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Billionaire Donors Lavish Millions On Code.org Crowdfunding Project
theodp (442580) writes "Whether it's winning yacht races, assembling the best computer science faculty, or even dominating high school basketball, billionaires like to win. Which may help explain why three tech billionaires — Code.org backers (and FWD.us founders) Mark Zuckerberg, VC John Doerr, and Sean Parker — stepped up to the plate and helped out Code.org's once-anemic Hour of Code Indiegogo crowdfunding project with $500k donations. When matched by Code.org's largest donors (Bill Gates, Reid Hoffman and others), the three donations alone raised $3,000,000, enough to reach the organization's goal of becoming the most funded crowdfunding campaign ever on Indiegogo. On its campaign page, Code.org remarked that "to sustain our organization for the long haul, we need to engage parents and community members," which raises questions about how reliant the K-12 learn-to-code movement might be on the kindness of its wealthy corporate and individual donors. Code.org started shedding some light on its top donors a few months back, but contributor names are blank in the 2013 IRS 990 filing posted by the organization on its website, although GuideStar suggests the biggest contributors in 2013 were Microsoft ($3,149,411) and Code.org founders Hadi and Ali Partovi ($1,873,909 in Facebook stock). Coincidentally, in a Reddit AMA at Code.org's launch, CEO and Founder Hadi Partovi noted that his next-door-neighbor is Microsoft General Counsel and Code.org Board member Brad Smith, whose FWD.us bio notes is responsible for Microsoft's philanthropic work. Just months before Code.org and FWD.us emerged on the lobbying scene, Smith announced Microsoft's National Talent Strategy, which called for "an increase in developing the American STEM pipeline in exchange for these new [H-1B] visas and green cards," a wish that President Obama is expected to grant shortly via executive action."
wont ever touch this always a reason they do this
That's cheap compared to paying programmers enough to make the job desirable. The thing with being cheap is that it usually doesn't get the job done.
The fact that it benefits them and that we don't like some things they've done do not together imply that this is automatically a bad thing.
This is simple. Tech firms benefit when people are more competent with tech.
Nice thing about billionaires is it really only takes one to make a crowd.
A nice thing about this is that tech is very fluid. The surplus American workers generated by Code.org will include the people who go off and start their own companies, and either displace these big tech companies or get bought out for ungodly sums that their buyers will never get back. These guys are sowing the seeds of their own demise through their myopic greed.
...why all this obsession to get every kid out there and their dogs to "code"?
Why support a racist and misandric bunch of SJWs? This ends up perpetuating stereotypes, while creating resentment all around.
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
Here is how you boost your child's high school basketball team.
That's like 0.1% of their worth. It would be like me "lavishing" 60$ on them.
There is a great portion of my favorite book on Political thought regarding wages and the Artisan. Socrates points out that once a person in society receives ample money for a project they no longer have incentive to do future work. Socrates continues stating that this is not the biggest problem. The biggest problem is that the person with the wealth is now free to meddle in the affairs of everybody else in society. That meddling is almost never in societies interests, but that person or the person's close friends and associates, so that they gain further control of society and have more stuff than everyone else.
That book in case you are interested is Plato's "The Republic".
The whole "everyone should code" argument is foolish. Society needs plumbers, welders, architects, accountants, doctors, physicists, line workers, and every other job there is. As society has demand for jobs the wages should go up, which draws people into the needed jobs. Since coders are in demand and receive good wages for their work, it seems at least some of this push is to artificially reduce the wages by flooding the market. And lets face it, there are not a whole lot of decent paying middle class jobs left in the US any longer.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
One of the first things code.org needs to do is settle on the first coding language to teach. Problem with coding languages is they do not follow the logic of other things young people are taught 'reading, 'w'riting and 'a'rithmatic' but only follows their own 'internal' logic and this makes it much more difficult to learn. The language needs to more tightly align with normal spoken and written language and maths use. Which of course makes other spoken languages coding language an interesting problem. Want more people to learn to code make code learn able, make sure is does not break the logic rules of other things they are taught and adheres to those logic rules. So a new free open source learning to code language, with some real research on how to align it properly with language and maths use, rather than convenience, or because it was done that way on punch cards. Simple proof of how defective programmers and the computer industry, is the querty keyboard, seriously still making excuses for non-alphabetic keyboards when teaching alphabetic order is one of the first lessons learned when learning to bloody write. Any one who tries to excuse that is a fool.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
You and everyone else who thinks being a plumber is a lucrative job now and tomorrow needs to understand that automation is going to change the employment landscape dramatically in the coming years. The undereducated people who have been automated out of their warehouse work, call center jobs, etc. will dogpile on those jobs that pay well and don't require a diploma. Then those jobs won't pay so well.
These wealthy tech billionaires see the writing on the wall and are trying to help equip the masses to be more relevant in tomorrow's job market. I appreciate your reference to Socrates and think it's an astute observation. While I think on the higher-end of the tech jobforce, companies like facebook and Microsoft are abusing the H1B visa program, I do think their support of STEM is in the interest of growing the domestic workforce towards the needs of industry.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
"The fact that it benefits them and that we don't like some things they've done do not together imply that this is automatically a bad thing. "
They do not together imply that is automatically a good thing wither, that's for sure. .. giving .. a .. sh1t..
Why are these multinational determined not to employ native residents?
Short answer. Immigrants have less rights and can be more easily trampled on - in the workplace, and in the country in general. Also, they tend not to give a s£it about the country they're in. Chinese immigrants sending money home to their families in China, signing the dotted line to give up liberties, and generally just not
Giving money to help others makes the world a better place, and is praiseworthy. Complaining about others doing so isn't helping.
Let us take a few billionaires in the US and see what "giving" could result in. Bill Gates with an estimated personal wealth of 67 Billion dollars could give away 66 Billion and still have a billion left (enough to live comfortably for the rest of his life and make his children very wealthy when he dies). That would purchase 660,000 houses for the homeless population in the US valued at 100,000 each. This is more than the amount of homeless people estimated in the US (by approximately 50,000) so would help 50,000 families in poverty as well. Add in Warren Buffet (53B), Larry Ellison(43B), the Koch brothers (34B each), and we have quite a few families that were in poverty in the US that now have a house bought and paid for.
Notice that we don't even touch a guy like David Rockefeller because his net worth is not reported, but estimated at 340 Billion dollars. That wealth alone would purchase 3.4 million houses valued at 100,000 each.
I would fully agree that the plan to purchase all of these people houses would not solve all of the problems, those people would need to get some form of income to pay their property tax every year, maintain the houses, and pay for insurance. The Walton family and all it's members could chip in some of their combined estimate of 130 Billion dollars into a fund to ensure that people can get by during hard times or just prepay the tax and insurance. Michael Bloomberg(27B), Jeff Bezos(25B) and Larry Page(23B) could all chip in as well, to make sure these people get education, medicine, etc.. to ensure that all of these people become productive members of society.
The guy that can't afford giving 60.00 without missing a phone bill would probably not complain if these stories were not presented as though these billionaires were making a sacrifice. Sure, it's nice that they give something to causes but the billionaires also seem to only give what they can benefit from giving. The issue is in the presentation, and it should be expected that people that do give what they can afford to the donation buckets have some resentment.
"Whether it's winning yacht races, assembling the best computer science faculty, or even dominating high school basketball, billionaires like to win. Which may help explain why three tech billionaires — Code.org backers (and FWD.us founders) Mark Zuckerberg, VC John Doerr, and Sean Parker — stepped up to the plate and helped out Code.org's once-anemic Hour of Code Indiegogo crowdfunding project with $500k
I guess they could have bragged about how great their skiing abilities are compared to the Urban crowd that can't afford 100K worth of gear and 1,000/day lift fees to make things look worse.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
That was funny!!
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Now it all makes sense. These are cheap flashy diversions intended as distraction from the real agenda. They can claim they are supporting the future of STEM education in the US, and training those post K-12 to become employable in software. See, they are patriotic businessmen who love the US!!!
Meanwhile the real plan is to flood the market with unlimited foreign trained employees and drive technical salaries into the dirt. They won't be satisfied until technical talent is in the same range as minimum wage.
Before anyone screams that I'm crazy, that is exactly what happened in the visual effects industry. A combination of moving jobs offshore, lots of 1H-B visas, and a glut of under-trained people moved salaries for many into the under $25/hour range. No health insurance, and since everyone is a show hire, no job security. You don't like the unpaid 40% overtime? Go work at Starbucks.
By the way, that is not a theoretical circumstance. I know someone who used to do pretty well doing visual effects. Eventually he had to declare bankruptcy, and take jobs at both Starbucks and Target. When he finally got back into do effects he was making a third his previous salary. Since he is officially a "professional", he works at least 16 hours a week unpaid overtime. The job is six months, and at the first of the year he'll be pounding the pavement looking for something else. It's kind of like free lance indentured servitude.
If your think that your precious technical ass is immune to this, you deserve to end up sleeping in your car. The plan to screw you is in motion and all systems are go. The only question is what are you going to do about it.
Why is Snark Required?
ah. nationalism at work. the new religion
You use the word "native".
I don't think it means what you think it does
It should not be surprising to see those names up there, for them it is all about getting access to cheaper employees by conjuring up the idea that there are not enough "experts" available. Bitkom has been doing the same scheme for over a decade now in Germany and it has become a running joke amongst IT professionals.
"Only one thing is impossible for God: To find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." - Mark Twain
Once they spend 3 billion they will earn my respect.
This still doesn't explain why Facebook is worth $208 billion. That's more than AT&T which has paying customers, Toyota, which makes cars, and Pfizer, which makes drugs. How does Facebook make their money, or enough to justify it being more valuable than Toyota?
This Sig does not Exist.
You use the word "native".
I don't think it means what you think it does
from merriam webster: Native: 1. born in a particular place
I did supect in smaller percentages than name engineering schools. A couple months of web coding does not make a software engineer.
They wouldn't have to do this if we just closed tax loopholes, then America would actually have the money to teach its youth.
Technology is not the solution; you can't scale attention.
The outcome of any serious research can only be to make two questions grow where only one grew before. - Thorstein