Skip to main content

New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector

Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
5 by Eilene | 0 comments on Hacker News.
Hi HN. I’m a journalist who wrote ‘The Lawyer, The Addict’, a story that ran in the New York Times in July. The story was about my ex-husband, Peter, who was a high-flying powerful partner in Wilson Sonsini (the prestigious, Palo Alto-based law firm) and who died in July 2015, a drug addict. Almost everyone in his life missed the signs. The story wound up with enormous traction and was the 55th most read story in the entire paper in 2017. It also generated several threads of commentary on HN, including http://ift.tt/2t2aMcp, http://ift.tt/2vpHetB and http://ift.tt/2tY2Km8. I’m now writing a book based on that story for Random House. Although it is about what happened to Peter, the broader story is about the problem of substance use (and often abuse) in white-collar professions, where the users are well-off, well-educated, working long hours, often with all the outward trappings of success. What can you tell me about drug use as a professional or in your profession? I know there is drug use in law, finance, medicine and technology, and am hoping that some of you will be open to discussing with me what you see and what you've experienced in your profession and professional environment. I’d like to use some of your comments in the book and will not know or need to know your names, so I hope you’ll feel comfortable being as candid as possible. I’m not here to make judgements, all I’m looking for is the truth about what’s going on. I'm interested in whatever you can tell me about drugs you are using or observe being used in your field: which drugs, what effects you see, any stories you have, any details you can share. Thanks.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The future of Magic Leap's promising AR efforts dim after layoffs

The Magic Leap Two is now further away than ever, unfortunately. Today in a blog post the augmented reality pioneer announced major layoffs and has decided to cut up to half of its workforce, according to some reports. The original Magic Leap One was supposed to be one of the first mainstream augmented reality headsets when it launched in 2018, but a high price point and lack of interest from developers left the headset high and dry after launch. According to the blog post, Magic Leap says it will be focusing its efforts on enterprise solutions (a statement HTC has made recently as well) and shift its focus away from consumer technology… at least for the time being.  The company has been open about creating a second headset that would offer improved specs for some time, but how that work will now have to go forward without half of the team , according to some estimates, remains to be seen. Is the window closing on augmented reality?  Although it’s just one company, Magic...

Airship acquires SMS commerce company ReplyBuy

Airship is announcing that it has acquired mobile commerce startup ReplyBuy . The startup (which was a finalist at TechCrunch’s 1st and Future competition in 2016) works with customers like entertainment venues and professional and college sports teams to send messages and sell tickets to fans via SMS. It raised $4 million in funding from Sand Hill Angels, Kosinski Ventures, SEAG Ventures, Enspire Capital, MRTNZ Ventures and others, according to Crunchbase . Airship, meanwhile, has been expanding its platform beyond push notifications to cover customer communication across SMS, email, mobile wallets and more. But CEO Brett Caine said this is the first time the company is moving into commerce. While sports and concerts tickets might not be a booming market right now, Caine suggested that the company is actually seeing increased purchasing activity “in and around the Airship platform” as businesses try to drive more in-app purchases. He also suggested that both the COVID-19 pandem...

Du offers new roaming bundle for summer

UAE-based telecom operator du is offering roaming bundle for travelers valid for seven days. The summer bundle features unlimited calling and 2.5GB of data to 174 destinations - all from their own UAE number. Priced at AED 300 (per week) this latest addition to du’s roaming bundles will be available for customers travelling to 174 countries, including GCC countries, UK, US, European destinations, and Egypt, starting from May 30. The postpaid mobile subscribers can subscribe to the roaming bundle by sending the SMS U to 5102. Fahad Al Hassawi, Deputy CEO – Telco Services at EITC, the parent company of du, said that the roaming bundle will enhance the subscribers’ connectivity while travelling overseas and minimise their current pain points. Etisalat doubles internet speeds for eLife Unlimited subscribers from TechRadar - All the latest technology news http://bit.ly/2KbK1O8