Race & Society
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Rather than chasing parity with White Americans over a projected 110-320 years, the Black community should run its own race and maximize its own boundless potential.
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With Black unemployment climbing and buy-Black movements falling short, the path forward is building institutions that support Black-owned businesses from the inside out.
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COVID-19 has connected the dots between all the disparities black people face in the U.S. A return to normal for black folks means a return to the conditions that left us vulnerable to death. That would be unacceptable.
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Not All IPOs are Created Equal. Jumia is a Fraud. (Citron Research) This tea is hot, but I’m not sure there’s enough honey in this report. Jumia has earned most of the side-eyes it gets but I don’t think this report hits the bar for a fraud claim. Princeton Looks to Break Up the White…
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No. 201: Edouardo Jordan Remembers Black Food | Ghana at Venice Biennale | Satya Levels Up Microsoft
Showing Up at Your Dream Job Uninvited (Without Fail Podcast) Ghana arrives at the Venice Biennale, bringing new narratives with it (Financial Times) The Most Valuable Company (for Now) Is Having a Nadellaissance (Bloomberg)
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Notes on AI Bias Machine learning is much better at doing certain things than people, just as a dog is much better at finding drugs than people, but you wouldn’t convict someone on a dog’s evidence. And dogs are much more intelligent than any machine learning. The problem with this statement is that we have…
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W.E.B. Du Bois and the American Soul This is a compilation of three beautiful set of conversations on W.E.B Du Bois’ life and impact on society during and after his life. I first understood that a black American living in Africa was an option when I learned that he finished his life in Ghana. I…
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Take Bigger Risks: Shellye Archambeau, Former CEO, MetricStream I’ve seen Shellye Archambeau’s name around and have been intrigued to learn more about her story. Her appearance on Masters of Scale gives a great peak into how she’s navigated her way through Silicon Valley. What stood out in particular was her telling about a Bible her…
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Thinking about Ads Differently https://twitter.com/BenedictEvans/status/936323784155414529 One of the latent questions I’ve had about the tech industry is the seemingly unchecked dominance of advertising in tech company business models. Google. Facebook. Snap. Advertising is practically the sole driver of their businesses. Aren’t there more creative revenue streams for their businesses? Benedict Evans turned that question on…
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This is a fascinating conversation between Guy Raz and Bob Johnson. I had no idea he was a policy guy who then got into lobbying. His work at the National Cable & Telecommunications Association opened his eyes to the opportunity in cable TV, a nascent idea that hadn’t yet caught up with broadcast television. The…
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Facebook has been on the hot seat as more information comes to light about the role it played in Russia’s meddling in the November 2016 election. The hot seat treatment brought the company’s COO, Sheryl Sandberg, to DC for an exclusive interview with Axios co-founder Mike Allen to discuss the situation and what Facebook was…
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Black Market Naira Trading Cheaper Than Official Naira Nigeria’s currency situation has been a mess of late, and I’m blaming it on Billions (read my thoughts in Issue No. 24). Sure enough, hedge funds are sniffing around for a deal. This week has felt like something of a perfect storm for Nigeria with telecoms having…
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No Pain. No Gain: Egypt Edition Yesterday, I bristled at the scenario of a group of hedge fund managers pushing for the devaluation of the Naira. A country going through a devaluation situation experiences lots of pain, but good can come from it. Egypt seems to be seeing early fruit from the devaluation it initiated…
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My head is still shaking after learning that a prison sits on the land where Floyd McKissick was trying to build a city for black people. White Flight, Urban Crisis, New Cities Soul City was a project McKissick began working on in the late 1960s as part of an initiative at the Department of Housing and…
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Kudos to fellow Woodberry Forest Tigers Johannes, Tao Tao and the rest of the Get Your Guide team on the $50m they raised from KKR. More vim to them as they continue helping folks have enjoyable trips around the world. I would be remiss to give a shoutout to Cherae and the Tastemakers Africa team…
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Francophone Africa and Europe can expect access to more African and African-American content through Afrostream. The two-year old startup led by Tonjé Bakang has been on a tear this year, finishing up at Y Combinator and landing funding from Troy Carter’s Cross Culture Ventures (have they finished raising their $50M fund?), Orange Digital Ventures, Ace…
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David Brooks published a review of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ latest book, Between the World and Me this morning. A few points stood out to me: The last year has been an education for white people. There has been a depth, power and richness to the African-American conversation about Ferguson, Baltimore, Charleston and the other killings that…
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North Carolina Democrats are beginning to roll out plans for unseating Republican Richard Burr from the Senate. This is set to be an interesting election if rumors are correct that former UNC president Tom Ross and current US Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx are eyeing a run for the seat. Both are Davidson grads and Tom…
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Be sure to subscribe to David D.’s The Freedom Ring. He’s calling up sung and unsung players in the Civil Rights movement and documenting their stories. His first conversation was with his dad, David Dennis, Sr. Amazing stories about how he got his start in the movement, people he met along the way, and some…
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Imagine being able to pull up a film on Yaa Asantewaa for your daughter when she asks to watch TV. I am frustrated with the dearth of animated films with black princesses as the star characters. After my daughter’s 30th viewing of Frozen, I looked for other films with a black princess. So far, I…
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I may have done a fist pump when I saw that Helios Investment Partners raised $1.1 billion for its latest Africa-focused fund – a new record besting the $908 million the firm raised about three years ago. The notion of investing on the African continent is not such a novelty any longer. Sixty percent of…
Kwame Som-Pimpong 