271–274 of 274 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Half of the science-heave PBS shows that are such a favorite of the SV crowd wouldn't be possible without Koch donations. So even if the Kochs really do end up killing all of the polar bears, it'll be well documented on TV.
The Kochs also exert editorial control over PBS content when they don't like what's reported.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think they're true believers, which does not justify the evil they do, but I expect they would view this as a situation where the ends justify the means - or a situation where they are educating the uneducated.
But did anyone ever point at any actual evil that they do? They seem to be rather liberal/progressive on social issues, and quite moderately conservative on economic ones, which doesn't seem too bad.
They've also paid over $733 mil in fines for environmental violations, and they're putting money into lobbying for stripping regulations. Whether you want to call this evil, I don't really care, but it's terrible for humanity and the world, and they should be stopped.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> aka deactivate, no full delete anymore IIRC, you can still full-delete, but you have to find a the link through a help page, not your profile. I'm content to leave my profile up with a big reminder that I'm no longer using Facebook, so I'm never going to use either option. I actually get some satisfaction that my profile is basically an ad against Facebook, which worse for them than if it just vanished.
I feel you, but you may be helping Facebook by leaving your profile alive. I’d guess that vertices in their social graph hold value, regardless of the content present. The more vertices, the more ads served, the more revenue Facebook brings in.
Despite what they say, I really doubt the ever truly delete the vertices after a profile-deletion, since they create vertices for people who have never even signed up (shadow profiles) from address book info they've slurped up.
Plus, I'm pretty pragmatic about this, and need to balance anti-social-network activist with personal inconvenience. My inactive profile's banners remind people that they need to contact me specially if they want to invite me to something, and the banner also increases the perception that people are leaving Facebook. Ultimately it's that perception that will start a snowball effect that will finally do it in.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Companies are just a realization that absent some outside force, multiple people will band together to work and sell the fruits of their labor. Get rid of all laws and you will see companies naturally form except they would be held together by a myriad of individuals agreements. Stopping companies or getting rid of them world requires stipping people from making agreements between themselves and be against human natu…
The crucial difference between companies, as the term is commonly used, and groups of private individuals, is limited liability. Companies are able to take risks that individuals would not because the individuals that make up the company are not held personally responsible for the potential consequences. Similar to granting people monopolies over culture and ideas with copyright and patents, this is a special privile…
Because corporations are ultimately people, any restraints on them are essentially restraints on people. There is a very fine and difficult to draw line between a person talking about this awesome idea he has and a CEO talking about this awesome product he has, but the law does try to draw that line and I think is often fairly good at it.