Peter Lennon Koechley is an American writer and internet entrepreneur. He was the managing editor of '' The Onion'' and co-founded

Upworthy Upworthy is a media brand that focuses on positive storytelling. It was started in March 2012 by Eli Pariser, the former executive director of MoveOn, and Peter Koechley, the former managing editor of '' The Onion''. One of Facebook's co-found ...

Biography

Koechley attended Madison West High School and graduated from

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

in 2003 with a double major in philosophy and creative writing. In 2005, he was profiled by

Ezra Klein Ezra Klein (born May 9, 1984) is an American American liberalism, liberal political commentator and journalist. He is currently a ''The New York Times, New York Times'' columnist and the host of ''The Ezra Klein Show'' podcast. He is a co-founde ...

as the youngest staff writer for '' The Onion'' on Generation Progress. His association with '' The Onion'' began when he published his first article on the site at age 17 as a high school student in

Madison, Wisconsin Madison is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. It is the List of municipalities in Wisconsin by population, second-most populous city in the state, with a population of 269,840 at the 2020 Uni ...

. He also published a satirical newspaper on campus and sent articles to '' The Onion,'' eventually attracting the latter's attention. Later, he began to work at the office of the publication and landed an internship during his senior year in high school as the site's first intern. At Columbia, he also freelanced for the publication, publishing a total of 25 articles for which he received a payment of $20. He was hired out of college and became manager editor of the website at age 24. At '' The Onion,'' Koechley was responsible for creating the Onion News Network and gravitated towards tech content. Koechley joined

MoveOn MoveOn (formerly known as MoveOn.org) is a progressivism in the United States, progressive public policy advocacy group and political action committee. Formed in 1998 around one of the first massively viral email petitions, MoveOn has since grown ...

in 2009 to produce viral media content for the nonprofit group. There he met Eli Pariser and the two began to develop a concept for a platform that generates viral content devoted to significant social issues, what they call "social media with a mission". Their business plan appealed to

Chris Hughes Christopher Hughes (born November 26, 1983) is an American entrepreneur and author who co-founded and served as spokesman for the online social directory and networking site Facebook until 2007. He was the publisher and editor-in-chief of ''The ...

, who provided them with $500,000 in seed capital. They also attracted seed capital from BuzzFeed co-founder John Seward Johnson III and

Reddit Reddit ( ) is an American Proprietary software, proprietary social news news aggregator, aggregation and Internet forum, forum Social media, social media platform. Registered users (commonly referred to as "redditors") submit content to the ...

co-founder

Alexis Ohanian Alexis Kerry Ohanian (; born April 24, 1983) is an American internet entrepreneur and investor. He is best known as the co-founder and former executive chairman of the social media site Reddit along with Steve Huffman and Aaron Swartz. He also ...

. In 2012, Koechley and Pariser launched

. By the end of October 2012, it has attracted 8.7 million users, leading '' Business Insider'' to name it the fastest growing media company in the world. In 2015, he apologized for

's out-sized success and pledged to change the algorithm, saying:"We sort of unleashed a monster. Sorry for that. Sorry we kind of broke the internet last year. I'm excited going forward to say goodbye to clickbait." In 2017, Koechley announced his departure from

. He has been working with Compass, Inc. founder Robert Reffkin, in writing the book ''No One Succeeds Alone: Learn Everything You Can from Everyone You Can,'' published in 2021. In 2021, Koechley joined The Our City PAC, a progressive

political action committee In the United States, a political action committee (PAC) is a tax-exempt 527 organization that pools campaign contributions from members and donates those funds to campaigns for or against candidates, ballot initiatives, or legislation. The l ...

supporting left-leaning mayoral and New York City Council candidates.

Personal life

Koechley is born to Barbara E. Koechley and Robert H. Koechley in

. His father is an executive with Promega Corporation and his mother is a teacher for the McFarland School District in McFarland, Wisconsin. In 2009, Koechley married Kristina Williams, also a Madison native. The couple lives in

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Koechley, Peter Living people American company founders American satirists The Onion people Madison West High School alumni Columbia College (New York) alumni American information technology businesspeople Writers from Madison, Wisconsin American activists Year of birth missing (living people)