Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you • Hacker News Board

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#401

Post by Animats » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:41 PM UTC

jnbiche wrote: post #214

austenallred wrote: post #24

People generally do love Silicon Valley and what it creates. It’s the media that doesn’t. Ask the average person what brands and products they like and use the most (or just look at the data on where and how they spend their time and money) and you’ll see that Silicon Valley is doing just fine in the eyes of the populace. In fact, Silicon Valley has never been more influential. Ask people to go to a world without iPh…

I think you underestimate how much this whole Russian fake news during and after the election has angered many Americans (at least outside of the ~30% of hard-core Trump supporters). Facebook was already on a lot of people's shit list because they know they're the product, they know their privacy isn't respected, and yet they can't keep in touch with their friends without it. This direct attack on our democracy mount…

Youtube and Gmail, too.[1] Google is trying to sort out the Russian ad buyers from the rest of their bottom-feeder advertisers.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-alphabet...

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#402

Post by root_axis » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:45 PM UTC

Clubber wrote: post #323

s73ver_ wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not true at all. Clinton had plans with job retraining for coal miners. They were offering jobs. They got swept because Trump came in and said, "We'll keep coal mining," despite having no actual plan for what to do.

Yes, but coal miners are such a small subset of middle America. I'm talking about all the blood letting between VA and CA. And (I'm not being snarky) but what would you retrain them to do? Unless those cities grow an economy, they will just be retrained, still unemployed people. Unless you have a massive migration to large cities, it's not going to do much good. I mean think about that for a few steps. You have milli…

The problem for democrats isn't their ideas or a lack of talking about jobs and economic growth, the problem is that voters instinctively sense that both parties are fungible in terms of economic outcomes regardless of what they say, so they stop critically thinking about a candidate's policy proposals and become easily swayed by bluster and demagoguery; this is a losing position for democrats because republicans are much better at these tactics and the result is the continued decline of the democratic party.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#403

Post by yahna » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:46 PM UTC

deadmetheny wrote: post #242

lostboys67 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they do want handouts /subsidies then

This is remarkably tone-deaf. I also originally hailed from a small Midwestern town. The lack of available work is not a pretty sight, and suggesting that people should just uproot themselves and move somewhere else is not a solution for a number of reasons (family/friends, lack of money to move in the first place, etc). It's no small wonder that people voted for Trump - even though his promises were pretty obviously…

Flyover country has nothing but contempt for coastal liberal elites. To the point where they make up bullshit about how much contempt we have for them and whine about being "flyover country".

At least we have the money.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#404

Post by s73ver_ » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:50 PM UTC

deadmetheny wrote: post #373

s73ver_ wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not tone deaf. It's tone deaf to not recognize that what these people want is a handout of it's own sort. They want to do the same stuff that they've been doing for the last 50 years. And it sucks for them, but that's just not feasible anymore. Jobs retraining programs have been available, but that's not what they want. They want the economy of the 50s, where they were able to do the same factory job for 30 year…

I don't disagree that the old timers want the old economy, but if they've been working that system their entire lives that's not exactly surprising. The younger folks, on the other hand, most of them just want something that provides a livable wage. I don't know how to fix that problem, but it's a problem, and every time I hear "lol move to the coasts there's jobs" it just tells me that whoever is saying that has som…

I hear that, and for the record, I don't support everyone moving to the coasts either.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#405

Post by s73ver_ » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:51 PM UTC

tomjen3 wrote: post #390

Clubber wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but coal miners are such a small subset of middle America. I'm talking about all the blood letting between VA and CA. And (I'm not being snarky) but what would you retrain them to do? Unless those cities grow an economy, they will just be retrained, still unemployed people. Unless you have a massive migration to large cities, it's not going to do much good. I mean think about that for a few steps. You have milli…

Then have the migrate to the cities. Seriously, the US was founded by people moving over the Atlantic in search of better opportunities and the west was converted the same way.

That is an awful solution. Housing is already extremely expensive on most coasts. Adding huge amounts of people to that would make it even worse.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#406

Post by iak8god » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:52 PM UTC

unhinged_wanker wrote: post #303

api wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It reminds me of the endless ghettoes of William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy (Neuromancer, etc.) where people are basically warehoused and left to jack into "simstim" and rot. In reality the pitchforks will come out as you say and this endless ghetto will be paired with a total surveillance police state to contain the angry aimless masses. Perhaps not coincidentally this is exactly what Silicon Valley seems to be buildin…

god what conservative bullshit. you must labor for others or else you are useless! just, no. >There's this idea that if you give everyone basic income they'll all turn into philosophers and artists and entrepreneurs, but it's not true No one says that you disingenuous weasel. Basic income is so that people can survive without being forced to hold a job. This is especially important for those that cannot hold a job -…

> god what conservative bullshit

> No one says that you disingenuous weasel

Is there any reason you're being so rude and hostile? It's very off-putting, distracts from your point, and is not in line with HN comment guidelines:

"Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.

When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names..."

~ https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#407

Post by s73ver_ » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:53 PM UTC

rtx wrote: post #357

s73ver_ wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not true at all. Clinton had plans with job retraining for coal miners. They were offering jobs. They got swept because Trump came in and said, "We'll keep coal mining," despite having no actual plan for what to do.

As a son and grandson of coal miners. That is just politician speak. My father and grandfather can't be retrained to do something else and make the same amount.

As someone who enjoys breathing clean air, they can't continue to mine coal. They just cannot. And I'm sorry they feel that way about their wages, but they have to continue to adapt.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#408

Post by AmIFirstToThink » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:54 PM UTC

austenallred wrote: post #24

People generally do love Silicon Valley and what it creates. It’s the media that doesn’t. Ask the average person what brands and products they like and use the most (or just look at the data on where and how they spend their time and money) and you’ll see that Silicon Valley is doing just fine in the eyes of the populace. In fact, Silicon Valley has never been more influential. Ask people to go to a world without iPh…

>People generally do love Silicon Valley and what it creates. It’s the media that doesn’t.

The problem is Google/YouTube, Facebook, Reddit and Twitter are behaving like media companies of past century. They wasted no time in doing that. Amazon + Washington Post is perfect example of bridge from one to other.

May be it would take Silicon Valley (creative minds not necessarily located just in few zip-codes in CA) to take down the giants that are Google/YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, or at least make them behave.

Reddit leadership team must be made to stand in front of photo of Aaron Swartz for one minute each day and be reminded of the cause. May be, just may be then the love would return.

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#409

Post by snark42 » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:57 PM UTC

tome wrote: post #281

jonbarker wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon's stated goal is to have no margins (Bezos 'your margin is my opportunity'). So yes if they are following their zero margin strategy they should be lower than WMT, whose only claim is low price. If something is cheaper elsewhere it is because Amazon has not figured out how to deliver that particular item to the consumer at cost yet. So for example if you find something cheaper at WMT it may be that WMT has a g…

Huh? So how does Amazon actually make money?

> Huh? So how does Amazon actually make money?

They sell at/near their cost (including warehousing, delivery, technology, etc.) which is lower than the cost of Walmart's brick and mortar presence.

Costco also sells at cost, almost all their profit is from membership fees (see Amazon Prime for Amazon's take on this.)

Re: Dear Silicon Valley: America’s fallen out of love with you

#410

Post by root_axis » Mon, Oct 09, 2017, 7:58 PM UTC

notthemessiah wrote: post #346

jeffdavis wrote: post #115

Sincere question: what is problematic about the word "bodega"?

It's not just the word Bodega, it's the insult to injury added to the death of the American dream. Bodega's were ways that people could people of a community could pool their resources together and make a living for themselves while serving their community. Now some ambitious VC-backed firm not only wants to decimate that road to the American dream, but they also have to steal the name too? That's like killing your n…

> That's like killing your neighbor and wearing his skin while fucking his wife.

Somewhat over the top, no?

A bodega is not a religious shrine, it's just a business like any other. I agree that the naming is tacky (it's like "Walmart" rebranding as "Mom & Pop's"), but that's about the extent of it. Certainly, they are not guilty of "decimating the American dream" by starting a business.