position:co-founder and ceo

  • From Warm Intro to $107M: Qwil’s Step-By-Step Fundraising Journey
    https://hackernoon.com/from-warm-intro-to-107m-qwils-step-by-step-fundraising-journey-412315450

    It’s a near-universal pain point for freelancers: the unpredictable cash flow cycle. It’s common to wait 30-plus days to be paid after completing a job, and sometimes, it’s just too long.Qwil, says its co-founder and CEO, Johnny Reinsch, was born out of his own experience as an independent contractor with a high-value client that paid him late. “I was about to overdraw my bank account the day before my payment was due,” he says. “I tracked down the finance person and got the money just in time, but I was like, ‘why does it have to work this way?’”As a self-described “recovering M&A lawyer” and a former exec at bitcoin wallet Xapo, he knew that it didn’t.Enter Qwil — a fintech company with a mission to “empower freelancers with instant, convenient access to credit.” For businesses, it’s a way to (...)

    #entrepreneurship #founders #startup #loans #venture-capital

  • Interview with CEO of NSO Group – Israeli spyware-maker – on fighting terror, Khashoggi murder, and Saudi Arabia - 60 Minutes - CBS News
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/interview-with-ceo-of-nso-group-israeli-spyware-maker-on-fighting-terror-kh

    Tonight we’ll take you inside the growing, shadowy global market of cyber espionage. We looked specifically at a controversial Israeli company called the NSO Group, valued at nearly a billion dollars, that says it developed a hacking tool that can break into just about any smartphone on Earth.

    NSO licenses this software, called Pegasus, to intelligence and law enforcement agencies worldwide, so they can infiltrate the encrypted phones and apps of criminals and terrorists. Problem is this same tool can also be deployed by a government to crush dissent. And so it is that Pegasus has been linked to human rights abuses, unethical surveillance, and even to the notoriously brutal murder of the Saudi Arabian critic Jamal Khashoggi.

    Headquartered in the Israeli city of Herzliya, NSO Group operates in strict secrecy. But co-founder and CEO, Shalev Hulio, has been forced out of the shadows and not into a good light, accused of selling Pegasus to Saudi Arabia despite its abysmal record on human rights.

    Lesley Stahl: And the word is that you sold Pegasus to them, and then they turned it around to get Khashoggi.

    Shalev Hulio: Khashoggi murder is horrible. Really horrible. And therefore, when I first heard there are accusations that our technology been used on Jamal Khashoggi or on his relatives, I started an immediate check about it. And I can tell you very clear, we had nothing to do with this horrible murder.

    #NSO organise sa défense dans l’affaire #kashoggi ?

  • Founder Interviews : Oege De Moor of Semmle
    https://hackernoon.com/founder-interviews-oege-de-moor-of-semmle-dc72e7888bd6?source=rss----3a8

    A former Oxford professor and author of several books on coding, Oege de Moor is on a mission to secure the world’s software as co-founder and CEO of Semmle.Davis Baer: What’s your background, and what are you working on?Oege de Moor: At Semmle, we are focused on securing software, together. We’re creating technology to scale security expertise through automation and provide a platform for sharing community-driven security. The biggest security challenge we face in software development today is a chronic shortage of security experts — even leading technology companies struggle to staff one security engineer for every 100 software engineers. Our products help automate variant analysis — the process of finding all instances of a coding mistake that caused a security incident — allowing (...)

    #founders #davis-baer #startup #founder-advice #founder-stories

  • Conquering crypto winter: inside #horizen’s move to increase its block reward
    https://hackernoon.com/conquering-crypto-winter-inside-horizens-move-to-increase-its-block-rewa

    During this ‘crypto winter,’ the slump in crypto prices has led to the shutdown of a number of projects.Most recently, the NEM Foundation, a community-sponsored non-profit organization that promotes the #blockchain of NEM, announced a massive downsizing of its 150-person staff.While the foundation says it’s not bankrupt, it admits that it only has about one month of funds left in the bank.Despite the hard times, some projects with governance and economic incentives in place have been able to weather the storm only partially scathed. One such project is Horizen, where I act as general counsel.I recently sat down with Rob Viglione, the company’s co-founder and CEO to get his insights on the declining prices. Rob elaborated on Horizen’s plan to use its unique tokenomic structure to survive the (...)

    #cryptocurrency-investment #cryptocurrency #crypto-winter

  • What’s Next for Streaming? The Convergence with Live Music
    https://hackernoon.com/whats-next-for-streaming-the-convergence-with-live-music-4ddf81f150bd?so

    “There’s a reason music never worked on TV. It’s a community experience. Now, if you turn a passive viewer into an active viewer that feels like they’re connecting with people, now we’ve created the music community online.” — Allen Sanford, LiveList co-founder and CEO.The RIAA 2017 year-end music industry revenue report clearly reaffirms the value of streaming for the industry. Total revenue from music streaming platforms increased by 43% to $5.7 billion, accounting for 65% of total industry revenues for last year, while paid subscriptions grew to become the biggest growth driver in 2017.With all eyes firmly focused on the latest trends, what is the new big wave for the streaming market?Live video streaming!Thanks in part to social networks, this technology has definitely gone mainstream. The (...)

    #technology-trends #entertainment #music-business #live-streaming #streaming-music

  • Bill Shihara, the founder and CEO of Bittrex, has joined Unikrn’s BOA
    https://hackernoon.com/bill-shihara-the-founder-and-ceo-of-bittrex-has-joined-unikrns-boa-64c01

    I’m extremely pleased to announce that. Bill Shihara, the co-founder and CEO of Bittrex, is joining Unikrn’s board of advisors. Bittrex is one of world’s largest and best exchanges, and another startup from Seattle. Having his insight along with our existing managers and advisors is a game-changer for our future, but it should come as no surprise that Bill is interested in joining our movement.Well before launching UnikoinGold, Unikrn was laying foundations to allow us to be a global leader in the future of esports and blockchain. We had already created use cases, product, customers and blueprints for future development.As I’ve said many times, for Unikrn to realize its potential requires an immense amount of forward work. Both Blockchain and esports are cutting-edge fields that regularly (...)

    #blockchain-technology #entrepreneurship #esport #ethereum #bitcoin

  • How my non-tech female cofounder built 45 CTOs for top-notch Startups!
    https://hackernoon.com/how-my-non-tech-female-cofounder-built-45-ctos-for-top-notch-startups-12

    Today, she has earned the Women Pride Award from her favourite Bollywood actor. She has been in the top 10 women entrepreneurs list in India. Her success is the result of her hard work and perseverance, tinkering her way to the top passing through a lot of background hurdles.Adding the co-founder tag on LinkedIn is easy, justifying it is so hard. You have to take some bold decisions as a CEO and you have no other choice.Aditi Chaurasia: Co-founder and CEO of EngineerBabu.She took some brilliant decisions to help us reach where we are today.1. You should choose your customers and not vice versa!The idea is that, people do understand their business domain and market, but technology may not be their forte. Eventually, Most of the people end up hiring the wrong person.Aditi made a decision (...)

  • How #amazon and #apple Transformed Customer Service into Customer Obsession
    https://hackernoon.com/how-amazon-and-apple-transformed-customer-service-into-customer-obsessio

    While launching a product, a company has no idea how it is going to be welcomed. There is the excitement of a new product launch and a slight doubt about how well the product would do. What role do customers play in all this? Let’s look into the approaches of two giants who made it big with a sustained focus on customers.How Amazon Tasted Success with Customer ObsessionAmazon Co-founder and CEO, Jeff Bezos, termed his approach Customer Obsession. According to him, the basic idea behind the success of Amazon should be the intense focus on customers. Here is an excerpt from a letter, he wrote to the shareholders:There are many ways to center a business.You can be competitor focused, you can be product focused, you can be technology focused, you can be business model focused, and there (...)

    #obsessions #startup #customer-service

  • Reverse Debugging with Greg Law
    http://cppcast.libsyn.com/reverse-debugging-with-greg-law

    Rob and Jason are joined by Dr. Greg Law from Undo to talk about the magic of reverse debugging and how it is becoming more widely known in the programming community. Greg is the co-founder and CEO of Undo. He is a coder at heart, but likes to bridge the gap between the business and software worlds. (Sadly, these days most of Greg’s coding is done on aeroplanes.) Greg has 20 years’ experience in the software industry and has held development and management roles at companies including the pioneering British computer firm Acorn, as well as fast-growing start ups, NexWave and Solarflare. It was at Acorn that Greg met Julian and on evenings and weekends, they invented the core technology that would eventually become UndoDB. Greg left Solarflare in 2012 to lead Undo as CEO and has (...)

    http://traffic.libsyn.com/cppcast/cppcast-130.mp3?dest-id=282890

  • CppCast Episode 130: Reverse Debugging with Greg Law
    http://isocpp.org/feeder/?FeederAction=clicked&feed=All+Posts&seed=http%3A%2F%2Fisocpp.org%2Fblog%2F2

    Episode 130 of CppCast the only podcast for C++ developers by C++ developers. In this episode Rob and Jason are joined by Dr. Greg Law from Undo to talk about the magic of reverse debugging and how it is becoming more widely known in the programming community.

    CppCast Episode 130: Reverse Debugging with Greg Law by Rob Irving and Jason Turner

    About the interviewee:

    Greg is the co-founder and CEO of Undo. He is a coder at heart, but likes to bridge the gap between the business and software worlds. (Sadly, these days most of Greg’s coding is done on aeroplanes.) Greg has 20 years’ experience in the software industry and has held development and management roles at companies including the pioneering British computer firm Acorn, as well as fast-growing start ups, (...)

    #News,Video&_On-Demand,

  • NOAH Internet Conference 2016 | Berlin 08 - 09 June
    https://www.noah-conference.com
    Une rencontre des protagonistes de la disruption à l’européenne se tiendra le 8 et 9 juin à Berlin. Si vous avez envie de découvrir un nid de crabes de casseurs d’aquis sociaux suivez les infos sur cette rencontre digne d’un Bilderberg des économies dites « nouvelles » . On y rencontrera les acteurs représentant les commanditaires principales des nouveaux lois du travail en Europe. La plupart des participants actifs sont des jeunes à la recherche de capital pour leurs startups déjà bien vus par les investisseurs.

    The preeminent European event where Internet CEOs, executives and investors gain deep insights into the latest proven concepts, network with senior executives and establish new business relationships.

    Now in our 8th year, we are delighted to be hosting two upcoming events with very different underlying themes. NOAH Berlin (8-9 Jun 2016) presents a unique discussion platform for CEOs and founders from established champions and disruptive challengers across a number of key industry verticals. NOAH London (10-11 Nov 2016) is focused on connecting capital with great companies and helping service providers to find relevant customers.

    Day 1

    Welcome Note
    Marco Rodzynek CEO NOAH Advisors Ltd
    Jens Mueffelmann CEO Axel Springer Digital Ventures
    Keynote
    Klaus Hommels CEO Lakestar
    Keynote
    Carlos Watson Founder & CEO OZY

    Home Automation & IoT
    Niall Murphy Founder & CEO Evrythng
    Ludovic Le Moan CEO Sigfox
    Christian Deilmann CEO tado
    Andreas Rudyk CEO Smartfrog
    Philipp Pausder Managing Director Thermondo

    Keynote
    Thomas Ebeling CEO ProSiebenSat.1

    B2B
    Karim Jalbout Head of the European Digital Practice Egon Zehnder
    Thomas Bergen Co-Founder & CEO getAbstract
    Steve Oriola CEO Pipedrive
    Peter F. Schmid CEO Wer Liefert Was
    Or Offer CEO SimilarWeb
    Andreas Koenig CEO TeamViewer
    Torben Majgaard Founder & CEO Ciklum
    Mark Schwerzel Deputy CEO Bureau van Dijk

    Fintech
    Roelant Prins CCO Adyen
    Antonio Gagliardi Co-Founder and Managing Director CompareEuropeGroup
    Jacob de Geer CEO iZettle
    Phil Lojacono CEO Advanon
    Jeremias Meier CEO & Co-Founder Bexio
    Yoni Assia CEO & Founder Etoro
    Oren Levy CEO Zooz
    Raffael Johnen Co-Founder & CEO auxmoney

    Fintech - Banking Deep Dive
    Markus Pertlwieser CDO Private, Wealth & Commercial Clients Deutsche BankAlexander Graubner-Müller CEO & Co-Founder Kreditech
    Valentin Stalf Founder & CEO Number26

    Who Will Win the Banking Client of the Future? - 2:2
    Markus Pertlwieser CDO Private, Wealth & Commercial Clients Deutsche Bank
    Dr. Tim Sievers CEO & Founder Deposit Solutions
    Alexander Graubner-Müller CEO & Co-Founder Kreditech
    alentin Stalf Founder & CEO Number26
    Christin Martens Editor-in-Chief Business Insider

    VC Panel
    Rainer Maerkle General Partner Holtzbrinck Ventures
    Yann de Vries Partner, Investments Atomico
    Yaron Valler General Partner Target Global
    Christian Leybold Managing Director E.ventures
    Timm Schipporeit Principal Index Ventures
    Luciana Lixandru Vice President Accel Partners
    Ankur Kamalia Managing Director – Head of Venture Portfolio Management & DB1 Ventures Deutsche Börse AG
    Bo Ilsoe Managing Partner Nokia Growth Partners (NGP)

    Fireside Chat
    Oliver Samwer Founder & CEO Rocket Internet
    Marco Rodzynek CEO NOAH Advisors Ltd

    NOAH Top Picks
    Dr. Holger Klärner VP Fast Growing Tech McKinsey & Company

    Mobility
    Hakan Koç Founder & Managing Director Auto1 Group
    Harold Goddijn CEO TomTom
    Christian Vollmann Patron of smart urban pioneers smart
    Nir Erez CEO Moovit
    Daniel Ishag Founder & CEO Karhoo
    Nicolas Brusson COO & Co-Founder BlaBlaCar
    Shahar Waiser Founder & CEO Gett
    Simone Menne CFO Lufthansa Group

    Keynote
    Greg Ellis CEO Scout24

    NOAH Top Picks
    Rudolph W. Giuliani Former Mayor of New York City Chair Cybersecurity and Crisis Management Practice, Greenberg Traurig LLP Greenberg Traurig

    1:1
    Peter Terium CEO RWE
    Rainer Sternfeld Founder & CEO Planet OS
    Marco Rodzynek CEO NOAH Advisors Ltd

    1:1
    Dr. Mathias Döpfner CEO Axel Springer SE
    Henry Blodget CEO, Editor-In-Chief Business Insider

    Mobility - 1:1
    Travis Kalanick CEO UBER
    Dr. Dieter Zetsche Chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG and Head of Mercedes-Benz Cars Daimler

    Music
    Thomas Hampson Baritone | Ambassador IDAGIO
    Wolfram Rieger Pianist IDAGIO

    Day 2

    Day 1 Summary
    Marco Rodzynek CEO NOAH Advisors Ltd

    Company Presentation
    Michael Gross Vice Chairman WeWork

    Winners Make Winners - The Strong Performance of Interhyp with ING - 1:1
    Ralph Hamers CEO ING Group
    Michiel Goris CEO Interhyp

    Consumer Goods
    Olaf Koch Chairman of the Management Board Metro Group
    Olivier Marcheteau COO Vestiaire Collective
    Jeff Lipkin CFO Harry’s
    Robyn Ward Founder Mahtay
    Fabian Siegel Co-Founder & CEO Marley Spoon
    Daniel Sobhani CEO Freeletics
    Luke Waite Co-Founder Titan Black

    Consumer Goods - 1:1
    Herbert Hainer CEO adidas Group
    Florian Gschwandtner CEO & Co-Founder Runtastic
    Marco Rodzynek CEO NOAH Advisors Ltd

    NOAH Top Picks
    Euan Davis Senior Director Cognizant

    Credit Suisse: Corporate Private Banking `connecting your wealth
    Henrik Herr Head Germany & Austria International Wealth Management Credit Suisse
    Florian Gschwandtner CEO & Co-Founder Runtastic

    Retail
    Tim Stracke Co-CEO Chrono24
    Rubin Ritter Member of the Management Board Zalando SE
    Dr. Oliver Lederle Founder & CEO MYTOYS GROUP
    Niklas Östberg CEO Delivery Hero
    Alexander Frolov General Partner Target Global
    Dr. Philipp Kreibohm Co-Founder Home24
    Thierry Petit Co-Founder & Co-CEO Showroomprive.com
    Philip Rooke CEO Spreadshirt
    Susanne Zacke Member of the Board Auctionata

    Travel & Tourism
    Johannes Reck CEO GetYourGuide
    Bo Ilsoe Managing Partner Nokia Growth Partners (NGP)
    Glenn Fogel Head of Worldwide Strategy and Planning Priceline Group
    Hugo Burge CEO Momondo Group
    Joachim Hunold Founder Air Berlin
    Jochen Engert Founder & Managing Director FlixBus

    7 Steps Needed for the Internet Economy in Europe
    Clark Parsons CEO Internet Economy Foundation

    Advertising
    Ragnar Kruse CEO Smaato
    Zvika Netter CEO & Co-Founder Innovid
    Jürgen Galler Co-Founder and CEO 1plusX
    Tim Schumacher Chairman Eyeo
    Carl Erik Kjærsgaard Chairman and Co-Founder Blackwood Seven

    Healthcare, Science & Education
    Mariusz Gralewski Founder & CEO Docplanner
    Markus Witte Founder and CEO Babbel
    Dr. Torsten Oelke Executive Chairman CUBE
    Jessica Federer Chief Digital Officer Bayer
    Friedrich Schwandt Founder & CEO Statista
    Stanislas Niox-Chateau CEO Doctolib

    Fintech - 1:1
    Christian Mylius Managing Partner Innovalue Management Advisors
    Julian Teicke Founder & CEO FinanceFox

    Technology, Media & Gaming
    Polina Montano Co-founder and COO JobToday
    Klaas Kersting Founder & CEO flaregames
    Hermione Mckee Head of Finance Wooga
    Hanna Aase CEO Wonderloop
    Christian Sauer CEO Webtrekk
    Nora-Vanessa Wohlert
    Founder and Managing Director EDITION F
    Susann Hoffmann Founder and Managing Director EDITION F
    Peter Würtenberger CEO upday
    Eric Léandri President and Co-Founder Qwant
    Lucas von Cranach Founder & CEO Onefootball

    What We’re Working on at NOAH: An Outlook for the Next 3 Years
    Marco Rodzynek CEO NOAH Advisors Ltd

    Les organisateurs se comportent comme une secte extrémiste - même les musiciens du « get together » font partie d’une startup potentiellement disruptive. Comme ca on est sûr de toujours communiquer sur la même longueur d’ondes bien à l’abri des critiques et contestations.

    Les conditions générales de vente le disent explicitement :

    The event is invitation only and generally tickets are not transferable. However, please contact us with your request and we can review.
    ...
    The ticket price for NOAH16 Berlin is EUR 690 for Internet companies and corporates, EUR 850 for service providers; EUR 990 for small investors, EUR 1,490 for large investors and EUR 3,000 for investment bankers. All mentioned prices are excluding VAT. This price includes two full days including breakfast, lunch, and drinks and cocktail party.

    Effectivement.

    #Berlin #disruption #startup #économie #politique #capitalisme

  • Smart Tampon Tells Women When It’s Time To Change « CBS San Francisco
    http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2016/05/17/smart-tampon-tells-women-when-its-time-to-change

    There are apps to monitor your heart rate, count how many steps you take, even track your sleep. Now there is an app that monitors a woman’s menstrual cycle and can tell her when its time to remove her tampon.

    A new startup called my.Flow has created the world’s first tampon monitor that promises to eliminate the monthly issues of stained clothing and mad dashes to the ladies’ restroom. According to Endgadget, co-founder and CEO Amanda Brief came up with the idea as part of a graduate engineering class at University of California, Berkeley.

    Some women know their flow well, which is awesome,” Brief said in an interview with Refinery 29. “Our product is for those that do not, or would like to learn and track more.

    My.Flow works via a key fob-sized Bluetooth-enabled monitor that attaches to the string of the tampon. Once inserted, the monitor transmits data to a smartphone app and sends a text to the wearer when the tampon is full. Notification times can be set up to send a message at any time — well before saturation reaches 100%.

    The app also tracks the frequency, length and level of a woman’s menstrual flow and creates statistics using daily and monthly data.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKy_xL4xNWE

  • #Propriétarien

    1.6 L’idéologie de Facebook – ce n’est pas fait par un étudiant cool.
    https://sortirdefacebook.wordpress.com/#sec-1-6

    En ces temps où on veut toujours nous faire croire que les débuts de l’internet étaient seulement portés par une idéologie californienne libératrice, il est salutaire de lire ou relire l’article de Tom Hodgkinson sur Facebook paru dans le Guardian en janvier 2008. Prémonitoire et on ne peut plus d’actualité près de [trois] ans plus tard, soit une éternité à l’échelle temporelle du web.

    Quelques extraits :

    « #Facebook est un projet bien établi, et les personnes derrière le financement sont un groupe de spécialistes du capital-risque de la #Silicon_Valley, qui ont clairement pensé l’idéologie qu’elles souhaitent diffuser dans le monde entier. (..)

    Bien que le projet ait été au départ conçu par le très médiatisé #Mark_Zuckerberg, le vrai dirigeant derrière Facebook est le philosophe #Peter_Thiel, spécialiste du capital-risque et futurologue de la Silicon Valley, âgé de 40 ans. Il y a seulement trois membres du conseil de direction sur Facebook : Peter Thiel, Mark Zuckerberg et #Jim_Breyer, appartenant au groupe de capital risque #Accel_Partners. (..)

    Mais Thiel est plus qu’un capitaliste intelligent et avare. C’est un philosophe du futur et un activiste des néoconservateurs. Il est diplômé de philosophie à Stanford, en 1998 il coécrit un livre appelé « Le mythe de la diversité », qui est une attaque détaillée sur l’idéologie multiculturelle qui domine Stanford. Il estime que le multiculturalisme a conduit à une diminution des libertés individuelles. Alors qu’il était étudiant à Stanford, Thiel fondait un journal de droite, encore en service actuellement, appelé « Que la lumière soit ». Thiel est un membre de #TheVanguard.Org, un groupe de pression néoconservateur sur Internet, qui a été créé pour attaquer MoveOn.org, un groupe de pression de gauche qui travaille sur le Web. (..)

    L’Internet [personnification étrange…]fait immensément appel aux néoconservateurs tels que Thiel, parce qu’il promet une certaine forme de liberté dans des relations humaines et dans les affaires : absence de droits nationaux embêtants, suppression des frontières, etc. L’ #Internet est le cheval de Troyes du libre-échange et de l’expansion du laissez faire. Peter Thiel semble également soutenir les paradis fiscaux en mer, et réclame que 40 % de la richesse du monde réside dans les endroits tels que Vanuatu, les Îles Cayman, Monaco et les Barbade. Je pense qu’il est réaliste d’indiquer que Thiel, comme Rupert Murdoch, est contre l’impôt et les taxes. Il aime également la mondialisation de la culture numérique parce qu’elle rend les banquiers mondiaux difficiles à attaquer. « Vous ne pouvez pas avoir une révolution des ouvriers contre une banque, si la banque est domiciliée au Vanuatu, » estime t-il… (..)

    Ainsi, Peter Thiel essaye de détruire le monde réel, qu’il appelle aussi « nature », pour le remplacer par un monde virtuel, et c’est dans ce contexte que nous devons regarder le succès de Facebook. Facebook est une expérience délibérée dans la manipulation globale, et Peter Thiel est une lumière pleine de promesse pour les néoconservateurs, avec un penchant pour les folies utopiques de la technologie. Pas vraiment quelqu’un que je souhaite aider à devenir riche pour ses projets…(..)"

    • With friends like these ...
      https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2008/jan/14/facebook

      Although the project was initially conceived by media cover star Mark Zuckerberg, the real face behind Facebook is the 40-year-old Silicon Valley venture capitalist and futurist philosopher Peter Thiel. There are only three board members on Facebook, and they are Thiel, Zuckerberg and a third investor called Jim Breyer from a venture capital firm called Accel Partners (more on him later). Thiel invested $500,000 in Facebook when Harvard students Zuckerberg, Chris Hughes and Dustin Moskowitz went to meet him in San Francisco in June 2004, soon after they had launched the site. Thiel now reportedly owns 7% of Facebook, which, at Facebook’s current valuation of $15bn , would be worth more than $1bn. There is much debate on who exactly were the original co-founders of Facebook, but whoever they were, Zuckerberg is the only one left on the board, although Hughes and Moskowitz still work for the company.

      Thiel is widely regarded in Silicon Valley and in the US venture capital scene as a libertarian genius. He is the co-founder and CEO of the virtual banking system PayPal, which he sold to Ebay for $1.5bn, taking $55m for himself. He also runs a £3bn hedge fund called Clarium Capital Management and a venture capital fund called Founders Fund. Bloomberg Markets magazine recently called him “one of the most successful hedge fund managers in the country”. He has made money by betting on rising oil prices and by correctly predicting that the dollar would weaken. He and his absurdly wealthy Silicon Valley mates have recently been labelled “The PayPal Mafia” by Fortune magazine, whose reporter also observed that Thiel has a uniformed butler and a $500,000 McLaren supercar. Thiel is also a chess master and intensely competitive. He has been known to sweep the chessmen off the table in a fury when losing. And he does not apologise for this hyper-competitveness, saying: “Show me a good loser and I’ll show you a loser.”

      But Thiel is more than just a clever and avaricious capitalist. He is a futurist philosopher and neocon activist. A philosophy graduate from Stanford, in 1998 he co-wrote a book called The Diversity Myth, which is a detailed attack on liberalism and the multiculturalist ideology that dominated Stanford. He claimed that the “multiculture” led to a lessening of individual freedoms. While a student at Stanford, Thiel founded a rightwing journal, still up and running, called The Stanford Review - motto: Fiat Lux ("Let there be light"). Thiel is a member of TheVanguard.Org, an internet-based neoconservative pressure group that was set up to attack MoveOn.org, a liberal pressure group that works on the web. Thiel calls himself “way libertarian”.

      TheVanguard is run by one Rod D Martin, a philosopher-capitalist whom Thiel greatly admires. On the site, Thiel says: “Rod is one of our nation’s leading minds in the creation of new and needed ideas for public policy. He possesses a more complete understanding of America than most executives have of their own businesses.”

  • The Marriage Equality Ruling Proves Exactly Why We Need More Women In Charge - attn:
    http://www.attn.com/stories/2169/women-of-the-supreme-court-marriage-equality

    On Friday, the Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriage is a right protected by the Constitution across the entire nation. In a response to this ruling, Vinicius Vacanti, co-founder and CEO of Yipit and YipitData tweeted the following:

    It was a 5-4 ruling: Men 4-2 against, Women 3-0 for. Another reminder of benefits of women in leadership positions