The tech world’s potential future founders are living out hedonistic existences in giant Silicon Valley mansions, where they live with a dozen and even more like-minded individuals, and where life is more a less a constant party. These so-called hacker houses, though, have a dark side.
A recent New York Times investigation has uncovered several harassment cases and rape allegations stemming from hacker houses. The most prominent of these is the AGI House — short for “artificial general intelligence” — in Hillsborough, where police have logged 37 incidents since 2022. At least 17 were related to the often large and extravagant parties and events that were regularly being thrown on the property.
In December, a woman called the Hillsborough police station at 2 in the morning from a Lyft, reporting that she had been trapped at the AGI House by a male resident who tried to force her to have sex.
The man told her she was old and “would be alone forever,” according to the police reported viewed by the NYT. He was “persistent in attempting to convince” the woman “to have sex with him, and she repeatedly declined.”
