A-List Angels
How a Band of Actors, Artists, and Athletes Hacked Silicon Valley
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Narrated by:
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Tristan Wright
About this listen
How Hollywood cashed in on the latest tech boom - and changed the face of Silicon Valley.
When Ashton Kutcher first heard about 50 Cent's nine-figure Vitaminwater windfall in 2007, the actor realized he'd been missing out. He soon followed the rapper's formula - seeking equity instead of cash for endorsement deals - but with a twist: as the first person to top one million Twitter followers, Kutcher leveraged his social reach to accumulate stakes in a vast range of user-hungry tech startups.
A decade later, Kutcher is perhaps the brightest in a firmament of star investors from Beyoncé and Jay-Z to Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez. Bartering credibility and connections in exchange for early (and often discounted) access to the world's most coveted investment opportunities, this diverse group changed the face of venture capital while amassing portfolios packed with companies like Airbnb, Spotify, and Uber. But how did two once-dissonant universes - Silicon Valley and Hollywood - become intertwined?
Forbes senior editor Zack O'Malley Greenburg told the first chapter of Kutcher's transformation for the magazine's cover story in 2016. Now he offers a lively, enthralling account of how this motley crew of talent managers, venture capitalists, and celebrities helped the creative class forge a brand-new blueprint for generational wealth. Through extensive reporting and exclusive interviews with more than 100 key players - including Shaq, Nas, Joe Montana, Sophia Bush, Steve Aoki, Tony Gonzalez, and dozens of behind-the-scenes power brokers - Greenburg sheds light on the unlikely group that fundamentally transformed the value of fame.
©2020 Zack O'Malley Greenburg (P)2020 Hachette AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"Another one! Zack's latest book has the keys to securing the bag on the highest level - it's not about cash, it's about getting that equity." (DJ Khaled)
"Exciting, well-researched chronicle of how a group of actors, athletes and artists have emerged as mega-successful venture capitalists. Their stories underscore the inspiring truth that great entrepreneurs can emerge from the most unlikely backgrounds...an un-putdown-able masterpiece." (Steve Forbes)
"An inspirational tale of the unlikely bunch that not only cracked the code for startup investing, but also brought a much-needed infusion of diversity to Silicon Valley. It's an essential read." (Arianna Huffington)
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Story
Based on the chart-topping Business Wars podcast, stories, and lessons from history’s greatest business rivalries, interspersed with audio clips from the podcast. Using Chinese military genius Sun Tzu’s strategies as a guide, Brown examines why some companies triumph while others crumble....
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Just a repeat of the pod cast…..
- By Vm2008 on 02-01-22
By: David Brown
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Smart People Should Build Things
- How to Restore Our Culture of Achievement, Build a Path for Entrepreneurs, and Create New Jobs in America
- By: Andrew Yang
- Narrated by: Tim Paige
- Length: 6 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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In Smart People Should Build Things, this self-described "recovering lawyer" and entrepreneur weaves together a compelling narrative of success stories (including his own), offering observations about the flow of talent in the United States and explanations of why current trends are leading to economic distress and cultural decline. He also presents recommendations for both policy makers and job seekers to make entrepreneurship more realistic and achievable.
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Smart doesn’t mean smart.
- By Will on 03-21-20
By: Andrew Yang
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The Big Picture
- The Fight for the Future of Movies
- By: Ben Fritz
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 9 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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In the past decade, Hollywood has endured a cataclysm on a par with the end of silent film and the demise of the studio system. Stars and directors have seen their power dwindle, while writers and producers lift their best techniques from TV, comic books, and the toy biz. The future of Hollywood is being written by powerful corporate brands like Marvel, Amazon, Netflix, and Lego, as well as censors in China. Ben Fritz chronicles this dramatic shakeup with unmatched skill, bringing equal fluency to both the financial and entertainment aspects of Hollywood.
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Who is overseeing the audio part of this project?
- By Lori P on 11-19-19
By: Ben Fritz
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How Money Became Dangerous
- The Inside Story of Our Turbulent Relationship with Modern Finance
- By: Christopher Varelas, Dan Stone
- Narrated by: Roger Wayne
- Length: 14 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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From a veteran of the trade, a provocative and entertaining voyage into the turbulent heart of modern money that sheds new light on the rise of our threatening and complicated financial system, how money became our adversary, and why finding a new course is crucial to a healthy society.
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Must read
- By Craig M. Stratton on 02-08-20
By: Christopher Varelas, and others
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Play Nice but Win
- A CEO's Journey from Founder to Leader
- By: Michael Dell, James Kaplan
- Narrated by: Michael Dell
- Length: 10 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1984, soon-to-be college dropout Michael Dell hid signs of his fledgling PC business in the bathroom of his University of Texas dorm room. Almost 30 years later, at the pinnacle of his success as founder and leader of Dell Technologies, he found himself embroiled in a battle for his company’s survival. What he’d do next could ensure its legacy — or destroy it completely.
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Not perfect, but worth a listen
- By James S. on 11-09-21
By: Michael Dell, and others
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Trade-Off
- Why Some Things Catch On, and Others Don't
- By: Kevin Maney
- Narrated by: Dennis Holland
- Length: 6 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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In Trade-Off, Kevin Maney shows how these conflicting forces determine the success, or failure, of new products and services in the marketplace. He shows that almost every decision we make as consumers involves a trade-off between fidelity and convenience between the products we love and the products we need.
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No Trade-Offs for Reading Trade-Off
- By Joshua Kim on 06-10-12
By: Kevin Maney
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Play Bigger
- How Pirates, Dreamers, and Innovators Create and Dominate Markets
- By: Play Bigger LLC, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, and others
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 8 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Winning today isn't about beating the competition at the old game. It's about inventing a whole new game - defining a new market category, developing it, and dominating it over time. You can't build a legendary company without building a legendary category. If you think that having the best product is all it takes to win, you're going to lose. In this farsighted, pioneering guide, the founders of Silicon Valley advisory firm Play Bigger rely on data analysis and interviews to understand the inner workings of "category kings".
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The most impactful new thinking of the year
- By Chris Guest on 12-21-16
By: Play Bigger LLC, and others
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Samsung Rising
- The Inside Story of the South Korean Giant That Set Out to Beat Apple and Conquer Tech
- By: Geoffrey Cain
- Narrated by: Michael Braun
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Based on years of reporting on Samsung for The Economist, The Wall Street Journal, and Time, from his base in South Korea, and his countless sources inside and outside the company, Geoffrey Cain offers a penetrating look behind the curtains of the biggest company nobody in America knows. Seen for decades in tech circles as a fast follower rather than an innovation leader, Samsung today has grown to become a market leader in the United States and around the globe.
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Misleading title
- By Kevin on 02-25-21
By: Geoffrey Cain
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The Code
- Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America
- By: Margaret O'Mara
- Narrated by: Nan McNamara
- Length: 19 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Long before Margaret O'Mara became one of our most consequential historians of the American-led digital revolution, she worked in the White House of Bill Clinton and Al Gore in the earliest days of the commercial Internet. There, she saw firsthand how deeply intertwined Silicon Valley was with the federal government - and always had been - and how shallow the common understanding of the secrets of the Valley's success actually was.
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Mostly good, but also irrating
- By Rodney on 12-20-20
By: Margaret O'Mara
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The End of Work
- Why Your Passion Can Become Your Job
- By: John Tamny
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 4 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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From the author of Popular Economics comes a surprisingly sunny projection of America's future job market. Forget the doomsday predictions of sour-faced nostalgists who say automation and globalization will take away your dream job. The job market is only going to get better and better, according to economist John Tamny, who argues in The End of Work that the greatest gift of prosperity, beyond freedom from painful want, is the existence of work that is interesting.
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Positive... fun all the way... no boring parts
- By Robert J. Marks on 02-20-19
By: John Tamny
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Frenemies
- The Epic Disruption of the Ad Business (And Everything Else)
- By: Ken Auletta
- Narrated by: Jonathan Todd Ross
- Length: 12 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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An intimate and profound reckoning with the changes buffeting the $2 trillion global advertising and marketing business from the perspective of its most powerful players, by the best-selling author of Googled. Advertising and marketing touches on every corner of our lives, and is the invisible fuel powering almost all media. Complain about it though we might, without it the world would be a darker place. And of all the industries wracked by change in the digital age, few have been turned on its head as dramatically as this one has.
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Good; not for beginners
- By DV on 10-05-18
By: Ken Auletta
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Googled
- The End of the World as We Know It
- By: Ken Auletta
- Narrated by: Jim Bond
- Length: 13 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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In Googled, esteemed media writer and critic Ken Auletta uses the story of Google's rise to explore the inner workings of the company and the future of the media at large. Although Google has often been secretive, this book is based on the most extensive cooperation ever granted a journalist, including access to closed-door meetings and interviews with founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, CEO Eric Schmidt, and some 150 present and former employees.
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Audio production could have been better
- By David on 11-12-09
By: Ken Auletta
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Black Founder
- The Hidden Power of Being an Outsider
- By: Stacy Spikes
- Narrated by: Stacy Spikes
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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From the award-winning entrepreneur USA Today named one of the twenty-one most influential Blacks in technology comes an empowering, bracingly honest, entertaining blueprint for success in life and work—including the true story of what really happened to MoviePass—straight from the cofounder and former CEO himself.
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An Epic Journey
- By Amazon Customer on 10-04-24
By: Stacy Spikes
What listeners say about A-List Angels
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Dorie Clark
- 05-13-20
Fascinating look at the nexus of Hollywood & Silicon Valley
This was a well written, action-packed book for anyone who enjoys contemporary business literature. Props for the content!
The narrator’s voice and delivery was great, but I found myself wanting to hurl my phone across the room on numerous occasions because he doesn’t know how to pronounce basic words and clearly no one corrected him. I’m writing this review in hopes that someone can provide better quality control re: this guy in the future.
A narrator should be able to pronounce basic words like buffet, and constituency, and even a French phrase that is used often in American English like ‘de rigueur.’ Not to mention a word that’s very important to a story about investing, which is ‘Benioff.’ And yet this narrator butchers them! Rant over, but I truly hope whoever hires audiobook narrators monitors this narrator better in the future.
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- Amazon Customer
- 09-28-22
The book is ok
Tells the origin of the entertainment industry meeting venture capital. The book has good stories about the luck of the draw with investing in start ups and different ways today's stars were involved.
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