They act like kings because we made them kings
America’s risk taker, 1982
The magic inside the machine, 1984
Master of the universe, 1995
The Golden Geek, 1996
Can anybody catch these guys?, 2004
The kid who turned down $1B, 2006
The greatest living inventor, 2013
Even one queen, 2014
CEOs made magazine covers before, of course—here’s GM’s Alfred P Sloan in 1945—but the superhero-genius framing wasn’t part of it
The turn comes in the early 80s and the saving-American-capitalism narrative built around figures like Lee Iacocca — Detroit’s Comeback Kid, 1983
This also happens to be right when the computer moves in (Machine of the Year, 1983)
Ronald Reagan calls the 80s “the decade of the entrepreneur.” And guess who gets the title of Entrepreneur of the Decade, 1989?
Then comes the 90s and a tech-fueled Wall St boom that helps make bankers and Treasury secretaries superheroes, too. The Committee to Save the World, 1998
Software—and tech companies—ate the world, but they didn’t do it alone. 2011:
They act like kings because we made them kings, 2022. /end
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