Who's This Guy?

Hi, I'm Anil Dash. I'm an entrepreneur, writer and geek living in New York City, obsessed with the ways that technology shapes and transforms culture, media, government and society. My work applies the techniques and innovations of tech startups to reinventing institutions and communities, and my writing tells the story of how this happens. The highest use of new technologies is to empower and connect people who aren't born with the privilege of access to the institutions that define our culture.

Best of all, I get to have a lot of fun doing amazing work, focused around a few key topics:

Founder

Board Member

Advisor (Equity)

Advisor (Non-Equity)

Disclaimer

In addition to the companies I advise or sit on the board of, I have equity in Say Media due to my past work at Six Apart. None of the organizations mentioned here or above are responsible for anything you see on this site. You might get a better understanding of what I do by looking at these videos and press articles about me and my work. Or you can follow me on Facebook, Twitter, or subscribe to this site to keep up with me online.

Biography and Personal Info

I am a proud and passionate resident of New York City, where I live in Manhattan with my wife Alaina and our son Malcolm. As is sometimes evident from my writing on this site or on social networks, I'm an avid and unabashed student of pop culture, extremely versed in the minutia of funk music and hip hop history, and obsessive about the details of how the modern technology industry came to be. I'm also always up for a good meal (largely thanks to having been educated by my wife on the topic) and am an enthusiastic amateur on the topics of urban studies and of New York City's history in particular.

These topics tend to filter in to the way that I do my work for the organizations listed above, as you may be able to tell if you watch this video from early 2011 where I describe some of my motivations as well as a few milestones. (It's about 20 minutes.)

If you're looking for a formal bio, you can use this:

Anil Dash is an entrepreneur, technologist and writer acknolwedged as a "blogging pioneer" by the New Yorker for having started his site Dashes.com in 1999 as one of the earliest and most influential blogs on the Internet. Today his work focuses on applying the pioneering techniques and technologies of the startup world in order to transform major institutions in society and culture.

Dash is cofounder of Activate, a strategy consulting firm which helps the world's major media and technology companies reinvent their businesses, and cofounder and CEO of ThinkUp, a new startup which helps make more meaningful connections in social networks. Dash also has a monthly column in Wired magazine which explores the intersection of consumers and technology companies. In addition, Dash is an active advisor to several of the most prominent and innovative technology startups and non-profit organizations.

Dash is a member of the board of the popular question-and-answer site Stack Exchange and sits on the board of the New York Tech Meetup which serves as the political and social hub for the New York technology community. Dash also advises the reading network startup Readability, respected new publisher Vox Media, the popular upstart hip hop label Greedhead Records and the noted education non-profit DonorsChoose.

Dash has also been recognized for his role in popularizing web culture and advocating for social and civic responsibility within the technology industry, earning showcases in museums including the New Museum of Contemporary Art, and honors including a Webby citation for Dashes.com in 2010 in the Personal Blog category and being named the second most media-connected person in technology by Forbes in 2009.

Dash's earlier career involved a seminal role as Chief Evangelist at pioneering blogging technology company Six Apart (now SAY Media), where he joined as the first employee and helped guide the company into being the world's leading blogging company. His earlier career featured roles in the newspaper and music industries.

Dash lives in New York City with his wife Alaina Browne, who is general manager of Serious Eats, the James Beard Award winner for Best Food Blog; They have a young son, Malcolm. Dash can be found online at dashes.com and on nearly every social network as "anildash".

Out and About

Over the past decade, my work's been acknowledged on TV and radio, in newspapers and magazines, and even put on display in a few museums, as you can see in my full bio. I've popped up in serious books like Chris Anderson's The Long Tail, Don Tapscott's Wikinomics, Lawrence Lessig's Remix and Scott Rosenberg's Say Everything. And it's just as important to me that I've participated in the more fun aspects of web culture, earning acknowledgments in silly books like I Can Has Cheezburger? and Barack Obama Is Your New Bicycle. Perhaps most appropriately, I've also been fortunate enough to be linked to by thousands of blogs all across the web, leading being named one of the top ten most influential people in NYC, according to NowPublic, and the second most media-connected person in technology, according to Forbes. I've tried to use that influence to draw attention to some of my independent efforts like Last Year's Model, which advocates getting the most out of the gadgets and technologies that we consume, and to support the effort to control malaria as a United Nations Social Media Envoy.

Selected Press/Media

You can see a list of recent press mentions and quotes on Google News, see published mentions of me on this Amazon.com Search, and see academic citations of my work via Google Scholar. Some highlights:

• A featured quote in this Wired story from December 2010
• A few quotes in the New Yorker profile of Nick Denton from October 2010
• A quote in this New Yorker story about Facebook from September 2010
• A profile in Fast Company's "Who's Next" from February 2010
• A New York Times One-on-One interview from January 2010
• A featured set of video interviews by Big Think from August 2009
• A quote in the New York Times Sunday Magazine's "On Language" column from August 2009
• A New York magazine roundtable from June 2009
• A video feature in Rocketboom's coverage of "Battledecks" in 2008
• Featured articles in the September 2006 and March 2007 issues of Wired
• This New York Times piece from June 2005
• A Wired News story from July 2004
• A profile in New York magazine from November 2003
• An extensive video segment on PBS from January 2003