According to TechCrunch, Theo Baker, a 20-year-old Stanford senior, is publishing a book on May 19 titled “How to Rule the World” that exposes Silicon Valley’s “money-soaked” startup recruiting culture. The book, based on over 250 interviews, details how venture capitalists treat Stanford students as a “commodity,” using slush funds, shell companies, and yacht parties to woo them before they even have business ideas. Baker first gained fame as a freshman when his reporting for The Stanford Daily led to the resignation of Stanford president Marc Tessier-Lavigne, earning him a George Polk Award. Shortly after that scandal, Warner Bros and producer Amy Pascal secured the film rights to his story. His upcoming work aims to dissect the “weird subculture” that hunts for the next trillion-dollar founder directly on campus.
The unlikely Stanford star
Here’s the thing about Stanford: it’s basically a feeder system for Silicon Valley. Most students are there to get funded or get hired. But Theo Baker took a completely different path. While his peers were chasing VC money, he was conducting stakeouts and tracking down confidential sources as a freshman. He even took his junior year off to write, spending time at a writer’s retreat. It’s a stark choice, especially given his family background—his parents are top journalists Peter Baker and Susan Glasser. So you could say the instinct for accountability reporting is in his blood. But still, turning down the Silicon Valley gold rush to write a book? That’s a bold move in that environment.
Why this book could hit different
Look, we’ve read exposes about tech bro culture before. But this one feels different because of the source. Baker isn’t a disgruntled founder or a cynical VC. He’s a 21-year-old student who watched this happen to his own classmates in real time. He’s reporting from inside the fishbowl. When he says students are being “plied with enormous wealth” and taught to cut corners, it carries a specific weight. It’s not an outsider’s critique; it’s a participant-observer’s account. The fact that it’s coming from someone who just orchestrated the resignation of his own university’s president means people in power will probably take notice. Will it make waves? As Axios notes, almost certainly.
A lone bright spot for journalism
And all of this is happening while the traditional journalism world is crumbling. Universities are dropping journalism majors, and newsrooms are laying people off constantly. So Baker’s success is this weird, anachronistic beacon. He’s proving that old-school investigative work can still have massive impact—it can topple presidents and get movie deals. But is he a harbinger of a revival, or just a brilliant outlier? I think he’s probably the latter for now. His path was uniquely supported by family expertise and a spectacular first act. The real test will be if his story inspires other students to pick up a notebook instead of chasing a funding round. The book’s reception will be a fascinating data point.
The Silicon Valley reckoning
So what happens next? The movie about his first scandal is already in the works, which adds a whole other layer of cultural penetration. This book feels like the opening shot in what could be a long career of holding powerful systems accountable. Silicon Valley loves a narrative, but it usually gets to control its own. Baker is flipping the script. He’s treating the Valley’s founder-creation machine as an investigative subject. Basically, he’s applying the tools of political journalism to the tech world. And if his freshman year is any indication, he doesn’t back down when the lawyers come calling. That might be the most valuable lesson of all.
