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It’s Time to Build

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Re: It’s Time to Build

#491

Post by david927 »

Aeolun wrote: post #470
pdonis wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This overlooks the fact that Marc is in fact one of these folks who has a profoundly outsized role in deciding what he wants. He says what he wants, but then he expects someone else to build it. He's rich: if he wants these things, why doesn't he just pay to get them built? Sure, not all of them, but just pick one and pay to get it built. But, as you point out, he's not interested in long term investments--and that…

I doubt Marc has anywhere near enough capital to get these things done (by himself). 2 trillion is on a completely different order of magnitude. That said, maybe this post is a call for help and the billionaires will unite?

[flagged]

Re: It’s Time to Build

#492

Post by Yhippa »

> I expect this essay to be the target of criticism. Here’s a modest proposal to my critics. Instead of attacking my ideas of what to build, conceive your own! What do you think we should build? There’s an excellent chance I’ll agree with you.

How about you put your money where your mouth is, Marc? Otherwise this is a useless circlejerk.

Re: It’s Time to Build

#493

Post by danny_codes »

MattGaiser wrote: post #121
cactus2093 wrote: post #78

Ok, assume I'm bought into this idea - where would I even begin? What are some companies working on these kind of fundamental building things problems? I know of the Boring Company, though haven't really heard anything from them since the flamethrowers a few years back. Sidewalk labs was doing some cool things in Toronto, but I think they've been running into big regulatory issues too and it one point it sounded like…

In many cases, I am not sure his solutions address the real problem. Housing is rising in price as more people pile into fewer cities. There is no housing crisis in Spartanburg, Louisville, Lethbridge or even Houston. You can build all the homes you want, but unless they are in Manhattan or San Franciso, a billion new homes won't make the condos there cheaper. You can also build all the colleges you want, but the ret…

> I had a conversation with a dean of a university about offering online courses and the reason they said they would never do it seriously is because that would greatly devalue that people admitted to that school were top tier and thus were top tier on the way out.

IMO that's pretty short-sighted. This line of reasoning is that the degree is valuable _because_ its exclusive, not because the degree is evidence of particular skills gained.

If you simply took the exact same course structure and grading from a Harvard degree and put it online for thousands, the skills gained would be identical.

Obviously being admitted to Harvard signals things besides skill. Wealth and connections, for example, though I would argue maintaining those value signals is harmful to society. It's unfortunate that this dean values those things over increased access to education.

> Is what makes Harvard special that it is doing something uniquely right or that it has the unique ability to draw the best?

'Excellence' in institutions is self-fulfilling. Harvard is seen as being the best, and therefore students choose to go there because they believe it's the best. Since the best students go there, Harvard is indeed the best. At the end of the day it's just perception that drives the cycle. Oh also being ludicrously wealthy.

Re: It’s Time to Build

#494

Post by adamsea »

pascalxus wrote: post #368
treis wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I find this essay to be extremely frustrating, and a good example of the attitude I've personally witnessed Andreessen have in the few interactions I've had with him directly. It's like it was written to be the perfect example of SV myopia for the rest of the world. Some examples: >Even private universities like Harvard are lavished with public funding; why can’t 100,000 or 1 million students a year attend Harvard?…

>>You see it in transportation. Where are the supersonic aircraft? Where are the millions of delivery drones? Where are the high speed trains, the soaring monorails, the hyperloops, and yes, the flying cars? >Because none of this stuff is economically or physically practical. He seems to want us to live in a science fiction fantasy world. I'm pretty sure most of that stuff is highly illegal. Make things illegal, and…

> Make things illegal, and they don't happen.

Well, as you said yourself, Uber happened. Why? Because it's investors saw a chance to make a huge profit, and so they _wanted_ to invest in that army of lobbyists.

However those same investors do not seem so excited to put their money where their mouth is when it comes to employment security, healthcare, etc, otherwise they would have _wanted_ Uber to have its drivers be employees, w/all the legal responsibilities entailed.

Re: It’s Time to Build

#496

Post by adamsea »

amasad wrote: post #321
worik wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a problem. Ten years is not long term. In the long term we are all dead. So we have to want to do these things for people who are not born yet and who will never pay us or pay us back or be able to even thank us. We have to do these things because these things are the right thing to do. That will decrease our wealth. Now please explain how capitalism can do that?

Having children will give you that incentive. People with no children will have higher time preference -- they prefer today's consumption over investment in the future. That's why I find a lot of the antinatalism of modern western culture to be concerning.

Yes and no? Plenty of parents in the U.S. with children don't seem to care about the environment.

Re: It’s Time to Build

#497

Post by haltingproblem »

I have nothing against the VC industry just like I have nothing against hedge funds, PE or the banking industry. They manage capital inside a regulatory framework to generate returns for their investors. The VC industry however excels at hype and hagiography which enables them to build up entrepreneurship as a holy calling while urging on legions of founders to take more risk but I digress.....

Imagine Wynn Resorts (world's largest operator of Casinos) berating the world for living large, drinking too much and indulging in non-productive activities. The biggest hits of a16z - airbnb, lyft, pinterest - are companies that are either media assets to monetize eyeballs, or software that extracts more value from existing assets while doing an end-run around existing regulation.

Yaay for a16z for being such baller investors. But to tell the rest of us it is time to build is like Pepsico trying to scare us into healthy habits.

Immensely hypocritical article.

Re: It’s Time to Build

#498

Post by zelly »

Aeolun wrote: post #452
kebman wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody want's a new McDonald's destroying their old status quo in their country. People don't want one-world-gov. They want disparate nations, that have charm and local uniqueness. Except that goes directly towards harmonizing international (trade) laws. If you want a lesson, check out how Lidl did in Norway when they challenged local chain stores.

> People don’t want one-world-gov Speak for yourself. I would personally love this. We’re long overdue for a one world government.

As long as it's $MY_POLITICS, I would love a one world government

Re: It’s Time to Build

#499

Post by dangoldin »

Aeolun wrote: post #452
kebman wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody want's a new McDonald's destroying their old status quo in their country. People don't want one-world-gov. They want disparate nations, that have charm and local uniqueness. Except that goes directly towards harmonizing international (trade) laws. If you want a lesson, check out how Lidl did in Norway when they challenged local chain stores.

> People don’t want one-world-gov Speak for yourself. I would personally love this. We’re long overdue for a one world government.

I've been thinking along similar lines - in my mind it boils down to that these days we have problems that only a global government can solve. And you can see this through history - tribes, cities, states, countries, X.

Re: It’s Time to Build

#500

Post by jussij »

jahaja wrote: post #423
tekdude wrote: post #388

Regulatory capture is indeed a major underlying cause of a lot of the issues, but who will actually do the political work to fight against it? Someone spent money to capture the regulations in the first place, through lobbying and campaign donations. Who will spend the money to lobby and donate for the cause of undoing that? The "builders"? No, their focus and limited capital is spent on whatever it is they are worki…

> Regulatory capture is indeed a major underlying cause of a lot of the issues How is it even possible to isolate capitalism from regulatory capture? Capital accumulation inherently creates power and influence, so regulatory capture is surely just the perfectly logical second phase?

Now I can't speak for other government systems around the world, but here in Australia a big step forward would be as simple as having open and transparent government.

Currently we have a Federal Government that loves slapping 'secret and confidential' stickers on as many of it's documents, just to keep them secret.

Add to that they spends large amounts of time, money and effort fighting to keep these details secret by vigorously challenging freedom of information request.

Then we have the problem where all layers of government love getting into bed with big business, while keeping the details of these arrangements secret using 'commercial in confidence' contracts.

Just one example of the later is how the New South Wales Government entered into a secret deal with a private toll road company, agreeing to make major road changes (i.e. closing public roads) in an effort to force traffic through the new toll road tunnel.

None of this was made public at the time and would never have been released to the public had the toll company not gone into receivership.

This brought the matter before the courts and the court forced the government to hand over these secret documents:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_City_Tunnel

To me this is a classic example of the problems with modern governments, where they are more interested in working for big business, rather than serving their constituents.

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