The Corporate Carve: How Private Equity Grinded Skateboarding’s Soul In the grainy VHS tapes of the late 1980s, skateboarding was a rebellion on wheels. It was the domain of misfits and dreamers, kids who rejected the manicured fields of organized sports for the raw concrete of urban streets. World Industries, founded by Steve Rocco and Rodney Mullen, wasn’t just a brand—it was a manifesto. Its subversive deck designs and anti-establishment ethos gave skateboarding its middle finger to corporate America. The company offered health insurance to its riders, extended credit to struggling skate shops, and built a cultural juggernaut that revived a fading sport. By the mid-1990s, World Industries was skateboarding’s heartbeat, pumping life into a counterculture that thrived on authenticity. But in 1998, the rebellion was sold. Swander Pace Capital, a private equity firm, acquired World Industries in a leveraged buyout, a deal that would set a grim precedent. The brand’s edge was dulled, its...
Freedom Without Democracy? How Silicon Valley’s Exit Fantasies Are Rewriting the Meaning of Liberty By Apirate Monk I. Miami, 2022: A Provocation The lights dimmed and the crowd at the Miami Beach Convention Center surged forward as if a headliner had taken the stage. Cryptocurrency hype videos looped on LED screens; the air smelled of energy drinks and cigar smoke. When Peter Thiel strode to the lectern at the 2022 Bitcoin Conference, he didn’t talk about block times or new protocols. He talked about enemies. Warren Buffett, he said, was “enemy number one,” a “sociopathic grandpa.” BlackRock’s Larry Fink and JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon were gatekeepers of a decaying order. The future, he told the faithful, belonged to those willing to route around them. The applause rolled like surf. Some cheered because they knew exactly what Thiel meant. Others cheered because they sensed a taboo had been broken; heresies feel thrilling inside a room primed for revolution. Outside, Miami’s humidity...