Phil Libin is as deeply rooted in the Silicon Valley ethos as you can find. He immigrated to the United States as a child from the Soviet Union and went on to found the once trendy tech word-processing software company Evernote. He took a detour as a venture capitalist at General Catalyst. Now he’s a founder again. He’s the CEO of Mmhmm, a video conferencing company that’s backed by Sequoia Capital, and runs a product studio called All Turtles. Even though he has virtual reality headsets spilling

Katie Benner, Tom Dotan, and Eric Newcomer look back on 2021 in Techmeme headlines for our final episode of Dead Cat for the year. We discuss some of the biggest stories of the year: * In January, Microsoft said Russian hackers accessed some of its source code and the U.S. government pinned the SolarWinds hack on Russians. * In February, Elon Musk drove Clubhouse listeners (and journalists blocked by Marc Andreessen) to YouTube as they tried to listen to the live interview on the platform. It would

MEP EP#310: 2022 New Year Engineering ResolutionsTig Stream Announcement Saturday Jan 15th at 6:00 PM Central Stay tuned for more information New Years Engineering Resolutions Parker Finish the Cat Feeder Unreminder Get the 65’ Checker “Running” Get to 200 lbs Stephen Smaller but more directed action Stretch resolution Be more present Practice more From the MacroFab Engineering Team Run DRC on your designs! We have DRC files for Eagle and Altium Questions

Hosts Tom Dotan and Eric Newcomer speak with longtime Hollywood reporter Richard Rushfield, who launched his newsletter The Ankler in 2017. Rushfield told readers he would be “giving Hollywood the business,” describing his unsparing newsletter as “the newsletter Hollywood loves to hate and hates to love.” Now, Rushfield has broader ambitions. A splashy New York Times piece announced that he’d teamed up with Janice Min, the media executive responsible for reinventing both The Hollywood Reporter and

New York Times reporter Erin Griffith returns to the show to catch us up on what’s been going on with the Elizabeth Holmes trial. To the surprise of many, Holmes took the stand to defend herself. Griffith updates us on her lunch, the politics of queuing outside of the courthouse, and Holmes’ legal strategy. At the 33:40 mark Katie Benner joins hosts Tom Dotan and Eric Newcomer. We talk about Andreessen Horowitz crypto partner Chris Dixon’s anti-media tweets and Bloomberg Businessweek’s story on Marc

Tom Dotan grills me on my trip to Miami during Art Basel. We talk about 500 Global in the shadow of 2017 exposé Dave McClure. We cover a potpourri of topics. I play my best Steven Pinker while Tom harkens back to his days as a digital media reporter. We talk about Max Read’s piece “Is web3 b******t?” and discuss the BuzzFeed public listing. (Ben Smith can finally sell his shares!) There’s even a brief discussion of the latest episode of Succession **spoilers** toward the end of the episode. Get

Covid-19 attacks fat cells, says new study :: Cats and misinformation :: Posting cat videos is now a revolutionary act? :: Democrats now disapproving the vaccine mandate? :: Sarah says the moon landing is fake :: Crazy conspiracy theories :: Bible metaphorically or literally :: An Omicron-specific vaccination card? :: Microchips to show vaccination status :: Mind-reading technology :: Over-reliance on technology :: Show: 2021-12-08 Aria, Nikki.Become a supporter of this podcast:

Covid-19 attacks fat cells, says new study :: Cats and misinformation :: Posting cat videos is now a revolutionary act? :: Democrats now disapproving the vaccine mandate? :: Sarah says the moon landing is fake :: Crazy conspiracy theories :: Bible metaphorically or literally :: An Omicron-specific vaccination card? :: Microchips to show vaccination status :: Mind-reading technology :: Over-reliance on technology :: Show: 2021-12-08 Aria, Nikki.Become a supporter of this podcast:

A quick announcement: I’m integrating the Dead Cat podcast a little more closely with this newsletter. We’ve brought on an audio editor with Substack’s support to professionalize the podcast. Now, you’ll be able to get Dead Cat right in your email. (But you can still listen to the latest episodes on Apple and Spotify.) If you don’t want to receive Dead Cat podcast episodes, you can go to Newcomer.co/account and deselect “Dead Cat.” I hope you’ll listen along.What’s the pitch?It’s a show that gets

Free Talk Live 2021-12-08Covid-19 attacks fat cells, says new study :: Cats and misinformation :: Posting cat videos is now a revolutionary act? :: Democrats now disapproving the vaccine mandate? :: Sarah says the moon landing is fake :: Crazy conspiracy theories :: Bible metaphorically or literally :: An Omicron-specific vaccination card? :: Microchips to show vaccination status :: Mind-reading technology :: Over-reliance on technology :: Show: 2021-12-08 Aria, Nikki.

We talked to former Facebook Chief Security Officer Alex Stamos about what the media got right and wrong about its coverage of Facebook’s influence on the 2016 election. Stamos — who played a key role in bringing information to Robert Mueller about Russian election interference — is someone who is willing to criticize his former employer without letting the media off the hook. Stamos argues that Facebook inadequately addressed misinformation posted onto Facebook’s platform and downplayed its

We break the seal on crypto in this podcast in a long chat with Dispo CEO Daniel Liss about how the technology could transform social media products. He attended the big NFT conference in New York this past week and explained why the optimism in tech has been directed here. The conversation goes into what the crowd was like at the conference, how the consumer companies could embrace crypto as an alternative business model to advertising and whether it makes sense for services to jump aboard the

Recently we hosted a live webcast in association with Genpact, on the use of technology within the reinsurance space and the importance of data. The insightful discussion explored the industry’s current use of technology and ability to adopt new processes, with a view to what this might mean for the future of the reinsurance market as it looks to progress and innovate. Our panellists for the webcast were from Genpact, Swiss Re, Google and Tremor Technologies and they all agreed that the

Yes, we talk about Facebook's metaverse announcement. And yes, Eric takes the techno-optimist point of view while Katie and Tom are completely befuddled why anyone would want to spend their time there. But also, we discuss whether the announcement actually buried all the Facebook paper scandals, why Frances Haugen's turn to release her documents to multiple outlets was a jolting move for any reporter, and how whistleblowers are now just another version of influencer culture. Get full access to

We dive into the wacky, wild and wildly inconsistent world of Peter Thiel with Bloomberg Businessweek editor Max Chafkin. He recently published a book, "The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley's Pursuit of Power" that goes through Thiel's origins in the industry, how he influenced other founders and how his right wing political project is shaping up. Max also makes the case for why Thiel is one of the most influential characters in the formation of the current culture in tech. And Eric, Tom

We're joined by New York Times tech reporter Erin Griffith. She's been on the scene in San Jose covering the fraud trial against Elizabeth Holmes—tech's trial of the century, or at least the decade, or maybe of a generation. We talk about the surprisingly plodding pace of such a high profile trial, what kind of a case the prosecution appears to be building and what will be the broader reckoning for the tech industry. If there will be one at all. Get full access to Newcomer at

Washington Post technology policy reporter Cat Zakrzewski hosts back-to-back conversations on the lessons learned from recent cyberattacks and the role of the private sector in charting a path forward to securing cyberspace.

We discuss Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong's tweets about how the tech press' harsh coverage of CEOs is driving away talent and whether the increasingly critical stories about tech companies is the natural maturity of the industry. We also dive into last year's controversies when national politics spilled into company Slack rooms and whether banning it actually helped improve morale (as Armstrong also claimed). Finally, as top Facebook officials make the media rounds after the whistleblower's testimony

Big Tech wields enormous power in today's global economy, from driving advances in technology to influencing our political and cultural conversations. Should that power be more tightly regulated and if so, how? Cat Zakrzewski, technology policy reporter at The Washington Post, joins us to share her insights. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Katie and Tom interview New York Times media columnist Ben Smith about his piece on the deception at Ozy. This was recorded a few hours before the digital media company announced it was shutting down, following his reporting. We discuss Ozy's appeal to investors, the courting of billionaires, the nature of the fraud, and what to make of the entire cohort of digital media companies the sprang up at the same time.Ben's initial column on