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Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

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Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#41

Post by cheeseprocedure »

pdeuchler wrote: post #37

Large leaps in technology have always, and will always, benefit the wealthiest 1% at the beginning. This is just the basics of capital in a capitalistic society. The internet has already redistributed earth shattering quantities of wealth in record time. Besides, to actually solve the "real problems" (no true scotsman, but we won't go down that path) you still need massive amounts of capital. Where else are you going…

> Large leaps in technology have always, and will always, benefit the wealthiest 1% at the beginning. This is just the basics of capital in a capitalistic society.

What about the Green Revolution?

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#42

Post by Phlarp »

narrator wrote: post #21
colechristensen wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This poorly represents where the US national debt goes. About 30% of the debt is owned by federal agencies ... that is the government owes itself that money. Social Security is the easiest (and largest) example. It owns about $3 trillion of the federal debt which it is saving (for now income>expenses for SS) for when it is needed as the population ages. 40% is owned by foreign governments. Being indebted to foreign c…

"40% is owned by foreign governments. Being indebted to foreign countries isn't so bad. It means they have faith in you and are rooting for your success. It supports peace and cooperation." "As for "rich people" mutual funds and banks own together about $1.5 trillion. A lot of those are pretty average folks. Even then this is only ~%10 of the $18 trillion debt." Ok so still that's 9 trillion in debt owed to people wh…

>Meanwhile, in China, whenever the government needs some money they just print it up at the PBOC and hand it out, usually to bail out bad debts to state owned enterprises, but at least they aren't sticking it to the taxpayer like we are.

And when PBOC prints up that money to bail out state owned enterprises it devalues existing currency by the same amount. Inflation by this manner is functionally indistinguishable to a tax.

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#43

Post by ryanSrich »

Jemaclus wrote: post #31

I applied and interviewed with the USDS, but the biggest thing was that they wanted me to move to DC for 6+ months. I'm quite happy here on the west coast, engaged to be married, and attempting to buy a house. Moving cross-country is pretty much a deal-breaker for me. That said, I really, really want to get involved in something that matters. My dream, for lack of a better phrase, no matter how cheesy it may sound, i…

If they truly wanted to embrace technology and working on important problems in the year 2015 they'd support remote work...

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#44

Post by acabrahams »

I'm sure this is a stupid question, but after a few minutes of googling I am still unclear on the answer so I thought I'd ask it here. I am about to start studying in the US (college), so I was wondering if the USDS accepts non-American citizens? Even without a green card? (I'm British, btw).

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#45

Post by ryanSrich »

jxm262 wrote: post #22

Nice read. I don't mean to derail the discussion, but I wonder what sort of developers they were looking for when recruiting for the program. When I applied to the US Digital Service, I received a message back - "we are seeking candidates with skills tightly matched to our current projects. Members of our team reviewed your application, and we don't have the perfect match for your background right now". I'm mostly a…

There are plenty of startups and companies working on important, world changing problems. You just have to look outside of Silicon Valley.

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#46

Post by jsn117 »

wpietri wrote: post #36
dnautics wrote: post #6

"Helping rich people get taxis easier". As a Lyft and Uber driver, I count among my rides: getting a rough looking fellow (who has spent years in prison after accidentally killing someone in a bar fight) get to the only job that would take him - affordably and on-time (he would have been fired otherwise). I've given an enlisted navy family from Oklahoma (husband was deployed) get home from a late night run to a dista…

The explicit inspiration for Uber's founding was as a "limo timeshare service": http://newsroom.uber.com/2010/12/ubers-founding/ I"m glad that some people are also getting easier taxi service. But having worked in in SF since the last bubble, there is definitely an intense focus here on solving rich-people problems; when they serve others (e.g., struggling felons and young military personnel) it is often, at best, a…

Every solution starts out as a solution for rich people, that's what brings the price down for everyone else

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#47

Post by markdeloura »

Jemaclus wrote: post #31

I applied and interviewed with the USDS, but the biggest thing was that they wanted me to move to DC for 6+ months. I'm quite happy here on the west coast, engaged to be married, and attempting to buy a house. Moving cross-country is pretty much a deal-breaker for me. That said, I really, really want to get involved in something that matters. My dream, for lack of a better phrase, no matter how cheesy it may sound, i…

You should reach out to 18F! While home base for them is DC, quite a few of the members are on the west coast. https://18f.gsa.gov/

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#48

Post by markdeloura »

Kephael wrote: post #27
gkoberger wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They do "tours of duty", since I think they found people had a hard time moving to DC permanently. Using this, they've managed to get a lot of people to take sabbaticals from their Google/FB/etc jobs. "Quit your high paying job and indefinitely work for the government" is a hard sell; "come do something awesome for 6 months then go back" is much easier.

Most of those listed as employees of the digital service on the main site seem to be employed for political purposes, if you read their biographies most don't have deep technical skills. The whole department seems to have been created to help Obama deflect from the healthcare.gov debacle and make it seem like he was taking serious action to fix the site.

Sorry... that's just totally not accurate. While there may be some who are not hacking code 24/7, it's because they're providing project management or leadership functions. This is a damn elite team of technologists there to make a difference - not for politics.

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#49

Post by wpietri »

carlosdp wrote: post #40
wpietri wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Saying profit-making companies are inherently not working on "things that matter" is just pretentious, in my opinion. Where do you believe he said that? The things he called out were "helping rich people find taxis more easily, selling ads more effectively, or building sexting apps". He also said that he believed "the advancing state of computing technology has overall benefitted peoples’ lives". So I think you're…

I had a feeling that sentence was going to be taken apart and thought I should change it, but I didn't have the words at the time. By "profit-making companies", I mean companies that work on products for people that are not directly designed to help an impoverished people or solve a health or social problem. That is being implied here. He calls out the "sexting apps" directly, but most of the article is about him rec…

Again, I think you're arguing against something that is not actually in the article. I read him as pointing at ends of a continuum, and I think you're falsely constructing a dichotomy out of that.

He says quite clearly: "I’m still a believer in technology, particularly in the web platform, as a force for good." He also is explicit that for himself he wants something farther toward the clear-impact end of the spectrum: "I needed to redirect my energies towards problems that society wasn’t adequately addressing."

Re: Back to SF After the U.S. Digital Service

#50

Post by dragonwriter »

cheeseprocedure wrote: post #41
pdeuchler wrote: post #37

Large leaps in technology have always, and will always, benefit the wealthiest 1% at the beginning. This is just the basics of capital in a capitalistic society. The internet has already redistributed earth shattering quantities of wealth in record time. Besides, to actually solve the "real problems" (no true scotsman, but we won't go down that path) you still need massive amounts of capital. Where else are you going…

> Large leaps in technology have always, and will always, benefit the wealthiest 1% at the beginning. This is just the basics of capital in a capitalistic society. What about the Green Revolution?

> > Large leaps in technology have always, and will always, benefit the wealthiest 1% at the beginning.

> What about the Green Revolution?

The "Green Revolution" is a term applied largely to the wealthiest 1% deciding to fairly directly forgo some part of the short-term returns from certain technical developments to purchase longer-term sociopolitical security and greater long term profits, specifically, to forgo some of the short-term profits of new agricultural technology to head-off dissatisfaction that might lead to Communist revolutions and instead get large parts of the world positively engaged with both specific product lines and the more general neoliberal economic model.

It certainly is not a counterexample to the technological changes benefitting the wealthiest in the short term.

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