a16z-backed tech publication Future to shut down, says report

US venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz-backed technology publication Future is shutting down,
reports Insider.

Future hasn’t published any new articles in months as most of its editorial staffers have left, said the report, noting that its newsletter has gone defunct as well. A source close to Andreessen Horowitz’s content strategy confirmed the development to Insider.

Future was launched in 2021 and billed as the next big thing in media, particularly because of its aim to sidestep legacy media and take an optimistic message on technological progress to readers.

The publication brought on board executives from Andreessen Horowitz’s portfolio companies, outside experts, and senior editors to publish hopeful articles about technology and society.
Opinions were diverse on the launch of such a publication, with The New Yorker calling it an “opportunity to introduce new terminology, new ideologies, new framing, and new ways for people in and around technology to conceptualize their work”. But tech news site Protocol questioned whether it was “the future of media.” Protocol shut down recently.

The Insider report tried to diagnose what may have led to the eclipse of the year-old tech publication, hinting that it could have something to do with the technology industry increasingly wanting to go direct. “Venture capital firms have long sought to speak straight to founders, recruiting former journalists to create newsletters and blogs, styling their partners on podcasts as philosophical thought-leaders, and even hiring ghost writers,” it said.

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The article noted that in recent years tech investors and executives had grown frustrated with the way mainstream media reported on their businesses. “Coverage has evolved from optimistic blogging to more adversarial reporting that often delves into thorny labor, political cultural issues, and closely scrutinizes power and influence, in a way some tech figures perceive as deliberately hostile,” it said.

And that, it added, had pushed many tech and venture firms to pivot from glorified marketing as a media strategy to having a full-fledged editorial operation.

But that approach has its downsides, as evident from recent developments.

Insider cited the example of Sequoia Capital. Relying less on traditional media, the investment firm commissioned lengthy pieces about its portfolio company founders. But, as the Insider article pointed out, when Sam Bankman-Fried’s firm FTX imploded in November, wiping out billions of dollars in investor and customer capital, “Sequoia’s glossy profile about him was mocked until the firm quietly deleted it.”

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