In April 2004, a couple of Harvard undergraduate roommates took a walk in the pouring rain around the university campus. They were two of the three co-founders of an internet company that had launched a couple of months earlier — a social network start-up that we now know as Facebook. One of the young men, a history student called Chris Hughes, was making his case to the other, a… Read More
11
Mar
2018
Facebook co-founder says its rise reveals the fault lines destroying the “American Dream”
In April 2004, a couple of Harvard undergraduate roommates took a walk in the pouring rain around the university campus. They were two of the three co-founders of an internet company that had launched a couple of months earlier — a social network start-up that we now know as Facebook. One of the young men, a history student called Chris Hughes, was making his case to the other, a… Read More
The educational backgrounds of VC investment professionals are in some ways surprisingly diverse, even if the population of investors generally isn’t. Still, there are some definite trends to suss out at all levels of the educational continuum, and that’s what we’re going to do today. 
The Midwest is back! At least, that’s the conclusion from a group of venture capitalists who went on a multi-day bus tour through the region recently. As Kevin Roose wrote in the New York Times this week, “The trip, which took place on a luxury bus outfitted with a supply of vegan doughnuts and coal-infused kombucha, was known as the ‘Comeback Cities Tour.’”… 
This week on CTRL+T, we talk MoviePass’s tracking drama and the way the local world works – media-style. We’re joined in the studio by Eric Eldon, co-founder and editor-in-chief of Hoodline (and former co-editor of TechCrunch and therefor my former boss). Hoodline is a local news site that covers hoods in San Francisco and Oakland “near you.” As in down the… 
The Gillmor Gang — Frank Radice, Denis Pombriant, Kevin Marks, Keith Teare, and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Saturday, March 10, 2018. G3: Fear Factory — Mary Hodder, Elisa Camehort Page, Halley Suitt Tucker, Maria Ogneva, and Tina Chase Gillmor. Recorded live Thursday, March 8, 2018. @stevegillmor, @kevinmarks, @kteare, @DenisPombriant, @fradice Produced and directed by Tina… 
Elon Musk, co-founder of Tesla and founder of SpaceX, made a surprise appearance on the Westworld panel at SXSW. After getting cued up by Jonathan Nolan, the co-creator of HBO series Westworld, Musk walked out on stage to people cheering and one person screaming, “Elon, we love you!” During his stage time, he spoke about the excitement of space travel, sending a Tesla into a… 
We were pretty skeptical about Everything Sucks!, a Netflix high school comedy set in the 1990s, which seemed to promise nostalgia, nostalgia and more nostalgia. The opening minutes of the premiere seemed to confirm those fears, as obvious ’90s references seemed to pile up one after another. But then the show kept going, and we found ourselves pulled into the story of Luke O’Neil… 
Rent the Runway has snagged a $20 million investment from Alibaba CEO Jack Ma and Joe Tsai via Blue Pool Capital, Recode first reported. Blue Pool Capital is a multibillion-dollar fund that invests in public and private equity on behalf people like Ma and Tsai. The round reportedly values Rent the Runway at about $800 million. Rent the Runway’s previous investment came in back in 2016,… 
GV partner Lo Toney is looking to raise up to $50 million for his new fund, Plexo Capital, Axios first reported. Since 2017, Toney has been incubating Plexo Capital inside GV, formerly known as Google Ventures. The idea with Plexo Capital, which is backed by Alphabet, is to invest as a limited partner in seed funds led by people of color and/or female general partners, Toney said in an…