Early life and education

Malone was born in the town of Fürstenfeldbruck in Bavaria, Germany. His father was a dyslexic U.S. Air Force officer who later worked as a freelance writer. Malone also has a deep family history of reporting, with his great-grandfather and his grandmother working in the field. After living in Munich for a time, he grew up in Sunnyvale, California. He graduated from Santa Clara University in 1975, and received his MBA from SCU in 1977.

Professional career

Malone worked in public relations for Hewlett-Packard Co. before joining the San Jose Mercury-News in 1979. In 1980, he joined the San Jose Mercury News and became one of the nation's first daily high-tech reporters.

For his work breaking stories on toxic waste, drugs, sweatshops, and espionage, he was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize twice, but he quickly left the Mercury News in 1981 and became a freelancer. Malone's work appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Mercury News, the Los Angeles Times, Forbes ASAP, Upside Magazine, Fast Company, The New York Times, and others under various roles between 1981 and 2001.

He has also written for the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, is a former editor of Forbes ASAP, and has contributed to Upside and Fast Company magazines. He was also the host of Malone, an interview series on PBS. In 2000 he became the "Silicon Insider" columnist of ABC News' website.

Malone is the author of 15 books, covering the world of business and technology, including Infinite Loop: How Apple, the World's Most Insanely Great Computer Company, Went Insane (ISBN 0-385-48684-7), The Big Score, The Virtual Corporation and Intellectual Capital, Going Public, Virtual Selling, and One Digital Day'. "Going Public" featured Joseph DiNucci.

Notable works and honours

Of his work for ABC, Malone has written that "Over the near-decade I've had this job, I've probably written five columns that drew major national attention: calling for Dan Rather's firing, declaring the decline of Microsoft, predicting the death of newspapers, naming Matt Drudge the most influential journalist in America and" (alleging liberal) "media bias in the recent" "presidential election."

In 2004, he was named a Distinguished Friend of Oxford University.

Malone produced the four episode/four hour PBS miniseries “The New Heroes” (2005), with colleague Bob Grove and executive producer David Davis. He also authored liner notes for the accompanying soundtrack CD.

Hosted by Robert Redford, "The New Heroes" was about social entrepreneurship. The series, which aired in primetime, was nominated for an Emmy (27th Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards) in the category of "Outstanding Achievement in a Craft: Cinematography", but did not win.

Private life

Malone is a hard-core fan of baroque pop—band The Zombies. He also has written about his support of contemporary bands such as Wilco, The Shins, Arcade Fire, The Decemberists, Dashboard Confessional, Bright Eyes, White Stripes, and Lupe Fiasco, calling them "as good...and often better...as the music of... Rock's so-called golden age."

His eldest son is also a professional reporter.

Scouting

In August 2008, Malone led a group of twenty Boy Scouts and troop leaders from the San Jose, California area on a 56-mile trek on horseback from Fort Reno, Oklahoma to Enid, Oklahoma. Malone said that he wanted to find another unique experience, after having previously taken Scouts in his troop on a 192-mile hike across England.

Malone's stated philosophy on journalism: