I am honestly so confused about Kara Swisher as a phenomenon. Is it a Maggie Haberman thing where she gets scoops from the subject because of ass-kissing? Did she have a heyday of legitimacy? - ThreadSky

gwensnyder.bsky.social • 6 days ago

I am honestly so confused about Kara Swisher as a phenomenon.

Is it a Maggie Haberman thing where she gets scoops from the subject because of ass-kissing?

Did she have a heyday of legitimacy?

Reposted from Shiv Ramdas Rice Lord

old enough to remember that before he was cosplaying as a genius businessman he was pretending to be a literal scientist and had the Kara Swishers of the world spend years calling him the new Edison and a genius inventor and all kinds of other cringe stuff, dunno why we never talk about that anymore

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socialistfrog.bsky.social•6 days ago

Legitimately I just think it's because she was at the NYT which gave her access. And that she was basically doing "exciting business" style coverage. Sort of like a local restaurant reporter for massive tech/defense contracting companies.

feralrobots.bsky.social•6 days ago

I suspect the key ingredient is that she used that position of privilege to validate techbros, but there are lots of other factors. She's been very good at selling her alt-cred, & that goes back a long ways. It's all very Californian Ideology, without openly copping to the ideology.

gwensnyder.bsky.social•6 days ago

Ooooooh I didn't realize she came out of NYT, that explains a lot.

fanofdemocracy.net•6 days ago

I first encountered her as Walter Mossberg’s intern at the WSJ. He helped her build her tech journalist cred back then (late 90’s).

socialistfrog.bsky.social•6 days ago

Yeah I realize I spoke in haste. NYT was way later.

fanofdemocracy.net•6 days ago

I remembered seeing his column introducing her. I’m THAT old. 😅

caseinmicelles.bsky.social•6 days ago

I think she started in the WaPo, then WSJ, Vox, then NYT later. I know she was in the McLaughlin group at one point.

caseinmicelles.bsky.social•6 days ago

I wouldn't classify her as a suck up, but I think she's gotten so deeply embedded in the tech industry over the past ~30 years that she doesn't see the forest through the trees.

gwensnyder.bsky.social•6 days ago

I really had very little interest in Silicon Valley politics until it became clear that they had stopped grudgingly accommodating anti-Nazi internet stuff and started actively encouraging the Nazis, so I'm playing a lot of catch up on a bunch of people that suck.

brunhilde2525.bsky.social•6 days ago

She bought the con early and got access as #1 fan who published fawning accounts. A self reflection that accurately assesses how credulous she was plus how much damage she is responsible for is painful.

zenlike.bsky.social•6 days ago

She happened to do the tech and internet beat in the 90ies just when it all started to blow up.

Right time right place I guess.

Rest of her career is typical access journalism, where Silicon Valley types use her to launder their PR, and she uses them to get scoops.

islandofreil.bsky.social•6 days ago

"Right time, right place" explains *so* many assholes that we've been forced to know about over the last three decades.

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