STANFORD, CALIFORNIA — Stanford student journalist Theo Baker published his book How to Rule the World on Tuesday, an account of his time at the university and its relationship with the venture capital industry. Baker, who broke the story that led to Stanford president Marc Tessier-Lavigne's resignation during his first semester of college, received a George Polk Award for that investigative work. Warner Brothers and producer Amy Pascal have optioned the rights to Baker's story on Tessier-Lavigne.

Baker joined the Stanford student newspaper in his first semester, arriving on campus a few weeks after his grandfather's death. He enrolled early in the computer science weeder class as a freshman and joined the student hackathon Tree Hacks, helping to run it.

One of Baker's early stories led him to PubPeer, a pseudonymous website where scientists critique published research. The site contained comments from seven years earlier alleging that papers co-authored by Tessier-Lavigne contained duplicated, spliced, or irregular images.

Within 24 hours of Baker's first article, the Stanford board of trustees announced its own investigation into Tessier-Lavigne. The board's statement announcing the investigation praised Tessier-Lavigne's "integrity and honor." A member of the board overseeing the investigation had an $18 million investment in Denali Therapeutics, the biotech company co-founded by Tessier-Lavigne.

Tessier-Lavigne sent memos to all faculty describing Baker's reporting as "breathtakingly outrageous and replete with falsehoods." Baker also received communications from Tessier-Lavigne's lawyers after publishing his reports.

The book describes a system at Stanford in which students perceived as high-potential startup founders receive privileges including yacht parties, slush funds, and meetings with billionaires. According to the book, some venture capitalists employ older Stanford students to identify freshmen with startup potential as soon as they arrive on campus. The book also describes a secret class at Stanford called How to Rule the World, taught by a Silicon Valley CEO, held once a week in the winter quarter with lectures, discussions, and guest speakers, but without course credit.

A Silicon Valley CEO cold-emailed Baker during his freshman year to network. During their first meeting at the Rosewood Hotel, the CEO spoon-fed eight-month-old caviar and mentioned that his first contract had been for Muammar Gaddafi. After the release of ChatGPT, a campus crypto supporter said that Sam Bankman-Fried was "directionally correct" but that people were trying to find ways around legal constraints.