Talk:Gil Duran

Request Edit: Factual Correction to Lead Sentence Regarding Employment Status

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Disclosure: I am Gil Duran, the subject of this article. I am not editing the article directly and am instead requesting review by an uninvolved editor. I'm requesting a correction to sentences describing my career history. My concern is with any phrasing that labels me a "political consultant" or "political operative" in a way that implies this describes my current or primary occupation, rather than a role I held years ago.

Concern: Describing me as a "political consultant" (or similar) is imprecise. I was never a "consultant" for Brown, Feinstein or Harris, as the article now states. I was a salaried, Senate/administration-appointed government staff employee — not as an independent contractor or outside vendor, which is what "political consultant" denotes in standard usage. Specifically: Press Secretary to Governor Jerry Brown, Communications Director to Senator Dianne Feinstein, Press Secretary to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, and Communications Director to Attorney General Kamala Harris.

Proposed text: "...is an American journalist, author, and former political staffer based in San Francisco."

Rationale: I returned to journalism full-time in 2018 (opinion editor, The Sacramento Bee; later editorial page editor, San Francisco Examiner) and I'm now a full-time journalist, newsletter/podcast author (The Nerd Reich), and forthcoming book author. A lead that foregrounds "political consultant" both mischaracterizes the nature of my past government roles (salaried appointee, not outside consultant) and is outdated as a description of my present occupation.

Supporting sources:

State of California, Office of the Governor, official appointment announcement (confirms salaried appointment as Press Secretary, with compensation listed): https://archive.gov.ca.gov/archive/gov39/2011/01/05/news16868/index.html

PBS Frontline, interview/profile detailing staff roles under Brown, Feinstein, and Harris: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/interview/gil-duran/

KQED Forum, "'Nerd Reich' Author Gil Duran on the Tech Authoritarian Movement" (Nov. 28, 2025), confirming current occupation as journalist/author: https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101912169/nerd-reich-author-gil-duran-on-the-tech-authoritarian-movement

Note for reviewing editors: I recognize the PBS Frontline piece also quotes me describing a brief period of paid consulting work after leaving government service; I'm not disputing that this occurred, only that it does not characterize my government appointments themselves, nor my current occupation. My main concern is that someone is trying to undermine my credibility as a journalist and writer by making it seem like I am currently a paid political operative. This matches online attacks by trolls that have escalated as my book publication date gets closer.

Thank you for your time in reviewing this. ~2026-39232-09 (talk) 23:32, 10 July 2026 (UTC)

Not done: your request appears to have been generated by a large language model. Day Creature (talk) 05:31, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

Are we sure this is LLM generated? IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 19:26, 17 August 2026 (UTC)

It definitely looks that way to me. The stock phrase "I am not editing the article directly and am instead requesting review by an uninvolved editor" is commonly used by LLMs, and there's all the boldface headings as well (WP:AILIST). That said, I don't see an issue with the underlying request of changing "political operative" to "former political staffer". Day Creature (talk) 19:46, 17 August 2026 (UTC)

FYI.. I was using this format a decade before LLMs did. Furthermore, this new trend of accusing people of using LLMs because the models now copy established writing conventions needs to stop. Viriditas (talk) 00:35, 24 August 2026 (UTC)

No, it does not. The established writing convention of using bolded headings with colons was borrowed by LLMs. Some of us have been using them for decades. I first started using them in my writing in 1993. We were taught in school to use them when word processing finally displaced the typewriter. This allowed the general population to create resumes and action reports using bold for the first time (there was no bold on the standard typewriter, but you could simulate it by striking the key in the same place, while more advanced, expensive typewriters apparently had this ability, so it was available to governments and business people.) Viriditas (talk) 00:46, 24 August 2026 (UTC)

I uncollapsed the edit request. As to the merits, I haven't looked into it enough to change anything but wouldn't be opposed to the suggestion of changing "political operative" to "former political staffer". IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 22:20, 21 August 2026 (UTC)

It seems like a legitimate request based on the sources given here. I will update appropriately. ~2026-42392-14 (talk) 20:40, 22 August 2026 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I have once again removed the insertion of "Democratic Party" to the lead, implying Duran was a democratic operative. It may come as a surprise to some here that Duran's work not only has nothing to do with the Democratic Party, but at one time in the recent past (when Duran worked in politics), both liberals and conservatives worked for both parties. In other words, Duran's job was not contingent on his political beliefs, unlike the post-Trump era which has muddied these waters, as these edits have also tried to do. There's additional info to consider. Duran says he grew up in a conservative town and his family members served in the military. He personally identifies as a mainstream Democrat, and notes that he has been attacked by left of center activists. He is also a critic of the Democratic Party's acceptance of crytpo cash donations and makes it clear that his work (newsletter and book) is outside the focus of mainstream Democrats who mostly ignore it, although play lip service to "concerns" with data centers without ever actually doing anything or regulating AI. Duran has also called for banning crypto, a position we have yet to see any dems take given that their donors forbid it. Viriditas (talk) 00:46, 20 September 2026 (UTC)

Viriditas, my old talk page friend and master of Overton windows, good to see you again! That was my edit you reverted regarding the "Democratic Party" in the lead. I was not aware this had been previously removed from the article. It seems like a rather straightforward statement of fact that Duran was a "political staffer for several Democratic Party officials" and a good way to describe his work in political comms between his posts in journalism. The things you've enumerated here about Duran (conservative hometown, attacks on him from the left, his criticism of Dems) sound like great things to include in the article, provided we have an RS for them. As for your claim that "both liberals and conservatives worked for both parties", yes that is true, but I'm quite certain that even before Trump first took office, the political staffs of both parties tended to be filled mostly by their own. For example, one of the sources cited in this article is a 2011 press release from Governor Jerry Brown's office detailing 10 of his appointments, including Duran's. All 10 appointees were Democrats. As for banning crypto, we have at least two Dems who have called for it: Brad Sherman and Joe Manchin; see Political positions of Joe Manchin. Jweiss11 (talk) 22:41, 1 October 2026 (UTC)

I made some changes based on your suggestions here. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 05:29, 2 October 2026 (UTC)

IOHANNVSVERVS, thanks. I know the infobox was small, but I'm not sure there was justification to remove it. I restored and expanded it. Jweiss11 (talk) 20:21, 2 October 2026 (UTC)

Diacritic in his name

I'm seeing his surname printed as Durán, not Duran. E.g.:

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2026/aug/05/journalist-taking-on-tech-fascists-silicon-valley

https://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Gil-Duran/243113363 Iokevins (talk) 23:48, 22 August 2026 (UTC)

Added that to the lead. IOHANNVSVERVS (talk) 00:40, 23 August 2026 (UTC)

The whole thing is odd. Looking into this, there was apparently a locally famous girls running coach in NoCal by the same name. I wonder if this is a way to differentiate the journalist in the search indexes? Viriditas (talk) 22:41, 24 August 2026 (UTC)

Why does it seem odd? ~2026-42392-14 (talk) 01:44, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

I believe I just explained it. Was the diacritical mark (accute accent) intentionally used to separate the search results? I do not see it used earlier in the decades. It would make sense if that was the reason. Otherwise, alternate explanations abound. Did the publisher add it for a reason? Did he use it before? Viriditas (talk) 01:48, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

I do not see it used earlier in the decades. Okay, that gets to the heart of it. Thanks for explaining.

I'm not aware of when this version of the name was first used, as I haven't paid any attention to that. Good question though. ~2026-42392-14 (talk) 02:41, 25 August 2026 (UTC)

@Viriditas: I dug around a little bit out of curiosity.

• DePauw University's Midwestern Review magazine - Volume 9, Issue 1 (1995) Under The Big Man's Boot; see Duran's poem here
• Another entry in the Midwestern Review magazine - Volume 9, Issue 2 (1996) Under the Big Man's Boot; see Duran's poem here
• A poem published in the Ploughshares literary journal (Issue #72, Spring 1997). Also see Duran's "about the author" page.
• Government document from 2010: A press release related to Senator Diane Feinstein

Those are the earliest examples I could find (1995, 1996, 1997, 2010) in which his last name was stylized as Durán (with the diacritic). ~2026-42392-14 (talk) 04:47, 26 August 2026 (UTC)

infobox - what positions should we include here?

Currently, the infobox just shows that Duran was former press secretary for Jerry Brown. Should we also add similar previous positions, like communications director for Dianne Feinstein and communications director for Kamala Harris, etc? ~2026-42392-14 (talk) 04:12, 23 August 2026 (UTC)

I deleted it entirely. It is currently a magnet for edit warring and should be added back when the bio is more fleshed out. Viriditas (talk) 01:18, 24 August 2026 (UTC)

Sounds good, thanks for responding. ~2026-42392-14 (talk) 01:56, 24 August 2026 (UTC)

More backstory

Duran goes into some detail about his life in the podcast The Latino Vote, where he is interviewed by Mike Madrid in a 2024 episode. There's some juicy bits there that I leave for the listener. Viriditas (talk) 23:42, 31 August 2026 (UTC)