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I've been working on a theory that corporations are actually cults. This is excellent validation.

by jsprogrammer 11y ago

chrismarlow9 11y ago
I think Google and Apple alone prove your theory.
- jsprogrammer 11y ago
  Unfortunately, I think I'd have to assert and verify that for every corporation to truly prove it. I'm not interested in spending my life doing that, but someone simply needs to show a counter-example to force me to drop the theory :P
nostrademons 11y ago
So is every human organization. The basic facts of life are that we're born, we eat, we sleep, we shit, we piss, some of us reproduce, and we die. All other meaning beyond that is socially constructed, from religion to power to currency and wealth to corporations, cults, voluntary associations, friendship, identity, and so on. All history has been the story of one social illusion replacing another. For a couple millenia the church was dominant; for some period within that, it jockeyed with the kingdom. Starting in the 1800s, the nation-state became dominant; people have been increasingly losing trust in them since Vietnam. The traditional big corp died, as a source of allegiance, in the 1980s. Startups are moving in to fill a void - and, as productive organizations that rely upon peoples' consent for their existence, I think they're a lot better than many of their predecessors.
- walterbell 11y ago
  > productive organizations that rely upon peoples' consent for their existence As a bonus for portfolio optimization and market experiments, they are more disposable than their predecessors. The half-life of socioeconomic belief continues to shrink.
Kinnard 11y ago
I think the whole language around 'cults' is shifting in large part because of startups and in particular the work of Peter Thiel and Steve Newcomb: http://www.wired.com/2014/09/run-startup-like-cult-heres/ http://www.wired.com/2014/09/run-startup-like-cult-heres/ http://blognewcomb.squarespace.com/essays/2010/10/14/cult-creation.html http://blognewcomb.squarespace.com/essays/2010/10/14/cult-cr... Steve Jobs obviously stands in a class all his own. I'd think of it this way, startups and tech disrupt easy things first then harder things. The Newspaper industry was easy pickings, tech devoured it. Now it's working on eating the taxi industry[Uber,Lyft], the auto Industry[Tesla], and the monetary & financial system[Bitcoin]. Once it devours money, which has been the traditional exclusive comport of governments, government itself will be next. After that . . . Religion. This pattern makes sense, pioneering West was often driven by a religious sentimentality. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Maybe we will start calling them NRE's: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_religious_movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_religious_movement
criddell 11y ago
If I open a restaurant supply shop to service restaurants in my city, is that a startup? Is my job to create believers? There seems to be something especially grandiose about internet startups to a lot of people. 15 years ago I bought into it (I was a fan of Wired's long boom prediction). These days, I'm a bit more jaded. Starting an internet business these days feels a little like starting a rock band.

I've been working on a theory that corporations are actually cults. This is excellent validation.

chrismarlow9 11y ago

I think Google and Apple alone prove your theory.

jsprogrammer 11y ago
Unfortunately, I think I'd have to assert and verify that for every corporation to truly prove it. I'm not interested in spending my life doing that, but someone simply needs to show a counter-example to force me to drop the theory :P

nostrademons 11y ago

So is every human organization. The basic facts of life are that we're born, we eat, we sleep, we shit, we piss, some of us reproduce, and we die. All other meaning beyond that is socially constructed, from religion to power to currency and wealth to corporations, cults, voluntary associations, friendship, identity, and so on. All history has been the story of one social illusion replacing another. For a couple millenia the church was dominant; for some period within that, it jockeyed with the kingdom. Starting in the 1800s, the nation-state became dominant; people have been increasingly losing trust in them since Vietnam. The traditional big corp died, as a source of allegiance, in the 1980s. Startups are moving in to fill a void - and, as productive organizations that rely upon peoples' consent for their existence, I think they're a lot better than many of their predecessors.

walterbell 11y ago
> productive organizations that rely upon peoples' consent for their existence As a bonus for portfolio optimization and market experiments, they are more disposable than their predecessors. The half-life of socioeconomic belief continues to shrink.

Kinnard 11y ago

I think the whole language around 'cults' is shifting in large part because of startups and in particular the work of Peter Thiel and Steve Newcomb: http://www.wired.com/2014/09/run-startup-like-cult-heres/ http://www.wired.com/2014/09/run-startup-like-cult-heres/ http://blognewcomb.squarespace.com/essays/2010/10/14/cult-creation.html http://blognewcomb.squarespace.com/essays/2010/10/14/cult-cr... Steve Jobs obviously stands in a class all his own. I'd think of it this way, startups and tech disrupt easy things first then harder things. The Newspaper industry was easy pickings, tech devoured it. Now it's working on eating the taxi industry[Uber,Lyft], the auto Industry[Tesla], and the monetary & financial system[Bitcoin]. Once it devours money, which has been the traditional exclusive comport of governments, government itself will be next. After that . . . Religion. This pattern makes sense, pioneering West was often driven by a religious sentimentality. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Maybe we will start calling them NRE's: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_religious_movement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_religious_movement

criddell 11y ago

If I open a restaurant supply shop to service restaurants in my city, is that a startup? Is my job to create believers? There seems to be something especially grandiose about internet startups to a lot of people. 15 years ago I bought into it (I was a fan of Wired's long boom prediction). These days, I'm a bit more jaded. Starting an internet business these days feels a little like starting a rock band.