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Cyrus Farivar

@cfarivar.bsky.social

9.4K followers 1.9K following 790 posts

"suh-ROOS" / سیروس‌ Sr. Director, Community Resilience Marketing 🔥🌲Fire Aside (http://fireaside.com) 🕵️ 20+ years in journalism (Forbes, NBC, and more) 🐻 4th-gen Californian // Oakland, CA 📥 [email protected] 📱 +1-341-758-0888 (mobile/Signal)

fireaside.com)

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · Mar 20

After 3+ years at Forbes, Friday March 21 will be my last day.

After 20+ years of doing professional journalism, I’m moving on to a new challenge with @fireaside.bsky.social.

After 3+ years at Forbes, Friday March 21 will be my last day. After 20+ years of doing professional journalism, I’m moving on to a new challenge.

I’m excited to join a new Marin Co.-based venture-backed startup called Fire Aside (Fireaside.com), which makes software for fire departments to help manage vegetation inspections in the wildland-urban interface (like the Oakland hills, which burned in 1991, very near my grandparents' home). Fire Aside already has numerous clients in the Bay Area including the City of Berkeley.

My new role is as the company’s first “Director of Community Wildfire Resilience.” I’ll be assisting local communities with fire mitigation and helping the company reach out to new partner agencies. (In particular, they’re looking to expand in SoCal, where I grew up.)

Given the recency of the LA Fires, which burned within miles of my childhood home, I feel that it’s time now more than ever to personally take on one aspect of this critical mission of reducing the risk of this ever-growing threat.

I wrestled with this decision a lot — it has been an emotional journey for me to decide to step away from the field that I love — but ultimately, I came back to wanting to prioritize the protection of the people and places that I hold dear.

Onward!

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 7h

L.A. Times journalists vote to authorize newsroom’s first open-ended strike

www.mediaguildwest.org/news/la-time...

L.A. Times journalists vote to authorize newsroom’s first open-ended strike — Media Guild of the West

Eighty-five percent of the Los Angeles Times Guild, the union that represents reporters, editors, designers, photographers and other journalists at the West Coast’s largest newspaper, voted this week ...

www.mediaguildwest.org

Reposted by Cyrus Farivar

Evan Frost @wildwoods.bsky.social · 9h

More acknowledgement that Forest Service footdragging is what doomed the Teakettle Forest to burn -- “What really slowed us down from being able to get prescribed fire implemented was lack of interest from the local national forest...” ~Malcolm North, USFS ecologist www.sfgate.com/bayarea/arti...

Forest Service lags on burns after Calif. loses old-growth trees to wildfire

An entire experimental forest in the Sierra Nevada burned up in September.

www.sfgate.com

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 7h

apnews.com/article/los-... a look at California's 5 most destructive wildfires

Here's a look at California's 5 most destructive wildfires

The Palisades Fire was the most destructive blaze in Los Angeles to date and among the five worst in California’s history.

apnews.com

Reposted by Cyrus Farivar

Bryan Yockers @yockfire.bsky.social · 10h

🔥The second webinar of the Oak Woodlands & Forests Fire Consortium's 2025 webinar series will be on Tuesday, October 21!
🔗For more information and to register: oakfirescience.com/events/webin...
#firescience #prescribedfire #RxFire #fireecology

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 10h

Crews battling wildfire along Minnesota’s North Shore www.mprnews.org/story/2025/1...

Crews battling wildfire along Minnesota’s North Shore

Crews are working on the ground and from the air to try to contain a wildfire burning in the highlands along Minnesota’s North Shore.

www.mprnews.org

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 12h

In which my pal Matt Drange goes deep on ALASKAN BURRITOS.

www.northernjournal.com/food-review-...

Food review: This Californian ate five Valdez burritos in 72 hours – on purpose

A Northern Journal contributor explores the culinary delights of a community whose name he hoped would denote a thriving Latino culture.

www.northernjournal.com

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Oakland author Tommy Orange among Bay Area recipients of MacArthur ‘genius grant’ www.sfchronicle.com/entertainmen...

Oakland author Tommy Orange among Bay Area recipients of MacArthur ‘genius grant’

Photographer Matt Black, UC Berkeley neurobiologist and optometrist Teresa Puthussery, and Stanford University chemical engineer William Tarpeh are also among the recipients.

www.sfchronicle.com

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

"Forest Service officials said the agency does not have a comprehensive strategic plan for improving the agency’s capabilities for two-way communications, tracking, and mapping for wildland firefighters."

www.gao.gov/products/gao...

www.gao.gov

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

I've been an @eliotpeper.bsky.social fan for years now. I read this cover-to-cover in one sitting.

Can't recommend ENSORCELLED more highly.

bsky.app/profile/elio...

Eliot Peper @eliotpeper.bsky.social · 1d

My new book drops today!

Ensorcelled is a coming-of-age adventure about a boy who goes on a camping trip that changes his life, opening his mind and rewilding his attention.

At just 90 pages, it's a one-sitting read that will suck you in, make you think, and leave you changed.

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

The city I have called home for 20+ years is recruiting for Entry Level Firefighter EMT & Paramedic positions.

Thank you for your service, @oaklandfireca.bsky.social .

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Yeah I hear ya. (I speak/read French fluently, fwiw.)

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Not sure that's what radicalized him per se, but he did listen to it.

Here's the video if you're curious: www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Va9...

Josman - Un Zder, Un Thé (Clip Officiel)

YouTube video by Josman

www.youtube.com

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

How a City Awash in Garbage Is Trying to Take Out the Trash

www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/u...

How a City Awash in Garbage Is Trying to Take Out the Trash

www.nytimes.com

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

The Boys in Blue are ready to advance to the NLCS! Let's get it done TONIGHT!

G2 NLDS recap: There's so much happening in these few seconds. Mad respect to Mookie and the Dodgers infield!

Read: www.latimes.com/sports/dodge...

Watch this well-executed play:

bsky.app/profile/dodg...

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

snoop dogg is sitting on a couch eating food and saying `` all gravy baby . ''

ALT: snoop dogg is sitting on a couch eating food and saying `` all gravy baby . ''

media.tenor.com

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Here's the DOJ press release:

www.justice.gov/usao-cdca/pr...

Florida Man Arrested on Federal Criminal Complaint Alleging He Maliciously Started What Became the Palisades Fire

A former Pacific Palisades resident now living in Florida has been arrested on a federal criminal complaint charging him with maliciously starting what eventually became the Palisades Fire of January ...

www.justice.gov

Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Not sure that's right. From what I've read so far he moved to Florida after the Palisades Fire.

www.latimes.com/california/s...

Uber driver accused of intentionally starting fire that destroyed Pacific Palisades

Authorities announced the arrest of 29-year-old Jonathan Rinderknecht, who is suspected of setting a fire on New Year’s Eve that eventually became the Palisades fire.

www.latimes.com

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

"(During his interview on January 24, 2025, RINDERKNECHT admitted he was fluent in French; he grew up in France.)"

www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...

USA v Rinderknecht COMPLAINT

www.documentcloud.org

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Here's the complaint:

www.documentcloud.org/documents/26...

USA v Rinderknecht COMPLAINT

www.documentcloud.org

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

I think this guy is from Los Angeles, not Florida. He was just arrested in Florida.

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Cyrus Farivar @cfarivar.bsky.social · 1d

Today, federal prosecutors announced the arrest of Jonathan Rinderknecht, 29, "charging him with maliciously starting what became the Palisades Fire in January."

He has his first court appearance today in Orlando.

The criminal complaint is not immediately available.