Carla Faraguna is the Executive Assistant to the Chief Executive Officer at Substack, the San Francisco newsletter and media platform. She joined in 2024 after nearly seven years running operations and people functions at Golden (Recursion Inc), the knowledge-graph startup. Her path runs through HR and employee programs at Fandom (Wikia), cultural exchange work with the Asia Society and the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program, and a stretch of self-directed travel and volunteering across a dozen countries. She holds a master's in East Asia Studies from Stanford and a political science degree from Stony Brook.
David Jaxon writes the Creator Economy Report, a newsletter covering the business of creators and the media industry built around them. Beyond the newsletter and its stated focus on the creator economy and media, no further details about Jaxon could be independently verified through public sources.
Evan Armstrong writes about profit and power in technology. He spent four years as lead writer at Every, where his column Napkin Math turned finance terms like revenue, COGS, and net income into deeply reported, deeply funny explainers for an audience of more than 100,000. In April 2026 he walked away to launch The Leverage, a solo publication promising rigorous, actionable, beautiful analysis of tech markets for founders, investors, and senior operators. He had never been paid to write before joining Every, and went on to publish almost 500,000 words there.
Jason Mikula is the publisher of Fintech Business Weekly, an independent newsletter that reaches more than 90,000 subscribers with critical, no-favors analysis of banking, fintech, and crypto. After more than a decade scaling consumer lending businesses at Enova, LendUp, and Goldman Sachs, he became one of the most-cited independent voices on Banking-as-a-Service and fintech regulation, writing the award-winning book on BaaS and co-hosting the Fintech Business Podcast. He works from outside Amsterdam, covering the U.S. fintech-banking ecosystem from across an ocean.
Ryan Avent is an American economics writer and author who spent 15 years at The Economist, six of them writing the magazine's flagship Free Exchange column. He wrote The Wealth of Humans (2016), a widely discussed argument that automation, globalization and a productive elite are creating a glut of labor that breaks the old social contract of work. He now runs portfolio communications at the investment fund Select Equity Group, writes the Substack newsletter The Bellows, and has a book on belief and the fate of societies forthcoming from Yale University Press.
Arnold Kling is an American economist, author, and blogger who turned a career spanning the Federal Reserve, Freddie Mac, and a sold-at-the-peak internet startup into one of the most charitable, contrarian voices in online economics. He writes the popular Substack 'In My Tribe,' is best known for 'The Three Languages of Politics,' and built a following by taking the most charitable view of those who disagree with him.
Brink Lindsey is a writer and policy thinker who spent decades inside Washington's free-market establishment - vice president for research at the Cato Institute, a leading free-trade voice - before publicly reinventing himself as a 'recovering libertarian.' Now senior vice president at the Niskanen Center, he argues that capable government and robust social insurance are not enemies of markets but their necessary complement. His writing, including The Captured Economy (with Steven Teles) and The Permanent Problem, wrestles with a single paradox: rich countries have never had more material plenty, and people have never felt less satisfied. He explores it weekly from a base in northeastern Thailand on his Substack, The Permanent Problem.
Bryan Caplan is a professor of economics at George Mason University who turns provocative ideas into bestselling books and graphic novels. He coined 'rational irrationality' to explain why democracies pick bad policies, argues education is mostly signaling, champions open borders and housing deregulation, and keeps a perfect public betting record on his predictions. He writes the Substack 'Bet On It' and has built a career out of cheerfully defending unpopular positions with data.
Charlie Sykes spent 23 years as one of Wisconsin's most influential conservative talk-radio voices, then walked away and turned his fire on his own movement. He co-founded The Bulwark, became a fixture of the Never Trump opposition, and now writes the Substack newsletter and hosts the podcast 'To the Contrary.' Author of nine books and an MSNBC contributor, he is a rare media figure who publicly reckoned with the part talk radio played in remaking the American right.
Derek Thompson is an American journalist, author, and podcaster best known for co-writing the #1 New York Times bestseller Abundance with Ezra Klein and hosting the Plain English podcast on The Ringer. After 17 years as a staff writer at The Atlantic, he left in 2025 to write independently on Substack, focusing on housing, energy, technology, and the decline of in-person social life.
Jennifer Rubin is a political commentator, author, and editor-in-chief of The Contrarian, the Substack publication she co-founded with attorney Norm Eisen in January 2025 after resigning from The Washington Post. A former labor lawyer who graduated first in her class at UC Berkeley Law, she spent years as the Post's resident conservative voice writing the 'Right Turn' column before breaking sharply with the Republican Party over Donald Trump and registering as a Democrat in 2020. Today she writes daily commentary in defense of democracy and is an MSNBC contributor.
John H. Cochrane is an American economist, the Rose-Marie and Jack Anderson Senior Fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution and author of the field-defining textbook Asset Pricing. A physicist-turned-finance scholar, he champions the fiscal theory of the price level, writes the popular free-market blog and Substack The Grumpy Economist, co-stars on Hoover's GoodFellows broadcast, and flies competition sailplanes in his spare time.
Josh Barro is an American journalist who left legacy media to run Very Serious, a subscription newsletter and podcast about politics, business, economics, and culture. A former Republican turned Democrat, ex-host of KCRW's Left, Right & Center and onetime New York Times and Business Insider columnist, he now writes a weekly mailbag called the Mayonnaise Clinic and co-hosts the litigation podcast Serious Trouble with attorney Ken White.
Scott Sumner is the economist behind The Money Illusion, the blog that turned an obscure idea - that central banks should target nominal GDP, not just inflation - into a mainstream policy debate. The intellectual force behind market monetarism, he spent 33 years teaching at Bentley before becoming the Ralph G. Hawtrey Chair Emeritus of Monetary Policy at George Mason's Mercatus Center. A late bloomer who bought his first cell phone in 2011, he is also a prolific film reviewer who has watched and rated thousands of movies.
Will Stancil is a civil rights attorney and research fellow at the University of Minnesota Law School's Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity, known for his prolific and combative presence on social media - dubbed by Slate as 'the most harassed man in the history of Twitter.' A specialist in housing policy, school segregation, and metropolitan governance, Stancil gained national attention in 2023 defending Biden-era economic narratives against 'vibecession' framing, ran for Minnesota state legislature in 2024, and emerged in 2026 as a visible organizer documenting ICE operations in Minneapolis. His mix of rigorous policy research and relentless online engagement has made him one of the most recognizable progressive voices in American digital politics.
Will Wilkinson is a political analyst, essayist, and policy intellectual who spent two decades navigating the intellectual terrain between libertarianism and liberalism before landing somewhere more interesting than either. A former research fellow at the Cato Institute and vice president at the Niskanen Center, he has written for The New York Times, The Economist, The Atlantic, and dozens of other outlets. Currently working in government affairs at Persona, a digital identity company, he continues to publish the 'Model Citizen' newsletter on Substack, where his blend of philosophy, political science, and sharp commentary finds its most faithful audience.
Chris Best is the co-founder and CEO of Substack, the subscription newsletter platform that has paid out hundreds of millions of dollars to independent writers. A systems engineer turned serial entrepreneur, Best previously co-founded Kik Messenger, scaling it to 300 million users before pivoting to rewrite the economics of media. Substack - which he launched in 2017 with Hamish McKenzie and Jairaj Sethi - has grown to over 5 million paid subscriptions, raised $213M in total funding including a $100M Series C in 2025, and minted more than 50 creators earning over $1 million annually on the platform.
Hamish McKenzie is the New Zealand-born co-founder and Chief Writing Officer of Substack, the subscription newsletter platform that has fundamentally reshaped how writers monetize their work. A former journalist and Tesla lead writer who wrote a book about Elon Musk's EV revolution, McKenzie pivoted from covering disruption to causing it - co-founding Substack in 2017 with Chris Best and Jairaj Sethi. Today the platform hosts over 50,000 earning creators and has raised $213 million total funding including a $100M Series C. McKenzie hosts The Active Voice podcast, delivered a TED2025 talk on the future of media, and is writing a book called 'How to Save the Media' due in 2026.
Kevin Lee is an executive at Substack, the subscription newsletter and media platform based in San Francisco that reached unicorn status with a $1.1 billion valuation in 2025 after raising a $100 million Series C. Substack has grown to host over 50,000 paid publications, with creators collectively earning more than $600 million annually and 20+ million monthly active subscribers on the platform.
Hannah Witton is a British and German YouTuber, broadcaster, and author who built a 14-year career talking frankly about sex, relationships and bodies online. In 2024 she pivoted away from sex-ed and now mentors other creators, writes the Creator Talks newsletter, and makes lifestyle videos about parenthood, books, and theatre.
Everett 'Ev' Randle is a General Partner at Benchmark, one of Silicon Valley's most legendary and selective venture capital firms. A Colorado native who graduated top of his class from CU Boulder's Leeds School of Business, Randle cut his teeth at Vista Equity Partners before moving through Bond Capital, Founders Fund, and two stints at Kleiner Perkins. He backed companies like Rippling, Anthropic, Databricks, Flock Safety, and Huntress across those roles. He is also a respected essayist in the VC world, best known for 'Playing Different Games' (2021), a widely-cited breakdown of Tiger Global's disruption of venture capital, and 'Operating Yield' (2023), a new framework for measuring SaaS growth efficiency. In April 2025, Benchmark announced Randle as its newest General Partner - a firm that manages roughly $425M per fund with only five partners.
James Wang is the General Partner of Creative Ventures, a San Francisco-based deep tech venture capital firm managing a $50M fund focused on AI, robotics, hardware, industrial automation, healthcare, agriculture, energy, and climate. With a background spanning Bridgewater Associates, Google X (Makani), co-founding the femtech startup Lioness Health, and a career in West African microfinance, Wang brings a rare combination of finance, engineering, and social-impact instincts to early-stage investing. He is also the author of 'What You Need to Know About AI' (2025) and publishes the 'Weighty Thoughts' Substack to over 3,000 subscribers.
Jin Ho Hur is a Co-Founder and General Partner at HRZ Han River Partners, a Menlo Park-based early-stage venture capital firm that bridges Silicon Valley and Korea's tech ecosystem. A PhD in Computer Science from KAIST and a serial entrepreneur who built and led internet companies in Korea from the mid-1990s, Hur helped shape the country's early internet economy and served as Chairperson of the Korea Internet Association. He later transitioned into institutional investing via Translink Investment before co-founding Han River Partners, which in October 2024 launched a $100 million fund focused on AI and consumer sectors within the 'Korea Graph.' He also writes the popular Substack newsletter 'Two Cents,' covering global tech and startup trends for over 9,000 subscribers.
Kyle Harrison is a General Partner at Contrary, the talent- and research-driven venture capital firm based in San Francisco. He joined in 2022 to co-found the firm's later-stage investment practice, bringing nearly a decade of experience from Index Ventures, Coatue Management, and TCV, where he backed companies including Ramp, Pave, Anduril, GitLab, Databricks, Snowflake, Figma, and Robinhood. Beyond deploying capital, Harrison built Contrary Research - one of the largest private market research platforms in the world, with 100,000+ subscribers and 500+ published reports. He also publishes the Investing 101 newsletter on Substack (26,000+ subscribers) and co-authored 'The Anduril Thesis,' a 300-page deep dive that took two years and 500+ sources to produce. Married to Camden, father of four, and a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
Matt Rappaport is General Partner at Future Frontier Capital, a pre-seed frontier technology VC fund based in Berkeley, California. A former professional musician who studied West African Sabar drumming in Senegal, Rappaport brings an unconventional lens to deep tech investing - 20+ years of IP strategy expertise, a faculty role at UC Berkeley's Fung Institute, and a data-driven methodology using patent landscape analytics to identify emerging sectors before mainstream adoption. He co-founded FFC with longtime partner Mark Garner in late 2023, building a portfolio of 100+ early-stage startups across AI, biotech, robotics, climate, and advanced materials - achieving nearly 11X TVPI on previous investments.
Medha Agarwal is a General Partner at Defy VC, an early-stage venture capital firm based in Woodside, California, where she partners with founders from day zero through Series A. With roots at Redpoint Ventures (7 years as Partner), Bessemer Venture Partners, and two founder stints of her own, she brings a rare blend of operator instinct and institutional investing muscle to sectors including vertical SaaS, fintech, AI-first companies, healthcare technology, and marketplaces. A Harvard College and Harvard Business School alumna, Medha is also a prolific writer—her Medium essays on vertical SaaS and AI pricing have become required reading in startup circles—and was named one of Business Insider's 66 Rising Stars of Venture Capital in 2023.
Stephanie Zinn is Editorial Partner at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), where she leads editorial strategy and audience growth across Substack, X, YouTube, and search. With over a decade in tech editorial, she previously built editorial teams from scratch at Coinbase and GitHub - generating 15M newsletter subscribers at Coinbase and launching GitHub's influential ReadME Project. She is one of the rare operators who treats clear writing not as a nice-to-have but as a core business asset.
Matt Ridley, 5th Viscount Ridley, is a British science writer, journalist, and hereditary peer whose books - from Genome to The Rational Optimist to How Innovation Works - have sold nearly two million copies in 31 languages. A zoologist by training (Oxford DPhil on pheasant mating systems), he argues that human progress is driven by the bottom-up exchange of ideas rather than top-down planning. Co-founder of the Rational Optimist Society newsletter, he writes a weekly column for The Times and is known for being simultaneously Britain's most prominent optimist about civilization and the chairman who presided over Northern Rock's catastrophic 2007 bank run.
Alberto Romero is a Spanish AI analyst, writer, and newsletter author behind The Algorithmic Bridge, a Substack publication with 40,000+ subscribers. A former machine learning engineer turned independent journalist, he brings an unusual fusion of aerospace engineering, cognitive neuroscience, and ML expertise to bear on the most pressing questions in AI - with a commitment to honesty, no ads, and no sponsors. He is also an analyst at CambrianAI Research, focusing on large language models and AI hardware/software.
Alex Kantrowitz is an independent technology journalist, author, and the founder of Big Technology - one of the most widely read independent tech newsletters in the world with 150,000+ subscribers. A former BuzzFeed News senior reporter and CNBC on-air contributor, he wrote 'Always Day One,' a deeply reported look at how tech titans like Amazon, Apple, Google, and Facebook maintain dominance through constant reinvention. Kantrowitz covers the systems and mechanisms driving big tech, not just the headlines, and has been named one of the ten most cited technology reporters in the world.