Ego, genius and hubris: The compelling and thoroughly watchable stories of tech titans

There’s a reason why everyone is so obsessed with whatever Elon Musk has to say, for better or worse, and, at the moment, it’s usually worse.

People like Musk are endlessly fascinating because they have incredible brains and unmatched ambition but the flip side of that coin is ego and hubris. They start to perceive themselves as more than, as if they’re gods and we’re all just peons who either rightly worship them or are too dumb to see why they’re correct about everything.

But for all the ones that made it to the top, changing the world with their innovations and ideas, their personalities and inability to see the wider lens beyond their own grand purpose has an Icarus effect. Especially when they believe the rules don’t apply to them.

It makes for fascinating screen stories. Just today, Rosamund Pike’s upcoming Silicon Valley thriller Thumblite has been picked up by Netflix in a bidding war, and The Good Wife creators Robert and Michelle King have a project called Cupertino in the works.

They’re both still a way off, so in the meantime, feast on these egomaniacal geniuses.

THE SOCIAL NETWORK

There’s no one like David Fincher when it comes to mastering intensity in tone, even when it’s a bunch of dudes congratulating themselves on being smart – or maybe especially when.

Fincher’s depiction of Mark Zuckerberg’s founding of Facebook (or, as it was called then, The Facebook) remains an incredible piece of cinema that examines one man’s quest for immortality as he tries to overcome or, at the very least, mask, his inadequacies as a person.

It’s why he’s so desperate to dominate everyone around him. The world was forever changed – but for the better?

Watch: Netflix, Stan, Binge, Prime Video

WECRASHED

Silicon Valley is very good at selling the world the story of itself as a hub for prodigies whose visions for the world and willingness to move fast and break things leads to pioneering shifts in our culture, business and politics. Mostly, it’s good at marketing.

That was certainly true for Adam and Rebekah Neumann, the founders of WeWork.

They said they were changing our consciousness but really they were hocking office space. You just have to get people to believe in you and plenty were willing to buy into them and their love story. When it came crashing it down, it crashed down hard.

Watch: Apple TV+

THE DROPOUT

Elizabeth Holmes was one of the rare female founders to have soared so high. She was the person behind Theranos, a supposedly revolutionary biotechnology company that was to change medical diagnoses.

It would’ve been great — if it actually worked.

Holmes’ fall was even more spectacular than her rise, exposed for being a fraudster who not only hoodwinked investors including Rupert Murdoch, but vulnerable everyday people who relied on what she was selling.

Behind the story was a young woman’s formative experiences which goes some ways to explaining why she did it.

Watch: Disney+

BLACKBERRY

Turns out, not all Canadians are just nice and happy-go-lucky people! Shocking, right?

This comedy-drama film by filmmaker Matt Johnson charts the improbable rise and perhaps-inevitable fall of Research in Motion, the makers of Blackberry, or as the devices were once known, the “crackberry”.

It started off as a plucky business from a couple of tech nerds who had no idea how to sell the prototype they had until they teamed up with a slick and ethically dubious marketing guru who had no shame and would barge into any room.

What follows is a tale of hubris and complacency as the Blackberry’s story intersected with the introduction of the iPhone. We all know how this ends but what a fun ride to get there.

Watch: Binge, Paramount+

SUPER PUMPED: THE BATTLE FOR UBER

Ubers are ubiquitous now, but former chief executive Travis Kalanick did a lot of dirty work to blanket the ride-share market. The emphatic word here is “dirty”.

The series stars Joseph Gordon-Levitt as the man who was eventually ousted from his own business after a cavalcade of scandals finally piled up on its door.

The series tracks Uber from its foundational days to the moment Kalanick was pushed, and all the shocking acts that happened because of its toxic culture, between including privacy breaches, drug-fuelled parties, sexual harassment and even murdered drivers. Which is what happens when you think disruption gives you carte blanche to be an arsehole.

Watch: Paramount+, Stan

SILICON VALLEY

OK, OK, Silicon Valley is not about a real-life tech titan or founder but you get the sense it captures the culture of tech better than the biopics – much like Veep is cited by Washington folks as the political series that best reflects what really goes on, not The West Wing or House of Cards.

The comedy from Mike Judge and Alec Berg is centred on Piped Piper, a compression software start-up as it navigates the bonkers world of Silicon Valley, encountering egos, moguls and rivals.

The perpetual cycles of funding, acquisition, decoupling and competition is soul-destroying but hilarious. It’s amazing anything actually gets done out there.

Watch: Binge

HALT AND CATCH FIRE

Routinely overlooked despite being one of the best shows of this century, Halt and Catch Fire is also a fictional scripted series but it’s a searing exploring of ambition, talent and the limits of what you’re willing to lose for greatness.

The story starts in the 1980s in Texas in the race to build the first personal computer and weaves its way to 1990s California in the gaming industry.

The tech stuff is the framework, the real story is the sometimes-tortured relationships between is it four core characters played by Lee Pace, Mackenzie Davis, Scoot McNairy and Kerry Bishe.

Few shows have done character development as well as Halt and Catch Fire did.

Watch: Foxtel, AMC+