Kevin Rose Entrepreneurial Timeline
Social news and web video
2004–2011-
One of the first internet television networks, co-founded with Dan Huard and Keith Harrison. David Prager quickly joined the founding team and Jay Adelson was the company's first investor, later serving as CEO. The network produced pioneering shows including:
- Diggnation (tech/comedy with Rose and Alex Albrecht)
- Systm (deep-dive tech tutorials with Rose and Dan Huard)
- Tekzilla (tech reviews and advice with Patrick Norton)
Discovery Communications acquired Revision3 in 2012 for over $30 million, under the leadership of Jim Louderback, marking one of the first major acquisitions of a digital-first video network.
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The first social news platform with voting on user-submitted content. At its peak, DIGG reached over 38 million monthly users. Rose initially wireframed and designed the platform himself, then hired Owen Byrne as the first developer through Elance. Early team members included Dan Huard (community), Ron Gorodetzky (engineering), and Daniel Burka (design and Kevin's product thought partner). Kevin later hired Jay Adelson to replace him as CEO and help with fundraising, allowing him to focus on product development. Digg pioneered concepts that would later become standard across social media, including voting as a signal for algorithmic content suggestions (patents sold to LinkedIn) and crowd-curated news.
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A weekly tech/comedy video podcast hosted by Rose and Alex Albrecht, running from 2005–2012. The show regularly drew over 250,000+ viewers per episode and helped establish the podcast medium. In addition to discussing top Digg stories, it featured notable guests including Jimmy Fallon, Mark Cuban, Rachel Maddow, Ashton Kutcher among others.
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As an early angel investor, Rose has built a portfolio of industry-defining companies, earning recognition from Bloomberg as a "Top 25 Angel Investor." His investments include Twitter, Facebook, Zynga, Square, Medium, Wealthfront, Oura, Solana, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Magic Spoon.
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A social networking and micro-blogging platform co-founded with Leah Culver and Daniel Burka. Pownce innovated by allowing users to share files, events, and links in addition to messages. The platform was acquired by Six Apart in 2008.
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A pioneering long-form interview series featuring intimate conversations with tech luminaries including Jack Dorsey, Ev Williams, Elon Musk, Gary Vaynerchuk, Tony Hawk, Chad Hurley, Dennis Crowley, Ben Horowitz, Matt Mullenweg, and Naval Ravikant. The show helped establish the format of in-depth, personal tech conversations that would later become standard in tech podcasting.
Venture
2012–2017-
Investments include Ripple (Google's first crypto investment), Nextdoor, Medium, Uber (a David Krane led deal), and Blue Bottle Coffee. His focus areas included consumer internet, mobile, and cryptocurrency.
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Rose helped support and mentor founders across True's portfolio of 500+ companies, with $3.8B+ in assets under management.
The app studio
2015–2017-
A mobile app for watch enthusiasts that aggregated news and provided accurate time synchronization. Watchville was the world's largest watch news app, which led to the merger and Rose's involvement with HODINKEE.
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An intermittent fasting app that has helped millions track their fasting windows and goals. The app combined Rose's interests in technology and wellness, offering features like fasting timers, progress tracking, and educational content.
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A meditation app designed to make mindfulness more accessible, downloaded by millions of users. The app reflected Rose's personal commitment to meditation, later leading him to a dedicated Zen practice. Oak offers guided meditations and breathing exercises in a minimalist interface, free of charge. Yearning for a deeper experience led Rose to invest in The Way, a full-featured app with roots in Zen.
Watches and Web3
2019–2023-
Rose served as CEO of the premier watch media platform, helping build and scale their e-commerce offerings, mobile apps, and launch several successful limited edition collaborations with major watch brands.
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A Web3 media and technology company that created the highly successful Moonbirds NFT collection. PROOF was acquired by Yuga Labs in 2023.
Digg, again
2025–-
Rose joined forces with former rival and Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian, along with Justin Mezzell, to reboot and reimagine the Digg brand as a new social news platform.