About NANCY SCOLA

Nancy Scola is a veteran Washington D.C.-based reporter and journalist whose work often focuses on the intersections of technology, economics, politics, and policy for publications like New York, Wired, The Information, Washingtonian, and The Atlantic. She is a contributing writer at POLITICO Magazine.

Nancy also teaches about the history, theory, and practice of journalism, including as a lecturer at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business.

llustration by Michael Hoeweler for POLITICO Magazine

She is a speaker at universities, think tanks, and conferences, focusing on the changing media landscape, the regulation of tech companies, the art of political campaigning, and evolutions in democracy and power. She has spoken at Yale Law School, the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics, Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, SXSW, Aspen Institute España, and beyond. For speaking requests, contact speaking@nancyscola.com.

Nancy appears on podcasts to discuss current events, trends, and intellectual debates, including POLITICO’s “Dispatch,” “Nerdcast,” and “Money” podcasts, as well as Slate’s “What’s Next.” She was a co-host for POLITICO's “Global Translations” podcast, focused on the battle over 5G, international trends in content moderation, and China’s tech landscape. She also wrote and hosted an on-demand, five-minute audio series for POLITICO putting Washington’s breaking news on tech in context, called “The Future This Week.”

She is also the publisher of a newsletter on technology and politics, called Slow Build.

Earlier in her career, Nancy was a senior technology reporter at POLITICO and a staff writer at the Washington Post. She was the lead writer for techPresident, a groundbreaking newsletter on the intersections of technology and politics.

Before going into journalism, Nancy worked in politics and government, including as a professional staffer member on the Committee on Government Reform in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Born and raised in New Jersey, Nancy is a graduate of both the George Washington University (B.A., anthropology/Africana studies) and Boston University (M.A., anthropology), and lives in D.C.’s Hill East neighborhood. On X, she’s @nancyscola.

Get in touch.

Stories

SELECTED STORIES

Pete Buttigieg vs. The Airlines

POLITICO Magazine "That led to a series of decisions...that has caused even some of Buttigieg’s loudest critics to reassess him."

Biden's AI Whisperer

POLITICO Magazine "[Reed believes] generative AI is poised to shake the very foundations of American life."

Tom Blanton Wants Our Secrets

Washingtonian Magazine "Blanton [is] committed to not letting this town forget."

The Anti-Monopoly Man

POLITICO Magazine "[Matt] Stoller is known for his dogmatic belief that taking on corporate power...is *the* goal."

The Good Information Wars

WIRED Magazine "Her argument goes like this: Too many newsrooms have lost their way by catering to elite readers..."

Lina Khan Isn't Worried

New York Magazine "Khan’s central argument is that none of this is inevitable; rather, it’s the product of legal and policy choices..."

Washington Can't Quit Twitter

POLITICO Magazine "Leaving a communications channel that’s become central to how Washington works won’t be easy."

Ken Buck's One-Man Boycott

POLITICO Magazine "'It started with tuna,' explains Congressman Ken Buck, when asked why he doesn’t use Google."

Senator Crypto

The Information "'It's "freedom from poverty" money,' she says. 'It's "freedom from Venezuela’s totalitarian regime" money."

The Vegan Wars

Washingtonian Magazine "All that’s changed over the past decade or so, as eating became a political act for a much wider swath of people."

The Case for Place-Based Visas

Next City "This quirky notion...can’t possibly work in the U.S. Right?"

Twitter's Head of Resistance

POLITICO Magazine "Said one Twitter official: 'I can’t imagine a world where Jack looks at her and says, No.'”

Why Isn't Congress Remote?

POLITICO Magazine "It’s a gathering defined by public accountability, with two centuries of rules and norms..."

Inside the Facebook Boycott

POLITICO Magazine "...fusing novel pressure tactics with the weight of legacy civil rights groups."

Punk Politico

Washingtonian Magazine "Goodstein’s ability to make a full-blown movement seem to have sprung from nowhere..."

Automating Washington

POLITICO Magazine "An algorithmic lobbyist sounds like a joke. But it’s already here. Here’s who the robots are coming for next."

Inside Code for America

Next City "Jennifer Pahlka is playing devil’s advocate. 'You can't,' she says, 'solve the world's problems through apps.'"

Kamala Harris' Online Crusade

POLITICO Magazine "Her legal fight against online harassment is one of her most innovative, and least-understood, contributions to public policy."

The Problem with Uber

Next City "Americans have been hiring driven cars for more than a century. Laws have accumulated governing that exchange..."

Google's Building a City

POLITICO Magazine "The idea is to reimagine Toronto’s derelict waterfront as 'the world’s first neighborhood built from the internet up.'"

OTHER WORK:

Why are Political Texts Out of Control?, Washingtonian Magazine
The Politics of TikTok, POLITICO Magazine
Can Alondra Nelson Remake the Government’s Approach to Science and Tech?, POLITICO Magazine
"Every Step of the Way, They Underestimated Us": A Q&A with Rep. David Cicilline, POLITICO Magazine
Is Andrew Yang for Real?, POLITICO Magazine
U.S. CTO Aneesh Chopra: The Interview, The Atlantic
Meet Facebook's Political Fixer, POLITICO Magazine
Ace in the Allegheny, Next City
This Startup Wants to Make Your Data Plan Dirt Cheap, WIRED/Backchannel
When the Internet Nearly Fractured — and How It Could Happen Again, The Atlantic
Is Tech Dividing America?: A Q&A with MIT's David Autor, POLITICO Magazine
What It's Like to Be Filmmaker to the President, The Atlantic
Inside Airbnb's Cuban Invasion, Next City
Silicon Valley Sends an Ambassador to Trump's Coal Country, POLITICO Magazine
How Medium Is Breaking Washington's Op-Ed Habit, POLITICO
Tech & the City, Next City
Darrell Issa's Call to the Internet's Right Side, The Atlantic
Julian Assange, Media Mogul, New York
Washington's I.T. Guy, The American Prospect
The New Interface of Governance, Seed Magazine
Is Coronavirus Killing Off Cash?, POLITICO Magazine

Contact

nancy@nancyscola.com