David Kirkpatrick

For more than 20 years David Kirkpatrick was a writer for Fortune, most recently as the senior editor for internet and technology. He has written numerous cover stories about Microsoft, IBM, Apple, Sun, Intel, and numerous other subjects, features on subjects including Facebook, MySpace, Second Life, the safety of cell phones and technology in China, plus his weekly “Fast Forward” column. He is regularly ranked one of the world’s top technology journalists. His expertise on these subjects led him to pen the definitive book on Facebook, The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That is Connecting the World. The Facebook Effect uncovers how in little more than half a decade, Facebook has gone from a dorm-room novelty to a company with over 900 million users. It is one of the fastest growing companies in history, an essential part of the social life not only of teenagers but hundreds of millions of adults worldwide. As Facebook spreads around the globe, it creates surprising effects—even becoming instrumental in political protests from Colombia to Iran.

Kirkpatrick had the full cooperation of Facebook’s key executives in researching this fascinating history of the company and its impact on our lives. At the podium and in the book, he shares how Facebook was created, why it has flourished, and where it is going next. He chronicles its successes and missteps, and gives audiences the most complete assessment anywhere of founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the central figure in the company’s remarkable ascent, a story that can be found nowhere else.

How did a 19 year old Harvard student create a company that has transformed the Internet and how did he grow it to its current enormous size? Kirkpatrick expands on how Zuckerberg steadfastly refused to compromise his vision, insistently focusing on growth over profits and preaching that Facebook must dominate (his word) communication on the Internet. In the process, he and a small group of key executives have created a company that has changed social life in the United States and elsewhere, a company that has become a ubiquitous presence in marketing, altering politics, business, and even our sense of our own identity. This is the Facebook Effect.

Kirkpatrick created Fortune’s Brainstorm brand, beginning with a 2001 conference in Aspen that ran for five years. Now, with a group of former Fortune colleagues, he has organized a conference and media company called Techonomy, focusing on the centrality of technology to business and social progress and the urgency of embracing the rapid pace of change brought by technology. Every major issue going forward will be affected by how it intersects with tech innovation. The inaugural conference was held in 2010. He has been a member of the World Economic Forum’s International Media Council, consisting of 100 of global media leaders, since 2006, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

An in-demand speaker, Kirkpatrick has spoken at companies including Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Hewlett-Packard, and AMD, at libraries, universities and numerous conferences. He appears frequently on television, radio, and the Internet as an expert on technology. He lives in New York City.