Tales of Silicon Valley

Nolan Bushnell arrived in Silicon Valley in 1968 - and changed it forever. He started Atari, launched the video game industry, gave Steve Jobs his first job, and created the wild, convention-defying model of the modern tech executive that everyone from Jobs to Mark Zuckerberg has followed.In this new eight-part series, the Sunday Times' technology correspondent Danny Fortson tells the story of the valley through portraits of key players through its short history. DIVE DEEPERlongform interviews on Danny's sister podcast, Danny In The Valleyread Danny's longform commentary on the series at thetimes.co.ukProduced by Cheeka Eyers at Rethink Audio for Wireless Studios and The Sunday Times. Matt Hall is the executive producer for Wireless Studios.

Michael and Xochi Birch launched Bebo, one of the first social networks. They sold it at the height of the market for $850 million to AOL Time Warner. Two years later, AOL sold it again - for $1. In a two-part podcast, we tell the Bebo story: its extraordinary rise, the fall, and how the Birches made away with the GDP of a small nation.In this new eight-part series, the Sunday Times' technology correspondent Danny Fortson tells the story of the valley through portraits of key players through its short history. DIVE DEEPERlongform interviews on Danny's sister podcast, Danny In The Valleyread Danny's longform commentary on the series at thetimes.co.ukProduced by Cheeka Eyers at Rethink Audio for Wireless Studios and The Sunday Times. Matt Hall is the executive producer for Wireless Studios.

Michael and Xochi Birch launch Bebo, one of the first social networks, and ride it to extraordinary heights before it all comes crashing down. In the conclusion to this two-part story, we tell of the rise and collapse of Bebo, and how the Birches become billionaires anyway. In this new eight-part series, the Sunday Times' technology correspondent Danny Fortson tells the story of the valley through portraits of key players through its short history. DIVE DEEPERlongform interviews on Danny's sister podcast, Danny In The Valleyread Danny's longform commentary on the series at thetimes.co.ukProduced by Cheeka Eyers at Rethink Audio for Wireless Studios and The Sunday Times. Matt Hall is the executive producer for Wireless Studios.

The city by the bay is ground zero of the tech revolution, but it has taken a dystopic turn. We dive inside San Francisco, where there are more billionaires per square foot than anywhere on the planet, but also more injection drug user than high school students. Families are fleeing; homelessness is soaring. We examine what the city can tell us about our techno-centric present - and the future.  In this new eight-part series, the Sunday Times' technology correspondent Danny Fortson tells the story of the valley through portraits of key players through its short history. DIVE DEEPERLongform interviews on Danny's sister podcast, Danny In The ValleyRead Danny's longform commentary on the series at thetimes.co.ukProduced by Cheeka Eyers at Rethink Audio for Wireless Studios and The Sunday Times. Matt Hall is the executive producer for Wireless Studios.

Fifty years on from Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk, we investigate how billionaires are racing to become the first to settle on the moon. They are convinced that humans will soon be a multi-planetary species, with a permanent settlement in outer space within five years. Is this the ultimate ego trip? Is it realistic? We find out all the answers.In this new eight-part series, the Sunday Times' technology correspondent Danny Fortson tells the story of the valley through portraits of key players through its short history. DIVE DEEPERLongform interviews on Danny's sister podcast, Danny In The ValleyRead Danny's longform commentary on the series at thetimes.co.ukProduced by Cheeka Eyers at Rethink Audio for Wireless Studios and The Sunday Times. Matt Hall is the executive producer for Wireless Studios.

Scott Kriens helped build the internet. Now he’s helping undo the havoc it has unleashed with a mountain retreat centre he’s built on the doorstep of Silicon Valley. We journey to 1440 Multiversity in the Santa Cruz mountains to commune with nature, go device-free and explore how the tech industry is trying to find its soul.In this new eight-part series, the Sunday Times' technology correspondent Danny Fortson tells the story of the valley through portraits of key players through its short history. DIVE DEEPERLongform interviews on Danny's sister podcast, Danny In The ValleyRead Danny's longform commentary on the series at thetimes.co.ukProduced by Cheeka Eyers at Rethink Audio for Wireless Studios and The Sunday Times. Matt Hall is the executive producer for Wireless Studios.

Millions of people are working every day, every hour, every minute to keep the web safe for the rest of us. They are human filters, finding and blocking the worst things that humanity can muster. But who are they? Why do we hear so little about them? We take an inside look at the world of content moderators, the shadow work force that is doing the web's dirty work - often to their own detriment.  

In an additional bonus episode to Tales From Silicon Valley, The Sunday Times’ tech correspondent Danny Fortson brings on Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari, for the full interview that was featured in episode 1 of Tales Of Silicon Valley. He talks about growing up in Utah (0:45), setting up his first business at age 10 (3:00), managing the games department (4:20), coming to Silicon Valley (7:10), working at Ampex (8:30), playing Space War (9:30), starting a gaming company with $500 (12:30), creating Pong (16:20), running on a shoestring (19:15), selling to Warner (23:30), the Atari culture (24:40), hiring Steve Jobs (27:00), making more than all of Hollywood combined (32:00), turning down an offer to be the first investor in Apple (34:40), his worst day of work (38:15), why the tech industry took root in Silicon Valley (39:00), why he’s excited about tech in 2019 (41:00), his other ventures (45:20), what Steve Jobs got right (48:25).