51–60 of 298 posts
>democracy is being dismantled not by coups or tanks, but by code, capital, and the illusion of innovation Not sure "code" belongs here. Even less sure about "illusion". Take those away and what is left is "dismantled... by capital". Nothing new, really.
And isn’t social media that prefers rage over information a danger to democracy?
I know it's fashionable to say that democracy itself leads to these outcomes that destroy democracy. I think Arendt was right about self-colonization and overproduction of elites being the main thing that leads to totalitarianism. There wouldn't even be such a thing as a silicon valley billionaire if the United States wasn't the most wildly successful political entity for the past 2000 years. Power corrupts, but that…
> There wouldn't even be such a thing as a silicon valley billionaire if the United States wasn't the most wildly successful political entity for the past 2000 years. It's less wildly successful as a political entity than Christianity or Islam.
I think it's simpler,money has no Color, no religion. Silicon valley just happened to reside next to the hippies in the first decades
When you have too much money, it's kinda boring to keep making more of them. You want self-expression to the max extent the society will allow you.
>democracy is being dismantled not by coups or tanks, but by code, capital, and the illusion of innovation Not sure "code" belongs here. Even less sure about "illusion". Take those away and what is left is "dismantled... by capital". Nothing new, really.
Of course “code” belongs here.
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I haven't read the book but I've read some stuff on a website of the same name, and the way it ties it all together felt very tinfoil hat to me. I think these guys all mutually tolerate each other's insanity in their common lust for ever more power and insatiable egos.
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It's cute but are there any actual nerds left in big tech leadership? Of the magnificent seven we basically only have Jensen Huang left as a technical leader and maybe you can count Zuckerberg.
Elon Musk must be one. Seems enough techy to me: Tesla, SpaceX, Starlink - software being used for the hardware in innovative ways. Edit: Oh, wow, mentioning this guy is surely controversial, sorry. However discussing whether he is a nerd, understands engineering on very deep level/gets his hands dirty OR he only manages people - there must be some psychological aspect related, a form of disagreement to discredit or…
Spoiler: He is not. But he is very good at faking it.
Anytime he tries to give a serious opinion on anything related to computers: It is laughably bad and out of touch (SQL, compilers, languages, performance, etc... ).
He definitively has a scientific background but definitively not "Tech" as far as computer are concerned.
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Code absolutely belongs there. Like any technology (be it printing presses, weapons, or algorithms) code is neutral by design, but not by impact. It can bolster democracies or undermine them. The real agency lies with those who wield it. And it's rarely the coders. It's the leaders, the platforms, the systems that choose how code is deployed.
That's my point. Any tech can (and is) used for this. There's really no point in putting word "code" there. It adds very little additional context. Only in my opinion mostly serves the other goal - to sell.
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Classic example of humour as stop-think
Classic example of motivated reasoning as stop think. Condescend at your own peril.
>democracy is being dismantled not by coups or tanks, but by code, capital, and the illusion of innovation Not sure "code" belongs here. Even less sure about "illusion". Take those away and what is left is "dismantled... by capital". Nothing new, really.
And why not code? Are facial recognition models, AI LLMs to spew out spam and addictive social media algorithms not backed by code? The kings and dictators of the past had a lot more capital than Silicon Valley, but could only dream of building such surveillance and propaganda capabilities, as is the case even in a number of tinpot dictatorships in the developing world.
Sure, just like tank is backed by metallurgy and engineers.
>The kings and dictators of the past had a lot more capital than Silicon Valley, but could only dream of building such surveillance and propaganda capabilities.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardinal_Richelieu (and not only him most likely) would disagree.
Soviet union had surveillance and propaganda capabilities you can't even imagine without any of LLM etc.
Surely new tech makes things easier and cheeper, but doesn't change the basic principles.
My point is exactly this: code makes things move faster for everyone, so you can really remove if from the sentence and nothing will change. In adds no meaningful context. It mostly sells.
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Fascism is a form of ultranationalism based on a myth of national rebirth (“we must purge decadence and be born again”), which seeks to create a new, regimented society through authoritarian power and mass mobilization, often embracing violence. == Facism is a very appealing form of organizing society, so no surprise that people would like to have it. The same way many europeans though that facism is an answer to man…
But the context in which it existed is gone. So if someone calls someone a puritan now, they don't mean they're trying to rid the Church of England of catholic influences. The reformation is over. It's now a fuzzier kind of "cultural" insult.
I think people are finding hard to let the word "fascist" go. For so long you could use it to immediately put people on the defensive. But much like puritan, the sting is basically all gone. Hard for people to grasp here as I know this place trends older and more left wing, but time marches on.