For other people, see Kevin Rose (disambiguation).
Kevin Rose
Birth nameRobert Kevin Rose
Birth dateFebruary 21, 1977 (age 49)
Birth placeShasta County, California, U.S.
EmployerDigg (2004–2011, 2025–present)
True Ventures (2017–present)
GV (2009–2015)
Known forCo-host of The Screen Savers
Co-founder of Digg, Revision3 and Pownce
SpouseDarya Pino (m. 2013)

Robert Kevin Rose[1] (born February 21, 1977)[2][3] is an American Internet entrepreneur who co-founded Revision3, Digg, Pownce, and Milk. He also served as production assistant and co-host at TechTV's The Screen Savers. From 2012 to 2015, he was a venture partner at GV.[4] In 2025, Rose re-purchased Digg with Alexis Ohanian and re-launched it initially as a competitor to Reddit, before returning its focus to news aggregation.[5]

Early life and education

Rose was born in California[6] and lived in Oregon before his family moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, where he spent most of his childhood. He became an Eagle Scout with the Boy Scouts of America.[7] Rose transferred to Southeast Career Technical Academy for high school (formerly known as Vo-Tech High School) in Las Vegas in 1992. He then attended the University of Nevada Las Vegas, majored in computer science but dropped out in 1998.[8]

Career

Rose worked for two dot-com startups through CMGI.[6]

Digg

Rose, Owen Byrne, Ron Gorodetzky, and Jay Adelson formed Digg, a technology link website, publicly launched on December 5, 2004.[8][9] In 2007, he was named to the MIT Technology Review TR35 as one of the top 35 innovators in the world under the age of 35.[10] In 2006, Fox InteractiveMedia Group offered $60 million (equivalent to $ million in ) for Digg, which the Digg board turned down given how quickly the brand was continuing to grow.[11] Over the next four years, CEO Rose lost interest in helping the site continue its growth, focusing on a series of non-Digg outside projects;[11] the board eventually replaced him as CEO, on September 1, 2010.[12]

Rose continued on at Digg until March 18, 2011, when he resigned from all operational activities, only keeping a presence on the board of directors;[13][14] Digg was acquired by Betaworks, in 2012, for $0.5 million (equivalent to $ million in ).[11]

In 2025, more than a decade after he originally sold it, Rose re-purchased Digg with Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian and re-launched it as a rebooted version of Digg's news aggregator with digging and burying features restored and the tagline: "The front page of the internet, now with superpowers." During its closed beta stage, it offered 21 generalized communities such as gaming, technology, and entertainment, and was open to 67,000 users on an invite-only basis. Its open beta launched to the public on January 14, 2026.[15]

Television

Rose was hired as a production assistant for The Screen Savers. He began appearing on-air in the "Dark Tip" segments and on Unscrewed with Martin Sargent, where he provided information on developing computing activities.[16] He became a regular co-host when Leo Laporte left TechTV on March 31, 2004. On March 25, 2004, Comcast's G4 gaming channel announced a merger with TechTV, which resulted in a round of layoffs. Rose moved to Los Angeles to stay with G4. On May 22, 2005, Rose reached an agreement with G4 that released him from his contract and went on to create Systm and later, Revision3, where he co-hosted Diggnation alongside Alex Albrecht for 6 years.

Guest appearances

Kevin Rose appeared on the first episode of R&D TV alongside Diggnation co-host Alex Albrecht.[17] On November 14, 2007, he was a contestant on a game show on Gigaom's NewTeeVee Live.[18] On March 11, 2009, April 16, 2010, and November 28, 2011, Rose was a guest on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, along with fellow Diggnation host Alex Albrecht.[19][20][21]

Podcasting

Rose began his career in web video (or IPTV) on July 24, 2003, with the release of the first episode of thebroken[22] while he was still working on The Screen Savers at TechTV. Rose founded Revision3 in Los Angeles, California, with Jay Adelson and David Prager in April 2005.[citation needed] On July 1, 2005, Rose and Alex Albrecht started the weekly podcast, Diggnation, which summarizes top stories submitted by Digg users. On October 3, 2011, Alex and Kevin announced that they would be retiring the weekly Diggnation show at the end of the year. The final show was taped on December 30, 2011, at The Music Box in Los Angeles, California.[23][24]

Starting in 2009, Rose started an intermittent podcast called The Random Show with friend Tim Ferriss.[25]

In 2024, Kevin and Alex rebooted Diggnation on the YouTube channel @diggnation.[26]

Other startups

Around 1998-1999, Kevin Rose started SimpleSearch.com in Las Vegas with his sister and brother-in-law, Kurt Arobogast. On June 27, 2007, Rose launched a micro-blogging site called Pownce,[27] which was acquired on December 1, 2008, and shut down on December 15, 2008, by blogging company Six Apart. In April 2011, the technology blog TechCrunch reported on the founding of "Milk".[28] The company is focused on creating mobile applications. The first application to be released was Oink, a tool for ranking real-world items.[29] In March 2012, Milk, Inc. announced that it would be shutting down its only product, Oink.[30]

Google

On March 16, 2012, Rose announced that he, along with the four others of the Milk team (Daniel Burka, Chris Hutchins and Joshua Lane), had been hired by Google after shutting down Milk and laying off the remaining members.[31] Kevin Rose started his first day as a senior product manager for Google on March 19, 2012.[32] On May 30, AllThingsD reported that Rose had moved off the Google+ team to become a venture partner at GV.[4] In January 2015, Rose announced he would leave GV to focus on his new app development lab, North.[33]

Venture capitalist

Rose invested in Gowalla, Twitter, Foursquare, Dailybooth, ngmoco, SimpleGeo, 3crowd, OMGPOP, Square, Facebook, Chomp and Formspring.[34][35][36]

Watchville/Hodinkee

After leaving Google, Rose started Watchville, a news aggregation app focused on wristwatches. In July 2015, after Watchville merged with another watch-enthusiast site called Hodinkee, Rose moved to New York City to become the chief executive of Hodinkee.[37]

In April 2017, Rose stepped down from his role as Hodinkee CEO to become a partner in a start-up venture firm, True Ventures.[38]

Proof Collective

Rose co-founded the Proof Collective, a group of NFT collectors, alongside Justin Mezzell. Members of the group include artist Mike Winkelmann, known as Beeple, and investor Gary Vaynerchuk. The collective released a collaboration called Moonbirds, a collection of 10,000 pixelated-bird non-fungible tokens which had $281 million in sales as of April 2022. Rose said Proof would use the proceeds to "build a new media company".[39]

Other appearances

Rose has a chapter giving advice in Tim Ferriss' 2016 book, Tools of Titans.

Personal life

In 2013, he married Darya Pino.[40]

References

  1. ^ "Diggnation Ep. 248". YouTube. March 30, 2010.
  2. ^ Russell, Melia & Joyner, April (June 21, 2022). "Inside early internet entrepreneur and Digg founder Kevin Rose's meteoric resurgence in the age of crypto". Business Insider. Archived July 12, 2022 at the Wayback Machine.
  3. ^ "Robert K Rose — Born 1977, Shasta County, California". California Birth Index. Retrieved 2026-05-27.
  4. ^ Gannes, Liz (2012-05-30). "Kevin Rose's Next Move: Partner at Google Ventures". All Things Digital. Archived from the original on July 8, 2012. Retrieved 2012-08-13.
  5. ^ Sarah Perez (May 11, 2026). "Digg tries again, this time as an AI news aggregator". TechCrunch
  6. ^ "Focus On: Kevin Rose". G4 Media, Inc.. 2002-03-01. Archived from the original on 2005-03-08.
  7. ^ Rose, Kevin (2007-04-19). Diggnation episode 94 (Vidcast). pp. 11:10. Archived from the original on 2007-05-21. Retrieved 2007-04-25.
  8. ^ Lacy, Sarah & Hempel, Jessi (2006-08-14). "Valley Boys". Bloomberg Businessweek. Archived from the original on 2012-07-23. Retrieved 2006-12-22.
  9. ^ MacManus, Richard (2006-02-01). "Interview with Digg founder Kevin Rose, Part 1". ZDNet. Archived from the original on 2006-07-15. Retrieved 2006-07-15.
  10. ^ Pontin, Jason (2007). "2007 Young Innovators Under 35: Kevin Rose, 30". MIT Technology Review. Archived from the original on 2011-10-22. Retrieved August 14, 2011.
  11. ^ Lynley, Matt (2012-07-17). "The Inside Story On Why Kevin Rose Never Had A Big Hit". Business Insider. Archived January 28, 2017 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2018-05-09.
  12. ^ Nguyen, Anh (2010-09-01). "Kevin Rose quits CEO role at Digg". Computerworld UK. Archived from the original on 2012-07-24. Retrieved 2010-09-01.
  13. ^ Lowensohn, Josh (2011-03-18). "Report: Digg co-founder Kevin Rose leaving Digg". CNET. Archived 2021-08-08 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2022-04-05.
  14. ^ Warren, Christina (2011-03-18). "Digg co-founder Kevin Rose scales back Digg duties". Mashable. Archived 2021-09-06 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2022-04-05.
  15. ^ Perez, Sarah (2026-01-14). "Digg launches its new Reddit rival to the public". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2026-01-14.
  16. ^ Olanoff, Drew (12 July 2012). "Memories: Kevin Rose introduces a "new site" called Digg on December 13th, 2004". TNW. Retrieved 18 September 2012.
  17. ^ "R&DTV : Episode 3 - BBC Backstage". Ftp.kw.bbc.co.uk. Archived from the original on May 22, 2012. Retrieved 2012-08-13.
  18. ^ Gannes, Liz (2007-11-08). "Help Our Game Show; Win a Nano". Gigaom. Archived from the original on February 22, 2014. Retrieved 2022-04-05.
  19. ^ "Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht Go On Jimmy Fallon, Plug Twitter". mashable.com. 2009-03-12. Retrieved 2016-06-16.
  20. ^ Bahareth, Mohammad (2012). Kings of the Internet: What You Don't Know About Them?. iUniverse. p. 117. ISBN 9781469798424.
  21. ^ Jimmy Fallon (2011-11-28). "Diggnation's @alexalbrecht and @kevinrose are back on the show tonight!! & of course Betty White, Jack Houston and Jimmy Cliff.". No. 141239867463057408.
  22. ^ "thebroken podcast". 2003.
  23. ^ Helft, Miguel (September 25, 2006). "Young Internet Producers, Bankrolled, Are Seeking Act II". The New York Times. Retrieved 2008-02-05.
  24. ^ Stelter, Brian (2011-10-03). "'Diggnation,' Popular Web Talk Show, to End in December". The New York Times
  25. ^ Rose, Kevin & Ferriss, Tim. "The Random Show w/Tim Ferriss". Retrieved 2022-04-05.
  26. ^ "The Diggnation podcast is back in 2024". Transistor. 5 September 2024. Retrieved 30 September 2024.
  27. ^ Malik, Om (2007-05-09). "Kevin 'Digg' Rose goes for 3rd startup". Gigaom. Archived from the original on 2007-05-12. Retrieved 2007-05-11.
  28. ^ Lacy, Sarah (2011-04-26). "Milk Completes $1.5 Million Angel Round, Packed with Valley Names". TechCrunch. Archived 2012-08-29 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2012-08-13.
  29. ^ Etherington, Darrell (2011-11-03). "First look at Oink, Kevin Rose's app for rating stuff". Gigaom. Archived from the original on 2020-08-14. Retrieved 2022-04-05.
  30. ^ Gannes, Liz (2012-03-15). "Exclusive: Kevin Rose Will Join Google". All Things Digital. Archived 2013-02-23 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 7 February 2013.
  31. ^ Rose, Kevin (2012-03-16). "Google+ (generic)". Kevin Rose. Archived from the original on December 17, 2012. Retrieved 23 March 2012.
  32. ^ Rose, Kevin (2012-03-19). "Google+ (generic)". Kevin Rose. Archived from the original on December 17, 2012. Retrieved 23 March 2012.
  33. ^ Kokalitcheva, Kia (14 January 2015). "Milk 2.0? Kevin Rose raises $5M for his app lab North Technologies, steps away from Google Ventures". VentureBeat
  34. ^ "Kevin, did you buy form spring?". Formspring. Archived from the original on 2012-07-31. Retrieved 2010-09-12.
  35. ^ Tate, Ryan (2010-09-09). "How To Make a Killing While Your Startup Burns". Valleywag. Archived from the original on 2010-09-10. Retrieved 2010-09-12.
  36. ^ "Kevin Rose". Quora. Retrieved 2010-09-12.
  37. ^ Isaac, Mike (2015-06-11). "Kevin Rose Moves On From Silicon Valley to Watches". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2020-11-08. Retrieved 2016-10-10.
  38. ^ Loizos, Connie (2017-04-03). "Kevin Rose is going back to Cali — and joining True Ventures as a venture partner". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2018-05-09.
  39. ^ Locke, Taylor (18 April 2022). "NFT collectors are clamoring for Moonbirds, digital owls with $281 million in sales. Here's why they're obsessed". Fortune. Archived from the original on 2022-12-07. Retrieved 7 December 2022.
  40. ^ "Foodist: My first book coming May 2013". daryapino.com. 2013-03-26. Archived June 13, 2013 at the Wayback Machine. Retrieved 2013-05-19.