In the Age of Trump, Tech CEOs Cast Themselves As the New Statesmen (buzzfeed.com)

An anonymous reader shares an insightful story on Buzzfeed News: Mark Zuckerberg isn't running for president of the United States, but you could be forgiven for thinking otherwise. On Tuesday morning, the Facebook CEO kicked off the company's annual developers conference in San Francisco with a glancing shot at Donald Trump, followed by a reiteration of the company's oft-repeated pledge to bring the world together. Zuck's not alone. Last month Apple CEO Tim Cook led his keynote with a similar stump-speech vibe. He dove right into the company's national security and privacy fight against the FBI. Two weeks ago Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told attendees of the company's annual Build developers conference of plans to "move our society forward," asking "profound questions" of his developers:"Is technology empowering people or is it displacing us? Is technology helping us preserve our enduring values such as privacy, or is it compromising it?" Google CEO Sundar Pichai hasn't delivered his big keynote yet (it's coming up May 18), but late last year he issued an open letter in support of Muslims after Donald Trump suggested he'd blanket-ban the religious group from entering the United States. Welcome to 2016: where tech's biggest leaders are no longer selling themselves as innovators, creative geniuses, or domineering tycoons, but as world leaders -- statesmen shaping the course of human history.According to a report from last month, several tech executives -- including Tim Cook, Elon Musk, Larry Page, and Sean Parker -- met recently to discuss how to "stop Donald Trump." Musk, however, later refuted such reports.

Comments

Nothing New

[ranton]

Companies banding together to exert control on governments is nothing new. This only seems new because it at least appears they aren't doing it for financial reasons, but instead are doing it for a real public good. This appears to be a good shift to me, but the cynical side of me still smells a rat.

Re:Nothing New

[shawn2772]

And adding H1B won't help FB/Google et. al.

Sure it will. Or reallocating visas from WiPro/Tata/et al. Either one will work.

Or even pushing the H1B minimum wage to FB's 250k (as you say it's their basic wage) the FB/Google et. al will have all the H1B's they want 'cause WiPro/Tata/Infosys/IBM's H1B model will be utterly destroyed and those companies will just pack up and go home.

No need to destroy them to fix the H1B problems, IMO. Heck, I don't think you even need to bump the minimum pay scales up. Just loosen the regulations so that H1B visa holders can easily change employers with very low overhead rather than being locked in. Given the cost and effort involved in sponsoring an H1B, plus language and culture issues, etc., that will give American citizens all the competitive edge they need, while still allowing companies to suck the smart people from the rest of the world (which is good for the US in the long run).

Of course, to the extent that WiPro et al have built a business on being able to exploit H1B lock-in, they'll take a hit, maybe a very large one. It needn't destroy them, though, because there *is* a place for organizations who know how to hire and manage technical people, because most companies don't know how to do it. They should be able to offer a cost-effective service even without slave labor. Though it'll clearly cost more than it does.

In the age of Trump "Liberals" love CEOs

[mi]

In the Age of Trump, Tech CEOs Cast Themselves As the New Statesmen

... and the supposed champions of the people are now happy with the corporate influence.

Because some CEOs are more equal than others... Oh, wait, Koch brothers hate Trump too, so let's suspend this campaign.

The noble aim of #NeverTrump justifies all means, does not it? Principles are for wussies anyway...

Meh, who gives a rats ass

[Virtucon]

"My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me." John 10:27