11–20 of 138 posts
That is an extreme claim (in the sense of surprising, remarkable, unusual, and one that needs a lot more support than ordinary claims).
It is inadequately defended here. The argument that it violates fair exchange is tautological.
At the end of the day I don't think Silicon Valley represents anything fundamentally different from the world at large. The world is unfair, and it may become even less fair. What is disturbing is how the hype-machine around "startups" and the unicorn myth encourages people to believe they can be the next big thing. But basic arithmetic makes that impossible: you can't have an abundance of unicorns when the attention…
Woz and the nerds were making machines at home, later hooking them up to one another with the janky telephone service as the interconnect. And this kid, just getting a taste of BBSs in Kansas in the mid 1980's, was so envious of the outrageous number of BBSs in Sunnyvale, Mountain View, Cupertino, San Jose…—all strange names to me. But I saw that they were all in California.
When a job offer got me to move out to the Bay Area in the early 90's there was still a kind of soft echo of those times. Plenty of electronics recycling warehouses you could wander through (and recognizing some of the same faces, often older men, as you moved through your morning circuit to the next warehouse). Disk Drive Depot, Computer Literacy Bookstore, etc.
I had a career there, raised a family there. I watched the dot-com boom/bust, the rise of the internet, Google, and the slow decline of the hardware focus of "The Valley".
When the last of my daughters left the nest, the wife and I sold the house and I retired back to the Midwaste where the two of us grew up. Weird Stuff Warehouse had recently closed up shop and that seems now as fitting a time as any to have said goodbye to The Valley.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
People have a tendency to think they're special, that they won't (or will) be the outlier. Gambling, unprotected sex, etc. We're not great at risk evaluation/comparison. But hey, without this, our public schools wouldn't get funding from lottery tickets! So I'm forced to conclude it's a good thing.
True, people consistently overestimate their chances of being the exception. But in parallel, I think we also lack hype around the opposite direction: learning to live with less, intentionally and intelligently. I'm not talking about UBI or forced austerity, but about developing smarter ways to live frugally without feeling deprived. That mindset would relieve a lot of the pressure that the "you must win the startup…
Well, I suppose I do know of one. Mindfulness training I think has been shown to help with this, but that's still at a very personal level.
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Transgenerational greed?
And still, not respecting these concepts make you the thief today. So, what now?
Just like their predecessors: Big Tobacco, Big Fossil, Big Tech. The Playbook is always the same: Run global Propaganda (ads/PR), while behind the public's back extract the capital from the general public into the private hands of a select few and "socialise" the costs (health, mental-health, polarisation, extremism, populism, ...) to the state (taxpayer). Basically: screwing the public and letting them pay the bill,…
PS: Of course all the SV hipster boys and wanna-be billionaires (do you still believe you will make it?) downvote this. Well, let "that sink in" as your poster boy would say. From the article: > And I’m talking to you now, fellow workers of the Valley! If you really want to do no evil, to be good, disrupt the status quo and make the world a better place, then don’t create a capitalist firm: it’s a top-down dictatorsh…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
People have a tendency to think they're special, that they won't (or will) be the outlier. Gambling, unprotected sex, etc. We're not great at risk evaluation/comparison. But hey, without this, our public schools wouldn't get funding from lottery tickets! So I'm forced to conclude it's a good thing.
It is not your main point, I know - but for everyone I know who buys lottery tickets, they're more thought of as an entertainment purchase than a financial purchase.
(Or perhaps they're when they tell you it is "for entertainment" they're entertaining fantasies of winning—which is probably what you can say for a lot of people buying lottery tickets.)
One of these, is not like the others.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
True, people consistently overestimate their chances of being the exception. But in parallel, I think we also lack hype around the opposite direction: learning to live with less, intentionally and intelligently. I'm not talking about UBI or forced austerity, but about developing smarter ways to live frugally without feeling deprived. That mindset would relieve a lot of the pressure that the "you must win the startup…
That's antithetical to capitalism and consumerism. Not to mention human nature. While I agree with you in principle, I don't know how one would even start to effect any change here at a societal level. Especially when it's impossible to not be bombarded with marketing from people who are extremely good at using your emotions against you here. Well, I suppose I do know of one. Mindfulness training I think has been sho…