Allie Garfinkle of Fortune's “Term Sheet” talks reporting, startups and AI

Fund/Build/Scale

I met Fortune Senior Finance Reporter Allie Garfinkle in February 2024 at an event for comms professionals.

She had just taken over the Term Sheet daily deals newsletter covering startups, venture capital, M&A, trends and pretty much anything tech-related.

When news broke right after our panel that Reddit was filing to go public, she didn’t have a desk or a chair, so she grabbed her laptop, sat on the floor with her back to the wall and began drafting her next column.

She wasn’t stressed out — she seemed excited and laser-focused.

Term Sheet comes out five times each week which means she’s up and reviewing reader tips between 4am and 6am. “I actually write every day because I want it to feel urgent. It's sort of this odd equivalent of being journalistically naked,” she said.

A lot of tech reporters use their platforms to make predictions, pick winners and embroider their opinions, but Allie tends to play it right down the middle.

“The thing that I probably excel at is sort of being somewhere between neither being a cheerleader nor being an incredibly harsh critic,” she said. “I actually try to approach every person in front of me on their terms, like, “okay, who are you?”

Episode breakdown

(3:49) “I started at Fortune in January. New year, new job. I'd actually never written a daily newsletter before, ever.”

(7:00) “I think there are great hot takers in this business. But I don't think I will ever be one of them.”

(9:27) “What's the bar for including things? I try to put myself in the position of the readers.”

(11:57) “The Reddit IPO — actually the day we met — I had another story in the can. I recall this.”

(14:40) “There's a certain kind of conventional story of success I find incredibly boring.”

(16:53) “There's sometimes stories where I don't know if I'm the right person.”

(17:13) Why Elon Musk just isn’t that interesting to write about.

(19:07) How Allie really feels about writing tech trend pieces.

(21:44) She explains how Stephen Sondheim’s rules for songwriting also apply to tech reporting.

(25:04) Allie’s advice for early-stage founders who are fundraising in 2024.

(29:04) “I don't want to work with jerks. This is something that I've had to learn the hard way over time.”

Links

• Allie Garfinkle, Senior Finance Reporter, Fortune
  • [e-mail]
• Fortune articles by Allie Garfinkle
  • Reddit’s S-1 paints the picture of a company with a complicated past, present, and future
• Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Essential Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger

Thanks for listening!

– Walter.

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