Silicon Valley comedy show divides opinion ahead of UK launch
An American situation comedy show designed to send up the get rich quick world of social media and technology entrepreneurs has split opinions amongst those it apes – with PayPal founder Ellon Musk dismissing it entirely as Google chairman Eric Schmidt agrees to a cameo appearance.
HBO series Silicon Valley is scheduled to arrive on British TV screens by the end of the month and stars Richard Hendriks, a socially challenged software engineer working for a fictitious firm called Hooli who stumbles on a means to shrink any file on the internet to half its size.
Hendriks is duly offered £10m by his boss to acquire the technology but opts instead to accept $200k in funding from a venture capitalist instead.
Schmidt has been drafted in to play himself in the opening scene of the series, attending a party in which rock star Kid Rock plays a set – ironically Schmidt is far wealthier.
Commenting on his creation show producer Mike Judge said: “It’s a world where someone could be worth a billion one day and nothing the next, or vice versa. So there is a lot at stake and a lot of really interesting introverted, brilliant people.”