Imagine amassing more wealth and power than even kings of old would know what to do with, waiting for your invitation to the Illuminati, and learning that it’s never coming because it doesn’t exist? Something along those lines appears to be what happened to PayPal founder Peter Thiel, who got to the top of the totem pole only to find there was no secret clubhouse.
He was not the only person who seemed to lament this fact. In a 2016 email sent to Jeffrey Epstein, former MIT Media Lab director Joi Ito told the convicted child sex offender, “peter thiel LOVED the secret socieity [sic) idea. he has done alot of work on the concept”—though, as Ito noted at the time, “all failed so far.”
Whether the idea under discussion in Ito’s email ever got off the ground is unknown, but it does seem that Thiel’s kind of been running his own secret society. On Tuesday, Wired reported on a trove of records related to Dialog, an invitation-only club founded by Thiel, first revealed by the Swiss hacktivist maia arson crimew. The members of the group have never been revealed, but documents leaked online appear to give a list of figures—notable names in politics, finance, tech, and other major industries—who have participated in the group’s clandestine meetings and, even more damning, willingly spent time with Peter Thiel.
The list is a real who’s who of people in power and people who can influence public narratives. Per Wired, a list of 222 people on a registration list for Dialog’s 2026 features multiple active Trump administration members, elected officials, and people of international influence. Some of the powerful names include General Alexus Grynkewich, NATO’s supreme allied commander Europe and the head of US European Command, current Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, and Senator Ted Cruz. Perhaps more surprisingly, Democratic Senator Corey Booker and Maryland Governor Wes Moore also appear.
Those officials, with significant say over governing policies, share a group with the heads of companies that you’d expect them to regulate. The world’s most annoying venture capitalist, Chamath Palihapitiya, OpenAI president Greg Brockman, and LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman are all listed as members. So, too, are noteworthy members of the media: author and podcast hosts Tim Ferriss and Sam Harris are on the list, as is New York Times columnist Ezra Klein, and former editor-in-chief of Wired/current CEO of The Atlantic, Nicholas Thompson.
The membership list really seems to stretch across the ideological divide (well, at least to the extent that is acceptable to Peter Thiel, which means it ranges from “centerist liberal” to “fascist authoritarian”), which might make one wonder: what do these guys—and it is mostly guys—even talk about, other than to ask each other why Joseph Gordon-Levitt is at the meeting?
Well, Wired has some insight there, thanks to a leak of a 2026 retreat scheduled for August 12-16 at the Powerscourt Hotel outside Dublin, Ireland (there’s still time to register!). Scheduled sessions for the multi-day getaway include topics like “Money (Does?) Buy Happiness,” “Navigating WWIII,” and “Bring Back Nuclear.” Other talks include “Build-a-Cult” and “Build-a-Party,” for the more leadership inclined.
There’s also a session called “How’s Your Sex Life?” which probably pairs well with any attendees who mark that they are “looking for love” on their registration form—a real option they have. Wired also reported that there is a dating portal on the Dialog website to help facilitate “meaningful connections for exceptional people”—basically like if Raya was only for annoying people.
Also, joke about Epstein and Thiel talking secret societies aside, it seems Epstein actually kinda hated Dialog. While he was listed as a participant in the group in an email forwarded to him by Lisa Randall, who was invited to a Dialog event in 2014, other emails reveal him and others shit-talking the operation. Tech investor Ian Osborne complained to Epstein that Thiel doesn’t even show up to the events, stating in a 2012 email, “Peter doesn’t even attend. I will tell him that he should stop them using his name.” Even when Epstein told Randall to attend, it wasn’t because the event was good but because the location of it, in Sundance, Utah, was nice.
It does seem like Dialog is a collection of people in positions of power who gather to discuss things behind closed doors. But it seems much closer to something like Davos for fascist-curious than the Illuminati. Nice to know that even the ultra-wealthy and powerful seem to think a lot of their meetings could just be emails.
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