Reading List: Friends, It's Time We All Give a [Heck]
Poppets! So much to read, and so little time. I’m closing out my first week at my new gig, all the while fighting back the hounds of the worst cold I’ve had in years, so let me tell you, I am ready for some longreads and all of the cups of sleepy time tea I can pour down my gullet.
TO THE INTERWEBZ!
Alex Wilhelm, How Much Sense Does Lyft At $20B Or $25B Make? (Crunchbase) - I am the first to admit I’m not great at understanding how companies are valued, or how IPOs “work.” Luckily, friend of the Missive and wonderful human Alex Wilhelm is consistently great at explaining these complicated financial things, and this take on the Lyft IPO is no different.
Nick Bilton, “She Never Looks Back”: Inside Elizabeth Holmes’s Chilling Final Months At Theranos (Vanity Fair) - I’m barely three paragraphs in but OMG THIS IS SO GOOD except for the part where her poor dog wasn’t trained very well and pooped all over the lab and, you know, those times she put actual human lives at risk by faking her blood testing technology. Also, while you’re at it, you should take the Which Weird As Hell Tech Founder Are You? quiz by BuzzFeed SF Bureau Chief Mat Honan and let me know if you as well got Ms. Holmes in the dystopic tech sorting hat.
Constance Grady, What do we do when the art we love was created by a monster? (Vox) - As #MeToo continues to reveal that, yes, awful behavior exists in powerful people in your favorite artistic industry, Grady meditates on how we deal with our affection for the canon of art these dudes leave in their abusive wake.
Drew Magery, Care What Other People Think (GQ) - I love Drew's writing, especially when he opines on the curse of men burrowing in their protective dirt of proudly not caring what people think of them in order to excuse careless actions: “You’re supposed to give a f*ck. People who tell you they don’t give a f*ck are either lying, or they fit the clinical definition of sociopathy… I really do care and I really do give a f*ck, because that’s what is human.”
David McMillan, My Restaurant Was the Greatest Show of Excess You’d Ever Seen, and It Almost Killed Me (Bon Appetit) - As someone who just celebrated her fourth anniversary of finally choosing her own life and happiness over booze, McMillan’s account of what it took him to get sober in an industry built on bacchanalia spoke to me (comms may not be creating lavish dinners, but it sure as hell involves a lot of entertaining and wine swilling.) His vulnerable and honest take on how and when he decided to stop starts with a comment that many of us who’ve dealt with substance issues can relate to: “I was never falling-down drunk. I was never belligerent. I always got my work done. I was never unkempt. I was always clean, I was always shaved, I always performed at work. I was always kind and gracious in the dining room. But I lived in hell.” (Emphasis mine)
You are all lovely, and I give a heck about what you think. Be kind to each other.
Xoxo Amy