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Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

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Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#131

Post by dalbasal »

mrweasel wrote: post #53
epc wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Am an LP in a couple of tiny funds…a lot of the funds have verbiage to the effect that the GP will not reveal any information about LPs except as required by law (I'm not saying that's what happened here, and the firms should have just responded that they don't disclose information about their LPs rather than ghosting you). There's also typically verbiage restricting what LPs can reveal about the fund, a recent one r…

Is it also possible that asking about the LPs, and especially saudi influence, could indicate that the founders has morals that could be “annoying” down the road?

Anything's possible... unreturned phone calls are hard to reach conclusions from. Here's a Douglas Adams quote:

"I don’t know if I’m right in thinking this, but I only have silence to go on, which is always a poor source of information."

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#132

Post by vmception »

mrweasel wrote: post #53
epc wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Am an LP in a couple of tiny funds…a lot of the funds have verbiage to the effect that the GP will not reveal any information about LPs except as required by law (I'm not saying that's what happened here, and the firms should have just responded that they don't disclose information about their LPs rather than ghosting you). There's also typically verbiage restricting what LPs can reveal about the fund, a recent one r…

Is it also possible that asking about the LPs, and especially saudi influence, could indicate that the founders has morals that could be “annoying” down the road?

well the point is that you wouldn’t know

its standard verbaige industry wide

your LPs can just be two neighbors that dont like each other

you can make up whatever helps you sleep at night its just not that complicated

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#133

Post by dash2 »

74d-fe6-2c6 wrote: post #112
74d-fe6-2c6 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. "nice intellectual discussion" my ass ... LOL fuck the Saudis and their money

who downvotes my comment thinks it is okay to suppress women, criminalize homosexuality, cause famines in Yemen, finance global terrorism or fillet journalists. I take those downvotes with pride :)

I think it's more likely that people downvote your comment because it adds nothing but heat to the discussion.

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#134

Post by cheaprentalyeti »

simonh wrote: post #67
cheaprentalyeti wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, speaking as someone who had a customer in the area in 2010 who kept me alive... as in, their contracts kept me from homelessness... the US government in 2011 under Barack Obama supported a putsch against the government of Egypt in an attempt to turn the country over to the Moslem Brotherhood, which led to about 1300 deaths in Egypt on both sides at the time. In addition it cost my customer his business. The Ara…

Egypt had an actual election, it was hardly a putch and it wasn't at all instigated by Obama, he just mildly cheered it along as you would any attempt to move towards democracy. Just as the Conservative British government here in the UK did. Any of his predecessors would have done exactly the same thing, so it's bizarre that you try to make a partisan point out of it. What exactly was Gorge Bush's "Freedom Agenda" po…

1. I'm just repeating what I was told by the guy that temporarily saved me from homelessness back in 2010, who lives in the country in question, instead of "Conservative Britian." Whatever that means these days.

2. Obama did what the "international legal system" told him to do and it funded two entire new fronts in Iran's war with the Sunnis, leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths.

(And at this point they use their "legally in the right/wrong" argument as if the deaths it led to don't matter.)

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#135

Post by the-dude »

chmod775 wrote: post #114
ianai wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well Biden did say he was going to direct companies to increase semiconductor production. He says critical components need to be identified as a national security concern. A similar effort could be introduced here. Identify what Arabia provides that’s so critical and introduce alternatives as a national security effort.

> Identify what Arabia provides that’s so critical Lots of oil. And money. Mostly oil.

An enemy.

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#136

Post by KDJohnBrown »

baybal2 wrote: post #71
zozin wrote: post #26

This is why we should not rely on businesses to lead the vanguard of social progress. A recent example is BLM. If you actually think most businesses that aired an ad or have a BLM webpage on their homepage actually care about advancing black interests in America, then I've got a bridge to sell you. These businesses only jumped on the bandwagon when it became untenable to say nothing, and saying _something_, anything…

> Every dollar returned to the House of Saud allows a regime that would've been considered repressive two centuries ago to continue repressing women, homosexuals, foreign workers, non-Muslims, etc. Saying this make no justice to the fact that it's Saudi Sunni Arab Muslims, practicing, or not who suffer the most under the regime. While Shia are the ones who suffer repressions by Saudi analogue of Stasi nearly all the…

> Saying this make no justice to the fact that it's Saudi Sunni Arab Muslims, practicing, or not who suffer the most under the regime.

Considering KSA’s funding of terrorists, I would say Iraqis, Syrians, Afghanis and especially Yemenis suffer an order of magnitude more than Saudi citizens. The millions of Philipino, Malaysian, Indian and Pakistani slaves in Saudi Arabia aren’t exactly thriving either.

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#137

Post by melomal »

pyrophane wrote: post #73

I am not looking forward to the rehabilitation of MBS's image that will take place over the next couple of years. After Khashoggi was killed, some prominent people took a bit of stand and pulled out of the Future Investment Conference. The narrative there was clear: we don't do business with people who murder journalists. So now, the US has essentially confirmed it: yeah, MBS did in fact have that journalist killed.…

You could also say the same about Russia making the UK basically their poison playing ground. You would think much more would be done when a whole city needs to be shut down due to the spread of the poison between people.

Money is money, people are fickle minded and will look beyond incredibly awful things if need be. It's a helluva drug.

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#138

Post by dash2 »

nabla9 wrote: post #29

Money = Power over what is spoken and done. Think about this: MSB meets Bezos and gives him a video that installs spyware into his smartphone. MSB taunts Bezos about his extramarital affair before it's widely known. Then his affair is leaked to the press. Bezos thinks MSB might be involved in the process that led to revealing the information. MSB kills one of Bezos's employers. Bezos flies Turkey to meet his fiancee…

According to at least one review, that might be just because The Dissident isn't very good. Little White Lies 88 (sorry, link not online yet) complains about "the film's commitment to a tired and gimmicky school of documentary filmmaking" describes its technique as "Juvenile and crass", and says it "lacks all feeling and creativity". Of course, that could be another instance of the reach of the Saudi propaganda...

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#139

Post by dalbasal »

baybal2 wrote: post #27

American relationship with "Middle Eastern North Korea" must be destroyed, severed, set on fire, and beshamed. Along with Guatanamo base, it's the biggest stain on US credibility in international relations. In other words, US can't dictate its allies who can they make friends with without taking the prickly subject of Saudi Arabia, and its chainsaw prince off the table.

I disagree.

You can make a moral case against MBS, but... where/when has SA really been affected the US' ability to do anything specific diplomatically?

Re: Silicon Valley Runs on Saudi (2019)

#140

Post by jacquesm »

pyrophane wrote: post #73

I am not looking forward to the rehabilitation of MBS's image that will take place over the next couple of years. After Khashoggi was killed, some prominent people took a bit of stand and pulled out of the Future Investment Conference. The narrative there was clear: we don't do business with people who murder journalists. So now, the US has essentially confirmed it: yeah, MBS did in fact have that journalist killed.…

Putin & company have done the same and more, and their money is still more than welcome in Silicon Valley and elsewhere.
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