Resources – Tech Newsletters

Sources of information and inspiration

For the next 3 weekends I will be sharing the various tech resources of information I use. The primary ones being:

• Newsletters
• Blogs
• Podcasts

Today I share my main source of information and inspiration, tech newsletters. Email has been proclaimed dead or dying numerous times over the years. And according to some it’s only a matter of time before it does, as the youngest generation despises it. Others suggest this to be far from true. Personally, I still love using email and find it one of the most consistently useful ways to receive information. But hey, I’m old.

Listed below are the main tech newsletters I receive, roughly ordered in terms of favorites. Some are focused more on news, others are less concerned with being topical. A few provide links or short reads, others in-depth deep dives. Some have original content, others curated content, with links to the original articles. Together, they provide a great flow of information about everything that’s happening in the world of tech.

I didn’t explicitly include magazines and sites like Techcrunch, Wired, The Verge, Vox, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New York Times etc in the list. The below tech newsletters, along with the blogs (next week) provide a lot of links to these publications. As a result, to prevent completely information overload, I don’t currently subscribe to any individual newsletters they might have.

Without further ado:

Newsletters

• The Download from MIT. I love the structure and content of this daily news letter. Each one has 1-4 main stories, succinctly summarized and with links to further information. This is followed by the top ten must-reads for that day, giving an instant overview of the key news stories, with links to the source. As such this is top of my list of tech resources. You can (and SHOULD) sign up here.
• Quartz Obsession. Another great daily newsletter. Unlike The Download, this one focuses on one specific topic, diving deeper into it from multiple angles in a series of articles. And Quartz provides a great complement to the more topical and news focused The Download. It also links up with the Quartz podcast, including the thought-provoking ‘Should This Exist’ podcast. Sign up here.
• Fortune Data Sheet, Term Sheet, Brainstorm Health, and Eye on AI. Fortune has a whole series of newsletters. To avoid information overload, I subscribe to the main ones of interest. Data Sheet is similar to The Download in terms of format and content. Term Sheet is great for listing out all the deals happening in the world of start-ups, VC and PE. Brainstorm and Eye on AI, as their names suggest, focus on healthcare and AI, both areas of particular interest to me. You can sign up for the various newsletters here.
• CBInsights. Another great complement to the other newsletters. The CBInsights newsletter is full of small snippets of information, with links to the full stories. The emails are peppered with graphics and emojis. This can sometimes be a bit distracting, but equally makes it very appealing for the more visually focused amongst us. I’m a big fan of the CBInsights platform in general, which seems to find the perfect balance between surfacing relevant information and delivering it in an entertaining way. Sign up here.

…more newsletters

• Bloomberg Technology. I’ve only recently signed up but so far so good. Similar to The Download and Fortune Data Sheet. Sign up here.
• Ark Invest. Ark are a leading investment house in the tech space. They provide a series of ETFs providing exposure to public companies working on cutting edge technology. They also publish a newsletter with valuable insights into their main areas of focus. You can sign up here.
• Gizmodo. Getting quite far down the list here, but definitely one I very much enjoy. Unlike the others, there is more focus on popular tech, culture, geek news, etc. Tons of fun, quirky, offbeat stuff to be found. To sign up, click here.
• Quanta Magazine. Significantly more technical than the other newsletters. As a result I haven’t used it as much yet as the articles can demand a significant time investment. But if you’re looking for in-depth articles about cutting edge developments in the world of maths, physics, computer and life sciences, this is one of the go to tech resources. Sign up at the bottom of the page, here.
• Singularity Hub. Similar to Quartz in that it has a main daily story. It’s more topical than Quartz, expanding on stories that were in the news that week. I haven’t used it as much as other newsletters, mostly because it contains information already received from other tech newsletters. Sign up here.
• FactSet StreetAccount. Could easily be at the top of the list, except that it requires a subscription to FactSet. There are a few emails each day with (due to different regional editions) links to key news from markets, politics, and miscellaneous news.

Topic specific newsletters

• Tokeneconomy. My one stop shop for everything crypto related. A weekly newsletter with links to all the key news and articles. Nothing else needed to stay up to date with the ever evolving world of crypto. Sign up here.
• Data Elixir. A great weekly resource for the field of data science. Needless to say this is a much vaster area that crypto, so it would be impossible to amalgamate all relevant information. But the team at Data Elixir do a great job of bringing a curated set of links about new technology, tools and news. Sign up here.
• AlternativeData.org and Quandl. For those interested in alternative data, these two weekly newsletters provide a great resource. Sign up here and here.

To pay or not to pay

All the above tech newsletters are available for free. For some, like The Download, a limited number of articles are available for free each month. A subscription is needed to access articles beyond that limit. However, due to the already large amount of tech information available for free, I have thus far only subscribed to Wired, as I found myself hitting their limit far too early each month.

However, I am considering signing up for more, as it can be rather frustrating hitting that limit just as you’ve come across a particularly interesting article. The Download, Quartz, and The New Yorker are high on the list. In addition to providing access to articles, subscription also brings additional perks such as ad free content or exclusive membership content and events. (11/05 update: I’ve not subscribed to The Download and the NY Times. I was already hitting that limit for The Download, and the NY Times had a great feature on privacy. Quartz also continues to pump out interesting content so that’s only a matter of time too.)

Lack of The Information

One of the tech newsletter missing from the list is The Information. From what I’ve seen and heard it contains a ton of useful, proprietary information. Unlike the above, there however unfortunately isn’t a free version currently available. And the 5 day trial doesn’t provide much time to get familiar before having to commit $399 per year.

What sources do you use?

I hope you’ve found some useful tech newsletters in the list above. It might seem like a long list, but each add their own value. Over time I’ll be adding new sources to the list. I’d love to hear of any additional sources you use. So please add them in the comments section below.

Next week, blogs!

While you’re here…

I hope you will check out some of my past posts and look forward to hearing your thoughts on the different topics.

• The impact of electric vehicles on the grid and the opportunities they provide
• Can AI hold copyright?
• And something for anyone who has been frustrated with elevators

Cover photo by Radek Grzybowski on Unsplash