2026-06-12 22:08:00
I've befriended some of the most thoughtful, brilliant, curious, eccentric, and sincere people I've ever met in the tech industry. Many of my dearest friends are former coworkers. I've also encountered the most egocentric, delusional, irritating personalities imaginable in tech.
It is a mixed bag, like anything. But increasingly, the egomaniacs are not only taking center stage at the most influential tier of their respective companies - whether as 'founding engineers' or founders/CEOs/CTOs/ETCs or 'GTM engineers' - but they're also talking about themselves incessantly online.
That is not good for any of us.
This blog is long so here is the short version: the technology industry spent forty years accumulating a very specific kind of trust and mostly had boring motives, which made us appear trustworthy and largely benign. Over the last decade and change, its leadership discovered that this trust could be liquidated and converted into a different asset, attention, at what looked like a great exchange rate. The problem with liquidating an illiquid asset though is that you don't find out the real price until you try to buy it back. The Founder's Fund Mafia video is the most egregious example of this. If there are any founders out there considering doing their own version of the Mafia video, please don't. Instead, focus on publicizing your core nerd values: a love of learning, curiosity, an obsessive interest in your domain, and an admirable humility re: how you present yourself to others and talk about your accomplishments. This will probably catch on slower and be less viral, but it will pay off in the long-run once people 'turn against' tech founders as reality stars, which they eventually will.
Ten years ago, the cultural idea of the technologist was still basically Jobs and Wozniak.
Jobs was flawed and everyone knew it, but it was all par for the course. He was aggressive in his ambition, uncompromising about even the most minute details of his company, and occasionally arrogant (not always, IMO. Sometimes you're just right.)
But people admired him anyway because the products he made worked well and were more tasteful/subtle/beautiful than any consumer electronic that had come before it. When Jobs was cruel, in the public's memory at least, he was cruel about kerning or whatever. The cruelty was bad, but it was presented as if he was cruel for our sake - for the sake of the customer. You could model him as a man who wanted the customer experience and the legacy of his business to be perfect, and that's exactly what we want our CEOs to do.
Then there was Woz, the patron saint of computer science: bashful, generous, humble, averse to the spotlight, and content with having a reasonable amount of wealth but not an absurd, evil-seeming amount of wealth. He gave away early Apple stock to colleagues because he felt weird about having so much and went back to teaching fifth grade. Woz was the proof of concept that you could be at the absolute center of the most important industrial transformation of the century and still not clamor to be famous for it. Instead, you could just do what you loved and make great money and share ideas about what you'd learned.
Together they told this story: the people building your future are, at worst, perfectionist jerks, and at best, gentle obsessives, and in either case their attention is mostly focused on their work, not at 'the world' with its glamorous sins.
Whether this was accurate or not is irrelevant. It is what the public thought. We trusted those people partly because they didn't seem to want our attention. They were nerds with money who mostly just wanted to be left to their projects, and it made sense that they were in charge of our digital experience.
We have strayed pretty far from that.
I'm going to massively simplify the transition from 'helpful, obsessive nerd who makes bank' to 'tech oligarch from hell who people joke is not human' into 3 phases.
Phase one (late 1970s to 2007): the founder as charismatic, mysterious byproduct. Founders appeared in media, but the coverage was mostly centered on what they were building. There was a mythology to them and they'd take photos in their garage surrounded by sparkling machinery, and they'd do keynotes and magazine interviews, but they were always orbiting around their products and companies vs. boastfully putting their own identities as rich/influential people center stage. We heard from them at regular intervals, but they were reasonably spaced apart so we didn't feel 'surrounded'. They never got too personal with us. Even Bill Gates, the era's villain, was on the cover of every magazine but we knew little about him beyond that he was competitive and well-read, which is true of all CEOs.
Phase two (2007 to 2015): the founder as parable. TED talks become a fun and popular way to learn new things and find interesting thinkers, The Social Network is a huge commercial hit, and the beginnings of 'founder' as an identity starts to sneak into the cultural mainstream. Starting a company becomes a viable career path thanks to YC, and the founder-as-protagonist narrative became the recruiting funnel for the entire industry. This phase was fine, because the parables were about innovation: products were still appended to founders, but now the founder was the central fixation culturally, and the product was proof that they deserved our admiration and curiosity.
Phase three (2015 to now): the tech industry as grift-adjacent. The digital commons of 2026 is defined by its grifters. So it's not purely tech's fault that its now seen as a sort of avenue for getting rich quick and amorally, even if you are an otherwise ordinary person. But it is our fault that many of our 'figureheads' are leaning way the hell in on this. Elon Musk is the most absurd example of this, but he almost doesn't count because he is in his own tier of ridiculously self-promotional and attention hungry.
But beyond Elon, we also have OpenAI acquiring TBPN, a founder-circuit podcast. An AI lab bought a talk show. That is a sign of something, and it's not something that falls in line with the tech moguls of yore. It's disconcertingly similar to Jeff Bezos buying The Washington Post.
Then there's Founders Fund, which installed its chief marketing officer as the editor-in-chief of his own media outlet and now, as we'll get to, a game show host. So, smartly, these companies and funds have learned that becoming media firms is a lot easier and more efficient than buying ads in existing media outfits, who are typically held back by something like journalistic integrity. The theory is correct short-term, but it ends in a vast humiliation of media. Our media outlets are already hanging on by the skinniest thread. With endlessly wealthy and powerful tech companies turning their 'big cyclops eye' onto sucking up share in the attention economy, I can only imagine the illusion of objectivity is going to deteriorate further.
And so, the founders attention has pivoted, in the eyes of the public, from their seemingly sacred work on nerd shit to an obviously shallow pursuit of power, money, and fame.
Eight years ago, the Jobs/Woz image was wobbling. Five years ago the first long crack appeared at the base of tech's reputation. Fast forward to today and the facade has shattered into tiny pieces to reveal 10,000 snakes.
The snakes really got loose IMO with the Founders Fund Mafia Game video. This shit is fucking insane.
This is Peter Thiel's VC firm creating a slickly produced show in which Sam Altman, Palmer Luckey, Bryan Johnson, Moxie Marlinspike, Dylan Field, Ryan Petersen and a rotating bench of the firm's favorite 'characters' play a party game about deception!!!!!! WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT!!!!
Even if it goes well short term, you are setting yourself up to be a punchline down the road. If any of these guys are involved in a Cambridge Analytica-level scandal in the future, people are going to point to this and be like 'see, he's a good liar', or 'he was hiding how good he is at deception here.' This is so dumb it's blowing my mind.
It's hosted by Mike Solana of Pirate Wires. The debut episode is titled "Can Tech Legends Find the Liar?" They filmed it at Tosca Cafe, the same San Francisco bar where the PayPal Mafia posed for their famous 2007 gangster photo shoot, so the self-mythologizing is out of control.
Obviously, commenters called the cast a "nightmare blunt rotation."
One critic revealed what the format is for: reality TV is a 30 yr old laundering technology, they said. It takes someone you'd keep at arm's length and makes him a recurring guest in your living room until the strangeness wears off. Ozzy bit the head off a bat so MTV made him the lovable bumbling dad who couldn't work the remote, and he became a lot more likeable. If the video editor and PR team can make enough smart cuts in post, everybody comes off pretty damn charming.
Applied to this cast, this strategy becomes undeniably sinister. One of them runs the most consequential AI lab on the planet and a side project to biometrically enroll the species. One of them builds autonomous weapons for the Pentagon. Between them, the principals hold the capital, the weapons contracts, and the line to the White House, and the show's function is to make you fond of them despite all this. (The shrewdest casting decision is Moxie Marlinspike, who doesn't have our future in his hands as explicitly, and is one of the most respected privacy engineers around. His presence at the table makes this all seem above-board. He is the equivalent of the beloved indie band on the festival poster, and the fact that the format needs him there tells you the producers understand exactly what their true goal is with this content.)
It is a charm offensive, in the technical sense: an offensive, conducted with charm. And even if it racks up some views and convinces a few people who already ride for Sama that tech CEOs are cool, it will disturb the rest, at least in hindsight.
There is no reason founders should disappear from public life. There are too many advantages to building in public to ignore it.
We just need to be a little smarter about how we present founders and tech workers in general to the public. It's extremely simple to do it the right way. Just remember who you are: a smart kid, often alone, tinkering around with hardware or on your computer, trying to understand how things work and see what you can make yourself.
What I'd recommend for founders and their top-level teams is:
Founder brands are necessary now. But they do not have to be as cringe and occasionally disturbing as they've become. Rather than projecting an obsession with wealth and power, trustworthy founders must instead focus carefully on projecting an obsession with core nerd values: enthusiasm about niche interests, obsession with technical pursuits, a love of learning and curiosity, and a deep-down humility and skepticism of the spotlight.
2026-06-12 05:07:00
My wife teaches undergrad art, and I was talking to one of her students, who is hilarious, about making your own website. She had some experience with that kind of thing, but still felt like she didn't really know what she was doing. I was answering her questions, and then she stopped, and said that she wanted to find more people who wanted to make websites, because she mainly talked about it with fellow art students. She said something like "When I talk about programming with art students, sometimes I feel like I know what I'm doing." Then she said the following thing, which made my brain pinwheel:
but really I'm just a dumb child in dog school.
After my brain came back online, and after unpacking it with her, I knew that this phrase would be with me for the rest of my life.
2026-06-12 05:04:00
Yesterday, I visited my mom at her senior living community. We drank some alcohol-free beer, talked, cried, and had a good time together.
That isn’t something I take for granted. If you had asked me two months ago whether I would ever enjoy spending time with her again, I would have said no.
After my dad died, she slowly let herself go. No exercise, no doctor visits, increasing isolation, and several mental breakdowns. It all eventually ended with a stay in the Emergency Room because of everything she had done, or failed to do, to her body.
After two weeks in the ICU, she was transferred to a geriatric ward. From then on, things slowly started to improve. She was finally put on the right medication, received an oxygen device, and learned to walk with a walker, something we had been asking her to do for years.
Now she’s living just around the corner in a place where she’s in good hands. My mind and body are slowly learning that I no longer have to live with the constant fear of finding her unconscious, or worse. I can visit her because I want to, not because I have to.
Her grandchildren can finally visit her again and play board games with her.
For the first time in years, our relationship is becoming healthy again. And little by little, I feel like I’m getting my mom back.
She’s 80+ now, and she proves that it’s never too late to get your shit together.
Wow. Writing this down feels good. At the same time, it feels a bit weird to share something this personal on the blog.
Then again, maybe this helps someone in a similar situation. Or maybe you can relate because you’ve been through something similar yourself.
2026-06-11 22:54:00
Today it was time again. A task at work I only do like once every three months.
I always feel a bit uncomfortable doing it. Partly because it involves a lot of secrecy, but mainly because I don't do it regularly.
It never becomes routine. It's like starting all over again each time. If I did it daily, or at least a couple of times a week, it would be a whole different story.
That's why I write every day. It's easier.
I write like it's meant to be a blog post. It doesn't always turn out that way, but the intent makes me more motivated to write. I also feel that it makes the writing more thoughtful.
It sounds weird. Writing a daily blog post being easier than writing every now and then with no pressure of anyone reading it. But it is, at least for me.
2026-06-11 22:04:00
A moment ago, I deleted a post mid-draft because writing led to a personal realization, the content of which I didn't think was of particular value to ~the blogosphere~. I wonder how often this happens with other bloggers. Perhaps it was cowardly of me to delete it.
I have a problem with overthinking, which is usually thinking-about-thinking, which leads to talking about everything in abstract terms and "losing the plot." I often delete "I think" from the beginning of sentences unless those sentences are transmitted by iMessage or Discord, in which cases my friends are subjected to repetitive bullshit.
I've noticed that I am less likely to bullshit when I have a hyperfixation, and those hyperfixations can only be supported when I'm not doomscrolling or otherwise wasting my time on the popular internet. But it's not sustainable to eliminate the popular internet from my life, I need to develop better habits instead.
So to cut down on distractions and "repair my attention span," I'm doing the following on a trial basis:
We'll see if I can stick to this plan for a week and adjust accordingly if not. I'll post about this again next Thursday. I imagine it will be easier to do once I'm back home (I'm still out of town) and thus much busier etc.
2026-06-11 11:48:53
Needed a place to talk like we used to. I guess Angelfire is gone. I'm too old for this internet and somehow still a beginner here... Substack gives me imposter syndrome and I always feel the need to explain...
I don't mind the ring lights and the 5G and the ultra crazy super hi-fi definition of everything... I just don't need the super reality. I get enough of that... everywhere.
I miss the internet as a haven. The place where I curated my interior. The place where I came with my real truth... but never from a beige palace... never with all the tapping. I miss not needing to be an expert. I miss our blurry photos not because I didn't love "Real", but because I already had a REAL WORLD to deal with and this was where it was my movie... this is where we could show how it would look if we could make it that way...
I miss talking about something without proclamation.
I am a little afraid that the only people in these corners are a part of some -osphere or another that I'm not invited to. Or welcome in. I'll be honest. I didn't even do my due diligence. I found a free blog site and crossed my fingers. I typed a title and jumped in. Old school.
I hope this isn't another wrong space, or worse, a space that hates me. I'm a creep. I'm a weirdo.
I want to process whatever is happening without a 30-day plan or hacks. I want to create and commune. I want to make music with other people who make music. I want to meet people in real life again and find them at concerts and around dumb camp fires like we did in '03. I wish it could be new again. I wish we'd get it right. I wish we'd keep the capitalism out and each other in. I wish we were still giving each other somewhere digital to be when the analog heart couldn't find anywhere out here to belong.
I lost that internet. And I miss it.
I'm 42 now. In some rooms, I'm ancient. In some, I'm still just a poseur manic pixie nightmare who didn't figure it out. I lost most of my metrics for how to do this wild and precious life thing.
I turned to the internet and I know it's happening. Running away in RVs and soft anarchism and Instagram homesteads... but I forget what's trust-funded and what's photoshopped and designed to sell me one more answer I can't afford. Anyone certain is selling something certainly or something. Ha.
I'm not a writer. I'm not handy with code. I'm a loser, baby, so why don't you kill me.
But somewhere between all the em dashes and optimization plans and politicized everything, I see meaning-making. I see ethics I respect. I see community. I see humans. It's just strange how little of it is anywhere I was told I could expect it. Certainly I thought our histories had been more fact-checked. I thought the people in charge were mostly good. I thought someone had the whole world in his hands.
I grew up in the Midwest with no small amount of religious confusion, so it was natural that I was unsure WHO had the whole world, but I was definitely being assured constantly by the grown-ups in the room that someone had this whole thing under control. Don't worry. I'm not still there.
I've got grown children now. That means I have experienced the singular pleasure of knowing my teenage child can articulate my generational trauma (and appear to understand it clinically) and plethora of diagnoses better at 16 than I could at 35 on hour seven-hundred-something of therapy... the language was there. Don't mind me. I'm just learning. We all are. Some of us quickly. Some of us with a fair degree of deprogramming to do. I'm one of those.
I don't have many days without some shadow of someone's disapproval or my own shame or some neurodivergent urge to only feed wolf number 16 because that's the motherfucker that gets things done (a little IFS humor for my babies in the back)...
I don't belong here. I don't know if I belong anywhere.
But I need to write in a way that isn't... allowed? Gosh... I am not here with any horrifying ideologies or anything. It's just... it hasn't always been a clean story. I've lived what's amounted to a staggeringly ordinary human life, so it's always stung a little when some part of me that was just true got marked restricted or called something it wasn't. Compressing my "self" into something easy to scan and incomplete.
I feel too big for the internet. Not like a megalomaniac. Like a pair of not-stretchy jeans from before my hips changed... like with this new shape... I'll never get back in... but here's to trying.
Is there anybody out there?
