Annalee Newitz (born May 7, 1969) is an American

journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

editor Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, photographic, visual, audible, or cinematic material used by a person or an entity to convey a message or information. The editing process can involve correction, condensation, ...

, and

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

of both fiction and nonfiction, who has written for the periodicals ''

Popular Science ''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...

'' and ''

Wired ''Wired'' (stylized as ''WIRED'') is a monthly American magazine, published in print and online editions, that focuses on how emerging technologies affect culture, the economy, and politics. Owned by Condé Nast, it is headquartered in San Fran ...

''. From 1999 to 2008 Newitz wrote a syndicated weekly column called ''Techsploitation'', and from 2000 to 2004 was the culture editor of the '' San Francisco Bay Guardian''. In 2004 Newitz became a policy analyst at the

Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. The foundation was formed on 10 July 1990 by John Gilmore, John Perry Barlow and Mitch Kapor to promote Internet ...

. With

Charlie Jane Anders Charlie Jane Anders is an American writer and commentator. She has written several novels, published magazines and websites, and hosted podcasts. In 2005, she received the Lambda Literary Award for work in the transgender category, and in 2009, ...

, they also co-founded ''Other'' magazine, a periodical that ran from 2002 to 2007. From 2008 to 2015 Newitz was editor-in-chief of

Gawker ''Gawker'' is an American blog founded by Nick Denton and Elizabeth Spiers and based in New York City focusing on celebrities and the media industry. According to SimilarWeb, the site had over 23 million visits per month as of 2015. Founded ...

-owned media venture '' io9'', and subsequently its direct descendant ''

Gizmodo ''Gizmodo'' ( ) is a design, technology, science and science fiction website. It was originally launched as part of the Gawker Media network run by Nick Denton, and runs on the Kinja platform. ''Gizmodo'' also includes the subsite '' io9'', w ...

'', Gawker's design and technology blog. As of 2019, Newitz is a contributing opinion writer at ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''.

Early life

Newitz was born in 1969, and grew up in

Irvine, California Irvine () is a master-planned city in South Orange County, California, United States, in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The Irvine Company started developing the area in the 1960s and the city was formally incorporated on December 28, 197 ...

, graduating from

Irvine High School Irvine High School is a public high school, located in the city of Irvine in Orange County, California, United States. It is part of the Irvine Unified School District. The school is located in the El Camino Real neighborhood in the north-central ...

, and in 1987 moved to

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and Emer ...

.Annalee Newitz, 2006, "About Annalee," at techsploitation.com (online), see , accessed February 19, 2015. In 1996, Newitz started doing freelance writing, and in 1998 completed a Ph.D. in English and American Studies from

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of Californi ...

, with a dissertation on images of monsters, psychopaths, and capitalism in twentieth century American popular culture, the content of which later appeared in book form from Duke University Press. Around 1999, Newitz co-founded the Post-World War II American Literature and Culture Database in an attempt to chronicle modern literature and popular culture.

Career

Newitz became a full-time writer and journalist in 1999 with an invitation to write a weekly column for the ''

Metro Silicon Valley ''Metro'' is a free weekly newspaper published by the San Jose, California, based Metro Newspapers. Also known as ''Metro Silicon Valley'', as well as ''Metroactive'' online, the paper serves the greater Silicon Valley area. In addition to prin ...

'', a column which then ran in various venues for nine years. Newitz then served as the culture editor at the '' San Francisco Bay Guardian'' from 2000 to 2004. Newitz was awarded a Knight Science Journalism

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

ship for 2002 to 2003, supporting them as a research fellow at

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern t ...

. From 2004 to 2005 Newitz was a policy analyst for the

, and from 2007 to 2009 was on the board of Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility. Newitz and

, a

Hugo award The Hugo Award is an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year, given at the World Science Fiction Convention and chosen by its members. The Hugo is widely considered the premier ...

-winning author and commentator, co-founded ''Other'' magazine. In 2008,

media asked Newitz to start a blog about science and science fiction, dubbed io9, for which Newitz served as editor-in-chief from its founding until 2015 when it merged with ''

,'' another Gawker media design and technology blog property; Newitz then took on the same leadership of the new venture.Richard Mankiewicz, 2010, "Science 2.0: Eureka’s Top 30 Science Blogs," at ''TimesOnline,'' February 21, 2010, se

accessed February 19, 2015. In November 2015, Newitz left Gawker to join ''Ars Technica'', where Newitz has been employed as tech culture editor since December 2015. Newitz is a contributing opinion writer at ''The New York Times''. Newitz's first novel, ''Autonomous'', was published in 2017. ''Autonomous'' won the Lambda Literary Award, Lambda Award and was nominated for the

Nebula Award The Nebula Awards annually recognize the best works of science fiction or fantasy published in the United States. The awards are organized and awarded by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), a nonprofit association of prof ...

and

Locus Award The Locus Awards are an annual set of literary awards voted on by readers of the science fiction and fantasy magazine ''Locus'', a monthly magazine based in Oakland, California. The awards are presented at an annual banquet. In addition to the pl ...

in 2018 for best novel. Newitz's second novel, '' The Future of Another Timeline'', published in 2019, was described on Newitz's website as: " ..about time travel and what it would be like to meet yourself as a teenager and have a really, really intense conversation with her about how fucked up your high school friends are." The book was received with acclaim by critics, and was a Locus Award nominee for Best Science Fiction Novel. Their 2014 non-fiction science book ''Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction'' was a finalist for the ''L.A. Times'' Book Prize. They also wrote ''Four Lost Cities: A Secret History of the Urban Age'', published in 2021. They have also written for publications including Wired, Popular Science, the New Yorker, the Atlantic, Slate, Washington Post, Smithsonian Magazine, and more. They have published short stories in Lightspeed, Shimmer, Apex, and Technology Review's Twelve Tomorrows. In March 2018, with their partner and co-host

, Newitz launched the

podcast A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosing ...

''Our Opinions Are Correct'', which “explor sthe meaning of science fiction, and how it’s relevant to real-life science and society.” The podcast won the Hugo Award for Best Fancast in 2019.

Personal life

Newitz is the child of two English teachers: Newitz's mother, Cynthia, worked at a high school, and Newitz's father, Marty, at a

community college A community college is a type of educational institution. The term can have different meanings in different countries: many community colleges have an "open enrollment" for students who have graduated from high school (also known as senior se ...

. Since 2000, Newitz has been in a relationship with

. The two began the podcast ''Our Opinions Are Correct'' in March 2018. Newitz has used

they In Modern English, ''they'' is a third-person pronoun relating to a grammatical subject. Morphology In Standard Modern English, ''they'' has five distinct word forms: * ''they'': the nominative (subjective) form * ''them'': the acc ...

pronouns In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (abbreviated ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not co ...

since 2019.

Venues

* Co-founder, ''

Bad Subjects ''Bad Subjects'' (more formally ''Bad Subjects: Political Education For Everyday Life'' and sometimes ''The Bad Subjects Collective'') was a research collaborative that operated generally out of California as part of the open access electronic pu ...

'', 1992 * Co-founder, ''other'' (magazine), 2002 * Co-founder, Editor in chief, io9.com,

Gawker Media Gawker Media LLC (formerly Blogwire, Inc. and Gawker Media, Inc.) was an American online media company and blog network. It was founded by Nick Denton in October 2003 as Blogwire, and was based in New York City. Incorporated in the Cayman Is ...

's science and science fiction blog * Editor in chief, ''

'', Gawker Media's technology blog * Tech culture editor, ''Ars Technica''

Awards & nominations

* ''Autonomous'' (

Tor Books Tor Books is the primary imprint of Tor Publishing Group (previously Tom Doherty Associates), a publishing company based in New York City. It primarily publishes science fiction and fantasy titles, and is the largest publisher of Chinese sci ...

, September 2017) ** Finalist for 2018

Nebula Award for Best Novel The Nebula Award for Best Novel is given each year by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) for science fiction or fantasy novels. A work of fiction is considered a novel by the organization if it is 40,000 words or longer; a ...

** Finalist for 2018 John W. Campbell Memorial Award ** Finalist for 2018

Locus Award for Best First Novel The Locus Award for Best First Novel is one of the annual Locus Awards presented by the science fiction and fantasy magazine '' Locus''. Awards presented in a given year are for works published in the previous calendar year. The award for Best Fi ...

**Winner of 2018 Lambda Literary Award, Lambda Award SF/Fantasy/Horror *Winner of 2019 Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for best short science fiction - "

When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis "When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis" is a 2018 science fiction short story by Annalee Newitz. It was first published in ''Slate''. Synopsis Robot is an autonomous CDC drone, monitoring the Metro East population for viral outbreaks. When th ...

" *Winner of 2019 Hugo Award for Best Fancast - '' Our Opinions Are Correct'' *''Future of Another Timeline'' (2019) **Finalist for

Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel The Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel is one of the annual Locus Awards presented by the science fiction and fantasy magazine ''Locus''. Awards presented in a given year are for works published in the previous calendar year. The award f ...

(2020) **Nominee for

Goodreads Choice Award The Goodreads Choice Awards is a yearly award program, first launched on Goodreads in 2009. Winners are determined by users voting on books that Goodreads has nominated or books of their choosing, released in the given year. Most books that Good ...

for Science Fiction (2019) **Winner (long-form) of

Sidewise Award for Alternate History The Sidewise Awards for Alternate History were established in 1995 to recognize the best alternate history stories and novels of the year. Overview The awards take their name from the 1934 short story " Sidewise in Time" by Murray Leinster, in ...

(2019)

Bibliography

Newitz's work has been published in ''

'', ''

,'' Salon.com, ''

New Scientist ''New Scientist'' is a magazine covering all aspects of science and technology. Based in London, it publishes weekly English-language editions in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. An editorially separate organisation publish ...

,'' ''

'', the '' San Francisco Bay Guardian'', and at ''

AlterNet AlterNet is a left-leaning online news outlet. It was launched in 1997 by the Independent Media Institute. In 2018, the website was acquired by owners of '' Raw Story''. Coverage Coverage is divided into several special sections related to prog ...

''. In addition to these print and online periodicals, they have published the following short stories and books:

Novels

* ''Autonomous'' (

, September 2017) (translated in German as ''Autonom'' in 2018) * '' The Future of Another Timeline'' (Tor Books, 2019) * ''The Terraformers'' (Tor Books, forthcoming 2022)

Short stories

"The Great Oxygen Race"
''Hilobrow'' magazine, 2010

'' Flurb'' magazine, 2010
"Twilight of the Eco-Terrorist"
''Apex Magazine'', 2011
"Unclaimed"
''Shimmer Magazine'', issue 18, 2014
"Drones Don't Kill People"
''Lightspeed Magazine'', issue 54, 2014
"All Natural Organic Microbes"
''MIT's Twelve Tomorrows'', 2016
"Birth of the Ant Rights Movement"
''Ars Technica UK'', 2016
"The Blue Fairy's Manifesto"
''Robots vs. Fairies'', ed. by Dominik Parisien and Navah Wolfe, 2018
"When Robot and Crow Saved East St. Louis"
Slate, 2018. Winner of the 2019 Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for best short science fiction.

Non-fiction

* Co-edited, with Matt Wray * * * Co-edited with Charlie Anders. * * Edited by Kathryn Cramer and Ed Finn. * * Edited by Nalo Hopkinson. * *

References

External links

Official site

Annalee Newitz
Gettingit.com authors
Annalee Newitz
at

columnists
Annalee Newitz
at the

Internet Speculative Fiction Database The Internet Speculative Fiction Database (ISFDB) is a database of bibliographic information on genres considered speculative fiction, including science fiction and related genres such as fantasy, alternate history, and horror fiction. The ISFD ...

Annalee Newitz, "She's Such A Geek" Interview
at 23C3
Annalee Newitz and Charlie Anders read from "She's Such A Geek"
Authors@Google {{DEFAULTSORT:Newitz, Annalee 1969 births Living people American women journalists American technology writers American bloggers People from Irvine, California American science writers Science fiction fans Journalists from California Writers from San Francisco Women technology writers American women bloggers 20th-century American journalists 21st-century American journalists 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women writers Lambda Literary Award winners Women science fiction and fantasy writers Sidewise Award winners American LGBT novelists 21st-century LGBT people