Always has been.
Secret History of Silicon Valley by Steve Blank https://youtu.be/ZTC_RxWN_xo
Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
31–40 of 405 posts
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#32I was around FEDRAMP stuff awhile back and there was a huge push to get "warroom" verbiage out of the tech field everywhere but there, like when visiting your normal silicon valley office we had to be careful about speech but you drive on base and let rip, since you had to interact daily with mil.
Wild seeing it come back completely unabated out of Luckeys mouth of all people. Missiles are kewl, bro!
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#33Transforming? You guys do know where google got it's start right? SV has been DOD funded from the start.
Tech workers on the way to work: I wonder why this tram stop is called "Lockheed-Martin". I guess we'll never know!
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#34It's up to us, as tech workers to push back against this. I quit my job at Microsoft due to their complicity with Israeli war crimes and oppression (and certainly the US government was involved too). It's tough to leave a high paying job, but I feel good about it every single day. We don't have to be cogs in the MIC machine and we don't have to build systems that terrorize people.
Thank you, both for following your values and for sharing it publicly
yes, OC was so brave
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#35It's up to us, as tech workers to push back against this. I quit my job at Microsoft due to their complicity with Israeli war crimes and oppression (and certainly the US government was involved too). It's tough to leave a high paying job, but I feel good about it every single day. We don't have to be cogs in the MIC machine and we don't have to build systems that terrorize people.
It should be noted that MSFT is the only tech company that explicitly asked the FBI to surveil about workers that were protesting the Gaza genocide:
https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/microsof...
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Also thank you for your bravery, it is not easy leaving well paid jobs. If you haven't already, I'd start donating some time with your local mutual aid groups. It's very therapeutic to spend time with people that believe similar things while helping others.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#36some interesting tidbits from the longer report: >Keyhole, a small San Francisco-based company that developed software for creating three-dimensional models of the earth’s surface [was] provided seed funding in 2003 [by a CIA-backed VC firm, In-Q-Tel], and within two weeks, military and intelligence agencies were reportedly using Keyhole’s software to support the U.S. war in Iraq. The following year, Google acquired…
VCs don't have ethics. The first puppy crushing startup will achieve record valuation in record time. The Torment Nexus is already real enough.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
What was your job at Microsoft?
I was a 68 working on consumer products, but it was still too much for me. Especially the revelation that Satya worked with the IDF to capture all Palestinian phone conversations and host them on Azure. Every day I woke up to go to work after I found that out, I was sick to my stomach. I eventually couldn't take it any more. I took a pay cut and I'm still in the tech industry working for a startup, and still facing e…
TIL an intelligence agency spying on a foreign adversary is human rights abuse. I would be super upset if my country of residence did the same to a neighbor sending rockets my way, would make me sick to my stomach
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
What was your job at Microsoft?
I was a 68 working on consumer products, but it was still too much for me. Especially the revelation that Satya worked with the IDF to capture all Palestinian phone conversations and host them on Azure. Every day I woke up to go to work after I found that out, I was sick to my stomach. I eventually couldn't take it any more. I took a pay cut and I'm still in the tech industry working for a startup, and still facing e…
I've always figured big tech workers were so compartmentalized that they wouldn't know their new analytic feature was also going to the defense skunks initiative, but that could be conspiratorial thinking.
Guess it doesn't matter now when they have full on defense orgs.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was a 68 working on consumer products, but it was still too much for me. Especially the revelation that Satya worked with the IDF to capture all Palestinian phone conversations and host them on Azure. Every day I woke up to go to work after I found that out, I was sick to my stomach. I eventually couldn't take it any more. I took a pay cut and I'm still in the tech industry working for a startup, and still facing e…
TIL an intelligence agency spying on a foreign adversary is human rights abuse. I would be super upset if my country of residence did the same to a neighbor sending rockets my way, would make me sick to my stomach
He didn't work for Israel, unless he failed to mention that this was not a USA job.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thank you, both for following your values and for sharing it publicly
yes, OC was so brave
I just want to say that I don't think I was brave at all. I actually feel a lot of shame because I knew that Microsoft wasn't compatible with my values when I joined. I didn't know the exact details that came out later, but I took a very high paying job for a company that I thought at best didn't align with my values. I had to live with a growing cognitive dissonance about the choices I made. I also didn't exit tech fully, I still work for a company that seems ethical and nice, but has VCs that are probably involved in the MIC post we're discussing.
I've debated exiting tech fully but I do have people to support. I think that's kind of an excuse though. I also tell myself that anywhere I go, if you follow the money far enough up the chain, it will be unethical. That's also kind of an excuse.
I'm not brave, but I do feel trapped. I think we need some sort of reckoning as an industry, a country and possibly a planet. I don't know what will happen but I'm trying to balance living in 2026 with making choices that I can live with in the future.