretty sure he’d just screwed up the deal. It was early 2021, and Shin was...
Stripe president and co-founder John Collison, as imagined in front of his Abbey Leix estate in the Irish midlands. Photo-illustration by Clark Miller
The Big Read

John Collison’s Land Grab: A Stripe Co-Founder Grows in Power

By Cory Weinberg · Jul 21, 2023 9:00am PDT · 11 comments
Visitors to the Abbey Leix estate in County Laois, Ireland, must drive on an unkempt gravel road that leads through a thick forest and past a derelict corn mill to get to the giant old house in the country’s midlands. Stephen Kinsella, an Irish economist, made the journey last May at the invitation of a friend who had recently purchased... Visitors to the Abbey Leix estate in County Laois, Ireland, must drive on an unkempt gravel road...
Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

Google’s Darkest Days: After Three Deaths, a Workforce Reckons with a Changed Company

By Becky Peterson · Jul 14, 2023 8:21am PDT · 22 comments
For Google employees, the news was a devastating turn in an already disorienting year. In May, a 31-year-old senior engineer at the company, later identified by police as Kevin Rawlings, died at Google’s New York office late at night in an apparent suicide. Rawlings’ death followed that of another Google employee in New York, a... For Google employees, the news was a devastating turn in an already disorienting year. In...
Daniel De Freitas and Noam Shazeer were AI pioneers at Google before leaving to start Character.AI. Midjourney-generated art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

‘Sometimes, It Feels Real’: Character.AI Gives Humans the Chatbots They Desire

By Jon Victor · Jul 7, 2023 9:00am PDT · 5 comments
One Saturday morning earlier this year, Noam Shazeer, CEO of Character.AI and one of the world’s foremost machine-learning researchers, looked out his window to see a stranger perched on a folding chair outside his home in Palo Alto, Calif. The man had come to Shazeer’s quiet residential street to deliver a message that had been... One Saturday morning earlier this year, Noam Shazeer, CEO of Character.AI and one of the...
Art by Clark Miller
Rishi and the VCs: London Is Calling, and Silicon Valley Is Happy to Answer
By Chris Stokel-Walker · Jun 30, 2023 9:00am PDT · 3 comments
Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

Rishi and the VCs: London Is Calling, and Silicon Valley Is Happy to Answer

By Chris Stokel-Walker · Jun 30, 2023 9:00am PDT · 3 comments
It was the worst-kept secret in U.K. tech. For months, the Conservative government of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak had been wooing Sam Altman’s OpenAI, trying to coax the San Francisco–based artificial intelligence firm into opening its first non-U.S. office in London. Then, in early June, two weeks after Altman met with Sunak in his... It was the worst-kept secret in U.K. tech. For months, the Conservative government of Prime...
Adobe chief strategy officer Scott Belsky. Photo-illustration by Clark Miller, using Adobe Firefly.
The Big Read

Can Adobe Catch the AI Bug?

By Margaux MacColl · Jun 23, 2023 9:00am PDT · 1 comment
Six months ago, Adobe’s chief strategy officer, Scott Belsky, was in a New York conference room with around two dozen top marketing executives. They had gathered to discuss how artificial intelligence could transform advertising, allowing them to turn a string of words into a visual ad. At first, Belsky thought they were on the same page... Six months ago, Adobe’s chief strategy officer, Scott Belsky, was in a New York conference...
CEO Dan Clancy in the livestreaming studio at Twitch's San Francisco headquarters. Photograph by Carolyn Fong for The Information
The Big Read

Twitch’s New CEO Tries to Strike the Right Chords

By Annie Goldsmith · Jun 16, 2023 9:00am PDT · 1 comment
I will start with John Denver,” said Dan Clancy. “There’s one note that’s kind of high, so I mangle it a little. But that’s OK. Part of doing this is being comfortable mangling a note or two.” Clancy, CEO of the $45 billion livestreaming platform Twitch, then launched into an emphatic keyboard rendition of... I will start with John Denver,” said Dan Clancy. “There’s one note that’s...
Art by Clark Miller.
The Big Read

The Overlapping Galaxies of Delian Asparouhov

By Margaux MacColl · Jun 9, 2023 9:00am PDT · 2 comments
Delian Asparouhov, newly minted Founders Fund partner and co-founder of Varda Space Industries, is obsessed with speed. As a hobby, he’s getting his pilot’s license, hoping to eventually fly a fighter jet. On the ground, he prefers to listen to audiobooks at triple the normal tempo. And when he started Varda in late 2020, he set a... Delian Asparouhov, newly minted Founders Fund partner and co-founder of Varda Space Industries,...
Art by Clark Miller
The Master of Destruction Rides Again
By Michelle Celarier · May 26, 2023 9:00am PDT · 10 comments
Art by Clark Miller
The Big Read

The Master of Destruction Rides Again

By Michelle Celarier · May 26, 2023 9:00am PDT · 10 comments
In the spring of 2022, the irascible Wall Street short seller Marc Cohodes was in a particularly foul mood. The 62-year-old’s second marriage was on the rocks. He was recuperating from shoulder surgery after his horse rammed him. He couldn’t do much of anything besides fume and tweet about the financial markets. On April 29,... In the spring of 2022, the irascible Wall Street short seller Marc Cohodes was in a particularly...