Four Thoughts on the Recode 100

The Forrest Four-Cast: December 12, 2017

Everyone loves a great list. And our friends at the web’s best source of in-depth, investigative reporting have done well with their inaugural Recode 100 ranking of top tech industry power players. Four quick observations of overall trends as manifested in this list are as follows.

1. The Hurricane Harvey Effect. Uncovering sexual harassment in the workplace is the most obvious trend from the Recode 100, as Uber whistle-blower Susan Fowler is #2 on the list and the combination of Jodi Kantor, Megan Twohey and Ronan Farrow weigh in at #3. More misbehaving from 2017 necessitates an entire section that is titled “the Terrible 10.”
2. Its a Big Four World Out There. The big four tech giants dominate the current ecosystem and they dominate the front end of this list, with Jeff Bezos at #1, Mark Zuckerberg #4, Tim Cook at #5 and Sundar Pichai at #7. Do we have any room for startups amidst these titans? As for (relatively) newly-minted founders, there is only one such person in the first 20 spots— Katrina Lake of Stitch Fix at #9.
3. What Net Neutrality? The equal access operating procedures for the Internet that we have known for so many years will likely change after December 14, thanks to the efforts of Trump’s pro-telco Federal Communication Commission. That said, these reorganizational efforts from FCC Chairman Ajit Pai only land him at #52 on the Recode 100.
4. Where is the Blockchain? While it is very refreshing to see a year-end list that isn’t completely skewed to what has happened in November and December, one would expect that the recent explosion of Bitcoin prices and blockchain hype would be more significantly highlighted here. Nope. Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong doesn’t arrive on the list until #54.

Hugh Forrest serves as Chief Programming Officer at SXSW, the world’s most unique gathering of creative professionals. He also tries to write at least four paragraphs per day on Medium. These posts often cover tech-related trends; other times they focus on books, pop culture, sports and other current events.

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