August 19, 2025 • 52 mins
Whatever stodgy image you have in your mind of the typical finance news reporter, I guarantee it isn't Allie Garfinkle. And yet still relatively early in her career, Allie has established herself as one of the best in that business with a resume that includes Forbes, The Deal, Yahoo Finance, and of course Fortune, where she serves as senior finance reporter, co-chair of Fortune Brainstorm Tech, the lead writer for Fortune Termsheet, their VC newsletter, and now the host of the Termsheet podcast, which debuted in July.
Despite all that, Allie actually wanted to be in theater. She's an accomplished alto. She's also a scuba diver and a free diver who finds spirituality in the ocean. And we didn't even have time to discuss her love of magic and pipe organs. Allie joined us to discuss her Miami upbringing, which probably explains a lot, where venture capital is heading other than AI, and of course, to preview Fortune Brainstorm Tech, which takes place in Utah in early September.
For this episode of Pressing Matters from Big Valley Marketing, the podcast that brings you conversations with the top media and influencers in B2B tech. I'm Dave Reddy, head of Big Valley Marketing's media and influencers practice, and I'm your host. Through research and good old-fashioned relationship building, we've identified B2B tech's top 200 media and influencers, including Allie. Here's our chat with Allie. Enjoy.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Dave Reddy (00:00):
Whatever stodgy image you have in your mind of
the typical finance newsreporter, I guarantee it isn't
Allie Garfinkel.
And yet still relatively earlyin her career, Allie has
established herself as one ofthe best in that business with a
resume that includes Forbes,The Deal, Yahoo Finance, and of
course Fortune, where she servesas senior finance reporter,
co-chair of Fortune BrainstormTech, the lead writer for
(00:23):
Fortune Termsheet, their VCnewsletter, and now the host of
the Termsheet podcast, whichdebuted in July.
Despite all that, Allieactually wanted to be in
theater.
She's an accomplished alto.
She's also a scuba diver and afree diver who finds
spirituality in the ocean.
And we didn't even have time todiscuss her love of magic and
(00:43):
pipe organs.
Allie joined us to discuss herMiami upbringing, which probably
explains a lot, where venturecapital is heading other than
AI, and of course, to previewFortune Brainstorm Tech, which
takes place in Utah in earlySeptember.
For this episode of PressingMatters from Big Valley
Marketing, the podcast thatbrings you conversations with
the top media and influencers inB2B tech.
(01:05):
I'm Dave Reddy, head of BigValley Marketing's media and
influencers practice, and I'myour host.
Through research and goodold-fashioned relationship
building, we've identified B2Btech's top 200 media and
influencers, including Allie.
Here's our chat with Allie.
Enjoy.
Music (01:23):
Music
Dave Reddy (01:31):
Allie, thanks so much for being on the podcast.
Really appreciate you joiningus.
Allie Garfinkle (01:34):
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
Long time listener, first timecaller.
Dave Reddy (01:39):
That's nice to hear.
So now we have 10 listeners.
So you've got a greatbackground and it all started,
as great backgrounds often do,in the party land of Miami,
Florida.
So what was it like growing upat the bottom of Florida?
Allie Garfinkle (01:55):
At the bottom of Florida.
No, it's funny.
Do all great resumes start inparty country?
Probably.
Maybe.
Yeah, mind up.
Well, I appreciate that.
So I grew up in Miami.
I grew up in North Miami Beach,which is not the South Beach of
everyone's imaginary, thoughI've spent a lot of time there.
You took your
Dave Reddy (02:15):
talents to North Beach, not South Beach.
Allie Garfinkle (02:18):
I took my talents to North Beach and then
eventually I took my talents,took quite a bit out of South
Beach and quite a bit out ofNorth Miami Beach too.
But yeah, I mean, look, Miamiwas a really interesting place
to grow up in the 2000s.
You know, got hit really hardby the Great Recession.
My dad is a real estateinvestor, commercial real
(02:38):
estate.
So I actually watched sort ofhow that affected our family.
I watched him try to make abusiness work sort of in an
incredibly difficult falteringenvironment to say the least.
So it's an interesting placefrom an economic perspective.
It's an interesting place froma demographic perspective.
I grew up around a lot ofdiversity of all kinds.
(02:59):
It's funny, in the politicalclimate we're in, a lot of
people don't know people whopolitically disagree with them,
and I certainly do.
It's also a place, though, withjust a lot of very underrated,
strange history.
And I definitely think I...
A lot of people are verysurprised that I'm from Miami,
but I think in certain waysit...
(03:20):
It really actually informs whoI am and informs kind of the
diversity of things I'minterested in.
It kind of, I think, began mypenchant for sort of some of the
stranger corners ofstorytelling.
I love a weird story and Idon't think that's unrelated to
being from Miami.
Dave Reddy (03:39):
Well, it is a weird town.
It's a very weird town.
Very weird town.
Are you familiar with the verydeep cut U2 song called Miami?
Music (03:46):
Yes.
Allie Garfinkle (03:46):
There is a deep cut U2 song called Miami.
I don't know
Dave Reddy (03:50):
if I believe you.
We might have to use that asthe intro music.
Allie Garfinkle (03:54):
Is it a good song?
I actually am quite a U2 fan.
But wait, so is it a good song?
I like it.
Dave Reddy (04:02):
It's on, wow, the listeners are like, what are you
guys doing?
I like it.
It's on Pop, that mid-90s albumthat everybody else hates.
Allie Garfinkle (04:13):
Oh, that's why I've never heard it.
Dave Reddy (04:15):
Yeah, right.
But I like it.
The drums are really cool.
At any rate, go give it alisten.
One reviewer called it theirmost naive song ever.
So at any rate, that's whathappens when Irish people write
about Miami.
So moving on, there's no seguefrom that.
So your dad was in commercialreal estate or is in commercial
real estate.
What did mom do?
Allie Garfinkle (04:35):
My mom's a homemaker, but she actually used
to work in theater.
before she sort of quit to kindof get married and raise us.
I have two siblings, bothyounger, Maddie and Heshy.
And my mom actually, my momtook, my mom, my, we don't,
nobody thinks of Miami as atheater town necessarily, but I
(04:56):
actually do tie a lot of my lovefor storytelling probably to my
dad's love for narrativehistory and my mom's love for
theater.
Dave Reddy (05:04):
And you followed originally in your mom's
footsteps.
You told me that you were inundergrad at, I presume, in
Chicago.
You were a theater andperformance studies major.
and that you were also an alto,and I had to look that up.
Allie Garfinkle (05:19):
So you're not into music.
No, I love
Dave Reddy (05:21):
music, and I had a sense of it.
Actually, two of my kids didmusical theater, and they always
had Abby sing soprano, butshe's really an alto.
But at any rate,
Allie Garfinkle (05:29):
I had to look it up.
Yes, that is a real problem.
That is
Dave Reddy (05:32):
actually a real problem.
So you know what I'm talkingabout.
Exactly what you're talkingabout.
So I don't know if you wouldcall these people– they were all
over the spectrum, I thought,but it was like everybody from
Annie Lettix to Adele– to StevieNicks, who I always thought was
a contralto, if that's theword.
I love Stevie Nicks.
Allie Garfinkle (05:49):
I love Stevie Nicks.
I actually, most of, Iactually, after a very, very
long hiatus, I actually took, Iactually started taking voice
lessons again, I think, to feelsomething.
Oh, cool.
Yeah.
And we mostly sing StevieNicks.
Dave Reddy (06:03):
All right.
That's your ring.
I got
Allie Garfinkle (06:05):
it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We mostly sing Stevie Nicks.
I'm not going to do it on thepodcast.
No,
Dave Reddy (06:10):
I wasn't even going to ask.
I know that's not cool.
Allie Garfinkle (06:12):
You're not even going to ask.
I mean, no, there's like aversion where I would be,
because again, much like being ajournalist, if you are going to
ask the questions, if you'regoing to ask questions, you
better be able to answer them.
If you're going to tell peopleyou sing, you better be willing
to sing.
Dave Reddy (06:25):
I hear you.
Allie Garfinkle (06:26):
I do believe
Dave Reddy (06:27):
that.
And actually, I think it wouldprobably increase my ratings,
but I'm not going to ask you todo it.
So I did have Don Clark playone of his instruments, but
that's a whole different storythat people can go back on.
So in addition, you have theMiami things make so much more
sense now that I know that.
So in addition to theater,you're a singer.
(06:50):
Certified scuba diver, that'stwo in a row now.
We had Julie Bord on lastmonth, also a certified scuba
diver.
A free diver.
Now, are those those crazypeople who go like 50 miles down
with no oxygen?
Are you one of those people?
Allie Garfinkle (07:03):
I definitely don't go 50 miles down.
Can't stress that enough.
But yeah, it is breath holddiving.
I really like scuba and Islowly am, I want to spend more
and more time with it becausethere's a lot you can do in
scuba that you can't do withfree diving.
I mean, free diving is breathhold diving.
I can go about 25 meters prettyreliably.
Sometimes if I'm lucky, I canget to 30.
(07:24):
You've got to equalize.
You actually, I actually spent,it took me almost a year to get
my original certification,Dave, because I was struggling
with equalizing.
It was actually a very funnycorner of my life.
At the time, I was working atYahoo.
It was the dead of COVID.
And I would like wake up anddo, I would wake up and I would
write earnings reports, like doa hit on a TV show.
(07:46):
And then in the afternoon,sometimes I would go free diving
in Redondo to try to figure outhow to equalize.
Oh, by the way, for anyonelistening to this, no one goes
free diving alone.
Never go free diving alone.
There's actually Okay.
Fair enough.
Yeah.
Disclaimer.
Don't try that at home, atleast not alone.
But yeah, no, it's a, it'sbreath hole diving.
It's a, the thing I think Ireally love about it is that you
(08:10):
can't white knuckle it.
I am a person who definitelywill white knuckle things.
Dave Reddy (08:14):
Hmm.
Allie Garfinkle (08:15):
If I'm having a terrible time or if I don't
know how to do something, I willtry to run through the wall
instead of look for a door.
And with freediving, youactually can't because if your
throat constricts enough, youactually won't be able to
equalize to get down past acouple of meters.
Dave Reddy (08:30):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Death is definitely aconsideration for how you want
to handle something like that.
Yeah.
Allie Garfinkle (08:36):
For what it's worth, freediving actually is
pretty darn safe as long asyou're with people and as long
as you're not doing anythingtruly crazy.
Right.
The documentaries you'veprobably seen are the most
extreme situations and the mosttalented freedivers.
I am not the most talentedfreediver.
I'm just trying to have a nicetime.
The thing that is best about itis once you get down past 15...
(09:00):
sometimes 10-ish, you go intowhat's called bradycardia, where
your heart rate slows down alot.
If you're a nervous person,it's actually a great activity
in that way.
I mean, I recognize I'm like,I'm trying to slow freediving
here.
Dave Reddy (09:13):
I'm the most anxious guy I know.
I might try freediving.
I'll probably kill myself,though.
What is that?
Allie Garfinkle (09:18):
It's actually a great thing to do that I
promise is not as scary orimpressive as it sounds, at
least not in the incarnation Ido it.
There are certainly people whodo it in much more scary,
impressive incarnations.
Dave Reddy (09:30):
All I can think of is, and I'm sure you saw the
movie, I cannot remember it,took place in Santa Cruz in
Monterey.
It was about some famous surferwho had a massive wipeout at
Mavericks and survived.
And then the last scene afterhe survives at Mavericks is they
shoot for it.
And he's died freediving.
It's like, well, I'm glad helived through that, but I
(09:51):
guess...
Come on, man.
Allie Garfinkle (09:55):
The thing is, it's a...
I mean, the ocean is veryimportant to me.
I'm not important to the ocean.
And that's what I like aboutit, actually.
No matter how big your problemsare, no matter how important
you may feel in a given moment,no matter how unimportant you
may feel in a given moment, theocean truly doesn't care.
(10:15):
It's actually kind of...
No matter how talented of asurfer someone is, no matter how
talented of a free diversomebody is, it is a way of, I
think, reckoning with mortality,maybe, but also just sort of
reckoning with how small wereally are.
And some people don't likethat, but I do.
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to gostraight to go to
(10:37):
existentialism.
Dave Reddy (10:38):
I'm cool with depth.
And actually, it's funny yousay that.
So, you know, as...
The other nine listeners know Igrew up in Cape Cod.
And so I grew up in the oceantoo.
And I'm a swimmer, but Iwouldn't free dive.
I never got into scuba oranything like that.
And I think both because I grewup there and don't live there
(10:59):
anymore.
And also just around the samesort of thing you just said, at
the risk of getting super deep,the most spiritual I feel is
when I step into an ocean.
There's something about that.
Because at the end of the day,it is, I know we break them up.
stupid humans into fivedifferent oceans, but it's all
one big giant body of water.
And that's a pretty spookyidea.
(11:21):
And if you don't have respectfor the ocean, you will be dead.
Yeah.
So
Allie Garfinkle (11:26):
very, very, uh, if, if on an unlucky day, it
can be really quick.
And I think, so I agree.
I, I actually do find, I dofind the ocean to be a
fundamentally spiritual entityas a person who struggles with
spirituality, right?
I think a lot of people inmedia struggle maybe struggle
with spirituality.
Dave Reddy (11:45):
That's fact, not faith-based.
Allie Garfinkle (11:47):
Well, see, I think that the thing about it,
to your point, every body ofwater is the same body of water,
actually, in the end, if it'sconnected to the ocean.
They're all
Dave Reddy (11:55):
that, except for the lakes,
Allie Garfinkle (11:57):
right?
Yeah, exactly.
They're all that, except forthe lakes.
But there is a sense ofsomething ancient and
continuous.
Like there are a lot ofcreatures in the ocean that have
existed long before humans didand will exist long after.
And I
Dave Reddy (12:11):
hope I never meet them.
Allie Garfinkle (12:12):
And you're like, I would like to see none
of them.
See, I'm the weirdo, Dave,who's like, I kind of would
actually like to see them.
Oh my gosh, what is it called?
I believe the book is calledThe Deepest Map.
It is about the sort of questto map the deepest points in the
ocean.
And spoiler alert, It's insane.
(12:33):
It's an insane process.
Dave Reddy (12:36):
I read a different book about this.
Sorry, you finish your thought.
Allie Garfinkle (12:39):
There are actually a couple.
It's also possible I've gottenthe name wrong.
And if I did, I am so sorrybecause I read it a couple of
years ago.
That writer did a fabulous job.
Dave Reddy (12:49):
It was a woman sports writer.
The one I read.
Oh
Allie Garfinkle (12:53):
my God.
Dave Reddy (12:53):
We'll tell you at the end in the outro.
Allie Garfinkle (12:58):
I forget what her name was, but it published
in like 2013.
And it was, it was, and I readit in like a weekend.
Right.
She
Dave Reddy (13:07):
hooked up with a couple of guys who do this for
like fun and basically went toevery deepest point in every
ocean.
Yes.
Allie Garfinkle (13:17):
Yeah.
Yes.
It was awesome.
And it's, and I'm, and part ofme is like, God, she has, she's
onto something.
Maybe I should, maybe thiswhole tech and finance thing,
maybe I've got this all wrong.
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (13:26):
I don't know though.
And you know, then you, thenyou think about the dudes who
went looking for the Titanicand, uh, At least they didn't
suffer.
So, well, this has beendefinitely the most interesting
first 10 minutes of the showI've ever had.
I almost don't want to move onto the other stuff, but I think
we have to.
Allie Garfinkle (13:42):
This is now a podcast about you two deep cuts
in the
Dave Reddy (13:48):
ocean.
I'm going to skip your love ofmagic and pipe organs just
because we do need to get intoyour career.
But I just, I do want to listthat out.
Theater, scuba, freediving,magic, and pipe organs and a
talented alto singer.
That is, you know, as we say inPassover, Dayenu.
(14:12):
That would have been enough.
Allie Garfinkle (14:15):
I just gave you, did I give you too much
information?
Dave Reddy (14:20):
No, this is awesome.
So after all that.
After basically writing storiesof your own and your childhood,
what got you, and you mentionedit a little bit before, but
what did get you interested instorytelling?
Were you doing journalism whileyou were doing theater or was
that something you picked uplater?
Allie Garfinkle (14:36):
So I was the managing editor of my high
school newspaper and thought Iwould never go into journalism
is the honest to God truth.
I'd always been interested instorytelling.
I've always loveddocumentaries.
I'm a big Errol Morris fan.
I've also always lovednonfiction writing.
The first nonfiction I everremember really loving, and I
(14:59):
know this is going to soundinsane, is Robert K.
Massey's Peter the Great.
Okay.
Have you ever read this?
It is now on
Dave Reddy (15:07):
my list.
I love reading nonfictionhistories to that and put it on
my list.
Allie Garfinkle (15:11):
It is an incredibly colorful portrait.
of Peter the Great, who was anincredibly colorful guy.
And I read it probably when Iwas 12.
It was a book my dad just hadaround the house.
And it was this kind ofincredible resurrection of a
person who's been dead forhundreds of years.
And I thought that was, Iremember being entranced by that
in a way I couldn't explain.
(15:32):
And as I got older, I had acreative writing teacher who
introduced me to David Sedaris'work pretty early.
And I really became interestedin essay writing.
Oh yeah, that's okay.
Really?
Dave Reddy (16:03):
Sort
Allie Garfinkle (16:04):
of like journalism.
Yeah, journalism actually haspaid my bills for quite a while.
I'm not nothing to brag about,but it's a living, you know?
That's what's great when youstart at the absolute bottom of
the barrel.
But no, the truth is, it was2016.
I was sort of puttering aboutin Chicago.
(16:25):
I was actually working on aproduction of Death of the
Salesman at the time.
You know, Trump had beenelected pretty recently at that
point.
And I was looking at sort of Idid a very honest assessment of
my life like one does when theyare 23, 22.
And I sort of decided thattheater wasn't going to have the
(16:47):
kind of impact I really wanted.
I was doing some documentarytheater work at the time, too.
And I realized the thing Iloved the most was interviewing
people.
So I messed around with thatfor a while.
I spent some time volunteeringat a military museum in Chicago
doing interviews.
I actually learned to interviewpeople and realized I really
(17:08):
liked it from the perspective oforal history and documentary
theater.
Yeah.
I know that the deadline'spassed, but I would love to
(17:38):
start a conversation for nextyear.
If it's possible to apply thisyear, I still would love to.
He got on a call and he let meapply, and that actually started
my career.
Economic stories are storiesabout people, often some of the
most high-stakes stories.
Sure.
And that was, I think, that wassort of the case I made,
(17:59):
basically, in saying, look, Iknow how to tell stories.
I know I'm a weirdo, but...
I think I could maybe do this.
And he said, sure.
And they gave me a scholarship.
To this day, I know there's alot of controversy over whether
journalism school is a good ideafor people.
I can't speak to anyone else,but I can say it was for me.
I don't have a career withoutNYU's business and economic
(18:22):
reporting program.
I don't, full stop.
They really took a chance on mein a way that it's hard to
articulate just how insane Irealize that is now.
What a decade later almost.
Dave Reddy (18:35):
Well, you know, they obviously knew what they were
doing.
So you've worked at Forbes,you've worked at The Deal,
you've worked at FT, you'veworked at Yahoo Finance, and of
course, now you're at Fortune.
You were working at Forbes asan intern during your time at
NYU, I believe, and then writingfor The Deal before you
finished your master's.
Was that part of getting themaster's or was getting a
(19:00):
master's just too boring foryou?
Music (19:01):
Yeah.
Allie Garfinkle (19:02):
Oh, Dave, I got so lucky.
I got so, so lucky.
So part of the master's is thatyou have to have an internship.
Of course.
Forbes, give him a lot ofcredit.
I was an intern on thebillionaire's team.
(19:23):
I took a test, basically.
And they were like, she didgood on the test.
She has no clips.
Let's let her hang out forthree months.
So that was helpful.
And then the Dow Jones NewsFund matched me with The Street,
which at the time owned TheDeal.
And the editor at The Deal is aguy named Mike Brown, who,
other than Steve Solomon, is theother person who I completely
(19:45):
give credit for starting mycareer with.
Mike Mike basically looked atthe pile of interns and said,
that one's mine.
And I was I was that.
And he he offered me a jobafter after a couple of months.
So I basically at the very sortof at the very end of grad
school, I I was I was I alreadyhad a job, which was yeah, which
(20:09):
was, you know.
the dream scenario like I can'tit wasn't nothing's perfect
ever but my god I that doesn'thappen it's actually I have a
lot of feelings about this Ithink because it's a really hard
time to start in journalism andI I was so lucky and I didn't
even realize how lucky I was atthe time So that's how it all
(20:31):
got started.
You
Dave Reddy (20:32):
never do it.
Allie Garfinkle (20:33):
Yeah.
No, you never do.
You're just kind of hanging outsaying, oh, this seems kind of
interesting.
Right.
Someone did somethingexceptional for you and you only
realize like a decade laterthat it was actually a
life-changing thing they did foryou.
Dave Reddy (20:46):
Right.
The forks in the road thatdon't look like forks at the
moment.
So you took the path– tocontinue the fork analogy, you
took the path into financialjournalism.
You mentioned before that yousee– economics, story about
economics, story about money,stories about people.
So explain that a little bitmore.
I mean, because obviouslyyou've hit a niche and you've
(21:08):
kept going with it, although youbranched a little bit into
tech.
So what is it that fascinatesyou about that money and people?
Allie Garfinkle (21:17):
Well, everyone's fascinated with
money, aren't they?
Right?
I am.
Dave Reddy (21:22):
I'd like to have more.
Allie Garfinkle (21:24):
Well, let's say everybody...
I remember I knew I did theright thing deciding to do
economic journalism as far backas being an intern at Forbes,
actually, when I would be inthese conversations.
I did a lot of the shippingbillionaires that year on the
billionaires list.
When I realized I was havingconversations with people about
(21:48):
how much they are worth, and Irealized nobody wanted it to be
accurate.
They wanted it to seem likethey either had more than they
had or less than they had.
And I was like, this is sointeresting.
And I mean, it's a sort of, Imean, if you think about sort of
just pieces of just, you know,just great stories in history,
right?
A lot of them are stories thatare implicitly about money.
(22:10):
A lot of them are implicitlyabout power, right?
Shakespeare, right?
What is the merchant of Veniceabout, ladies and gentlemen?
Or if you think about somethinglike King Lear, yes, we're
talking about power politically,but we're also talking about
financial resources.
That is where so much tensionis just created.
I also just do think that,particularly in M&A, where I've
(22:33):
sort of funneled, weaved in andout of throughout my whole
career, You know, it's a faultline.
That kind of exchange is afault line.
No company acquires anothercompany, pays $100 million for
it, let's say, unless there'ssomething they really need.
So it's important to figure outwhat that is.
No company raises more capitalunless that's something they
(22:55):
really need or unless it'ssomething they've convinced
themselves that they need, whichare two separate things.
And sort of in the middle ofthe AI boom, you know, There's
something I think reallyinteresting happening where, you
know, I mean, the Overtonwindow has shifted so far that
we're now seeing, you know, $2billion seed rounds like for
Thinking Machines Lab, right?
(23:16):
But that would have beenunheard of five years ago.
like five years ago, not thatlong ago, right?
So I think it's, and I thinkthat is indicative of something.
It's indicative of not onlyjust the level of capital
flowing through the system, butthe ways in which the narrative
has changed about opportunity.
And I think there's, and Ithink the ways in which capital
(23:37):
flows tells stories, tellsnarrative stories, we just don't
always pay attention to whatthose are.
Because a lot of reporting, andno shade on this at all, I've
done these scoops too, is Xcompany pays X million dollars
for this company, right?
Like there's nothing wrong withthat, but actually a lot of the
time there is a very goodreason why that has happened.
(24:00):
And sometimes there's somereally colorful characters at
the center of it.
So if you're someone like mewho is interested in why people
make an ambition, is interestedin high stakes decisions, is
interested in what it actuallymeans to build a truly excellent
(24:21):
business, it is a veryinteresting corner in which to
live your life.
I mean, money also just haslike a very, if you want to talk
about history, right?
Money has an interestinghistory too, right?
It actually has come to mean alot of different things.
And we're actually in, if youlook at what's happened with
crypto, if you look at sort ofhow payments have evolved over
(24:41):
the last few years, especially,what money actually means also
changes over time in ways thatare, I think, interesting to
track.
I recognize it's a long answer,but it's something I do think
about a lot.
Dave Reddy (24:55):
I mean, it's fundamental to what you do.
Now, I want to go back to theAI boom in a second, but first,
you did make a switch to tech.
Was that an accident?
Were you thinking, all right,the money's going into tech?
What was the reason for firstYahoo Finance and now focusing
on tech for
Allie Garfinkle (25:10):
the most part?
I love how you assign so muchlogic to what I've done.
No, I...
Okay, I'm going to saysomething that might be slightly
controversial.
I think most people who go intobusiness journalism want to
cover tech at some point.
They're the biggest businessesin the world.
They are often so mired incontroversy if they get big
(25:34):
enough for long enough.
The people who run them are allfascinating in ways that are
good and bad.
And I think tech also, thething I always found really
intriguing about tech is it'slike the sector where everything
escalates so quickly.
It's like, remember thatescalated quickly bit from
(25:55):
Anchorman or whatever it is?
That's tech.
It starts with, oh, this iskind of cool.
It can kill us all.
And that's fascinating.
I'm sure there are people whowould fight me on this, but I
actually think anyone who isinterested in being a financial
journalist at some point has theidea they'd want to cover tech.
The way Yahoo Finance happenedis, I'll be honest, the first
time I remember thinking vividlythat I was interested in
(26:17):
covering tech was when Amazonacquired Whole Foods.
That's such a weird memory tohave, but I remember thinking,
that's fascinating and an efforttowards a kind of ubiquity that
is, I find, sort of scary, butis maybe also brilliant.
Dave Reddy (26:34):
It's important to remind people that Amazon
started out as an onlinebookseller.
I don't know how many peopleactually remember that.
Allie Garfinkle (26:42):
I think about that all the time, Dave.
All the time.
Because there's a lot of...
I mean, NVIDIA started as agaming chip company, right?
And I think about that all thetime with these startups that
come to me where someone willsay, oh, it's just this right
now.
And I say, well, okay, but whatcould it be?
What are we actually talkingabout here?
(27:04):
Especially if you are VCs.
And one of the things that'sgreat about VCs is they're very
good at articulating thissometimes a little too good for
their own good, where I thinkthey can convince themselves of
things that maybe are a littlebit of a stretch, but also a lot
of things like this become astretch, right?
So all of this, I mean, all ofthis to say, I do, the way Yahoo
happened, you know, I'd alwayskind of wanted to cover tech and
(27:26):
they, you know, you know, forwhatever reason, I was covering
a lot of insure tech at thetime.
So for whatever reason, Isomehow convinced them that they
should let me cover Amazon.
Of
Dave Reddy (27:39):
course.
Allie Garfinkle (27:40):
Right.
Like I actually like, again,like one of those steps.
Makes total sense.
Yeah.
One of those steps in aperson's life where I look at it
and I go, wait, really?
Like they bought that story.
I actually, I've hadconversations with some of the
folks who've hired me since, whohired me over there since.
A lot of them have left Amazon.
But they basically sort ofsaid, look, we thought you'd be
good on camera.
You didn't seem scared.
(28:01):
And you really, really, really,really wanted to do it.
And I was like, I did really,really, really want to do it.
So that's how that transitionhappened.
I tech, I don't see sort of thetech and finance angles as
being at odds.
Like I am, as it stands atFortune, I am the senior finance
reporter on the tech desk.
And that is how I like it.
I think I will never, I thinkit's important to know your,
(28:22):
know your your skill set, I knowI'm never going to be the most
technical reporter out there.
And it's not what I aspire to.
I aspire to know just enoughthat I'm dangerous.
But what I want to know is howthe money is flowing, why the
thing works, if the thing works,which is very important and
underrated, and what this allcould be and what it all could
(28:43):
actually mean.
Because tech is veryexistential, right?
And that's what I like aboutit.
Dave Reddy (28:49):
It's, you know, when you read history, it's hard to
imagine what life was likebefore the Industrial
Revolution.
And now I can imagine what lifewas like before the internet.
Most people can't.
Well, I should say most people,but people younger than me
can't.
But it is amazing.
And it bears repeating that theinternet, the public internet,
I was 23 years old, 22 years oldwhen that came online in 1993.
(29:10):
And it's hard to imagine whatthe hell we did.
How did I go to college withoutthe-
Allie Garfinkle (29:15):
Yeah, what did you do?
Well, it's funny.
I was talking to someone who'squite a bit younger than I am.
Who has no conception of theworld before social media?
Dave Reddy (29:26):
Oh, I so wish we hadn't invented that.
But at any rate, that's anotherpodcast
Allie Garfinkle (29:31):
altogether.
I mean, my dad has a joke thatthere are no good old days
before indoor plumbing.
There were good old days beforesocial media, but actually
there are so many little thingswhen I think about sort of a
post-internet existence that Iactually don't know how to do.
I know how to read a map.
Depending on the map, but itwould take me a lot longer than
(29:54):
looking it up on my phone.
You know, it's technology doeschange our world in ways that
are unassailably true.
You
Dave Reddy (30:01):
know, just, I mean, who walks through a city that
they don't know anymore withouttheir phone out going, okay, I
need to go here.
I need to go there.
Right.
I mean, you know, back in theday, you just walked around
until you found where you weregoing or ask for directions.
Oh my God.
We had to talk to people.
So you also write the termsheet.
And you mentioned before thatwe're all seeing the obvious
(30:23):
patterns with AI, the big roundsand so forth.
What other patterns are youseeing as you write that
newsletter on the regular?
What are other things that arepopping or not popping as tech
evolves this year?
Allie Garfinkle (30:37):
So I get a lot of incoming, as you can imagine.
Dave Reddy (30:40):
Oh, I can imagine.
I send something.
Allie Garfinkle (30:43):
Yes.
Yeah, please send it my way.
Because I actually know, andit's the sort of thing I
apologize to people all the timebecause I cannot answer every
single thing, but I like to seeas much as possible.
Sure.
You know, the amount of moneybeing funneled into AI is
absolutely staggering.
I sometimes will look atsomething and I'll say, Really?
(31:05):
Like how many times how manytimes a week, Dave, I sit there
and look at a 15 to 35 millionseries A that is AI for X.
It happens.
It happens.
It is essentially a constantstream.
And it's the sort of thing,like sometimes I've sat there
and I've wondered, I was like,how many, how many of these
could I stack up?
(31:26):
How could I stack up intobillions of dollars?
And I'm just like, no, no, no,let's not, let's not even try.
But it's, it's truly staggeringand it's happening.
And the ones we talk about arethe $2 billion seed rounds, like
thinking machines, which ofcourse we're talking about
because it just happened thisweek.
But, you know, it's happeningacross the ecosystem, right?
You know, there's a, I wastalking, I saw a 50 million seed
(31:49):
round last a couple of daysago, $50 million for a seed
round.
Seed.
Which, yeah, that is more moneythan Google ever raised, I
believe.
It's the sort of thing thatit's kind of unfathomable.
And the thing I think about allthe time is, look, this is like
sea turtles.
Not everyone's going to make itto the shore here, people.
(32:09):
Back to the ocean.
Yeah, back to the ocean, fullcircle.
So the thing that I'm...
I think I'm going to keepseeing that trend for a while
where I just keep seeing theseseries A's, these like large
seeds and series A's sort ofjust piling on up in sort of AI
for X territory.
Other things that I think areintriguing, fintech had a rough
(32:32):
couple of years and I'm nowseeing some really good fintech
deals.
in the mix, right?
In part, that's aided becausecrypto is so back, but that's
not all it is.
I think there is definitely,despite a couple of serious
controversies and some verydifficult regulatory problems,
people really want to beinvesting in fintech.
(32:53):
Stripe may or may not go publicsomeday, who knows?
But Stripe's existence on itsown sort of proves that to their
point, the GDP of the internetis massive, right?
And that there actually arebetter financial services
opportunities out there.
You know, you see that withsuccess of like, like Stripe
competitor, Adyen, right?
So I think there's, I thinkFinTech is, FinTech is in a good
(33:16):
spot right now.
Exits are really interestingbecause on one hand, we have
more, we've seen, We've got muchbetter news than we've had in a
while.
We have a couple of IPOs thathave actually gone out or are
heading out.
Figma is the next one that'ssort of set as we're talking
right now.
I don't know if by the timethis is out, Figma will be out
in the world.
But you could argue the public.
(33:40):
I know one CEO who is now apublic market CEO.
He argues the public marketsare always open for great
companies.
And I think that is both trueand untrue.
I think there are better timesthan others.
So it's the sort of thing thatin terms of exits, I think it's
(34:23):
not a bad time.
I don't think it's a good timeeither.
And I guess the last thing Iwould say is that there is
actually a lot of reallyinteresting stuff happening
that's not expressly AI.
There's stuff that might useAI.
Like I've been covering some agtech recently and it's great.
That's actually a reallyimportant time for people to be
building technology for farmersin the United States.
(34:44):
And that's been really edifyingbecause a lot of those
companies are just ripping.
Right.
I mean, defense tech obviouslyhas its own has its own corner
of the universe.
You know, I live in L.A.
El Segundo is right there andis also ripping.
But I think with fewer proofpoints about how this is all
going to play out over time.
And I think I think there aresome smaller niche area.
(35:06):
I'll just say what I'm gettingat, I guess, is that I think
there's some smaller niche areasthat are doing really well with
some startups that are doingsome really interesting work
that are we're going to wake upin a couple of years and they're
going to be giants.
And they won't expressly be AI.
And actually, that's for thebest.
Dave Reddy (35:24):
Let's talk about the show.
And by the show, I mean, well,first of all,
Allie Garfinkl (35:27):
congratulations.
Dave Reddy (35:28):
Congratulations.
You're about to launch, as ofthis taping, and you'll probably
have a few done by then, you'reabout to launch the Term Sheet
podcast, which we're all lookingforward to.
Yes.
It's going to be great.
But I wanted to talk aboutBrainstorm, which you, of
course, are a co-chair ofFortune Brainstorm Tech, which
is happening in September.
in Utah, correct?
Allie Garfinkle (35:51):
Yes, sir.
Dave Reddy (35:52):
Absolutely.
Right.
Allie Garfinkle (35:53):
It's a, it's so pretty.
It's a lovely place.
I can't believe I get to gohang out there.
Dave Reddy (35:59):
So what, what do you, as you are developing the
show in conjunction with AndrewNuska, our past guest, what he
mentioned to me that you werefocused more on round tables
this year than one offinterviews.
Why the shift?
Allie Garfinkle (36:15):
So to be clear, we're still doing one-off
interviews.
There's going to be quite a fewof them.
But yeah, we definitely decidedwe wanted to extend our
roundtable program because therule at Brainstorm is that
everybody who's in the audiencecan be on stage.
And we decided we wanted togive a lot of those folks more
speaking opportunities, morechances to sort of not only for
(36:35):
us as journalists to be able tocover some of the things they
say, but to sort of give themthe chance to really have a
conversation and sort offacilitate that conversation.
Like we're starting thisprocess.
We're starting this event, youknow, so within Brainstorm, this
event called an InsightExchange.
And when Insight Exchanges is,it's going to be kind of town
hall-y.
There's going to be, you know,eight to 10 speakers, which is
(36:57):
going to be a task formoderators like me, of course,
but is going to be a chance tokind of have a rollicking,
wide-ranging conversation.
And we want to have as many ofthose as possible because, you
know, Andrew Nuska, shout out,we love that guy.
He's the greatest.
We do not have enough time forme to say all of the nice things
about Andrew Nuska, but he issomebody who's been...
(37:18):
a wonderful mentor and teacherto me, but also I think is
really doing a good job ofsaying, okay, why actually do
people go to brainstorm?
Because, you know, I mean,after the pandemic, it was a
question worth asking, right?
If all events kind of had tochange, had to sort of change or
die.
And Andrew really has done agood job of articulating to me,
(37:39):
why bother?
Which is, you know, people goto brainstorm to brainstorm.
The goal is to be in a roomwith as many high profile people
Thank you so much.
That's what you want it to be.
(38:15):
You want it to be like the bestdiscussion section ever from
like your social sciences classin college.
And it is, and you know, it hasin my, as we've been doing it,
really, really been that.
So I'll just say, why do we doroundtables?
So we can have more literalbrainstorms is the short answer.
Dave Reddy (38:34):
Great.
Well, as PR people, we like it.
That means we have moreopportunities to get speakers
on.
Music (38:38):
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (38:39):
Another question I know you guys are constantly
asking yourselves these days isyou've got Fortune Brainstorm AI
around the world, but in theUnited States, it'll be in
December here in San Francisco,and you've got Brainstorm Tech.
There must be some seriousthinking to make sure that
Brainstorm Tech these days inparticular just isn't a preview
or a larger version ofBrainstorm AI.
(39:02):
How do you pull that off?
Allie Garfinkle (39:04):
You know, it's interesting you say that because
I actually have...
In some ways, it is easier thanyou would expect because when
you're doing Brainstorm AI, it'sa slightly different audience.
It's a lot, there's a lot ofoverlap, but it is, you know,
especially like Brainstorm AISan Francisco, for example, will
attract a very specificaudience that is very, very San
Francisco, very like CTO, very,very, very focused on sort of
(39:30):
research in some cases too.
Whereas like Brainstorm,Brainstorm tech is broader.
You know, there are, Like, forexample, a lot of fintech.
doesn't fall into the categoryof what you would talk about it,
what you would talk about abrainstorm AI or, and a lot of
crypto for that matter.
You know, EVs, for example, aresomething that, you know, we're
(39:50):
going to be touching on abrainstorm tech this year.
And like, could you do that abrainstorm AI?
Yeah, absolutely.
But it would have to be throughkind of a very specific lens.
So I think there's brainstormtech is kind of really the
flagship where everything thatwe wouldn't necessarily talk
about an AI happens there.
It's also this Yeah.
To me, brainstorm tech is alsoan opportunity, as much as it is
(40:30):
to talk about AI, to have aconversation about where venture
capital as a whole is headedright now.
Because actually, independentof AI, venture capital is in the
midst of a sea change.
And as a maturing asset classkind of needs to figure out what
it wants to be, or rather firmsneed to figure out who they
want to be and kind of placetheir bets as it were.
So I think what I would say isthat There are some folks who
(40:55):
are like, oh, this is brainstormAI all the way.
And there are some folks whoare like, oh, this is a
brainstorm tech thing.
And then there's a lot, to yourpoint, there are a lot of
things in the middle becauseeverything it does feel like is
AI right now.
That being said, I thinkthere's just so much, there
really is just so muchopportunity when you expand
beyond AI too.
You know what I mean?
(41:15):
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (41:16):
Talk to me about, we mentioned earlier about chaos
and so forth.
A question I've been askingeverybody this year is, second
Trump presidency, he seems to dowell in chaos, not making a
political statement that he justdoes.
Allie Garfinkle (41:30):
I would say that's a statement of fact.
Dave Reddy (41:33):
Yep.
And you mentioned earlier thatchaos for the markets, as he
himself has seen, as we have allseen, is not necessarily a good
thing, at least for a couple ofdays and then Maybe it goes
away, maybe it doesn't.
You guys are coveringtechnology, which I think
Washington is more involved withnow more than ever,
particularly under hispresidency.
The Musk-Trump romance hasended, but there was that whole
(41:56):
thing going on.
Allie Garfinkle (41:57):
It was a doomed romance from the beginning.
Yes.
A tragic love story.
Dave Reddy (42:01):
Yeah.
No, that was definitely notgoing to work.
But at any rate, how do youfolks address a topic like that
at Brainstorm without turning itinto Brainstorm Trump?
Allie Garfinkle (42:15):
Ooh, brainstorm Trump.
What an event that would
Dave Reddy (42:20):
be.
I want a royalty.
Allie Garfinkle (42:23):
Hey, Andrew, I have a great idea.
We're going to do brainstormTrump.
Yeah, no, I mean, to yourpoint, there are a few figures,
Donald Trump, Elon Musk,anything they do seems to
overshadow absolutely anythingelse going on at that moment.
The answer is thoughtfully.
Right.
You know, we are there's onlyso much I can disclose as we're
talking here because there aresome conversations that are
still happening.
But we've definitely beentalking about what it means to
(42:44):
have a political presence atBrainstorm and what it actually
means to sort of treat that withthe correct amount of
journalistic skepticism and alsosort of actually.
talk about what's newsworthy.
Because the thing aboutanything with covering this
(43:05):
administration is the puck isgoing to move so fast somewhere
else, you don't even know what'snewsworthy anymore sometimes.
Did this just make headlines,or should we actually be talking
about this as a sustainablechange?
So all of this to say, theanswer is carefully.
The answer is with an eyetowards facts, an eye towards
(43:26):
Actual policy and not justrhetoric.
And particularly, I would say,as pertains to tech, yes, it's
this, you know, my colleagueLeo, who writes Termsheet on
Mondays, and we call this theA16Z White House, venture
capital in particular, has neverbeen more effective.
present in an administration ina lot of ways.
(43:50):
Now, I'm sure there arearguments you could make, but
it's particularly hard toignore.
And I would say that weapproach it at Brainstorm, at
least from an editorialprogramming perspective, the way
I approach it as a journalist,which is hear everybody out,
have the thoughtfulconversation, ask the hard
questions, always respectfully,and you do the story.
And the thing about livejournalism that is great is in a
(44:13):
lot of ways, it's the sameprocess.
You sit there, you look at asituation, you say, okay, what
does an audience really need toknow about this?
What questions do I need tohold this person to account to
answer?
And that is a thing I do reallyappreciate.
I think about when I starteddoing interviews on the Fortune
Media side, they were verysupportive.
(44:34):
I was like, okay, I've got togo in on this.
And they were like, go dowhatever you need to do.
They get mad at you.
Oh, well, we can blame thejournalist.
I'm like, great, perfect.
I would love to be blamed.
So I think that it's the sortof thing too, where it's also
the last thing I would say aboutit too, is it's important to
know what's important to youraudience.
And I will say that issomething that I think about a
lot.
And the answer depends.
(44:55):
Like I'm working on a defensetech session, for example.
What does a brainstorm audiencereally want to know about the
state of defense tech?
I have some theories, but Thething that I will actually do
before I get on that stage withthose folks is I will actually
ask a couple of Brainstormmembers what they want me to
ask.
And I would say that that istrue of anything like this.
(45:16):
And I'll insert all of this toapply to stuff around Elon, too.
I mean, just put them all inthat generalized, very large
vicinity.
Dave Reddy (45:26):
This may not be as applicable a question to someone
who's doing mostly livejournalism, but how are you
using AI at Fortune?
Allie Garfinkle (45:35):
I mean, for what it's worth, I write a
newsletter every day.
You know, most days, right?
You know, Fortune actually juststarted a program called
Fortune Intelligence wherethey're sort of experimenting
with AI-generated articles.
I'm not involved with that.
For me, personally...
I've found that Fortune's donea really good job of giving us
the tools to say, go try thisout and see if it works for you.
(45:56):
For instance, Allison, oureditor-in-chief, has done a
really good job with perplexity.
And she's been like, look, wehave a perplexity partnership.
You all should go try usingthis, see if it works.
I know there's quite a bit ofcontroversy around perplexity,
but I will say...
As a product, it's really good.
And it's actually reallyhelpful for what I do where I'm
(46:18):
on deadline and I have to sortof aggregate a bunch of
information and say, wait, whatdo I actually need to know about
this?
It does a really good job.
So I definitely do that.
I have definitely used ChatGPTto check for typos at a panic.
That definitely happens too.
Though I will say, you know,the biggest, I actually, my
theory is that I'm exactly theright age in certain ways.
(46:39):
Because I actually remember, Iremember the world before social
media.
And I remember the world doingjournalism before auto-generated
transcripts.
And I
Dave Reddy (46:49):
have
Allie Garfinkle (46:51):
criticisms of Otter.ai.
I don't I don't think theirtranscripts are necessarily very
good.
I think they could be better.
That being said, do I pay forthat no matter what compel or
high water?
Absolutely.
It's the...
It's the sort of thing where Ithink I think it's kind of hard
to overstate how much easier ajournalist's life gets when
(47:12):
you're not doing your owntranscription, at least not
constantly.
So the it's the sort of thingthat I think about.
Do you know those old movies,Dave, about journalists like a
Billy Wilder movie where thejournalist like runs to the
payphone
Dave Reddy (47:24):
and
Allie Garfinkle (47:29):
like calls the editor?
And it's, it's like, and it'sthe sort of thing, like
sometimes I'll watch that.
I'll be like, God, technologycould not move as fast as
journalists could at that time.
But also at the time, like I dothink about sort of my, my, my
ancestors didn't have tools thatI have either.
(47:51):
My ancestors had to go rollback the tape and listen to
things over and over again.
So I think there's, there's allof this to say, like, I'm, I'm
a big fan of the tools, keep thetools coming.
I actually think there's,Someone somewhere in the world,
I hope, is working on a greatfact-checking machine for
stories.
Because I actually would lovethat the best case of AI be not
(48:13):
that there is inaccurate slopand misinformation published
online, but that actuallystories are more accurate than
ever.
Dave Reddy (48:20):
Hallucinations.
We could do without those.
They'll get...
There, I think, I hope.
Allie Garfinkle (48:27):
The thing about hallucinations is I think I've
talked to a lot of folks aboutthis.
Hallucinations are aninevitability and they will be
different than the things ahuman would hallucinate.
So it's the sort of thing thatI think that part of it is
taking the crickets with thestraights.
But also, I do really thinkthat we could get to the place
where that level of errorexists.
becomes negligible and maybeunfortunate sometimes, but at
(48:51):
the average, like if the answeris, I think there is a tool to
be created.
I'm not the one to make it.
I don't have the expertise, butI do feel, I don't know.
I feel very, I feel very, Ifeel anxious and hopeful about
you're scaring every
Dave Reddy (49:05):
professional copy editor out there.
Allie Garfinkle (49:09):
They're actually, we still need human
copy editors.
We actually still need morehuman copy editors is my
personal opinion, but that's aseparate conversation.
Dave Reddy (49:16):
By the way, I did look it up and I don't know if
it's the book you read, but Iwas referring to Underworld by
Susan Casey.
Oh.
We can go back to our deep seadiving conversation.
Allie Garfinkle (49:29):
Okay.
I was referring to, hold on,we're going to look it up right
now.
The deepest- It's the DavidAlley Book
Dave Reddy (49:35):
Club.
Allie Garfinkle (49:37):
Yes, the David Alley Book Club.
Books about the ocean.
The deepest map, the highstakes race to chart the world's
oceans by Laura Trethelewy?
If I mispronounce her name, Iam very sorry.
But it's a fabulous
Dave Reddy (49:51):
book.
All right.
I'm going to order that.
And you should too.
Yes, I
Allie Garfinkle (49:56):
would go order
Dave Reddy (49:56):
Underworld.
Yeah, and order Underworld.
It was great.
All right.
So my last question is always alittle fun.
Actually, this was all fun, butlet's have some real fun.
So you have lived in four ofthe biggest cities, three of the
biggest cities, and then one inthe top 15 at least.
Miami, Chicago, New York.
or L.A.?
Allie Garfinkle (50:16):
I have a particular love for Los Angeles.
I live here right now, so Idon't want to insult my current
love.
Yeah, I try not to bite thehand that feeds me, especially
because you want the trafficgods on your side in this town.
But no, L.A.
is funny because my husband andI moved here in 2020.
(50:37):
I thought I would stay a year,and now I can't imagine leaving.
I might someday, but L.A.
is...
LA is a place that's still gota little magic on it in a way
that, and that's like nowhereI've ever been.
It's crazy.
Don't get me wrong.
It's insane.
But I like, as we'veestablished here, I love crazy.
Dave Reddy (50:53):
Which seems like a perfect way to end this really
fun
Allie Garfinkle (51:00):
interview.
First five minutes of anywhere.
It's like, okay.
So she likes, she likes, shelikes, she likes crazy from
Miami.
Makes all sense.
Dave Reddy (51:08):
That will be the headline.
Music (51:10):
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (51:11):
Allie, thanks so much for your time.
That was a whole lot of fun.
I really appreciate it.
And good luck with the podcastand best of luck at the show in
September.
Allie Garfinkle (51:19):
Thank you so much, Dave.
Dave Reddy (51:21):
I'd like to thank you all for listening today.
And once again, a big thank youto our guest, Allie Garfinkel
of Fortune.
Join us again next month whenwe celebrate our third
anniversary with a specialepisode, theme still to be
determined.
Surprise is coming.
In the meantime...
If you've got feedback ontoday's podcast, or if you'd
like to learn more about BigValley Marketing and how we
identified the B2B Tech Top 200,be sure to drop me an email at
(51:45):
dready at bigvalley.co.
That's D-R-E-D-D-Y atbigvalley, all one word, .co.
No M.
You can also email the wholeteam at pressingmatters at
bigvalley.co.
Once again, thanks forlistening.
And as always, think big.
Whatever stodgy image you have in your mind of
the typical finance newsreporter, I guarantee it isn't
Allie Garfinkel.
And yet still relatively earlyin her career, Allie has
established herself as one ofthe best in that business with a
resume that includes Forbes,The Deal, Yahoo Finance, and of
course Fortune, where she servesas senior finance reporter,
co-chair of Fortune BrainstormTech, the lead writer for
(00:23):
Fortune Termsheet, their VCnewsletter, and now the host of
the Termsheet podcast, whichdebuted in July.
Despite all that, Allieactually wanted to be in
theater.
She's an accomplished alto.
She's also a scuba diver and afree diver who finds
spirituality in the ocean.
And we didn't even have time todiscuss her love of magic and
(00:43):
pipe organs.
Allie joined us to discuss herMiami upbringing, which probably
explains a lot, where venturecapital is heading other than
AI, and of course, to previewFortune Brainstorm Tech, which
takes place in Utah in earlySeptember.
For this episode of PressingMatters from Big Valley
Marketing, the podcast thatbrings you conversations with
the top media and influencers inB2B tech.
(01:05):
I'm Dave Reddy, head of BigValley Marketing's media and
influencers practice, and I'myour host.
Through research and goodold-fashioned relationship
building, we've identified B2Btech's top 200 media and
influencers, including Allie.
Here's our chat with Allie.
Enjoy.
Music (01:23):
Music
Dave Reddy (01:31):
Allie, thanks so much for being on the podcast.
Really appreciate you joiningus.
Allie Garfinkle (01:34):
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
Long time listener, first timecaller.
Dave Reddy (01:39):
That's nice to hear.
So now we have 10 listeners.
So you've got a greatbackground and it all started,
as great backgrounds often do,in the party land of Miami,
Florida.
So what was it like growing upat the bottom of Florida?
Allie Garfinkle (01:55):
At the bottom of Florida.
No, it's funny.
Do all great resumes start inparty country?
Probably.
Maybe.
Yeah, mind up.
Well, I appreciate that.
So I grew up in Miami.
I grew up in North Miami Beach,which is not the South Beach of
everyone's imaginary, thoughI've spent a lot of time there.
You took your
Dave Reddy (02:15):
talents to North Beach, not South Beach.
Allie Garfinkle (02:18):
I took my talents to North Beach and then
eventually I took my talents,took quite a bit out of South
Beach and quite a bit out ofNorth Miami Beach too.
But yeah, I mean, look, Miamiwas a really interesting place
to grow up in the 2000s.
You know, got hit really hardby the Great Recession.
My dad is a real estateinvestor, commercial real
(02:38):
estate.
So I actually watched sort ofhow that affected our family.
I watched him try to make abusiness work sort of in an
incredibly difficult falteringenvironment to say the least.
So it's an interesting placefrom an economic perspective.
It's an interesting place froma demographic perspective.
I grew up around a lot ofdiversity of all kinds.
(02:59):
It's funny, in the politicalclimate we're in, a lot of
people don't know people whopolitically disagree with them,
and I certainly do.
It's also a place, though, withjust a lot of very underrated,
strange history.
And I definitely think I...
A lot of people are verysurprised that I'm from Miami,
but I think in certain waysit...
(03:20):
It really actually informs whoI am and informs kind of the
diversity of things I'minterested in.
It kind of, I think, began mypenchant for sort of some of the
stranger corners ofstorytelling.
I love a weird story and Idon't think that's unrelated to
being from Miami.
Dave Reddy (03:39):
Well, it is a weird town.
It's a very weird town.
Very weird town.
Are you familiar with the verydeep cut U2 song called Miami?
Music (03:46):
Yes.
Allie Garfinkle (03:46):
There is a deep cut U2 song called Miami.
I don't know
Dave Reddy (03:50):
if I believe you.
We might have to use that asthe intro music.
Allie Garfinkle (03:54):
Is it a good song?
I actually am quite a U2 fan.
But wait, so is it a good song?
I like it.
Dave Reddy (04:02):
It's on, wow, the listeners are like, what are you
guys doing?
I like it.
It's on Pop, that mid-90s albumthat everybody else hates.
Allie Garfinkle (04:13):
Oh, that's why I've never heard it.
Dave Reddy (04:15):
Yeah, right.
But I like it.
The drums are really cool.
At any rate, go give it alisten.
One reviewer called it theirmost naive song ever.
So at any rate, that's whathappens when Irish people write
about Miami.
So moving on, there's no seguefrom that.
So your dad was in commercialreal estate or is in commercial
real estate.
What did mom do?
Allie Garfinkle (04:35):
My mom's a homemaker, but she actually used
to work in theater.
before she sort of quit to kindof get married and raise us.
I have two siblings, bothyounger, Maddie and Heshy.
And my mom actually, my momtook, my mom, my, we don't,
nobody thinks of Miami as atheater town necessarily, but I
(04:56):
actually do tie a lot of my lovefor storytelling probably to my
dad's love for narrativehistory and my mom's love for
theater.
Dave Reddy (05:04):
And you followed originally in your mom's
footsteps.
You told me that you were inundergrad at, I presume, in
Chicago.
You were a theater andperformance studies major.
and that you were also an alto,and I had to look that up.
Allie Garfinkle (05:19):
So you're not into music.
No, I love
Dave Reddy (05:21):
music, and I had a sense of it.
Actually, two of my kids didmusical theater, and they always
had Abby sing soprano, butshe's really an alto.
But at any rate,
Allie Garfinkle (05:29):
I had to look it up.
Yes, that is a real problem.
That is
Dave Reddy (05:32):
actually a real problem.
So you know what I'm talkingabout.
Exactly what you're talkingabout.
So I don't know if you wouldcall these people– they were all
over the spectrum, I thought,but it was like everybody from
Annie Lettix to Adele– to StevieNicks, who I always thought was
a contralto, if that's theword.
I love Stevie Nicks.
Allie Garfinkle (05:49):
I love Stevie Nicks.
I actually, most of, Iactually, after a very, very
long hiatus, I actually took, Iactually started taking voice
lessons again, I think, to feelsomething.
Oh, cool.
Yeah.
And we mostly sing StevieNicks.
Dave Reddy (06:03):
All right.
That's your ring.
I got
Allie Garfinkle (06:05):
it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We mostly sing Stevie Nicks.
I'm not going to do it on thepodcast.
No,
Dave Reddy (06:10):
I wasn't even going to ask.
I know that's not cool.
Allie Garfinkle (06:12):
You're not even going to ask.
I mean, no, there's like aversion where I would be,
because again, much like being ajournalist, if you are going to
ask the questions, if you'regoing to ask questions, you
better be able to answer them.
If you're going to tell peopleyou sing, you better be willing
to sing.
Dave Reddy (06:25):
I hear you.
Allie Garfinkle (06:26):
I do believe
Dave Reddy (06:27):
that.
And actually, I think it wouldprobably increase my ratings,
but I'm not going to ask you todo it.
So I did have Don Clark playone of his instruments, but
that's a whole different storythat people can go back on.
So in addition, you have theMiami things make so much more
sense now that I know that.
So in addition to theater,you're a singer.
(06:50):
Certified scuba diver, that'stwo in a row now.
We had Julie Bord on lastmonth, also a certified scuba
diver.
A free diver.
Now, are those those crazypeople who go like 50 miles down
with no oxygen?
Are you one of those people?
Allie Garfinkle (07:03):
I definitely don't go 50 miles down.
Can't stress that enough.
But yeah, it is breath holddiving.
I really like scuba and Islowly am, I want to spend more
and more time with it becausethere's a lot you can do in
scuba that you can't do withfree diving.
I mean, free diving is breathhold diving.
I can go about 25 meters prettyreliably.
Sometimes if I'm lucky, I canget to 30.
(07:24):
You've got to equalize.
You actually, I actually spent,it took me almost a year to get
my original certification,Dave, because I was struggling
with equalizing.
It was actually a very funnycorner of my life.
At the time, I was working atYahoo.
It was the dead of COVID.
And I would like wake up anddo, I would wake up and I would
write earnings reports, like doa hit on a TV show.
(07:46):
And then in the afternoon,sometimes I would go free diving
in Redondo to try to figure outhow to equalize.
Oh, by the way, for anyonelistening to this, no one goes
free diving alone.
Never go free diving alone.
There's actually Okay.
Fair enough.
Yeah.
Disclaimer.
Don't try that at home, atleast not alone.
But yeah, no, it's a, it'sbreath hole diving.
It's a, the thing I think Ireally love about it is that you
(08:10):
can't white knuckle it.
I am a person who definitelywill white knuckle things.
Dave Reddy (08:14):
Hmm.
Allie Garfinkle (08:15):
If I'm having a terrible time or if I don't
know how to do something, I willtry to run through the wall
instead of look for a door.
And with freediving, youactually can't because if your
throat constricts enough, youactually won't be able to
equalize to get down past acouple of meters.
Dave Reddy (08:30):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Death is definitely aconsideration for how you want
to handle something like that.
Yeah.
Allie Garfinkle (08:36):
For what it's worth, freediving actually is
pretty darn safe as long asyou're with people and as long
as you're not doing anythingtruly crazy.
Right.
The documentaries you'veprobably seen are the most
extreme situations and the mosttalented freedivers.
I am not the most talentedfreediver.
I'm just trying to have a nicetime.
The thing that is best about itis once you get down past 15...
(09:00):
sometimes 10-ish, you go intowhat's called bradycardia, where
your heart rate slows down alot.
If you're a nervous person,it's actually a great activity
in that way.
I mean, I recognize I'm like,I'm trying to slow freediving
here.
Dave Reddy (09:13):
I'm the most anxious guy I know.
I might try freediving.
I'll probably kill myself,though.
What is that?
Allie Garfinkle (09:18):
It's actually a great thing to do that I
promise is not as scary orimpressive as it sounds, at
least not in the incarnation Ido it.
There are certainly people whodo it in much more scary,
impressive incarnations.
Dave Reddy (09:30):
All I can think of is, and I'm sure you saw the
movie, I cannot remember it,took place in Santa Cruz in
Monterey.
It was about some famous surferwho had a massive wipeout at
Mavericks and survived.
And then the last scene afterhe survives at Mavericks is they
shoot for it.
And he's died freediving.
It's like, well, I'm glad helived through that, but I
(09:51):
guess...
Come on, man.
Allie Garfinkle (09:55):
The thing is, it's a...
I mean, the ocean is veryimportant to me.
I'm not important to the ocean.
And that's what I like aboutit, actually.
No matter how big your problemsare, no matter how important
you may feel in a given moment,no matter how unimportant you
may feel in a given moment, theocean truly doesn't care.
(10:15):
It's actually kind of...
No matter how talented of asurfer someone is, no matter how
talented of a free diversomebody is, it is a way of, I
think, reckoning with mortality,maybe, but also just sort of
reckoning with how small wereally are.
And some people don't likethat, but I do.
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to gostraight to go to
(10:37):
existentialism.
Dave Reddy (10:38):
I'm cool with depth.
And actually, it's funny yousay that.
So, you know, as...
The other nine listeners know Igrew up in Cape Cod.
And so I grew up in the oceantoo.
And I'm a swimmer, but Iwouldn't free dive.
I never got into scuba oranything like that.
And I think both because I grewup there and don't live there
(10:59):
anymore.
And also just around the samesort of thing you just said, at
the risk of getting super deep,the most spiritual I feel is
when I step into an ocean.
There's something about that.
Because at the end of the day,it is, I know we break them up.
stupid humans into fivedifferent oceans, but it's all
one big giant body of water.
And that's a pretty spookyidea.
(11:21):
And if you don't have respectfor the ocean, you will be dead.
Yeah.
So
Allie Garfinkle (11:26):
very, very, uh, if, if on an unlucky day, it
can be really quick.
And I think, so I agree.
I, I actually do find, I dofind the ocean to be a
fundamentally spiritual entityas a person who struggles with
spirituality, right?
I think a lot of people inmedia struggle maybe struggle
with spirituality.
Dave Reddy (11:45):
That's fact, not faith-based.
Allie Garfinkle (11:47):
Well, see, I think that the thing about it,
to your point, every body ofwater is the same body of water,
actually, in the end, if it'sconnected to the ocean.
They're all
Dave Reddy (11:55):
that, except for the lakes,
Allie Garfinkle (11:57):
right?
Yeah, exactly.
They're all that, except forthe lakes.
But there is a sense ofsomething ancient and
continuous.
Like there are a lot ofcreatures in the ocean that have
existed long before humans didand will exist long after.
And I
Dave Reddy (12:11):
hope I never meet them.
Allie Garfinkle (12:12):
And you're like, I would like to see none
of them.
See, I'm the weirdo, Dave,who's like, I kind of would
actually like to see them.
Oh my gosh, what is it called?
I believe the book is calledThe Deepest Map.
It is about the sort of questto map the deepest points in the
ocean.
And spoiler alert, It's insane.
(12:33):
It's an insane process.
Dave Reddy (12:36):
I read a different book about this.
Sorry, you finish your thought.
Allie Garfinkle (12:39):
There are actually a couple.
It's also possible I've gottenthe name wrong.
And if I did, I am so sorrybecause I read it a couple of
years ago.
That writer did a fabulous job.
Dave Reddy (12:49):
It was a woman sports writer.
The one I read.
Oh
Allie Garfinkle (12:53):
my God.
Dave Reddy (12:53):
We'll tell you at the end in the outro.
Allie Garfinkle (12:58):
I forget what her name was, but it published
in like 2013.
And it was, it was, and I readit in like a weekend.
Right.
She
Dave Reddy (13:07):
hooked up with a couple of guys who do this for
like fun and basically went toevery deepest point in every
ocean.
Yes.
Allie Garfinkle (13:17):
Yeah.
Yes.
It was awesome.
And it's, and I'm, and part ofme is like, God, she has, she's
onto something.
Maybe I should, maybe thiswhole tech and finance thing,
maybe I've got this all wrong.
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (13:26):
I don't know though.
And you know, then you, thenyou think about the dudes who
went looking for the Titanicand, uh, At least they didn't
suffer.
So, well, this has beendefinitely the most interesting
first 10 minutes of the showI've ever had.
I almost don't want to move onto the other stuff, but I think
we have to.
Allie Garfinkle (13:42):
This is now a podcast about you two deep cuts
in the
Dave Reddy (13:48):
ocean.
I'm going to skip your love ofmagic and pipe organs just
because we do need to get intoyour career.
But I just, I do want to listthat out.
Theater, scuba, freediving,magic, and pipe organs and a
talented alto singer.
That is, you know, as we say inPassover, Dayenu.
(14:12):
That would have been enough.
Allie Garfinkle (14:15):
I just gave you, did I give you too much
information?
Dave Reddy (14:20):
No, this is awesome.
So after all that.
After basically writing storiesof your own and your childhood,
what got you, and you mentionedit a little bit before, but
what did get you interested instorytelling?
Were you doing journalism whileyou were doing theater or was
that something you picked uplater?
Allie Garfinkle (14:36):
So I was the managing editor of my high
school newspaper and thought Iwould never go into journalism
is the honest to God truth.
I'd always been interested instorytelling.
I've always loveddocumentaries.
I'm a big Errol Morris fan.
I've also always lovednonfiction writing.
The first nonfiction I everremember really loving, and I
(14:59):
know this is going to soundinsane, is Robert K.
Massey's Peter the Great.
Okay.
Have you ever read this?
It is now on
Dave Reddy (15:07):
my list.
I love reading nonfictionhistories to that and put it on
my list.
Allie Garfinkle (15:11):
It is an incredibly colorful portrait.
of Peter the Great, who was anincredibly colorful guy.
And I read it probably when Iwas 12.
It was a book my dad just hadaround the house.
And it was this kind ofincredible resurrection of a
person who's been dead forhundreds of years.
And I thought that was, Iremember being entranced by that
in a way I couldn't explain.
(15:32):
And as I got older, I had acreative writing teacher who
introduced me to David Sedaris'work pretty early.
And I really became interestedin essay writing.
Oh yeah, that's okay.
Really?
Dave Reddy (16:03):
Sort
Allie Garfinkle (16:04):
of like journalism.
Yeah, journalism actually haspaid my bills for quite a while.
I'm not nothing to brag about,but it's a living, you know?
That's what's great when youstart at the absolute bottom of
the barrel.
But no, the truth is, it was2016.
I was sort of puttering aboutin Chicago.
(16:25):
I was actually working on aproduction of Death of the
Salesman at the time.
You know, Trump had beenelected pretty recently at that
point.
And I was looking at sort of Idid a very honest assessment of
my life like one does when theyare 23, 22.
And I sort of decided thattheater wasn't going to have the
(16:47):
kind of impact I really wanted.
I was doing some documentarytheater work at the time, too.
And I realized the thing Iloved the most was interviewing
people.
So I messed around with thatfor a while.
I spent some time volunteeringat a military museum in Chicago
doing interviews.
I actually learned to interviewpeople and realized I really
(17:08):
liked it from the perspective oforal history and documentary
theater.
Yeah.
I know that the deadline'spassed, but I would love to
(17:38):
start a conversation for nextyear.
If it's possible to apply thisyear, I still would love to.
He got on a call and he let meapply, and that actually started
my career.
Economic stories are storiesabout people, often some of the
most high-stakes stories.
Sure.
And that was, I think, that wassort of the case I made,
(17:59):
basically, in saying, look, Iknow how to tell stories.
I know I'm a weirdo, but...
I think I could maybe do this.
And he said, sure.
And they gave me a scholarship.
To this day, I know there's alot of controversy over whether
journalism school is a good ideafor people.
I can't speak to anyone else,but I can say it was for me.
I don't have a career withoutNYU's business and economic
(18:22):
reporting program.
I don't, full stop.
They really took a chance on mein a way that it's hard to
articulate just how insane Irealize that is now.
What a decade later almost.
Dave Reddy (18:35):
Well, you know, they obviously knew what they were
doing.
So you've worked at Forbes,you've worked at The Deal,
you've worked at FT, you'veworked at Yahoo Finance, and of
course, now you're at Fortune.
You were working at Forbes asan intern during your time at
NYU, I believe, and then writingfor The Deal before you
finished your master's.
Was that part of getting themaster's or was getting a
(19:00):
master's just too boring foryou?
Music (19:01):
Yeah.
Allie Garfinkle (19:02):
Oh, Dave, I got so lucky.
I got so, so lucky.
So part of the master's is thatyou have to have an internship.
Of course.
Forbes, give him a lot ofcredit.
I was an intern on thebillionaire's team.
(19:23):
I took a test, basically.
And they were like, she didgood on the test.
She has no clips.
Let's let her hang out forthree months.
So that was helpful.
And then the Dow Jones NewsFund matched me with The Street,
which at the time owned TheDeal.
And the editor at The Deal is aguy named Mike Brown, who,
other than Steve Solomon, is theother person who I completely
(19:45):
give credit for starting mycareer with.
Mike Mike basically looked atthe pile of interns and said,
that one's mine.
And I was I was that.
And he he offered me a jobafter after a couple of months.
So I basically at the very sortof at the very end of grad
school, I I was I was I alreadyhad a job, which was yeah, which
(20:09):
was, you know.
the dream scenario like I can'tit wasn't nothing's perfect
ever but my god I that doesn'thappen it's actually I have a
lot of feelings about this Ithink because it's a really hard
time to start in journalism andI I was so lucky and I didn't
even realize how lucky I was atthe time So that's how it all
(20:31):
got started.
You
Dave Reddy (20:32):
never do it.
Allie Garfinkle (20:33):
Yeah.
No, you never do.
You're just kind of hanging outsaying, oh, this seems kind of
interesting.
Right.
Someone did somethingexceptional for you and you only
realize like a decade laterthat it was actually a
life-changing thing they did foryou.
Dave Reddy (20:46):
Right.
The forks in the road thatdon't look like forks at the
moment.
So you took the path– tocontinue the fork analogy, you
took the path into financialjournalism.
You mentioned before that yousee– economics, story about
economics, story about money,stories about people.
So explain that a little bitmore.
I mean, because obviouslyyou've hit a niche and you've
(21:08):
kept going with it, although youbranched a little bit into
tech.
So what is it that fascinatesyou about that money and people?
Allie Garfinkle (21:17):
Well, everyone's fascinated with
money, aren't they?
Right?
I am.
Dave Reddy (21:22):
I'd like to have more.
Allie Garfinkle (21:24):
Well, let's say everybody...
I remember I knew I did theright thing deciding to do
economic journalism as far backas being an intern at Forbes,
actually, when I would be inthese conversations.
I did a lot of the shippingbillionaires that year on the
billionaires list.
When I realized I was havingconversations with people about
(21:48):
how much they are worth, and Irealized nobody wanted it to be
accurate.
They wanted it to seem likethey either had more than they
had or less than they had.
And I was like, this is sointeresting.
And I mean, it's a sort of, Imean, if you think about sort of
just pieces of just, you know,just great stories in history,
right?
A lot of them are stories thatare implicitly about money.
(22:10):
A lot of them are implicitlyabout power, right?
Shakespeare, right?
What is the merchant of Veniceabout, ladies and gentlemen?
Or if you think about somethinglike King Lear, yes, we're
talking about power politically,but we're also talking about
financial resources.
That is where so much tensionis just created.
I also just do think that,particularly in M&A, where I've
(22:33):
sort of funneled, weaved in andout of throughout my whole
career, You know, it's a faultline.
That kind of exchange is afault line.
No company acquires anothercompany, pays $100 million for
it, let's say, unless there'ssomething they really need.
So it's important to figure outwhat that is.
No company raises more capitalunless that's something they
(22:55):
really need or unless it'ssomething they've convinced
themselves that they need, whichare two separate things.
And sort of in the middle ofthe AI boom, you know, There's
something I think reallyinteresting happening where, you
know, I mean, the Overtonwindow has shifted so far that
we're now seeing, you know, $2billion seed rounds like for
Thinking Machines Lab, right?
(23:16):
But that would have beenunheard of five years ago.
like five years ago, not thatlong ago, right?
So I think it's, and I thinkthat is indicative of something.
It's indicative of not onlyjust the level of capital
flowing through the system, butthe ways in which the narrative
has changed about opportunity.
And I think there's, and Ithink the ways in which capital
(23:37):
flows tells stories, tellsnarrative stories, we just don't
always pay attention to whatthose are.
Because a lot of reporting, andno shade on this at all, I've
done these scoops too, is Xcompany pays X million dollars
for this company, right?
Like there's nothing wrong withthat, but actually a lot of the
time there is a very goodreason why that has happened.
(24:00):
And sometimes there's somereally colorful characters at
the center of it.
So if you're someone like mewho is interested in why people
make an ambition, is interestedin high stakes decisions, is
interested in what it actuallymeans to build a truly excellent
(24:21):
business, it is a veryinteresting corner in which to
live your life.
I mean, money also just haslike a very, if you want to talk
about history, right?
Money has an interestinghistory too, right?
It actually has come to mean alot of different things.
And we're actually in, if youlook at what's happened with
crypto, if you look at sort ofhow payments have evolved over
(24:41):
the last few years, especially,what money actually means also
changes over time in ways thatare, I think, interesting to
track.
I recognize it's a long answer,but it's something I do think
about a lot.
Dave Reddy (24:55):
I mean, it's fundamental to what you do.
Now, I want to go back to theAI boom in a second, but first,
you did make a switch to tech.
Was that an accident?
Were you thinking, all right,the money's going into tech?
What was the reason for firstYahoo Finance and now focusing
on tech for
Allie Garfinkle (25:10):
the most part?
I love how you assign so muchlogic to what I've done.
No, I...
Okay, I'm going to saysomething that might be slightly
controversial.
I think most people who go intobusiness journalism want to
cover tech at some point.
They're the biggest businessesin the world.
They are often so mired incontroversy if they get big
(25:34):
enough for long enough.
The people who run them are allfascinating in ways that are
good and bad.
And I think tech also, thething I always found really
intriguing about tech is it'slike the sector where everything
escalates so quickly.
It's like, remember thatescalated quickly bit from
(25:55):
Anchorman or whatever it is?
That's tech.
It starts with, oh, this iskind of cool.
It can kill us all.
And that's fascinating.
I'm sure there are people whowould fight me on this, but I
actually think anyone who isinterested in being a financial
journalist at some point has theidea they'd want to cover tech.
The way Yahoo Finance happenedis, I'll be honest, the first
time I remember thinking vividlythat I was interested in
(26:17):
covering tech was when Amazonacquired Whole Foods.
That's such a weird memory tohave, but I remember thinking,
that's fascinating and an efforttowards a kind of ubiquity that
is, I find, sort of scary, butis maybe also brilliant.
Dave Reddy (26:34):
It's important to remind people that Amazon
started out as an onlinebookseller.
I don't know how many peopleactually remember that.
Allie Garfinkle (26:42):
I think about that all the time, Dave.
All the time.
Because there's a lot of...
I mean, NVIDIA started as agaming chip company, right?
And I think about that all thetime with these startups that
come to me where someone willsay, oh, it's just this right
now.
And I say, well, okay, but whatcould it be?
What are we actually talkingabout here?
(27:04):
Especially if you are VCs.
And one of the things that'sgreat about VCs is they're very
good at articulating thissometimes a little too good for
their own good, where I thinkthey can convince themselves of
things that maybe are a littlebit of a stretch, but also a lot
of things like this become astretch, right?
So all of this, I mean, all ofthis to say, I do, the way Yahoo
happened, you know, I'd alwayskind of wanted to cover tech and
(27:26):
they, you know, you know, forwhatever reason, I was covering
a lot of insure tech at thetime.
So for whatever reason, Isomehow convinced them that they
should let me cover Amazon.
Of
Dave Reddy (27:39):
course.
Allie Garfinkle (27:40):
Right.
Like I actually like, again,like one of those steps.
Makes total sense.
Yeah.
One of those steps in aperson's life where I look at it
and I go, wait, really?
Like they bought that story.
I actually, I've hadconversations with some of the
folks who've hired me since, whohired me over there since.
A lot of them have left Amazon.
But they basically sort ofsaid, look, we thought you'd be
good on camera.
You didn't seem scared.
(28:01):
And you really, really, really,really wanted to do it.
And I was like, I did really,really, really want to do it.
So that's how that transitionhappened.
I tech, I don't see sort of thetech and finance angles as
being at odds.
Like I am, as it stands atFortune, I am the senior finance
reporter on the tech desk.
And that is how I like it.
I think I will never, I thinkit's important to know your,
(28:22):
know your your skill set, I knowI'm never going to be the most
technical reporter out there.
And it's not what I aspire to.
I aspire to know just enoughthat I'm dangerous.
But what I want to know is howthe money is flowing, why the
thing works, if the thing works,which is very important and
underrated, and what this allcould be and what it all could
(28:43):
actually mean.
Because tech is veryexistential, right?
And that's what I like aboutit.
Dave Reddy (28:49):
It's, you know, when you read history, it's hard to
imagine what life was likebefore the Industrial
Revolution.
And now I can imagine what lifewas like before the internet.
Most people can't.
Well, I should say most people,but people younger than me
can't.
But it is amazing.
And it bears repeating that theinternet, the public internet,
I was 23 years old, 22 years oldwhen that came online in 1993.
(29:10):
And it's hard to imagine whatthe hell we did.
How did I go to college withoutthe-
Allie Garfinkle (29:15):
Yeah, what did you do?
Well, it's funny.
I was talking to someone who'squite a bit younger than I am.
Who has no conception of theworld before social media?
Dave Reddy (29:26):
Oh, I so wish we hadn't invented that.
But at any rate, that's anotherpodcast
Allie Garfinkle (29:31):
altogether.
I mean, my dad has a joke thatthere are no good old days
before indoor plumbing.
There were good old days beforesocial media, but actually
there are so many little thingswhen I think about sort of a
post-internet existence that Iactually don't know how to do.
I know how to read a map.
Depending on the map, but itwould take me a lot longer than
(29:54):
looking it up on my phone.
You know, it's technology doeschange our world in ways that
are unassailably true.
You
Dave Reddy (30:01):
know, just, I mean, who walks through a city that
they don't know anymore withouttheir phone out going, okay, I
need to go here.
I need to go there.
Right.
I mean, you know, back in theday, you just walked around
until you found where you weregoing or ask for directions.
Oh my God.
We had to talk to people.
So you also write the termsheet.
And you mentioned before thatwe're all seeing the obvious
(30:23):
patterns with AI, the big roundsand so forth.
What other patterns are youseeing as you write that
newsletter on the regular?
What are other things that arepopping or not popping as tech
evolves this year?
Allie Garfinkle (30:37):
So I get a lot of incoming, as you can imagine.
Dave Reddy (30:40):
Oh, I can imagine.
I send something.
Allie Garfinkle (30:43):
Yes.
Yeah, please send it my way.
Because I actually know, andit's the sort of thing I
apologize to people all the timebecause I cannot answer every
single thing, but I like to seeas much as possible.
Sure.
You know, the amount of moneybeing funneled into AI is
absolutely staggering.
I sometimes will look atsomething and I'll say, Really?
(31:05):
Like how many times how manytimes a week, Dave, I sit there
and look at a 15 to 35 millionseries A that is AI for X.
It happens.
It happens.
It is essentially a constantstream.
And it's the sort of thing,like sometimes I've sat there
and I've wondered, I was like,how many, how many of these
could I stack up?
(31:26):
How could I stack up intobillions of dollars?
And I'm just like, no, no, no,let's not, let's not even try.
But it's, it's truly staggeringand it's happening.
And the ones we talk about arethe $2 billion seed rounds, like
thinking machines, which ofcourse we're talking about
because it just happened thisweek.
But, you know, it's happeningacross the ecosystem, right?
You know, there's a, I wastalking, I saw a 50 million seed
(31:49):
round last a couple of daysago, $50 million for a seed
round.
Seed.
Which, yeah, that is more moneythan Google ever raised, I
believe.
It's the sort of thing thatit's kind of unfathomable.
And the thing I think about allthe time is, look, this is like
sea turtles.
Not everyone's going to make itto the shore here, people.
(32:09):
Back to the ocean.
Yeah, back to the ocean, fullcircle.
So the thing that I'm...
I think I'm going to keepseeing that trend for a while
where I just keep seeing theseseries A's, these like large
seeds and series A's sort ofjust piling on up in sort of AI
for X territory.
Other things that I think areintriguing, fintech had a rough
(32:32):
couple of years and I'm nowseeing some really good fintech
deals.
in the mix, right?
In part, that's aided becausecrypto is so back, but that's
not all it is.
I think there is definitely,despite a couple of serious
controversies and some verydifficult regulatory problems,
people really want to beinvesting in fintech.
(32:53):
Stripe may or may not go publicsomeday, who knows?
But Stripe's existence on itsown sort of proves that to their
point, the GDP of the internetis massive, right?
And that there actually arebetter financial services
opportunities out there.
You know, you see that withsuccess of like, like Stripe
competitor, Adyen, right?
So I think there's, I thinkFinTech is, FinTech is in a good
(33:16):
spot right now.
Exits are really interestingbecause on one hand, we have
more, we've seen, We've got muchbetter news than we've had in a
while.
We have a couple of IPOs thathave actually gone out or are
heading out.
Figma is the next one that'ssort of set as we're talking
right now.
I don't know if by the timethis is out, Figma will be out
in the world.
But you could argue the public.
(33:40):
I know one CEO who is now apublic market CEO.
He argues the public marketsare always open for great
companies.
And I think that is both trueand untrue.
I think there are better timesthan others.
So it's the sort of thing thatin terms of exits, I think it's
(34:23):
not a bad time.
I don't think it's a good timeeither.
And I guess the last thing Iwould say is that there is
actually a lot of reallyinteresting stuff happening
that's not expressly AI.
There's stuff that might useAI.
Like I've been covering some agtech recently and it's great.
That's actually a reallyimportant time for people to be
building technology for farmersin the United States.
(34:44):
And that's been really edifyingbecause a lot of those
companies are just ripping.
Right.
I mean, defense tech obviouslyhas its own has its own corner
of the universe.
You know, I live in L.A.
El Segundo is right there andis also ripping.
But I think with fewer proofpoints about how this is all
going to play out over time.
And I think I think there aresome smaller niche area.
(35:06):
I'll just say what I'm gettingat, I guess, is that I think
there's some smaller niche areasthat are doing really well with
some startups that are doingsome really interesting work
that are we're going to wake upin a couple of years and they're
going to be giants.
And they won't expressly be AI.
And actually, that's for thebest.
Dave Reddy (35:24):
Let's talk about the show.
And by the show, I mean, well,first of all,
Allie Garfinkl (35:27):
congratulations.
Dave Reddy (35:28):
Congratulations.
You're about to launch, as ofthis taping, and you'll probably
have a few done by then, you'reabout to launch the Term Sheet
podcast, which we're all lookingforward to.
Yes.
It's going to be great.
But I wanted to talk aboutBrainstorm, which you, of
course, are a co-chair ofFortune Brainstorm Tech, which
is happening in September.
in Utah, correct?
Allie Garfinkle (35:51):
Yes, sir.
Dave Reddy (35:52):
Absolutely.
Right.
Allie Garfinkle (35:53):
It's a, it's so pretty.
It's a lovely place.
I can't believe I get to gohang out there.
Dave Reddy (35:59):
So what, what do you, as you are developing the
show in conjunction with AndrewNuska, our past guest, what he
mentioned to me that you werefocused more on round tables
this year than one offinterviews.
Why the shift?
Allie Garfinkle (36:15):
So to be clear, we're still doing one-off
interviews.
There's going to be quite a fewof them.
But yeah, we definitely decidedwe wanted to extend our
roundtable program because therule at Brainstorm is that
everybody who's in the audiencecan be on stage.
And we decided we wanted togive a lot of those folks more
speaking opportunities, morechances to sort of not only for
(36:35):
us as journalists to be able tocover some of the things they
say, but to sort of give themthe chance to really have a
conversation and sort offacilitate that conversation.
Like we're starting thisprocess.
We're starting this event, youknow, so within Brainstorm, this
event called an InsightExchange.
And when Insight Exchanges is,it's going to be kind of town
hall-y.
There's going to be, you know,eight to 10 speakers, which is
(36:57):
going to be a task formoderators like me, of course,
but is going to be a chance tokind of have a rollicking,
wide-ranging conversation.
And we want to have as many ofthose as possible because, you
know, Andrew Nuska, shout out,we love that guy.
He's the greatest.
We do not have enough time forme to say all of the nice things
about Andrew Nuska, but he issomebody who's been...
(37:18):
a wonderful mentor and teacherto me, but also I think is
really doing a good job ofsaying, okay, why actually do
people go to brainstorm?
Because, you know, I mean,after the pandemic, it was a
question worth asking, right?
If all events kind of had tochange, had to sort of change or
die.
And Andrew really has done agood job of articulating to me,
(37:39):
why bother?
Which is, you know, people goto brainstorm to brainstorm.
The goal is to be in a roomwith as many high profile people
Thank you so much.
That's what you want it to be.
(38:15):
You want it to be like the bestdiscussion section ever from
like your social sciences classin college.
And it is, and you know, it hasin my, as we've been doing it,
really, really been that.
So I'll just say, why do we doroundtables?
So we can have more literalbrainstorms is the short answer.
Dave Reddy (38:34):
Great.
Well, as PR people, we like it.
That means we have moreopportunities to get speakers
on.
Music (38:38):
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (38:39):
Another question I know you guys are constantly
asking yourselves these days isyou've got Fortune Brainstorm AI
around the world, but in theUnited States, it'll be in
December here in San Francisco,and you've got Brainstorm Tech.
There must be some seriousthinking to make sure that
Brainstorm Tech these days inparticular just isn't a preview
or a larger version ofBrainstorm AI.
(39:02):
How do you pull that off?
Allie Garfinkle (39:04):
You know, it's interesting you say that because
I actually have...
In some ways, it is easier thanyou would expect because when
you're doing Brainstorm AI, it'sa slightly different audience.
It's a lot, there's a lot ofoverlap, but it is, you know,
especially like Brainstorm AISan Francisco, for example, will
attract a very specificaudience that is very, very San
Francisco, very like CTO, very,very, very focused on sort of
(39:30):
research in some cases too.
Whereas like Brainstorm,Brainstorm tech is broader.
You know, there are, Like, forexample, a lot of fintech.
doesn't fall into the categoryof what you would talk about it,
what you would talk about abrainstorm AI or, and a lot of
crypto for that matter.
You know, EVs, for example, aresomething that, you know, we're
(39:50):
going to be touching on abrainstorm tech this year.
And like, could you do that abrainstorm AI?
Yeah, absolutely.
But it would have to be throughkind of a very specific lens.
So I think there's brainstormtech is kind of really the
flagship where everything thatwe wouldn't necessarily talk
about an AI happens there.
It's also this Yeah.
To me, brainstorm tech is alsoan opportunity, as much as it is
(40:30):
to talk about AI, to have aconversation about where venture
capital as a whole is headedright now.
Because actually, independentof AI, venture capital is in the
midst of a sea change.
And as a maturing asset classkind of needs to figure out what
it wants to be, or rather firmsneed to figure out who they
want to be and kind of placetheir bets as it were.
So I think what I would say isthat There are some folks who
(40:55):
are like, oh, this is brainstormAI all the way.
And there are some folks whoare like, oh, this is a
brainstorm tech thing.
And then there's a lot, to yourpoint, there are a lot of
things in the middle becauseeverything it does feel like is
AI right now.
That being said, I thinkthere's just so much, there
really is just so muchopportunity when you expand
beyond AI too.
You know what I mean?
(41:15):
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (41:16):
Talk to me about, we mentioned earlier about chaos
and so forth.
A question I've been askingeverybody this year is, second
Trump presidency, he seems to dowell in chaos, not making a
political statement that he justdoes.
Allie Garfinkle (41:30):
I would say that's a statement of fact.
Dave Reddy (41:33):
Yep.
And you mentioned earlier thatchaos for the markets, as he
himself has seen, as we have allseen, is not necessarily a good
thing, at least for a couple ofdays and then Maybe it goes
away, maybe it doesn't.
You guys are coveringtechnology, which I think
Washington is more involved withnow more than ever,
particularly under hispresidency.
The Musk-Trump romance hasended, but there was that whole
(41:56):
thing going on.
Allie Garfinkle (41:57):
It was a doomed romance from the beginning.
Yes.
A tragic love story.
Dave Reddy (42:01):
Yeah.
No, that was definitely notgoing to work.
But at any rate, how do youfolks address a topic like that
at Brainstorm without turning itinto Brainstorm Trump?
Allie Garfinkle (42:15):
Ooh, brainstorm Trump.
What an event that would
Dave Reddy (42:20):
be.
I want a royalty.
Allie Garfinkle (42:23):
Hey, Andrew, I have a great idea.
We're going to do brainstormTrump.
Yeah, no, I mean, to yourpoint, there are a few figures,
Donald Trump, Elon Musk,anything they do seems to
overshadow absolutely anythingelse going on at that moment.
The answer is thoughtfully.
Right.
You know, we are there's onlyso much I can disclose as we're
talking here because there aresome conversations that are
still happening.
But we've definitely beentalking about what it means to
(42:44):
have a political presence atBrainstorm and what it actually
means to sort of treat that withthe correct amount of
journalistic skepticism and alsosort of actually.
talk about what's newsworthy.
Because the thing aboutanything with covering this
(43:05):
administration is the puck isgoing to move so fast somewhere
else, you don't even know what'snewsworthy anymore sometimes.
Did this just make headlines,or should we actually be talking
about this as a sustainablechange?
So all of this to say, theanswer is carefully.
The answer is with an eyetowards facts, an eye towards
(43:26):
Actual policy and not justrhetoric.
And particularly, I would say,as pertains to tech, yes, it's
this, you know, my colleagueLeo, who writes Termsheet on
Mondays, and we call this theA16Z White House, venture
capital in particular, has neverbeen more effective.
present in an administration ina lot of ways.
(43:50):
Now, I'm sure there arearguments you could make, but
it's particularly hard toignore.
And I would say that weapproach it at Brainstorm, at
least from an editorialprogramming perspective, the way
I approach it as a journalist,which is hear everybody out,
have the thoughtfulconversation, ask the hard
questions, always respectfully,and you do the story.
And the thing about livejournalism that is great is in a
(44:13):
lot of ways, it's the sameprocess.
You sit there, you look at asituation, you say, okay, what
does an audience really need toknow about this?
What questions do I need tohold this person to account to
answer?
And that is a thing I do reallyappreciate.
I think about when I starteddoing interviews on the Fortune
Media side, they were verysupportive.
(44:34):
I was like, okay, I've got togo in on this.
And they were like, go dowhatever you need to do.
They get mad at you.
Oh, well, we can blame thejournalist.
I'm like, great, perfect.
I would love to be blamed.
So I think that it's the sortof thing too, where it's also
the last thing I would say aboutit too, is it's important to
know what's important to youraudience.
And I will say that issomething that I think about a
lot.
And the answer depends.
(44:55):
Like I'm working on a defensetech session, for example.
What does a brainstorm audiencereally want to know about the
state of defense tech?
I have some theories, but Thething that I will actually do
before I get on that stage withthose folks is I will actually
ask a couple of Brainstormmembers what they want me to
ask.
And I would say that that istrue of anything like this.
(45:16):
And I'll insert all of this toapply to stuff around Elon, too.
I mean, just put them all inthat generalized, very large
vicinity.
Dave Reddy (45:26):
This may not be as applicable a question to someone
who's doing mostly livejournalism, but how are you
using AI at Fortune?
Allie Garfinkle (45:35):
I mean, for what it's worth, I write a
newsletter every day.
You know, most days, right?
You know, Fortune actually juststarted a program called
Fortune Intelligence wherethey're sort of experimenting
with AI-generated articles.
I'm not involved with that.
For me, personally...
I've found that Fortune's donea really good job of giving us
the tools to say, go try thisout and see if it works for you.
(45:56):
For instance, Allison, oureditor-in-chief, has done a
really good job with perplexity.
And she's been like, look, wehave a perplexity partnership.
You all should go try usingthis, see if it works.
I know there's quite a bit ofcontroversy around perplexity,
but I will say...
As a product, it's really good.
And it's actually reallyhelpful for what I do where I'm
(46:18):
on deadline and I have to sortof aggregate a bunch of
information and say, wait, whatdo I actually need to know about
this?
It does a really good job.
So I definitely do that.
I have definitely used ChatGPTto check for typos at a panic.
That definitely happens too.
Though I will say, you know,the biggest, I actually, my
theory is that I'm exactly theright age in certain ways.
(46:39):
Because I actually remember, Iremember the world before social
media.
And I remember the world doingjournalism before auto-generated
transcripts.
And I
Dave Reddy (46:49):
have
Allie Garfinkle (46:51):
criticisms of Otter.ai.
I don't I don't think theirtranscripts are necessarily very
good.
I think they could be better.
That being said, do I pay forthat no matter what compel or
high water?
Absolutely.
It's the...
It's the sort of thing where Ithink I think it's kind of hard
to overstate how much easier ajournalist's life gets when
(47:12):
you're not doing your owntranscription, at least not
constantly.
So the it's the sort of thingthat I think about.
Do you know those old movies,Dave, about journalists like a
Billy Wilder movie where thejournalist like runs to the
payphone
Dave Reddy (47:24):
and
Allie Garfinkle (47:29):
like calls the editor?
And it's, it's like, and it'sthe sort of thing, like
sometimes I'll watch that.
I'll be like, God, technologycould not move as fast as
journalists could at that time.
But also at the time, like I dothink about sort of my, my, my
ancestors didn't have tools thatI have either.
(47:51):
My ancestors had to go rollback the tape and listen to
things over and over again.
So I think there's, there's allof this to say, like, I'm, I'm
a big fan of the tools, keep thetools coming.
I actually think there's,Someone somewhere in the world,
I hope, is working on a greatfact-checking machine for
stories.
Because I actually would lovethat the best case of AI be not
(48:13):
that there is inaccurate slopand misinformation published
online, but that actuallystories are more accurate than
ever.
Dave Reddy (48:20):
Hallucinations.
We could do without those.
They'll get...
There, I think, I hope.
Allie Garfinkle (48:27):
The thing about hallucinations is I think I've
talked to a lot of folks aboutthis.
Hallucinations are aninevitability and they will be
different than the things ahuman would hallucinate.
So it's the sort of thing thatI think that part of it is
taking the crickets with thestraights.
But also, I do really thinkthat we could get to the place
where that level of errorexists.
becomes negligible and maybeunfortunate sometimes, but at
(48:51):
the average, like if the answeris, I think there is a tool to
be created.
I'm not the one to make it.
I don't have the expertise, butI do feel, I don't know.
I feel very, I feel very, Ifeel anxious and hopeful about
you're scaring every
Dave Reddy (49:05):
professional copy editor out there.
Allie Garfinkle (49:09):
They're actually, we still need human
copy editors.
We actually still need morehuman copy editors is my
personal opinion, but that's aseparate conversation.
Dave Reddy (49:16):
By the way, I did look it up and I don't know if
it's the book you read, but Iwas referring to Underworld by
Susan Casey.
Oh.
We can go back to our deep seadiving conversation.
Allie Garfinkle (49:29):
Okay.
I was referring to, hold on,we're going to look it up right
now.
The deepest- It's the DavidAlley Book
Dave Reddy (49:35):
Club.
Allie Garfinkle (49:37):
Yes, the David Alley Book Club.
Books about the ocean.
The deepest map, the highstakes race to chart the world's
oceans by Laura Trethelewy?
If I mispronounce her name, Iam very sorry.
But it's a fabulous
Dave Reddy (49:51):
book.
All right.
I'm going to order that.
And you should too.
Yes, I
Allie Garfinkle (49:56):
would go order
Dave Reddy (49:56):
Underworld.
Yeah, and order Underworld.
It was great.
All right.
So my last question is always alittle fun.
Actually, this was all fun, butlet's have some real fun.
So you have lived in four ofthe biggest cities, three of the
biggest cities, and then one inthe top 15 at least.
Miami, Chicago, New York.
or L.A.?
Allie Garfinkle (50:16):
I have a particular love for Los Angeles.
I live here right now, so Idon't want to insult my current
love.
Yeah, I try not to bite thehand that feeds me, especially
because you want the trafficgods on your side in this town.
But no, L.A.
is funny because my husband andI moved here in 2020.
(50:37):
I thought I would stay a year,and now I can't imagine leaving.
I might someday, but L.A.
is...
LA is a place that's still gota little magic on it in a way
that, and that's like nowhereI've ever been.
It's crazy.
Don't get me wrong.
It's insane.
But I like, as we'veestablished here, I love crazy.
Dave Reddy (50:53):
Which seems like a perfect way to end this really
fun
Allie Garfinkle (51:00):
interview.
First five minutes of anywhere.
It's like, okay.
So she likes, she likes, shelikes, she likes crazy from
Miami.
Makes all sense.
Dave Reddy (51:08):
That will be the headline.
Music (51:10):
Yeah.
Dave Reddy (51:11):
Allie, thanks so much for your time.
That was a whole lot of fun.
I really appreciate it.
And good luck with the podcastand best of luck at the show in
September.
Allie Garfinkle (51:19):
Thank you so much, Dave.
Dave Reddy (51:21):
I'd like to thank you all for listening today.
And once again, a big thank youto our guest, Allie Garfinkel
of Fortune.
Join us again next month whenwe celebrate our third
anniversary with a specialepisode, theme still to be
determined.
Surprise is coming.
In the meantime...
If you've got feedback ontoday's podcast, or if you'd
like to learn more about BigValley Marketing and how we
identified the B2B Tech Top 200,be sure to drop me an email at
(51:45):
dready at bigvalley.co.
That's D-R-E-D-D-Y atbigvalley, all one word, .co.
No M.
You can also email the wholeteam at pressingmatters at
bigvalley.co.
Once again, thanks forlistening.
And as always, think big.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Law & Order: Criminal Justice System - Season 1 & Season 2
Season Two Out Now! Law & Order: Criminal Justice System tells the real stories behind the landmark cases that have shaped how the most dangerous and influential criminals in America are prosecuted. In its second season, the series tackles the threat of terrorism in the United States. From the rise of extremist political groups in the 60s to domestic lone wolves in the modern day, we explore how organizations like the FBI and Joint Terrorism Take Force have evolved to fight back against a multitude of terrorist threats.