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Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

nytimes.com

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Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#121

Post by deadmetheny »

Fordrus wrote: post #42
s_kilk wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the "sin" is in Valley programmers broad refusal to acknowledge the social impacts of their work, their refusal to believe that technology, which is inseparable from the context it is used in, could possibly have any negative impact on that context, and the people who use it. Even in 2017 we still have engineers crowing about how technology is value neutral, it's a-political, and how any attempt to claim otherwis…

But one main alternative to that value neutral statement and one major outcome of truly caring about the context of technology is literally Ludditism- like, if we figure out a way to make unlimited free energy with zero waste, do we REALLY want to restrict that because it'll bankrupt the coal industry? Does it become the inventor's responsibility to care for coal miners displaced by her/his new tech? I am in the end…

That sentiment is all well and good for technologies like self-driving cars and solar energy and the like, but a non-trivial percentage of extremely intelligent and talented Valley programmers are spending their time and effort figuring out how to most efficiently gather information on folks and how to most efficiently advertise and convince them how to buy shit they don't need. There's a lot of those types here who will bury their heads in the sand and suggest that it's not really that bad that Facebook and Google and the like are siphoning everyone's information and that they don't work on that project anyway so they aren't at fault in any way, shape, or form anyway. Those types are the ones that need to wake up and realize they are doing more harm than good.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#122

Post by jacquesm »

hprotagonist wrote: post #2

I grew up reading 2600 and the jargon file and early slashdot, and hanging out on freenode and usenet, so i've been indoctrinated in this way of thinking this way for 20 years. In my experience, the people who built the net are among its sharpest and most vocal critics, and there's some cause for that. I'm not sure what the implications of everyone else thinking this way will be.

Unfortunately we're being ignored and it will take something much worse than the Equifax disaster to make the message land. Highly frustrating.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#123

Post by ghostbrainalpha »

trafnar wrote: post #110
PhisherPrice wrote: post #30

The only purpose of a public company is to maximize profits for the shareholders. That means they don't care about your best interests at all.

A common way to maximize profits is to concern yourself with the interests of your customers.

The counterpoint being that often "you" are not the customer. The company buying ADs is.

Also many companies are not driven by long term thinking. They are focused on maximizing profits on a quarterly basis which may not be in your interests, even if you ARE the customer.

But I'm still with you for the most part. I don't like when people say a business is "evil". I think of it like a wild animal, like a Bear.

The Bear might be friendly with you, but it is not your friend, it might eat you if it gets hungry. It has its own reasoning. Even if it does eat you, it wasn't because its EVIL. It just doesn't have empathy for humans the way we do. It's a force of nature, and most of the time it just wants to see what's in your trash can and then go away.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#124

Post by TeMPOraL »

pascalxus wrote: post #116

I think 2017 is the year we have a turning point in the media's opinion of Silicon valley. I don't remember seeing this much SV bashing in the last 10 years. I think it has less to do with what SV is doing precisely: it's more about the threat of automation and the consolidation of power in the hands of a few companies. Pieces like this, so enfused with bitterness show a fundamental lack of understanding of how capit…

SV is now officially the current elite to hate. Recent news stories were all but reasonable, and it's going to get worse. People need a scapegoat so that their anger can be diverted to it, controlled and exploited for money. This scapegoat is now the tech industry.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#125

Post by gm-conspiracy »

bogomipz wrote: post #114
darethas wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, but do you hang out with people around you that tweet, Instagram, and post on Facebook? Have you ever had dinner with friends and they have an Echo/Dot/Home/"Smart" TV? They can infer where you are based on being around others that use these services.

I understand about being tagged in a photo and a social media site inferring where I am but can you explain how this happens with a friend's "Echo/Dot/Home/"Smart" TV"?

Ultrasonic? GPS? geolocation using WAN IP of those devices and your device's GPS coordinates. You are in the same vicinity.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#126

Post by gm-conspiracy »

hprotagonist wrote: post #2

I grew up reading 2600 and the jargon file and early slashdot, and hanging out on freenode and usenet, so i've been indoctrinated in this way of thinking this way for 20 years. In my experience, the people who built the net are among its sharpest and most vocal critics, and there's some cause for that. I'm not sure what the implications of everyone else thinking this way will be.

Were you a BBS guy?

That is how I learned to never give your real identity in an electronic world.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#127

Post by tqi »

bradyo wrote: post #43
cmsonger wrote: post #22

"For profit organizations are not your friend" is usually true. It's not restricted to tech companies or silicon valley.

I agree, but I think companies who build a product where the end user isn't the customer unsurprisingly tend to be worse.

"Tend to be worse" is open for interpretation, but I think energy companies, telco companies, defense companies, finance companies, pharmaceutical companies, and many others would beg to differ.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#128

Post by wallace_f »

macNchz wrote: post #109
ChuckMcM wrote: post #62

I wonder how "Wall Street is not your friend" would play in the NY Times. I mean I get it, greed and flexible morality result in exploitation of the masses, but it is not unique to tech. During the dot.com boom it was pretty clear that there were people here in the Bay Area whose only goal was to sell some investors on an idea, pump it up, take it public on a story, pocket some big profits and then blow town. My frie…

>I wonder how "Wall Street is not your friend" would play in the NY Times. NY Times regularly publishes very critical opinion pieces on Wall St behavior. Here's a particularly good one from last year, "When You Dial 911 and Wall Street Answers", Part 1 of a 5 part teardown on how PE firms have wormed their way into critical services in search of profits: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/26/business/dealbook/when-yo...

Ok not bad, but it isn't really fair. The real villains are not PE firms (people who play with their own money and don't care who they hurt trying to make more), but the commercial-investment banking empires (people who play with other people's money, get the world's cheapest, most unlimited insurance--err no: bail out policy, from a private bank that somehow swindled the American people into controlling its printing press (the Fed), gets direct financing from the Fed, are filled with collusion and corruption with government, and have the ability to destroy the entire economy).

After every election there are always the same winners: Wall St is one of the biggest ones.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#129

Post by TeMPOraL »

vasilipupkin wrote: post #95
danenania wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We aren't just talking about some random FB ads. These were targeted specifically at undecided voters in swing states based on data from hacked voter rolls. It was a surgical operation designed to shift the balance while leaving a small footprint. It obviously wasn't the only factor, but given the extremely thin margins in the pivotal states, it's not unreasonable to wonder whether it could have been the straw that b…

you are talking about this as if somebody got into the brain of those undecided voters and surgically forced them to vote one way or the other. It was their decision, made of free will and if a nonsensical ad can sway them, the responsibility is theirs ! at some point human beings have to take responsibility for their own decisions instead of blaming everyone else.

Actually, I disagree with your argument and agree with the conclusion.

The way I see it, ads work, but I feel the Russian angle is mostly overblown bullshit, and US with its history of fucking up elections worldwide should be the last to point fingers.

That said, I'd love for people to be consistent. If one believes that Russian targeted ads were so influencial that they swayed the election, they should just admit that ads are that powerful, and follow it to the natural conclusion - that the advertisement industry is evil and malicious, a disrespectable profession that's an affront to a free society. It's just people taking advantage of other people. So let's talk about that, and not about Russians.

Re: Silicon Valley Is Not Your Friend

#130

Post by bogomipz »

tannhauser23 wrote: post #90
engagement wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wall Street does not claim to improve the world. Zuckerberg for example claims that he has some goal of changing the world for the better. Note, I think this is all a little silly when it clearly comes down to rich individuals that define most of the giving. Gates couldn’t have done so much without microsoft.

Dude, the head of Goldman Sachs said he'a doing God's work: https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2009/11/09/goldman-chief-says-h...

Dude, it was totally snark and the media left out some important context:

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2009/11/world_not_laugh...

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