'The Nerd Reich' tracks the 'unmasking of Silicon Valley's true politics'
Journalist Gil Durán argues that a small circle of Silicon Valley billionaires and venture capitalists have concluded that democracy is in their way — and that they should be governing in its place.
The Nerd Reich
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “This transfixing debut from journalist Durán investigates the antidemocratic ideologies espoused by tech billi...
The Technological Republic: The Sunday Times bestseller from the great minds behind Palantir
The Sunday Times and #1 New York Times Bestseller‘The Technological Republic is far too important to ignore’ Times Literary SupplementSilicon Valley’s brightest minds once collaborated with governments to advance technologies, securing the West’s dominance on the global stage. But that relationship has corroded – with perilous repercussions for us all.Lifting the veil on tech giant Palantir and its broader political project, visionary co-founder and CEO Alexander C. Karp and his long-time deputy Nicholas W. Zamiska offer a searing critique of our collective culture of complacency. To regain geopolitical power and preserve our freedoms, we must tackle the world’s most pressing challenges – including the artificial intelligence arms race – together and head-on. Now is the time for the West to wake up.‘Bold and ambitious ... Essential reading’ Eric Schmidt‘Fascinating’ Financial Times‘A stirring manifesto’ Niall Ferguson‘Provocative and insightful’ Jamie Dimon
‘If we don’t fight back, we don’t have a future’: the journalist taking on the ‘tech fascists’ of Silicon Valley
As Elon Musk, Peter Thiel and their peers have grown richer and more influential, Gil Durán argues they have all but abandoned democracy – and found the perfect government to enable them
AI Bros Wanted Trump. Now They Learn What Happens When You Tell Him No.
Last year, in Fascism For First Time Founders, I warned the tech industry what happens when you cozy up to authoritarians. As I wrote then: Innovation requires trust. Not just between individuals, …
Major Tech Investor Calls Architect of Fascism a 'Saint' in Unhinged Manifesto
Silicon Valley's 'techno-optimism' cult believes we should let rich tech guys do whatever they want.
Technically Radical
Over 2024, we saw major tech investors and company owners overtly turn toward the right, overtly backing Donald Trump in his electoral campaign. This group of individuals, which commentators have taken to calling the “Tech Right”, are motivated by various concerns like the attempts by the Biden administration to regulate them and a general backlash against “wokeness”. Representative individuals and their respective justifications can be found in things like Marc Andreessen's essay The Techno-Optimist Manifesto or books like Balaji Srinivasan’s The Network State, and Alexander Karp and Nicholas Zamiska’s The Technological Republic.
Tech billionaires aren't juvenile science-fiction nerds, they just can't read
Tech billionaires aren't juvenile science-fiction nerds, they just can't read
The Anti-Intellectualism of Silicon Valley Elites
I recently re-read Richard Hofstadter's Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, and now every time a reactionary Silicon Valley billionaire opens his mouth, I think about it. So I wrote about it for The Nation. Here's the column: On Instagram, there’s an activist named Brian Patrick (@pano.
Has technological innovation lost the plot? An interview with AI ethicist Dr. Shannon Vallor | Chicago Policy Review
Shannon Vallor is the Baillie Gifford Chair in the Ethics of Data and Artificial Intelligence at the Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI) at the University of Edinburgh, where she is also appointed in Philosophy. Professor Vallor’s research explores how new technologies, especially AI, robotics, and data science, reshape human moral character, habits, and practices. She is […]
Silicon Valley has a science fiction problem | Aeon Essays
Tech titans claim the genre inspired them. But all they’ve done is graft their politics onto stories of a better future
The scent of Musk: Power, charisma and paranoia in Silicon Valley
The Connections That Turned a Precocious Teen Into the Fallen ‘Nostradamus of AI’
A 24-year-old investor hailed as a visionary attracted billions—before turning into Wall Street’s latest cautionary tale.
Imagination — Ruha Benjamin
Race After Technology (Polity) cuts through tech-industry hype to understand how emerging technologies can reinforce white supremacy and deepen social inequity. Benjamin argues that automation has the potential to hide, speed, and even deepen discrimination, while appearing neutral and even benevole
How Elon Musk and the Tech Billionaires Hijacked the State and Our Minds
Historian Quinn Slobodian tells Byline Times that Elon Musk's rise tells a deeper story—of fortunes built on state power, and a new politics where humans are treated less as citizens than as systems to be optimised
Gil Duran, author of The Nerd Reich, pulls it together: "the real 'innovation' we are seeing is the tech bros using wealth to seize government - in order to break government."
David Fenton
Crypto companies are the largest donors in American politics. Very few Americans use crypto at all. Journalist @gilduran.com calls it a gun to the head of American democracy. If a politician goes against them, tens of millions of dollars land on their head.
Sep 10, 2026 at 4:19 AM
