World Eaters world tour: A year discussing VC and our modern tech economy
Theranos raised more than $700 million from venture capitalists before its “breakthrough health technology” blood tests were shown not to actually work. Once a venture capital darling, WeWork went from being valued at over $47 billion in 2019 to declaring bankruptcy in 2023.
Yet companies that promise steady financial returns and proven ingenuity to help solve some of the world’s biggest problems struggle to raise funding. Those who do secure funding and mean well are pushed to exploit and extract from workers and users to achieve ever-higher profits to feed the VC machine.
We’re seeing this across industries, not just tech. This ethos has even entered the White House. In that context, World Eaters: How Venture Capital is Cannibalizing the Economy, by TechEquity Founder and CEO Catherine Bracy, came at the perfect time last March.
What began as three years of research quickly turned into conversations that stretched far beyond the printed page. The World Eaters book tour took Catherine around the globe. From a spirited book launch in San Francisco alongside New York Times tech reporter Erin Griffith to the Steward-Ownership Conference in Berlin, each event challenged Catherine to refine how we talk about capital, innovation, and the kind of economy we want to build.
One thing became clear in every room: people are hungry for honest, grounded analysis. Questions kept circling back to real conditions in workers’ lives, in housing markets, and in the everyday struggles of communities neglected by the myth that “move fast and break things” was ever enough.
Some readers expressed that the book helped them make sense of forces they’d felt but couldn’t explain. Others were more critical, pushing back on the framing of venture capital in World Eaters. These rigorous debates sharpened our collective thinking. The more we understand how VC functions, the more likely we are to identify it and work to implement more equitable economic systems.
Media coverage from Bloomberg to The Daily Show has opened doors into audiences we never anticipated. This ongoing dialogue in policy and tech circles has reinforced something we’ve long believed here at TechEquity: the incentives that shape our economy matter. The story of capital isn’t just about wealth creation; it’s about who benefits and who pays the price.
Looking back now, as we celebrate one year since the publication of World Eaters, we are filled with gratitude and a renewed sense of urgency. The conversations we sparked in person, online, and all over social media and podcasts aren’t simply about critiquing what’s wrong. They’re about imagining alternatives that prioritize sustainability, equity, and human dignity. That work continues.
The World Eaters world tour may have ended, but the work is not over. We hope the tech sector is ready for what we have in store as we continue to reflect on what we learned from World Eaters, this experience, and each other.