Valleywag
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Posts Tagged “
Peter Thiel
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once you're lucky, twice you're good
internet famous
Facebook investor Peter Thiel No. 10 in Out's list of powerful gays
Peter Thiel, the famed venture capitalist who cofounded PayPal and funded Facebook, has not spoken about his private life since Valleywag broke the curious silence about the gay entrepreneur's sexuality in December. (He hadn't really discussed it before then, either.) But it has again become the topic of conversation. Out has put him in tenth place on its Power 50 list of prominent gays and lesbians. The magazine praises him for his multibillion-dollar hedge fund (Out says it's worth $3 billion, but we've heard $5 billion) as well as his $1 billion stake in Facebook and his funding of the Methuselah Foundation, an anti-aging research group. Knowing Peter, we suspect that none of this bothers him particularly — except for the fact that he wasn't No. 1.
hires
Andreessen to stack Facebook board further in Zuckerberg's favor
Netscape cofounder and propagator of porn social networks Marc Andreessen will join Facebook's board of directors, Kara Swisher reports. Andreessen will join current board members Accel Partners Jim Breyer, Clarium Capital's Peter Thiel, and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Andreessen is the chairman of Ning, a company which sells tools for rolling your own social network. If your mom has an excellent visual memory, she will probably remembers him for appearing on the cover of Time magazine without shoes on. You can tell her that he dresses better now, but only slightly. Why Andreessen, and not a proxy for new investors Microsoft or Li Ka-Shing? More »
antitrust
Australians question eBay's PayPal-only policy
Years ago, PayPal was an independent company which fought constantly with eBay to be allowed on the site as a way to settle accounts after an auction was won. Now, years after eBay bought PayPal, the payments service is elbowing out all manner of competition. In Australia, eBay is limiting purchases to either PayPal or cash on delivery — no checks or money orders allowed, let alone rival electronic payment methods. In the U.S., eBay was sued last year for tying PayPal too closely to its online marketplace. How soon they forget: PayPal is aiming to quash an economic freedom its founders, including noted libertarian Peter Thiel, fought for.
geek love
Forbes declares Peter Thiel "single," which may be news to his boyfriend
In its latest list of billionaire bachelors, Forbes lists Facebook investor and hedge fund Midas Peter Thiel as "single." Technically true, I'll give the magazine's factchecker that much, if it means "confirmed bachelor." Thanks to California's marriage laws, he doesn't have much choice in the matter. In fact, I hear Thiel is getting less single every day. One tipster close to his hedge fund, Clarium Capital, shares this rumor: that Thiel may have hired his boyfriend, Matt Danzeisen, away from BlackRock Securities, thereby discarding plans to relocate the fund's headquarters to New York. Aside from being convenient for the pair, it would seem like a good career move for Danzeisen. More »
rumormonger
Facebook buying Social.im? Nah
We hear that Facebook has purchased Social.im, the instant messaging application built on top of Facebook. This jibes with Michael Arrington's report that Facebook is about to launch an IM service. Mogad, the company behind Social.im, also took investment from Facebook backer Peter Thiel. Update: "If we're being bought, I haven't gotten the call yet," says Mogad CEO Yanda Erlich. In a now-deleted blog post, he also poked coy fun at the now-debunked rumor with this fake IM exchange: More »
quotable
"What would you be in this environment?" a CNBC reporter asked Facebook invester Peter Thiel late last year. "The basic thing we think is going to happen," Thiel responds, "is either a lot of deflation ... or you're going to have a lot of inflation." More »
Timeless wisdom from Peter Thiel: Things could go one way, or the other
"What would you be in this environment?" a CNBC reporter asked Facebook invester Peter Thiel late last year. "The basic thing we think is going to happen," Thiel responds, "is either a lot of deflation ... or you're going to have a lot of inflation." More »
deep thoughts
"Grey's Anatomy" illustrates Peter Thiel's Christian philosophy
Facebook investor Peter Thiel plans to pay someone who adheres to a "specific strain of Christian philosophy" $100,000 to $200,000 a year to give away his money. A tipster tell us that the strain is Stanford professor Rene Girard's. Girard's big idea is something he calls mimetic desire, which posits that the only reason I want a Wii so bad is because everybody else wants a Wii so bad. This is called the triangulation of desire. Girard has a 52-minute clip on the Web in which he explains how the theory relates to Christianity. Or, there's this clip from Grey's Anatomy, which YouTube user nefariouscarrot claims illustrates mimetic desire. More »
careers
Facebook board member Peter Thiel seeks Christian to give away his money
Want to work for Peter Thiel, the Facebook board member, hot-shot venture capitalist, and hedge fund manager? Thiel's personal assistant at Clarium Capital, Robertson George Morrow III — call him Trey — is sending around an email looking for the "right kind of conservative" to give away Thiel's money from his New York offices. Thiel's targeting four areas:1) conservative political education and activism, 2) life extension research, 3) a specific strain of Christian philosophy, and 4) university life.With a starting salary between $100,000 and $200,000 and business-class everying — "none of the usual economizing associated with nonprofits" — the gig actually sounds pretty sweet. That is, if you can embrace Thiel's necessarily nuanced right-wing politics and get over reporting to a guy whose name ends in a roman numeral. Send your resume along with SAT scores to: foundation.th@gmail.com.
politics
Would calling them beta elections make you feel better?
Every vote counts, people. Even if like Peter Thiel, you plan to vote for a loon like Ron Paul. It still sends a message. It says: I am a crazy person who opposes the FDA. Which is cool, because this is a democracy and the majority rules. And you wackos — you lovely, lovely pageview-generating wackos — are never going to be a majority. But don't take my word for it. Go vote and find out for yourselves. Follow this link to find your polling place. (Photo by jean_baptiste_soufron)
politics
Peter Thiel supports Ron Paul, the candidate who opposed the "black agenda"
PayPal cofounder, early Facebook investor and noted Objectivist Peter Thiel endorsed Ron Paul, the Republican presidential candidate, late last month, according to the candidate's website. Ron Paul, you'll recall, is the candidate known for his taste in blimps as well as for his plans to withdraw troops from Iraq and dismantle government agencies such as the IRS and the FDA. Paul has also become known for a series of newsletters he and his staff published, ranting against the "black agenda." What's the black agenda? It's what caused the 1992 L.A. riots, of course! More »
geek love
Peter Thiel to move his hedge fund to New York
Why on earth is Silicon Valley's fastest-rising venture capitalist moving to New York? In the Valley, Peter Thiel is best known for his prescient investment in Facebook. His $500,000 grubstake is now worth $750 million on paper. And his Founders Fund may well revolutionize the venture-capital industry. But in real cash money, Thiel has made far more from Clarium Capital, the hedge fund he's operated since selling PayPal to eBay in 2002. More »
zynga
VCs sink big money into spammy Facebook games
The first gold-rush miners to make any money during the 1840s were the ones who stopped digging and started selling shovels, according to Timesman Brad Stone. Today a similar operation from Mark Pincus, Tribe.net founder and early Facebook investor, announced $10 million in funding from Union Square Ventures, Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman, and Bob Pittman.More »
facebook
Peter Thiel "trying to destroy the real world" -- the 3,500-word version
Facebook funder Peter Thiel is a "neocon" who is trying to "destroy the real world." So says British journalist Tom Hodgkinson in a feature-length screed for The Guardian. You really don't want to miss a word of this one — it's a classic Cassandra piece — but OK, I'll 100-word it after the jump. More »
rumormonger
Yahoo to buy Powerset?
Whither Powerset, the once-hot search engine backed by a heavenly set of angel investors, including Facebook board member Peter Thiel? Little has been heard from the startup since COO Steve Newcomb left amid rumors of a C-suite love triangle. Cofounder Barney Pell — another leg in the whispered-about tryst — is so checked out that he's wasting time coding Facebook applications. The company has been searching, so far fruitlessly, for a CEO. Now comes word that Yahoo may be interested in buying the startup. More »
rumormonger
Is Plaxo ready to sell to Facebook?
It's curious that rumors of a Plaxo sale exploded at the same time that Robert Scoble got his Facebook account suspended using a secret, unreleased tool for extracting data from Facebook. Curious, too, that Plaxo is so eager to milk the incident for good PR. While a battle of words takes place in public, we hear that quieter talks are happening behind the scenes: A sale of Plaxo to Facebook. A clash between the companies' backers, though — the powerful VC Michael Moritz and the rising VC star Peter Thiel — could sink any deal. More »
6:30 AM on Fri Jan 4 2008
By Owen Thomas
2,198 views,
7 comments
Latest by scottwired: I'd heard a comcast acquisition of Plaxo was all but done -- that these discussions have been going on for months. more »
venture capital
Venture capital is totally "cushy," people
Early Facebook investor and openly Objectivist Peter Thiel tells the Wall Street Journal that Silicon Valley VCs are too quick to fire startup founders. They also meddle too much in their companies. He blames a cultural divide. More »
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