Queenie Wong

Queenie Wong covers how technology, state politics and the digital economy intersect, focusing on how decisions in California’s tech and entertainment sectors affect people’s lives and public policy.

AI, robots and biometric tech in everyday life

Wong’s recent work follows artificial intelligence from big tech product updates to its use inside government, showing both the promise and the risks of automation. She has reported on Apple’s overhaul of Siri as the company tries to catch up in the AI race, explaining how new capabilities fit into wider competition over consumer-facing AI tools. In coverage of Anthropic’s partnership with California to expand AI use by government workers, she looks at how state agencies might deploy generative tools and what that means for efficiency, oversight and public trust.

Her beat extends beyond software to the physical machines and biometric systems that embody emerging tech. In a story on humanoid robots designed to fold laundry, she contrasts hype around robotics with analysts’ skepticism about whether businesses or consumers will adopt these machines, highlighting the gap between demonstrations and real-world utility. She has also written about Sam Altman-backed eye-scanning orbs that verify whether a user is human, examining how biometric devices blur the line between identity, privacy and the push to distinguish humans from bots online. Across these stories, she approaches AI and hardware not as abstractions but as tools that could reshape everyday routines, labor and civil liberties.

California’s tech economy and state policy

Wong gives sustained attention to the ways technology and state politics collide in California’s economy. Her reporting on a “California conundrum” of high economic growth paired with high prices and high unemployment breaks down data on output, jobs and the cost of living to show why headline growth does not always translate into broad prosperity. She has covered controversial proposals to tax billionaires, detailing how such measures would affect wealthy residents and state revenues and why they generate intense political fights.

She also tracks how tech wealth is deployed beyond traditional philanthropy. In a story on Snap Chief Executive Evan Spiegel and Miranda Kerr helping erase $550 million in medical debt for Californians, she connects the couple’s intervention to the wider problem of healthcare affordability and the burden of debt on patients. Her coverage of the APEC summit preparations in San Francisco ties global political events to local concerns, showing how a gathering of world leaders and tech executives forces the city to confront security, protests and its image as a technology hub. Taken together, these pieces illustrate her interest in how California’s tech ecosystem, public finances and political choices shape life for residents far beyond corporate headquarters.

Social platforms, online dating and digital communities

Wong frequently writes about the social platforms and apps that mediate relationships and information, treating them as both businesses and public spaces. She has interviewed Nextdoor co-founder and chief executive Nirav Tolia about the social network’s turnaround plan, probing how the company hopes to repair its reputation and reshape neighborhood conversations while pursuing growth. In coverage of “swipeless” online dating, she examines new matchmaking models and what they signal about users’ fatigue with traditional swipe-based apps, focusing on how product design changes the way people meet.

Her reporting also explores the role of AI inside social media ecosystems. In one piece, she describes how people turned to the Grok chatbot on X during deadly flash floods and received a confident but false narrative blaming specific political decisions, using the episode to show how generative tools can spread misinformation by packaging speculation as fact. Before joining the Los Angeles Times, she wrote extensively about major social networks at other outlets, giving her a long view of how platforms evolve, grapple with moderation and influence civic life. Across this work, she treats digital communities as places where policy, design and human behavior collide, rather than simply lifestyle products.

Corporate deals, layoffs and the business of tech

Wong’s coverage of the tech industry’s corporate maneuvers foregrounds how high-level decisions ripple through jobs, competition and consumers. In reporting on eBay’s rejection of GameStop’s unsolicited $56-billion takeover offer, she explains the board’s reasoning and what such a deal would have meant for the online marketplace’s growth and profitability, framing the story as a contest over the future of retail and gaming commerce. Her work on Cisco’s layoffs charts how restructuring at major tech firms affects employees and signals broader trends in the sector’s investment priorities.

She often connects these corporate stories back to workers and users, rather than focusing solely on financial metrics. In coverage of tech layoffs, she situates job cuts within larger cycles of boom and retrenchment, asking what they mean for innovation, regional economies and the people whose careers are tied to the industry. In other business pieces, she examines how strategic partnerships and policy-related deals change the balance of power between companies and the state, consistent with her broader interest in the intersection of technology, governance and everyday life. She describes herself as a versatile, tenacious storyteller with a strong interest in public service, looking for the human face in complex technology and policy stories while still digging into the technical and political details underlying them.