Journalists are the unsung heroes of tech scam series The Dropout, WeCrashed and Super Pumped

Pajiba

"You might have noticed that these are shows largely populated not by anti-heroes, but by evil billionaire villains," says Dustin Rowles. "Elizabeth Holmes in The Dropout, Travis Kalanick in Super Pumped, and Adam and Rebekah Neumann on WeCrashed. The stories all also follow a similar formula: The tech founder comes up with a great idea and raises hundreds of millions of dollars in investment capital, but as their companies 'disrupt' and grow on their way to IPO status, so do the egos and greedy appetites of the founders. While hubris eventually brings them all down, that’s only part of the story. What few people are acknowledging about these villain-led series is that there is a common hero in all three: Journalists. All of the tech grifters engage in despicable behavior, but it’s good reporting and a lot of help from whistleblowers that bring that behavior to light."