Cover story newsletter: 3/12/26

In a 2024 interview with The Advocate, Sam Altman said he didn’t really think about being a gay CEO. Over the years, he's quietly become a gay tech titan, part of a tiny club that didn’t openly exist at the turn of the century. Its members are inspirational to some people by that virtue. But measuring their actual impact on other LGBTQ+ people shows a less rosy picture.

Their tech companies have been known to wreak havoc in the lives of marginalized people. They have enriched themselves by aligning with Donald Trump and the far right. And even when it comes to other gay people in tech, they’ve modeled privacy over pride.

For The Advocate's March-April cover story, Kat Tenbarge explores what gay leadership at the top of tech actually means — for everyone else. Read the full story.

Have the gay tech titans turned their backs on us?

Photo illustration by Mariusz Walus; original portraits via Getty Images

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Have the gay tech titans turned their backs on us?

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Cover story newsletter: 3/12/26

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The Latest

Appointed by Mayor Zohran Mamdani to run the office, Taylor Brown becomes the first transgender person in history to lead a New York City office or agency.

With his first of now two wins at the games, Jake Adicoff of Team USA becomes the first out gay man to win an individual gold medal at the Winter Paralympics.

A year after Iowa stripped gender identity from its civil rights code, Kim Reynolds signed a law barring cities and counties from restoring protections for trans residents.

The unsolved murder, dubbed the “gay Black Dahlia,” was cracked wide open by filmmaker Rachel Mason.

LGBTQ+ stories deserve to be told.

More For You

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A civil rights group claims that backlash to the show's popularity has caused an uptick in anti-LGBTQ+ hate from fellow players and coaches.

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In Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!, the legendary performer details descending into an impassioned, drug-fueled affair with the filmmaker during the filming of the 1977 movie musical New York, New York.

Jill Collen Jefferson, the founder of JULIAN, explains what happens when a transgender woman’s death is ruled a suicide and a community calls it something else.

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