Changes

I'm not doing my old job anymore as of right now.

Hey everyone, happy Friday.

Today was my last day at Crunchbase. I stepped down as Editor in Chief of Crunchbase News back in October but agreed to a period of transition to help the team find a new normal. That’s now complete.

My time at Crunchbase was one hell of an adventure. Willing a news organization into existence from nothing was wildly difficult, and far more so than I anticipated.

But it worked. Crunchbase News published thousands of pieces following its early 2017 launch. The publication earned the 24th spot on Techmeme’s presence leaderboard (ahead of Axios, Gizmodo, and The Information), broke news (like this), reached millions and millions of people, and, in October, my final full month writing for Crunchbase News, smashed its own records across every metric that publishers care about.

We also got linked to by effectively everyone we respect, and our work was frequently covered by other publications. The News team launched a podcast with friends that racked up millions of downloads (two, actually), produced and published a podcast at home, wrote endless columns, put together hundreds of newsletters (including a weekend missive that we made up), and partnered with Yahoo Finance, the San Francisco Chronicle, SmartNews, and TechCrunch.

In just over 1,000 days we got a hell of a lot done.

So why am I leaving? I stepped down because living in two places was hard before I got married in June and impossible after. During one particular run after the wedding I wound up in San Francisco for four out of five weeks.

More on what I’m doing next in a few weeks (I’m super, super excited). Now it’s time to fly to San Francisco (with Liza, this time) and move out of my apartment. Then, a week off and a new challenge directly following.

A big thanks to the News team: Sophia (for her crazy fast ramp on late-stage topics), Mary Ann (for her reporting prowess and kindness), Jason (for joining super-early and leading our data work), Jenna (for being a tremendous editor and leader), Natasha (for her reporting eye and excellent writing), Joanna (for rigorous reporting and rock-solid dependability), Li-Anne and Dom (for our art), and our former interns Celia (Celia is now a journalist at The Block), Grace, and Sav (who is now in law school).

And Holden. As News’s managing editor, he was indispensable in the professionalization of the team’s processes, tightening our writing and editing, and demanding that we level up. He’s one hell of a journalist and understands the fundamental value of the trade.

Finally, a big thank you to Crunchbase and the people who comprise the company. When I joined back in January of 2017 we hadn’t yet raised our Series B and were sharing office space with Engadget (Hello, Robbie!). Now thanks to the hard work of everyone at the company, Crunchbase is growing quickly and recently announced its Series C.

I’m proud of the Crunchbase News project. And I wound up being able to publish roughly 950 articles (around 570,000 words) while working with amazing people. It’s hard to beat that.

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