Yesterday was my last day as a staff reporter at Fortune. I'm walking through a new door.

On June 16, you'll see where it leads.

Photo by Ari Scott

After four years covering AI as a daily beat — first at VentureBeat starting in April 2022, then at Fortune starting in March 2024 — I’ve decided to do the thing many journalists whisper about but few do: go independent.

What an incredible privilege it has been covering the society-shifting story of AI at this moment for Fortune, such an iconic brand. It has been an extraordinary platform to report on AI from the ground up — from C-suites to data centers to Capitol Hill — and along the way I even landed my first Fortune cover story! I'm deeply grateful to my editors and colleagues for the opportunity, the support, and the friendship. And while this chapter is ending, I hope to continue contributing to Fortune in the future.

But I've always been drawn to building things, starting with the family newspaper I launched at age 11 called The Gardenia Gazette (I grew up on Gardenia Lane), for which I was an editor, reporter, food critic and comic writer — and I got to boss around my little sister who served as an (unpaid) assistant editor.

Thanks to you for reading AI Side Notes

AI Side Notes has long fed that builder side of me, and I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who has subscribed and read along.

This little Substack experiment started out as Sharon’s AI Extra, and some of you have been here since those earliest posts in the fall of 2023. Along the way, I’ve shared reporting tidbits, analysis, observations from the AI beat, and occasionally some unfiltered thoughts about where all of this is headed.

Whether you’ve been here from the beginning or joined more recently, thank you!! The support and encouragement have meant more than you know—and helped give me the confidence to take this next step.

Doubling down on the AI beat and Substack

I’m still going to be an AI reporter, but I’m going to be doubling down on Substack and launching something new — right here.

On June 16 — five days from now — AI Side Notes will become something bigger, with a full rebrand, a new name, a sharper mission, and a podcast to go with it.

I won’t reveal much more than that until next week, but I can tell you this: I’ll be focused on original reporting about an AI era that is reshaping business, technology, policy, and society in real time.

As a thank-you for being early supporters, current AI Side Notes subscribers will receive a special launch offer in a separate email next week before the new publication officially launches. The publication will continue to offer a free subscription option, alongside additional benefits for paid members.

The door opens June 16. I hope you'll walk through it with me!

❤️
Sharon

Photo by Ari Scott