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Is Silicon Valley Morally Bankrupt and Toxic?
concealment sends this quote from a post about how the goals of many tech companies are at odds with what's good for consumers:
"Since I've been out of the Silicon-Valley-centered tech industry, I've become increasingly convinced that it's morally bankrupt and essentially toxic to our society. Companies like Google and Facebook — in common with most public companies — have interests that are frequently in conflict with the well-being of — I was going to say their customers or their users, but I'll say 'people' in general, since it's wider than that. People who use their systems directly, people who don't — we're all affected by it, and although some of the outcomes are positive a disturbingly high number of them are negative: the erosion of privacy, of consumer rights, of the public domain and fair use, of meaningful connections between people and a sense of true community, of beauty and care taken in craftsmanship, of our very physical well-being. No amount of employee benefits or underfunded Google.org projects can counteract that. Over time, I've come to consider that this situation is irremediable, given our current capitalist system and all its inequalities. To fix it, we're going to need to work on social justice and rethinking how we live and work and relate to each other. Geek toys like self-driving cars and augmented reality sunglasses won't fix it. Social networks designed to identify you to corporations so they can sell you more stuff won't fix it. Better ad targeting or content matching algorithms definitely won't fix it."
Betteridge's law of headlines
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Betteridge's law of headlines is an adage that states:
"Any headline which ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no". ...
"The reason why journalists use that style of headline is that they know the story is probably bollocks, and don’t actually have the sources and facts to back it up, but still want to run it."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge's_law_of_headlines
As for the article's content:
A great discovery!
The author has finally also found out that their customers are the advertising firms, their 'users' are the product they sell.
Film at 11.
The rest is some pseudo-socialist rant.
Move along, nothing to see here.
you dont have to be republican to vote for your corporate overlords
then it will happen. Companies that survive do so by providing something that people want and something that people will pay for (sometimes the two are split, like Facebook).
If other people don't want what you want, accept it, and don't blame Silicon Valley.
Holy rant...
Here's another idea, it's not broke.
-Malakai
A Dragon Lives in my Garage
Bitter much? Get fired or something?
You were the one who wanted all this great content for free (as in beer). By "you", I mean the opinions expressed here on Slashdot, especially when the topic comes to copyrights and file sharing laws. Google and Facebook are doing things "the right way", by that reckoning, but yes there is the darker side of which you speak.
How is Google supposed to pay 30,000 engineers, 1M rack-mounted x86 systems, and still hit their quarterly earnings and revenue targets? And the same for Facebook.
Only Amazon has a traditional business model, but even they are leaders in mining content about their users as well as their traditional IP inventory.
Cuz it doesn't feel like news. It feels like a gossip column.
Long answer yes, with a "but". They are no better nor worse then any other for profit venture. As soon as a company goes public, they are money making tools for the share holders.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Let me tell you, if you want to see toxic check out Wall St. and it's satellites in NJ and CT. At least Silicon Valley creates cool shit that make people productive and/or entertained. Wall Street produces nothing, it just sucks value out of the economy and puts it in overseas tax shelters. it sounds to me like you're burned out from living in the center of a capitalist vortex. Take some time off and go live in Massachusetts or Oregon or something and decompress. I would kill to work at a place like Apple. I don't care if it means 90 hour weeks, you got something more important to do than develop the next generation of computing technology?
Looking back to what it was 25 years ago, much of what it was no longer exists. There's lots of vacant buildings, don't know why they are building more.
mfwright@batnet.com
Which is why I plan to switch my career over to the socially conscious and ethical industry of... Umm, never mind, I'm just going to go back to work at the evil insurance company tomorrow.
We can't have an economy of all non-profits* and any (non-tongue-in-cheek) references to ethics or societal good in a mission statement will get scrubbed out by the MBAs as soon as there's any significant money to be had.
* Actually, I think we could theoretically, but that just isn't going to happen.
Gee, I'd love to see a world where Intel, Dell, IBM, HP, TI and a host of other companies never existed. Yea, we'd be better off without GE, Ford, General Motors, Exxon and the like. Would not need any hackers in Silicon Valley, much less silicon. Just forget the transistor, integrated circuits or microprocessors ever existed.
Capitalism may have it's flaws, but it is better than any previously tried system over the last 6,000 years of recorded history. Please let's not repeat any of them!
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
The era of socialism as it defined in the dictionary is dead in America. The idea of noblesse oblige, and societal responsibility are not only forgotten in minds of those who control the wealth in this country, but spit upon as if it were a curse. Too many Americans today feel that wealth redistribution by the state should be abolished, as they are quick to scapegoat the needy in light of this country's ills. It is this undercurrent of disregard for our fellow countrymen that is showing all over the place in the attitudes of the Haves, in today's politics and even something so basic as getting a job.
America needs to wake the hell up and realise that helping each other, taking responsibility for one's actions, and working for the common good are the cornerstones of civilization. Throw them out, and all you will have is barbarity and all that implies.
The Richest Man in the World: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p14bAe6AzhA
A parable about robotics, abundance, technological change, unemployment, happiness, and a basic income.
The knol mentioned in the video has been moved here because Google Knol is shutting down: http://www.pdfernhout.net/beyond-a-jobless-recovery-knol.html
That parable and video was directly inspired by this:
"Structural Unemployment: The Economists Just Don't Get It"
http://econfuture.wordpress.com/2010/08/04/structural-unemployment-the-economists-just-dont-get-it/#comment-254
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
http://vimeo.com/38724174
Ehh, you're just now figuring that out?
No sig for you. YOU GET NO SIG!
This crap is so ridiculous. Article in short...
Company I worked at got bought by Google. They kept me on. Then Google wouldn't let me switch to a technical position since I wasn't a technical person. Jerks.
Google+ doesn't want me to use a handle. I'm a queer/transgender female so that's offensive.
I went back to school for something kinda technical and found out I hated it, so I quit school again. Still angry that Google didn't hire me for a technical position without any technical credentials.
After I quit, Google tried to hire me a few times for other stuff. How dare they.
I've since decided that ToS minutiae at unrelated companies and requiring people to use their names on a voluntary social network that nobody uses demonstrate that an entire industry / area is morally bankrupt and toxic. Corporations are evil corporationy corporations, so I started an open source gardening project... yay me.
Some day when Google learns to give me what I want for no reason, I'll take their offers more seriously and decide they're not evil anymore.
Seriously, wtf... a whole post just so someone can cry us a river? Some people are desperate for decent work, and it's borderline insulting to read entitled garbage like this.
I thought that Silicon-Valley being "morally bankrupt and essentially toxic to our society" was self evident. But, why single out Silicon-Valley?
There is too much invested in the lifestyle we have now for society to change course to avoid catastrophe. People will continue doing the same things until collapse by economic, environmental or political forces impose change.
Feeling down?
No help around?
Burma Shave
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Not that I seriously disagree with TFS, but... Since when is this tech news or stuff that matters?
News at four! Business is focused on its own interest rather than on the public's good in corporate America! Read all about it on Slashdot!
Seriously... This is the kind of stuff I'd expect to be reading on some political site, not on slashdot. I barely cope with the US political news and the US elections. (How about EU, Asia or Latin America political news for a change?) Wtf?
I am not completely convinced of the points that the OP is trying to make. But any company has the interest of it's owner closest to heart. In a public company, the owners are the stock holders and stock holders usually wants continuous growth and year on year profit, which might not be what is best for the company an might not be what is best for the consumer/user.
I once had the fortune to work for a very large international corporation that was entirely family owned, with no external stock holders. And I can tell you that the culture and mentality within that corporation was completely different compared to other workplaces I have been in.
They were much more concerned with continuously building the value of the brand / family name, than to make profit for the share holders. If they were convinced something was the right thing to do, they would allow it to take time and money.
So I would say the problem lays more in the way that companies are financed today, and the effects that has on their operations, than whether they are located in Silicon Valley or not.
If my comment didn't sound as good in your head as it did in mine, then I guess we all know who's to blame
The answer? It's no. Just like it always is. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines
...but it helps!
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"Since when are self-driving cars a "geek toy"? Road safety is a huge thing. Unless you hate old people, the disabled, and people who are just unlucky, getting humans away from the steering wheel is going to be up there with curing cancer.
... well ...
Please stop using the PC / Tablets / Smartphones - for many of the hardware were designed in Silicon Valley
Please stop using many of the software that you are using - including technologies that enable you to surf the Net
Without the Silicon Valley - and many of its offspring around the world - the author of TFA can whine all he wants, on a column on his local newspaper - if the editor of his local newspaper grant him a column, that is
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Looking back to what it was 25 years ago, much of what it was no longer exists. There's lots of vacant buildings, don't know why they are building more.
Spot on. All the semiconductor manufacturing has gone to Asia, mainly Taiwan. Our CEO was always over there on business trips and is always coming back with stories about office parks the size of the city of Fremont being built left right and center over there. Still a fair bit of design work happening here though. Apple is probably the archetypal modern company. Most value is added at the design, sales and marketing ends of the process, and that all takes place in the valley. The dirty work of manufacturing happens in Taiwan.
As for the OP, sounds like the guy needs to get laid.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
Companies try to make money! How evil!
Companies are meant to make money, that's how they pay their employees. As long as they're not using the law/government to take advantage (i.e. Apple) then there's nothing wrong with it.
Money is not evil. It's usually the most greedy who complain about the wealth of others.
>Better ad targeting or content matching algorithms definitely won't fix it
Maybe not, but you have to admit that if you're going to be force-fed ads, ads for computer hardware & home automation gear are several orders of magnitude less annoying than ads for feminine hygiene products, diapers, payday loans, personal injury lawyers, and [Romney|Obama].
Gee, I'd love to see a world where Intel, Dell, IBM, HP, TI and a host of other companies never existed. Yea, we'd be better off without GE, Ford, General Motors, Exxon and the like. Would not need any hackers in Silicon Valley, much less silicon. Just forget the transistor, integrated circuits or microprocessors ever existed.
Capitalism may have it's flaws, but it is better than any previously tried system over the last 6,000 years of recorded history. Please let's not repeat any of them!
I'm with you all the way, except for your inclusion of Exxon. Some companies happen to bump shoulders with society by accident from time to time, but Exxon really is a nasty piece of work and I'm not just talking about the Exxon Valdez disgrace. Much of the global warming denial industry can be traced back to this one company.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
The article's not much better than the summary. Key points:
8/10 troll. Outrageous while maintaining credibility; full-bodied with notes of cassis and oak.
DATABASE WOW WOW
Yup, there are lots of morally bankrupt and toxic corporations. Limiting your critique to the high tech industry could cause you to think this is about technology vs human interactions or some made up arbitrary distinction. Clear your mind, feel the force, and examine your feelings: this issue is much broader than you suppose.
People can be morally bankrupt and toxic. They can be greedy little shits. Usually they're either taught by society, or reigned in by societies laws, to be more ethical and bubbly and interested in the social justice and all that -- but only usually. And we all know that if you add a few layers of indirection, like maybe they're just doing their job and trying to get a bonus or grow their team or implement a cool feature and see their stock go up or find a business model that feeds and diapers the kids... well, ethics about some shmuck on the internet is a pretty easy thing to let slip. Heck, give them a big enough bonus and they'll close a plant and ship all the jobs to China. And run for office based on how much money they made when they increased the value of the stock.
If you're concerned then you need to engage with people. Work to built the society you want to see exist; work to encode that society into our enforced laws, and _vote_ for people that reflect your opinions.
I moved there in 1997 to work for the Lighthouse Design division of Sun Microsystems (formerly the division did NeXT software). As a mid-size city kid from the Canadian prairies, I was immediately struck by, not just the moral bankruptcy, but what I felt was literally a soul-destroying culture. I left soon after and only returned a couple times, each time having that impression confirmed.
Here are some of the things I observed. Some are general to the United States and its form of capitalism, some (seem to be) specific to the Bay Area and Silicon Valley:
1. Culture of guns and violence. Simply a belief that enough other people are "bad" that you must protect yourself and it would be okay to kill someone else to do that. There are lots of places in the world where that belief is not pervasive and they seem to be nicer places to live. It's kinda like the justice system is supposed to work: it's fairer if you presume innocence and that actually encourages people to behave nicely whereas if you presume guilt, people will live up to that expectation.
2. Extreme Culture of Materialism. Money matters, and getting rich matters even more. The expression "F***-You Money" is a good indicator of this. I knew a few people who had their "F***-You Money" and they weren't enlightened... they were spoiled. It's like the "American Dream" taken to an unhealthy extreme. People were generally extremely busy and most friendly conversation was either about money, money other people make, technology, sex or drugs. Very little friendly conversation was about community, relationships, or the soul.
3. A Bizarre Hypocrisy around Tolerance/Inclusion. San Francisco, in particular, was bad for this; blind to its own racism yet so proud that it was inclusive and tolerant. If you know the area, I only need say "East Palo Alto" (it's been a few years so maybe it's gentrified now) and you should be able to figure out what I mean. We tolerate all religions, all philosophies, all genders, all types of cultures... except the black and spanish folks in our midst who only work menial or retail service jobs. The real problem is that most people there were completely blind to what was blindingly obvious to me as an outsider.
4. Pervasive, Persuasive Moral Bankruptcy. The longer I was there, the more I "got into" the culture. I've seen this happen to other friends from outside the area. It kills people's souls. Maybe not everyone... I'm sure there are some people who are shining examples of enlightenment... but I couldn't resist it, and I don't know anyone else who has (save one person). Of course, this is "normal" - we adjust to and eventually adopt the culture of our surroundings unless we actively work against it. I _was_ actively working against it and it still changed me to my own detriment.
I believe that the organizations that are there (Google, Facebook, etc.) are not "to blame" as they are just participating in the culture and trying to be successful in that culture. (Or to be more accurate, the people in those organizations are doing this.) But anyone who has an idealistic bone in them will quickly have it gellified and unconsciously begin to give up that idealism for the much more flexible moral relativism and then eventually the outlook that, heck, capitalism isn't so bad after all! not realizing that the ideology in that area is beyond capitalism: it's imperial corporatist capitalism that cares only for growth, and at any human cost (just so long as it doesn't harm the bottom line).
Helping with organizational effectiveness is our job.
It's not just corporate greed; consumer greed fuels the race to the bottom of the price curve. Users apparently have no problem "paying" for a service with their and others' privacy or other intangibles as long as the service is free-as-in-beer. The whole vendor-customer structure has been inverted; Facebook's and Google's etc. users who might have been paying customers in a sane economy pay nothing so are now the product. Now half the "innovation" that happens in the valley is just new ways to get people's attention and sell them out to advertisers, and the more obvious a patent is, the more it's worth.
I wonder if there could ever be a sane market again where you paid what a phone costs and got secure communication without being tracked, or paid for email with built in PGP and avoided getting spammed and having your email property of and stored by your provider forever, paid for a social networking service without having your life exposed or your face secretly scanned and sold to the government. I think those times are gone.
FLAC - Free Lossless Audio Codec
Of course, fixing the broken websites would be helpful too.
there are parts of san jose that are nearly ghost towns. acre after acre of FOR LEASE office / manufacturing buildings. but you are right, they keep building new stuff. i guess because no company wants to move into a depressing 1970's office.
It's an airy concept devoid of any real meaning. It's has the flimsiest of justifications for its existence and every time I hear it I want to hit someone. It's a high-minded sounding renaming of whatever particular pet grievance the current user of the term has in mind at the moment. It's an attempt to avoid any real debate over the merits of the grievance by presenting a piece of the picture and appealing to someone's sense of fairness. It's dishonest, deceitful and doesn't belong in polite conversation. It's the race-baiting of the left.
Otherwise, I completely agree with you. Silicon Valley is toxic and morally bankrupt. Just as bad in its way as Wall Street.
The problem, as I see it, is the profit motive. Which is not exactly a problem precisely. It's when the profit becomes the goal instead of the reward.
When you structure a business, you have to structure it so it makes financial sense, so it can support itself, so it can make money. Structuring it to extract the maximum possible value out of the system is counter-productive. With the right kinds of locks and business tricks you can keep anybody else from getting into your value stream at all. Microsoft is the king of this. Unfortunately this behavior is long-term toxic to the business ecosystem. And it's long-term toxic to the fabric of society.
No, you should have a goal in your business that has nothing to do with money. The goal you have is the value you provide. Then think about how to get enough money out of the system to achieve that goal grow modestly and make you and your employees reasonably well-off. Your profit is your reward for doing something people value. It's not the goal.
Of course, there are puzzles like Facebook. Facebook has never been profitable. They're greedy because they have no idea how to extract value. So any means is considered fair game because they're hungry. Which is a different (but related) kind of attitude problem.
To me, the evil of Facebook is one of centralization. Whenever you have that kind of centralization you will get something that uses its control to the detriment of everybody else. It might not happen right away (aka Google), but it will inevitably happen. Centralization is a bug, never a feature.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
If you read the article, it's not about that at all. It's about _new_ Silicon Valley: the startup culture. This is massively different to the culture that existed when Intel, Dell, IBM, HP and TI were founded.
Those companies are all fairly traditional companies in organization and goals. They were typical old-school American corporate structures built to achieve modern results. HP wasn't crowdfunded, hyped into a bubble and then pushed into an IPO to make the founders and a couple of venture capitalists into multi-millionaires. It was a long-term endeavour built around providing serious engineering for serious ends. It wasn't a get-rich-quick scheme.
This article is more about the culture of quick-hit startups in Silicon Valley these days, which are built more around buzz, hype and marketing vapidity than they are around serious engineering or any kind of long-term planning. It's questioning the culture of founding a company around a cute idea with the aim of selling out in two years to become a millionaire. That is not what Hewlett and Packard were about. They built a company around engineering on the basis of a belief that they could provide a benefit over the long term.
If anything I'd say the weakness of the article lies in its evidence, which isn't really sufficient. It has one useful and accurate case study - Uber - but it really needs more than that to talk about any kind of trend. I rather think, though, that if the author had tried, he could have come up with lots of other examples. Uber was a great case study, though. It's 'innovative' and 'disruptive'...where you read 'disruptive' to mean 'doesn't see the point in complying with regulations meant to ensure public safety'. There's a _reason_ taxi services are strongly licensed and regulated virtually the world over (and you probably wouldn't feel great taking a cab in a place where they aren't).
I think my subject line says it all. We need to make a headline out of that.
Period.
- Don't ever think a corporation does anything directly to benefit their customers.
- Don't ever think a corporation does anything directly to benefit their internal employees.
- Don't ever think a corporation does anything directly to benefit the "public"
For corporations, everything is done in the name of profit. If it happens to benefit other parties, that's a side effect, not the intention. In most cases, it has to benefit other parties to make a profit, but by no means is original intention. The original intention is profit.
AC states this as a fairly generalized statement. There are exceptions - corporations who fall outside this stereotype, private companies who are not necessarily interested in a profit, non-profits, etc. However, for most cases, don't delude yourself into thinking there was ever any true intention other than profit.
They started in the Nile River Valley. We should have killed them before they evolved into other rich people.
Gently reply
Earlier Silicon Valley tweeted:
Duh, WINNING
brandelf -t FreeBSD
If you think we live in a capitalist society, think again.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
It can work for us, too... we just have to prevent J. J. Abrams from rebooting us back to capitalism.
Just this infinitely recurring zero floats into view.
"Capitalism may have it's flaws, but it is better than any previously tried system over the last 6,000 years of recorded history. "
I have noticed that many people who praise capitalism is often not realising they are praising a system that arent anymore. Capitalism today is not the capitalism you saw 20-40 years ago, when the economy flourished. Everything was more regulated back then. The industry was regulated, the banks where regulated(take the glass stegal act.) Unions was much stronger. Income inequality was waaaay smaller, jobs wasnt outsourced to cheap 3rd world countries where people want to work for pennies. Companies wasnt as focused on profit maximizing, low wage jobs didnt pay soo low that people still had to ask for food stamps, or lived inside tents in the woods because their paycheck was soo small they couldnt pay rent(hello walmart: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/19/walmart-warehouse-workers_n_1989121.html )
Capitalism today is failing bigtime. Cooperation turn in record profit numbers yet keep firing people and outsource the jobs to low wage countries. CEO paychecks explode while the lower and middle incomeclass becomes poorer. Loopholes are being used by everyone to prevent paying taxes, that funds schools, healthcare, fire and policedepartments and more. Right now our capitalistic system is soo focused on how to maximize their short term profit, that they dont realize(or dont care) what they are doing to the system in the long run.
Take Apple. If there was no big consumerbase in the west who would buy their phones? Not their chinese workers because they dont get paid near enough to afford such a phone. Like soo many other big companies Apple want to sell to a rich consumerbase that we have in the west, but they dont want to pay to have such a consumerbase. They expect other companies to make sure we have jobs that pays us enough to afford a iphone, so they can skip that important step and pay poor chinese people to produce their stuff instead. Problem today is that the outsourcing of productionjobs have skyrocketed. Everyone want to sell to the western consumerbase, but noone want to pay that consumerbase enough to be able to consume. They all expect others to lift that burden, and that is not happening atm.
So before you praise capitalism think about what kind of capitalistic system you are praising. Is it the capitalistic system of today that outsource productionjobs, and find tax loopholes, or is it the capitalistic system of yesterday.
This is not because this system has allowed great things that it is exempt from any criticism or that alternatives can not exist. Half of the achievements of the 20th century was publicly funded, let's not forget about that. Corporation are not the only way to make things happen.
Look at Bletchley park, look at the NASA. Look at the Bell Labs, which are an hybrid entity of public obligations and private funds and which invented Unix, C, and radioastronomy amongst other things.
Great things can be done through capitalism, free entrepreneuship and competitions, but let's not assume that this is the only way.
By the way, let's review the invention that you attribute to corporations :
So be careful with the examples you choose and realize that the computer revolution started as a governmental effort to crack German code, continued in the US as a Navy project, was given its best tools by the Bell Labs, an entity whose structure would make most business angels cringe and that software development is now driven in big part by a bunch of OSS idealists that often work on it for free.
Internet itself started as a university and military project. It was heavily funded by the government (Hello, M.Gore) before corporations could understand the interest of this thing. Afterwards, they tried very hard to break and control it, unsuccessfully. (Look at AOL, look at what MSN was supposed to be at first)
I don't deny that capitalism or even corporatism can drive innovation, but if you want examples, computer science is not the best place to get them. The feeling I get is that groundbreaking innovations are usually publicly funded while incremental innovations are made by corporations.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
The only person who would defend that "insightful" article is the one who wrote it, and maybe whoever thought it was valid news and posted it here, though that could be the same person.
The author needs to get out of his narrow mindset. What he's describing is applicable to every corporation in the U.S. (probably the rest of the world too, but since I haven't been there I won't drag them in) Technology, specifically PCs and all the potential tech and software tied to them is no longer being run by guys who grew up the companies from their mom's garages. Those people, and those idealogies are gone. They've been replaced by generic CEOs who demand huge salaries without even knowing the specifics of the new industry they moved to. They're controlled by wealthy stockholders who don't care about anything other than their ROI.
Every corporation is evil. The one I work for, which had the largest profit margins ever last year (hint it's in the billions) still cited the poor economy and some other woe is me bullshit to justify cutting every employee offered benefit. That includes vacation time caps, accrual rates, health insurance premiums, health insurance coverages, losing holidays, and a few other things all on top of royally fucking every employee over with raises that were in the 1-2% range for employees who were good. Mediocre to bad employees got nothing. (god forbid we get rid of the bad ones..right)
Anyways, so that's how shitty my large corp is. Safe to say I dislike my employer. I do like what I do though and haven't found a better landing spot yet that isn't a big corp. What shocked me more is that everything I just laid out that my company did to us, the company across the street did to their employees too. Corporations have got employees by the balls and they know it. This is why unions existed. This is why unions will start to come back.
Social media topped the list when /.ers were asked What tech would you un-invent?
I guess all the people complaining about the article forgot to vote in that particular poll.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
I think the heart of it stems from the fact that even non-users are affected by this kind of thing - at least unless they go massively out of their way to avoid it. Look at the opposition and non-adoption of the DNT header, to actively* express that you do not want to be tracked by these companies. They just don't care about the human side of things if there's money to be made.
But at the same time, it's like the banking crisis. In theory, a single business going under should only hurt its direct customers. There's going to be some ripple effect in there, but what we see today is far beyond what anyone would have expected. There's now so much interdependency between these companies that one doing something stupid affects half the world.
However I don't blame SV for this. It's just a lot more prominent because there's so much (largely stupid and pointless) tech coming out of here. Give it a couple years now that we're no longer throwing $2m at a random college kid with no business model and aspirations of ten million users and you'll see it die off quite a bit (VCs are, it seems, finally looking at the business side of things again before investing). It was happening in NY and Boston too, just not nearly to the same degree since those investors weren't all high on recent tech IPOs.
* Yes, fuck you IE10 for not understanding the concept of "actively". Even when you're using new tech, you somehow manage to still screw it up for everyone.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
It was a diatribe. Come back when you learn how to summarise. ;-p
The problem in Silicon Valley is the same as everywhere else: unregulated capitalism coupled with political corruption that leads to further deregulation and further corruption. We seem to be stuck in a downwards spiral. All of the negative aspects mentioned -- erosion of privacy, of consumer rights, etc. -- may seem to result from new technologies, but the latter has been a double-edged sword throughout history. The only reason our rights are currently being trampled on is because those new technologies and businesses are not being regulated properly.
The problem is that, contrary to what corporations and many politicians would have us believe, corporations are by definition incapable of regulating themselves, because their only legal responsibility is to make a profit for their shareholders. If they have any responsibility to do otherwise, it is because of the laws applied to them by the state. The state, however, must always remain vigilant, for just as psychopaths cannot be taught that there is an intrinsic value in treating other people with respect, corporations are always seeking to find and/or create loopholes and do away with any and all regulations that would stand between them and their profits.
How to fix the problem? Start by getting money out of politics. Eventually, though, I think an end to publicly owned companies should be considered. The problem is that when corporations break the law and get caught, rarely is anyone held responsible and sent to prison; the organization just ends up paying a fine. But, if the fine is only a fraction of what it was worth for them to break the law in the first place, it does not act as a deterrent. They continue to operate as though many laws do not apply to them and let their legal departments take care of the details. Obviously, society cannot tolerate this situation indefinitely. If nothing is done, the way things are going now we will eventually be left with no freedoms, no rights, no justice, no democracy -- only a police state in which the masses are required to toil and consume for the benefit of a plutocratic elite... perhaps lead by someone like Mittroford Romnifeld the Great.
Cmon... admit it... you are really just aright winger posting ad a dumb left winger... nobody could be advocating for the left while portraying such a caricature of a left winger.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Silicon Valley in its current incarnation is evidence of a VERY capitalist society. So is selling people pet rocks. Nothing morally wrong with either as long as the customer understands what they're getting.
But, in the case of the current "products" coming out of Silicon Valley, don't confuse "users" with "customers." And, you betcha, Facebook's and Google's customers know what they are buying and are quite happy to pay the price. It's just that the customers aren't the users.
Cheers,
Dave
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
It's not a ding on SV, it's a report from the trenches in Sunnyvale and Mountain View. . This is how it is. No one trusts anyone and no one is trustworthy either. There is zero comroderie that doesn't blow over with the first sign of shifting political winds. IT's one of the most disgusting atmospheres imaginable.
A few things I learned working here : corporations are like Darwinistic experiments in evolving and promoting sociopaths.
I will never hire anyone who has been in a position of management with a corporation for years.
I have no interest in incubators, VC or any of the other trappings of SV which are supposedly dedicated to helping entrepreneurs. Thanks. See ya.
I will think long and hard about hiring anyone who has been an engineer in a large corporation for a prolonged period of time. Long and hard. Sorry.
For having this much money, SV is basically a long series of yesteryear strip malls with very very very expensive houses most of which were built in the 50s and go for , oh, about 5-8 times their value elsewhere in the country, which is to say their actual worth.
Heck, replace it with "American-style capitalism".
The thing is, if you decide that you're going to demand a better quality of life, they'll just import labor . The bounty of the haves does indeed depend on the desperation of the have nots.
They know how to leverage those have-nots against you, specifically, those have nots want your job and will work 14 hours a day if you give it to them.
Then in 6 -10 years time they'll return to homeland exchange-rate adjusted multi-millionaires.
For DECADES now workers have raised their productivity year over year and now it's into the stratosphere relative to the 80s and what have they seen for their labor? Declining living standards. .
The only way anything is going to change is if people who want that change can make a competitive statement in the marketplace . IT's also going to take governmental action, as it always does. Programmers fancy themselves too smart and fast moving for slow government to do them any good but the fact is we have an even semi-tolerable society b/c of progressive legislation passed throughout the decades. You have to prevail upon your Congressmen for stuff like fair pay for women, maternity leave, limit to working hours, health benefits, paid vacations and personal time, child care, all the fairness and quality of life shit that Americans totally lack compared to say Germany whose fantastic goods we can't stop yearning for and whose progressive workplace policies and productivity is second to none...
Products and services are not forces of moral good. Moral good is a force for moral good. And as long as we're bashing capitalism, all those communist countries didn't for one second consider the well being of their captive populations. Did you know for example that there is not a single communist/socialist country which ever permitted trade unions?
We all know the Tesla vs. Edison fight and we all know that nothing has been done to correct these mistakes.
I'm actually not familiar with this. I'll have to read up on it but would you mind giving a brief recap of what happened, especially in relation to the topic of this discussion?
In short, Edison and Tesla were working on the same things, but Tesla was generally smarter and had better ideas. Edison was better at business and showmanship, though, and became hugely wealthy while Tesla died in poverty having accomplished much less than Edison, even though he was a better inventor, scientist and engineer.
Some people think the story shows a flaw in the system. I think it shows a flaw in Tesla. If he wasn't good at the business side, he should have hired someone who was. Kinda like Woz and Jobs (far from a perfect parallel, but you get the idea).
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
It's questioning the culture of founding a company around a cute idea with the aim of selling out in two years to become a millionaire. That is not what Hewlett and Packard were about.
No, but it's how HP, Dell, and IBM continue to grow.
Yes, they do their own R&D, but acquisitions are a quicker way to acquire new technology.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Everything is relative, and comparing Google and it's ilk with previous companies make it look like a god-send.
Proprietary AOL vs. ICQ chat? no more. Google uses open protocols for thair Chat system.
Having to pay for IMAP or such for Hotmail or be trapped to the web interface? No more, Google gives free or paid mail service, and uses open protocols to let you access that mail from any client you like.
They also have built a state-of-the-art machine translation system that you can use for free, made an open source mobile operating system, and more.
And as you mentioned, they run (and fund) lots of other cool projects like Summer of Code, Google Code, etc.
And their ads are almonost always text ads that are relevant to something you might be interested in, instead of annoying animates flash ads for bullshit like you used to find on AltaVista. They've been taking a huge loss running YouTube, and created open source patent-free video codecs, etc. All of this is *good* for consumers.
What exactly would you have them do? What could they do that they aren't? What are they doing that's so bad? Yes they run ads, but they clearly differentiate paid content from unpaid content. Yes they scan your gmail to determine ad content, but that means you get less annoying ads. Would you have them make the ads generic again? Stop running ads at all? If you're a super privacy nut, don't log in. Use a VM, and in-private mode on your browser. Whatever.
I mean if you want to bitch about the Farmville makers or whatever, maybe I can see your point - but Google is of course a business, who's primary goal is supposed to be to make a profit for shareholders - yet it seems to be run by enough geeks that they do the right thing for everyone in the long run instead of what they think is the right thing to please the stock analysts for this quarter.
It would help if we actually had a left wing. Currently, we've got a center-right and far-right wing. I'm admittedly on the far-left, making me a bit out of step with the rest of the country, but it's deeply frustrating to any socialist when people call Barack Obama, a center-right politician, a Marxist or socialist.
Obama is very friendly to Wall Street. Very, very friendly.
And now perhaps it's time to broaden your view a bit. Poisonous as Silicon Valley may be, it's probably less so than corporate sectors featuring the likes of Big Pharma, Monsanto, Halliburton, and on and on and on.
Over time, I've come to consider that this situation is irremediable, given our current capitalist system and all its inequalities. To fix it, we're going to need to work on social justice and rethinking how we live and work and relate to each other.
You may not realize it, but what you're talking about is nothing less than revolution. And given the stranglehold on power that the corporations have, such a revolution would be unlikely to be bloodless. (See "French Revolution").
Geek toys like self-driving cars and augmented reality sunglasses won't fix it. Social networks designed to identify you to corporations so they can sell you more stuff won't fix it. Better ad targeting or content matching algorithms definitely won't fix it.
No, but they will keep the majority of the population amused, distracted, anaesthetized, materially ambitious, divided, and unable/unwilling to challenge the status quo. (See "Bread and Circuses", unless you believe, as I do, that corporatism is a religion - then see "Opiate of the Masses").
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Skud's an experienced programmer. As is the case with many experienced computer programmers, she didn't have a computer science degree. Please see any of the countless debates on Slashdot on whether computer science degrees are necessary for programming. She wasn't switching to a technical position: she was getting forced out of a technical position she had held for three years. She wasn't switching to a handle; her name is Skud, that is the name she normally uses, and that is what Google's official policy supposedly defines as the name to use for a Google account.
Much of the article is a critique of Silicon Valley culture in general, and why she's glad she left.
Actually when I searched on the three items, I only expected one of them to be invented through public funding, as I thought Sony had a bigger role in the discovery of transistors. So I am happy that you give some balance to the list.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
empty vacuous shell of it's old self. Having been a reader of Malda's old Chips and Dip site for Window Maker themes then became Slashdot, the technical news about Linux, the various BSDs, UNIX(s) and underlying technologies have been replaced with this whiney PC (not Personal Computers) crap. And the submitter of this idiotic topic "Soulskill" reminds me of Jon Kats. Sadly I rarely visit slashdot anymore. Others sites like http://www.shiningsilence.com/dbsdlog/ or http://undeadly.org/ still have value. R.I.P /.
The number of MBAs in the valley has probably reached critical mass.
Either way, Bell Labs were very far from being a classical private R&D unit that either protect its inventions through secrecy or patents.
Very few people are working on anything of merit "for free"
Open your eyes, Anonymous Coward.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
Google+ doesn't want me to use a handle. I'm a queer/transgender female so that's offensive.
You obviously read enough of The Fucking Article to have seen this part:
As a queer/genderqueer woman, victim of abuse, and someone who was (at that very time) experiencing online harassment and bullying, I was very vocal within Google for the need for Google+ to support pseudonymity.
Her words speak for themselves.
You haven't done anyone a service by summarizing.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
At least 3 citations needed (that aren't wiki pages! ;-p).
Some people think the story shows a flaw in the system. I think it shows a flaw in Tesla. If he wasn't good at the business side, he should have hired someone who was.
Tesla was a good engineer and a poor salesman, Edison was a poor engineer and a good salesman. Edison was retributed, I think that this is a flaw in society.
Tesla invented many of the electric devices we are still using today. All the devices necessary for an AC grid, AC electric motors, radio remote control, and several other things. Our societies retribute more highly people who know how to exploit commercially an invention than people who invent it, who can die in poverty. Saying this is a flaw in Tesla's side is like saying that a dyslexic can't be a good scientist because of poor writing skills.
On the societal bugs that should be corrected is the ability of people like Edison to hinder innovation. You know why Hollywood appeared on the West coast, right? On the East coast, Edison's company was suing anyone using his patented recording devices without paying huge fees into oblivion. He actually prevented the apparition of big movie studios on the East coast through this silliness.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
That's probably the sorriest, steamiest sack of minging withered bollocks ever to smear across a comment box. Maybe Betteridge on a bad day scraped his own across the table and left what you've mistaken for a serious adage. You're probably just used to being told what to do and how far to bend! Can't take a question cause it makes you feel uncomfortably manly. Yeah? You Move along too, now.
Tesla was probably the most competent engineer working for Edison. The latter refused to honor a deal he made with Tesla regarding AC generators, starting a feud between them. They are now regarded as strong opposites. Edison was a very big patent troll who ended up wealthily living out of inventions made by others but commercialized by him. Tesla was too busy inventing the foundation of the electrical century to fight in the patent system and ended up dying poor.
The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
I can kind of live with the self-interest part. But the short-term orientation is killing us.
One solution to that is to put back some of the old features which forced businesses to think longer-term. Longer lock-in periods for stock options. (That used to be 2 years; now it's 6 months or less) Taxing short-term capital gains at much higher rates than long-term gains. (Warren Buffet keeps mentioning this.) Bringing back Glass-Stegall, so commercial banks and investment companies are separate industries and trouble on the investment side can't take down the depository institutions. Bring back some of the old bank regulations which kept banks more local and tied to their own loans, so they don't make bad ones.
More radically, tax dividends, interest paid, stock buybacks, and executive compensation at the same corporate tax rate. There's a bias in favor of debt in current tax law, and this fuels the "private equity" industry. Level that out, and companies will pay dividends rather than boost their stock.
Make pension funds no longer "qualified investors", so they can't invest in hedge funds. Regulate hedge funds like other mutual funds. Don't allow traders to deduct short-term capital losses from capital gains, which would end high-speed trading.
Give stockholders control over executive compensation. Not advisory votes, but each stockholder puts down the total compensation of the top 5 employees on the proxy, and the share-weighted median is used. Make voting rights pass through as far as the tax break does, so mutual funds and pension funds pass that decision through to their shareholders.
Now that's financial conservatism and solid American values, circa the Eisenhower administration.
In perspective:
Web freedom faces greatest threat ever, warns Google's Sergey Brin
Silicon Valley is as pure and free of toxic sludge as the New York subway.
It would be more honest to follow the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition rather than Ayn Rand, at least the Ferengi have moral clarity.
Dunno about you, but I find google to be hugely beneficial. Mostly the search engine and Gmail, but also Android to a lesser degree in that it's a foil to iOS. I also find Facebook to be very handy. It's basically a BBS for the 21st century, only this time all my friends and acquaintances can participate instead of just the ones nerdy enough to have modems. And I pay virtually nothing for these services. Yes, I volunteer some personal information, but that's something I wasn't going to monetize on my own anyway.
See here:
http://viableawesomism.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/viable.html
Silicon valley solves problems. It may not solve the ones you want, but it solves many of them, and with cutthroat efficiency.
Why? because it allows people to take risks with new ideas. I'd transport you 100 years back, or maybe 700 years, and let you try acting out new ideas back then.
Some of them may be world-changing. Others may be fart apps.
But the important thing is that there are many, and there can be many, because the risk is not all worn by government or the taxpayer or some planning comittee of old farts who care more about their seat than about what they can use their power to fix. In Silicone Valley risk is worn by the people who consciously choose to take it.
I find this "war" between people who want to fix the world and people who want to make money one of the dumbest ideas ever concocted.
If you don't like east-coast MBA's being taught that money is the single important product of any business - good on you. neither do I. Money is a byproduct, albeit an important one. The real product of any organisation we build should be the awesome it creates, whatever that may be. If you agree - prove that old-school profit-over-everything MBA culture wrong. Go and DO something awesome.
And why can't you do something awesome for the world AND make a killing?
Money is important. If awesome organisations don't make money, if they don't have a built-in economic engine, it's like giving birth to a child without a heart, who will need to spend the rest of his life carrying around a life-support machine. I'd rather that life-support machine comes built in.
Our societal life support machinery (charity, government funding) is limited and finicky. You want to build organisations that will die the second someone closes a tap? go ahead. I'd rather see us create things with the resilience of Google.
You think Facebook and Google aren't awesome?
Suggest you take your head out of your ass, because you can't perceive the change these technologies made to places elsewhere in the world, outside your nice comfy American bubble. Compare Hama, Syria - 30 years ago and today. Compare India, China or Brazil back then and now. What do you think technology has done to these people? Given a lot of them more hope and dignity and prosperity than they every had in history.
Recognize you are not alone in the world - there are 7 billion of us now. And things that were possible when there were 10 times less people may no longer be possible when there's this many vying for the same amount of resources. If your idea is going back - it's a bad one. If your idea is going somewhere new - stop bagging the existing system and start being very specific about how you want to make it better.
Last, I sense a big disillusionment with "money". Money is not merely a vacation or a new plasma. It's not just a gold star. Money is power to change. Succeeding in Silicon Valley (and anywhere else in the world as an entrepreneur) is about convincing people of ideas and obtaining the resources to make what you can imagine happen. Money gives power to do that. You're not going to change anything by whinging or waxing ethical theories. You need to get off your bum, figure out a vision to do /something/ better, figure out how to connect a "power source" to that vision in the form of an economic engine so your idea isn't a public liability, and go build this organisation that does awesome.
As a society we have a list of problems as long as the eyes can see. Quit wasting people's time by ranting. Society as it hangs together today is stacks better than anything else we ever tried. If there's things you don't like about it - start fixing them, or get the fuck out of the way of those that are doing just that.
Yes, that's a dare.
-
While in the past many companies there were actually headed by engineers who understood what they did, those companies are more and more headed by MBAs. They don't understand technology that's why they come up with business models like "renting e-Books". That's also why there is next to no progress in the mobile sector for example. And that's the reason why we still have to deal with horribly bad and insecure computer systems.
Then again fewer and fewer people with technical skills want to work in the US, so the remaining companies will eventually have to move out in order to get workers.
This is the way it is with everything, the way it has always been and sadly, the way it will always be until we're genetically altered as a species to have an unquestioned hive mentality. It only seems unusual when one gets initially involved with a sense of excitement about their own dreams and plans, eventually realizing they were wrong for imagining it to be otherwise. Humanity operates politically as a political animal and has never been a meritocracy -- although it tries to be on occasion. The real challenge is to find a way to constantly improve something and allow everyone involved in the problem to buy into the decision making process. Anything else will only result in variations of the original complaint skewed with a different perspective.
So what will you actually do? It has to actually be something.
Speeches that allow you to feel proud about your comments are more about the pride and little about the (conveniently vague) idea. The idealistic rant is a classic condition of human nature. It's been done by everyone at one time or another and not unique to any time, place or culture. Stating the obvious while thinking others were unaware of the obvious and thinking they have become impressed with your enlightened insight is one aspect of what the Greeks meant by being sophomoric. After stating the obvious, you then "walk away" and leave it for someone else to resolve while feeling like a genius for somehow equating the stating of a problem with the offering of a solution.
Personally, my beliefs presently lack the cynicism anyone may wrongly infer from this post and embrace a positive outcome for societies in the long run, maybe even close to what was explained in the summary. But that will occur only if there isn't suppression of communication or a suppression of disparate groups of people with differing opinions independently trying to work with each other to improve their condition, including a process that prevents one of those groups from becoming a monopoly; or a way to prevent a bunch of royal asshats wandering around with nothing to do except to question people's motives -- every time they pursue something they happily enjoy doing or find interesting -- explaining this is not in the best interest of society.
The utopian scenarios I'm told I should pine for instead of pursuing personal happiness, never seem to really explain themselves well enough to prevent it from deteriorating into some one-size-fits-all master plan empowering a committee of well meaning self appointed leaders to decide what's best for everyone to do. Also, they tend to pay lip service to people's feedback (in the best case scenario -- usually, they disappear) and becoming an inhumane version of the original complaint in TFS. If you want to prevent it from happening, well ... then (cough) ... you should do something about it.
Yesterday's Weirdness is Tomorrow's Reason Why
...is the Silicon Valley / tech world really any worse than most large industries or professions?...
- TWR, Redondo Beach, California
Even the new shit is unoccupied. There are buildings in Milpitas that are going on 12 years old and have never had a business in them
Well, to be fair, it's Milpitas. People normally like to breathe through their noses.
And still new shit is going up today for the same reason, the fed gave them stimulus dollars to put union members to work, whether there was an actual need or not for the structure is irrelevant, it's jobs the current administration can claim to have saved or created.
Same shit goes on in China; they have work crews building cities that no one will ever live in, a second crew comes along behind the first and demolishes what was built, followed by a third crew that cleans it all up, it comes full circle and is repeated again and again. It accomplishes nothing other then give people something to do. The members of the work crew know full well that what they're doing is meaningless, its just busy work.
Would you rather the people just sit at home unemployed? I'd rather the government pay people to build, then knock over buildings, than have them unemployed, hungry and ready to rob me to feed their kids.
While everything you say is probably true, it's the kids that flipped their vapid start-ups who are buying 5-million dollar mansions in the hills, and it's the hard-working "traditional company" schmucks toiling away making "competitive" wages who are renting the 900 sq.ft. flats.
Given the choice, I'd take the vapid start-up path every time. Do what society rewards best.
Until you find a way of leveraging those members of society that have the gold to make rules according to your way of thought, you're screaming down the wind. If your answer to this is 'Redistribution' well that only happens in budding communist/socialist/soon-to-be-failed states and we're no where near seeing that in the U.S. of A. regardless of how hard you wish. Or how hard the media tries to sell that tired old chestnut.
Compounding this: If you or I were one of them with the gold, making the rules, we'd be exactly the same as the ones doing it now.
Are people confusing the Slashdot journal post by the user "Concealment" with the post being submitted by the editor "Soulskill"? He may agree with the idea, I don't know; then again, he may not and be wrongly criticized just for being a submission editor. In any case, shouldn't the comments be directed at Concealment?
Yesterday's Weirdness is Tomorrow's Reason Why
Seriously... a company that consistently ranks among the top of every "Best Companies to work for" list keeps trying to recruit you, and you're complaining??? While tons people struggle to find work and would love to even get past the first round at Google?
It's like passing by people dying in the desert, complaining about how that awful water you're drinking should taste better.
Half of the achievements of the 20th century was publicly funded, let's not forget about that.
Publicly funded with private funds, let's not forget that. The US government does have modest sources of income from providing services for pay, but at a glance it appears to be around 3% of overall federal revenue. The rest comes from taxes. I gather most borrowing is from other governments so there is that sort of "funding" as well.
Ever hear the phrase "Pop will eat itself?" It stems from hatred of so-called "Pop" or "popular" music. What it means is this: Popular music or what is popular will fall out of favor and be discarded for the new, shiny "Pop" music. It will "eat" itself.
The same holds true for capitalism. I mean, when was the last time you used anything made by Acorn Computers? Or Aston-Tate? Or logged into Novel Netware? Each instance was eaten by another corporation. The same thing will happen to Google and Apple. Nokia was once the undisputed king of the cell phone and PalmPilot was the only "smart" phone to have if you wanted apps.
You're right about one thing. Corporations are corrosive to society. So is government. All of these things are eventually replaced by our actions and our choices. So don't worry about such things. Look for the change, or be part of the change. Just don't be flattened by the change.
Only the dead have seen the end of War. - Plato
Would you rather the people just sit at home unemployed? I'd rather the government pay people to build, then knock over buildings, than have them unemployed, hungry and ready to rob me to feed their kids.
There is an unspoken assumption and a false dichotomies in there. The first is the assumption that if they're not working then they will be less happy and more likely to rob you. I bet a lot of construction workers (and, indeed, people in general) would be just as happy to be paid to do nothing as being paid to do busy work. The second is that the choice is pay them to do something silly or don't have them do anything, when in reality they could also be paid to do something of actual benefit to society, such as build railways or some other infrastructure that a large proportion of the population will use.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Profit is not evil. There are a number of triple bottom line companies now, with the three goals of people, planet, and profit. The first means don't exploit your employees or customers, but make fair exchanges with both so that both parties come out better off than they started. The second means don't exploit externalities and account for all of the costs of doing business, even those that you would not be required by law to carry. And the last is obvious and note that it is present and still important: it's entirely possible to be profitable without being evil and doing so is important for your endeavour's sustainability.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Can't say whether it's morally bankrupt, but considering your average computer contains PCBs, cadmium, chromium, radioactive isotopes, and mercury - I can say for certain it's toxic.
"In the absence of the ability to establish the attribute of truth they tried to establish the noble attributes."
The US is a socialist nation and has been so for decades if not at least a century and more.
Any nation with a social security system, is socialist. It don't matter if it is a good system or a bad one. You got it, your a pinko. The US got it, so they are all pinko's.
Any true capitalist nation, and there exist none, would not have a social system as it would be entirely private property with a tiny state collecting just enough by magic to do the bare minimum of centralized tasks, like the army. And even there, it would play a small role, relying more on private armies owned by those who can afford them to protect them. After all, why should I pay taxes to protect your property?
It is no surprise that the fantasy land Romney and his kin dream about has never been realized, it can't be realized in a modern society. Take something as simple as a fire service, in a backwards rural place you can afford to let the house of someone who didn't pay for fire insurance burn down, do that in apartment block in a major city and you have some real problem. You MUST put out your neighbors fire, to save our own ass but why should I pay to put your neighbors fire out to save your ass?
Far simpler to just organize a collective fire service payed out of common funds paid for by all according to their capability and service given to their needs. COMMUNIST!
A while ago slate had an article about how a businessman was sure Romney would win if only Businessmen could vote and how it would be nice if the country was run like a business. The moron.
Steve Jobs was a businessman, how would you like him running the country? First off, you won't have a second say because business doesn't run a popularity contest to determine the leader, the workers have no fote and USA Inc. you would be a worker, one of 360 million and the country only needs about 100 million workers. What do you do with surplus workers? Right, you evict them from the premises. Since Mexico Inc and Canada Inc ain't hiring that leaves one spot, hope you can swim really well dear redundant civilian.
Also, I am fairly certain Steve Jobs would not allow people to run small businesses from their office desks, no business would allow 4 competing divisions to do exactly the same thing, so why would USA Inc need 4 telecoms?
In the end, the only workable system is one where you have a large inefficient government trying damn hard to compensate for humans being lousy human beings. You wouldn't need rent control, if landlords build affordable housing. You don't need social security if companies hire for life (japan tried this, until it fell apart).
The funny thing is that America tried the free unregulated every man for himself approach in the Wild West days. People couldn't bring civilization fast enough to get rid of it and introduce socialist ideas to take the rough edges of life.
Read up on capitalism on wikipedia, the true capitalism is so unworkable, only the watered down socialist forms are discussed.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Center wing and far right wing? Well that just doesn't fly around here....
Barak Omarxist was seen in drag on Wall St. being picked up by Eddie Murphy,....very friendly on Wall street.
Always a story behind the story,behind the story......
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
Would you rather the people just sit at home unemployed? I'd rather the government pay people to build, then knock over buildings, than have them unemployed, hungry and ready to rob me to feed their kids.
I'd rather we give up the idea of working 40 hours a week when there's so many people that we only need to work 20 hours a week to do all the work that can be done. And if you don't believe that, drive past some highway construction sometime and count the ratio of workers to dick-holders.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Everywhere you look you can find examples of moral bankruptcy. They are always associated with the acquisition of money or power, and in a capitalist society the two are much the same thing. Capitalism will probably always lead to mercantilism. But any system which permits the accretion of power to already-powerful forces is going to have runaway effects...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
And, what is with Amazon? Normal shipping used to be 5-8 business days. This morning, an order was greeted with 17-28 day shipping, while at the same time, expected date of shipping was added, and indicated to be Nov 1 or Nov 2. The order was available with free shipping which I chose. The target receipt data is Nov 17 out through Dec 14. All this on top of using unrecognizable delivery vehicles & drivers (Prestige Shipping with drivers in shorts & multi-colored shrts using personal cars for delivery and no tracking information). They built a reputation on recognized & reliable shipping and now throw it away. My latest shipment has spent the last 5 days alone in Kansas City, for no good reason. I think it is all about greed.
I don't believe a one dimensional political continuum is adequate to describe the diverse spectrum of political beliefs out there. I'm libertarian-leaning, which some would characterize as "far right", but that's a half truth at best.
I would consider both parties to be generally left leaning to the extent that they are both obsessed with the use of government power as the basis for society. All the Republican talk about limited and non intrusive government is just rhetoric and Democrats openly advocate bigger government.
Where does individual liberty vs. authoritarianism fit in the left/right dichotomy? If libertarians are "far right" then the Republican ideology of big government, erosion of civil liberties and perpetual war has to be center-left or far left.
What do you call Obama's advocacy for massive government intervention in the healthcare system if not "socialist"?
I think what we're seeing is a government in Washington DC where neither party represents the people to any great extent. You're "far left" and think the government is center-right, giving you no representation. I'm "far right"(or whatever) and think the government is center left, giving me no representation. Basically the federal government doesn't represent us. That's why we should all agree to dismantle large parts of the federal bureaucracy and transfer revenue and power back to the states and local communities.
I don't deny that capitalism or even corporatism can drive innovation, but if you want examples, computer science is not the best place to get them. The feeling I get is that groundbreaking innovations are usually publicly funded while incremental innovations are made by corporations.
The government also forced the sharing of innovations in computer/information technology in exchange for funding and monopoly rights. It is almost impossible to find a real break-through innovation that was not the direct result of public financing or some sort of forced sharing of results. Markets are brilliant at finding short-term solutions and amorally deriving answers to hard questions. They are terrible at long-term planning or "out of left field" innovation because it requires too much unquantifiable risk and long-term funding without tangible results. The order of operations has for the entire modern era has always been to let the public assume the risk of creating new ideas (because it can dilute the risk) and then let the private sector refine those ideas into a consumable product (because the profit motive works so well at it).
Actually, I wrote my thesis on life experience.
Elections in the US didn't switch to a secret ballot system until the late 1800s, long after the Founding Fathers were gone. Until then, everybody knew where your loyalties lie. The secret ballot actually introduced problems, people paid in droves for their votes. With an open ballot these stunts had to be out in the open.
Now you are talking about government abuse of technology. The problem is that when the poster called for "social justice" he was probably thinking of using the power of government to implement it. You remind us that the government will just abuse that power.
Wow, racist song parodies? Really? That's what you've got?
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
So true. I worked at Y! around 2000 when they left the campus on Keifer Rd and moved to their massive complex near Moffett. Shortly there after they had several rounds of lay-offs. Then I move to Applied Biosystems in Foster City. While there they built a nice campus in Pleasanton which they never occupied. Then, like many other techs, they had several rounds of lay-offs. Maybe they should tear down all those unoccupied buildings and reestablish the farming industry down here. Perhaps Del Monte might come back!
pretty much nailed it, too bad you replied AC
Saying this is a flaw in Tesla's side is like saying that a dyslexic can't be a good scientist because of poor writing skills.
Nonsense. It's like saying a dyslexic scientist must find ways to overcome his dyslexia -- which is a flaw! No one is going to pay attention to scientific papers rife with spelling errors, that's just reality and it's not something society needs to change to address. Instead, the dyslexic scientist uses a spellchecker, gets help from friends, colleagues and editors to clean up his errors, and does whatever is required to produce a well-written, readable paper so that his ideas and results won't be hidden behind a flawed presentation.
Also, it's far from accurate to say that Edison was a "poor engineer". He was a very good engineer. Not as good as Tesla, but very talented. Yes he had other strengths that allowed him to succeed, many of his PR stunts were in bad taste and I was well aware of Edison's patent assault on moviemakers (though it's not really accurate to say that he was demanding "huge" fees... the fees were reasonable, it's just that movie execs found that by fleeing to the west they could avoid paying anything). But the bottom line is that Tesla could have addressed his own shortcomings by getting the right sort of help... and even more importantly it is *not* society's job to make sure that people can succeed at making large amounts of money, or at doing anything. It's society's job to provide access to opportunity. What people do with that opportunity is up to them. Tesla had vast capability and squandered much of it.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
the goals of companies are are self preservation and self-enrichment. On occasion, this may be coincidentally good for consumers, but just as often it produces disasters like Dell technical support, a medical system that rewards tests instead of patient outcome, Windows 95, 98, and ME, corporate centralization of services, voicemail hell, interlocking directorates (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlocking_directorate) that dictate media output and economic behavior as effectively as any communist party, and Justin Beiber.
Thus capitalism fails all the time. The fails just don't make the nightly news.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Well, for a non-Marxist, he sure does have a lot of Marxist friends.
Really, Marxist? Who?
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
In a capitalistic society, organizations follow a survivalistic way of operating unless kept in check by the people purchasing their products. As a result, I have to blame the society that isn't keeping these organization in check by being cognoscente of the issues mentioned.
Why should people get off so easily? What good does it do a society to just allow people to consume technology services like zombies and then demand that organizations treat the zombies better?
Raise awareness, promote consciousness, and force organizations to operate in a more ethical way.
Self aggrandizing people like the author of this article makes my blood boil. Yes google and facebook are public companies and yes they need to return some value to their investors and yes they will sell your data to some people to do that. I am sure she is still using her gmail, google maps, facebook and what-not without any reference to this in her article or even if she denies using them, you and I both know she is a closet googler and facebook addict.
There is nothing free in this world. And people in general, want everything for free. So, I think it is better for the capitalist world to go communist and everyone work for the good of community and every service they provide to every other human being (read as slackers) should be free. Isn't this the morality of the article ? Or am I missing something ?
There is nothing wrong with the Silicon Valley or any other tech incubating regions in the world. If one must look for some toxic-to-people things, there is no more effort necessary than checking the workings of financial system of the world. What are they really contributing to the system other than being a conduit to your money ?
__________
The more I know people, the more I love animals
Just saying. Not enough people like you in my life (whether I agree with your perspectives or not).
/. ID, likely not :-)
That's assuming you're not some pimply kid just pretending to have thought things through to this extent. But with a 5-digit
"Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh
Criticize all you want, but consider how the frog put in a pot of cool water doesn't sense the temperature rising till it's too late.
FreedomBox is something worth supporting (imho).
"Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh
Silicon Valley is little but a microcosm of a larger opportunistic/predatory-capitalist mentality which has grown ascendant in modern society's markets. The signs of infection predate even the oft-quoted, "There's a sucker born every minute." We have built a system that rewards a very fundamental form of corruption and seem to have little will to reform it.
Could anyone decode the precise meaning of "queer/genderqueer woman" for me? Anyway the author article seems very angry about everything which is difficult for me as an emotionally repressed-to-the-point-of-non-existence geek like me to relate to. They probably only want to hire her because of the benefit she'd have on their diversity metrics anyway so she's right to boycott them.
Google is a tool that 50 years ago nations would have gone to war to have access to. And it's freely available to every human on the planet. Google/the internet in general is the thing mankind has created with the most potential to bring peace to the world. We can address the side-effects as we go.
or else!
It would help if we actually had a left wing. Currently, we've got a center-right and far-right wing. I'm admittedly on the far-left, making me a bit out of step with the rest of the country, but it's deeply frustrating to any socialist when people call Barack Obama, a center-right politician, a Marxist or socialist.
Obama is very friendly to Wall Street. Very, very friendly.
True, compared to most of the world, the far right in the US (typically on the West Coast - California, Oregon, and Washington State) are a lot closer to center than those that are far right in Europe and Asia. That's in part due to the U.S. Constitution which does limit how far right or left the country can go - Nazi/Facist/Stalinist/Marxist forms of government would all be equally disallowed since they would all be unconstitutional forms of government. So no matter how much Obama may want to transform the US into a Marxist state, he can't by law.
But that's kind of true in the US too. The most conservative in the US are typically along the East Coast - most of the states east of the Mississippi River, and someone that is far right on the East Coast is either center or center-right on the West Coast; while someone that is right-wing on the left coast is typically center or center-left on the East Coast. The mid-west (between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains) tends to be more center, but still probably right leaning.
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
Actually all money is debt issued by the federal government, so all money is created by the goverment period. In fact you can think of taxes as a big money incinerator every year and the goverment just creates money to pay for what it wants to do every year - the debt/deficit is just the difference between the incinerated money and the money created out of thin air. To talk of "publicly funded with private funds" is the biggest piece of horseshit I have read in a long time, it assumes money comes from businesses or "wealth creators" (how Bill Gates can "create" money is a mystery to me, he has to get it from someone else) or some other bullshit - currency is created by the goverment, it _is_ debt, and the goverment can create it at will and decide to pay people to do whatever the goverment decides needs to be done. The reality is money is just a way of keeping score, what is real is what people _do_, if a guy in a goverment lab invents the transistor or a guy in bell labs makes a transistor it does not matter, what matters is we now know how to make a transistor - the fact is the goverment has used some of its money to invest in long term research, which has helped the econmony, businesses who always have to worry about revenue and costs generally do not invest in long term research, the gov't can because it doen't have to worry about getting the money back, all it really has to worry about is the amount of money in circulation.
If you don't like Google or Facebook, don't use them. I don't use Facebook. They can do whatever they want, zero privacy, share all data, etc. Doesn't affect me.
These companies only survive if they satisfy their customers. If they annoy people they will go out of business. No regulation required.
There was an old quote from the 1700s about corporations: They have no souls to damn; no bodies to kick. The basic issue between business and consumer (moderated by government) was outlined by Adam Smith in 1776. Free enterprise provides the best prices to consumers. Established business despise free enterprise (which is why Smith had to write his book in the first place).
A current example is Monsanto and GMOs (genetically modified organisms). Monsanto does not want to advertise their products in a truthful manner so consumers can make a wise choice. Monsanto lawyers say it is because consumers are uninformed that GMOs are better for them. Bullshit. Nobody knows if that is true or not yet. What we do know is if you offer a new untested product along with an established one at the same price, consumers will buy the familiar product.
Of course, if you pass along the cost savings of the new product (forego some of the anticipated profit), then your GMO will actually sell better than the current familiar stuff.
It is basic economics as outlined by Adam Smith in Wealth of Nations. A free market forces businesses to pass along cost savings to consumers instead of pass them along to the CEO and Wall Street.
Any one of them out there you can search up, the ones that produce a chart with two axes: authoritarian to libertarian on the social scale, and communist to free-market on the economic scale. I usually score right in the middle of the libertarian/free-market quadrant.
As for the OP, sounds like the guy needs to get laid.
As much as I can agree that undue stress can make someone overly reactive to situations, advocating sex to calm someone down smells a bit too much like "bread and circuses" in a modern sense. What does mass media advocate for recreation and to help people "unwind and forget their problems" but alcohol and entertainment flush with violence and sexual content? Programming on TV dumbs down and avoids critical thinking or introspection on the human condition, exactly what our poster is ranting about.
Don't do anything about societies problems that bother you. Just waste your time in carnal pleasure.
Yes, because geeks are meat machines and have no use for social discourse or the humanities. Only delicious code.
We shed a single tear at the loss of your presence on this site.
Signed,
The Internet
As for the OP, sounds like the guy needs to get laid.
As much as I can agree that undue stress can make someone overly reactive to situations, advocating sex to calm someone down smells a bit too much like "bread and circuses" in a modern sense. What does mass media advocate for recreation and to help people "unwind and forget their problems" but alcohol and entertainment flush with violence and sexual content? Programming on TV dumbs down and avoids critical thinking or introspection on the human condition, exactly what our poster is ranting about.
Don't do anything about societies problems that bother you. Just waste your time in carnal pleasure.
Carnal pleasure is a "waste of time"? Dude, you need to get laid!
Drill baby drill - on Mars
We feel the same way watching from up here in Canada, where our version of right-wing is down-right communist compared to our neighbours ;-)
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Everyone that starts a .com now a days just try and position themselves to be bought by Google, Facebook, Microsoft or one of the big giants. The problem is most of there businesses are crap shoots and setup to fail unless they are bought. People should try to build a business rather then a company to just start and sell.
http://www.thetechnologygeek.org
If you are a Marxist - You have a friend in the White House:
In his own words, From 'Dreams of My Father':
"To avoid being mistaken for a sellout,I chose my friends carefully.The more politically active black students.The foreign students.The Chicanos.The Marxist Professors and the structural feminists and punk-rock performance poets.We smoked cigarettes and wore leather jackets.At night,in the dorms,we discussed neocolonialism,Franz Fanon,Eurocentrism,and patriarchy.When we ground out our cigarettes in the hallway carpet or set our stereos so loud that the walls began to shake,we were resisting bourgeois society's stifling constraints.We weren't indifferent or careless or insecure.We were alienated."
What Capitalist or Center American call soceity "Bourgeois" and "Neo-Colonialism"?! Why that's as American as Apple Pie and the Manifesto!
Capitalism may have it's flaws, but it is better than any previously tried system
Capitalism works well in times of easy access to natural resources, as the economics of Capitalism classes them as "externalities".
When resources are scarce, it does not work very well at all. We have the illusion of Capitalism being "the best system", because it has created the world we are familiar with. Hindsight is 20/20. Capitalism will not function effectively into a future of resource paucity.
founding a company around a cute idea with the aim of selling out in two years to become a millionaire
Totally agree. I was asked to work for a start-up which had this exact mentality. The idea was ok, but no market research had been done, none of that traditional work was done. Create something as quickly and cheaply as possible, and then "when" it becomes popular we'll worry about a V2.. yeah right, and V2 will just be a quick & cheap rewrite to build in the advertising engine, because the focus isn't a quality product for the user, the focus is making as much money as quickly as possible.
They were not passionate about the *idea*. I prefer working with people who believe in what they're doing. The web app start-up culture is mostly about hype and money. But there are still many who want to do great things of real value. They're often started by people who have experience in a certain field and see a need there.
I'm not sure I can agree with you on this one. Capitalism has taken industries marked by scarce and expensive supply and has made supplies abundant and cheap. Capitalism drives change. It has done this time and time again.
If you have scarce resources, you just have another case where Capitalism can improve efficiency or provide alternate resources so things can carry on. Think about it. We've moved from candles to lamps to electricity for lighting, largely driven by Capitalism and the development of technology it has allowed. If there is not a way for Capitalism to fix it, I don't see where there is any other way to fix the problem.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
The USS enterprise would have not existed if all the nations on earth did not put Earth as a a whole in front of their own needs. We can't get there unless people put the needs of society ahead of their own as individuals.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.