7 ms·

DC faces Silicon Valley's riches and ever-growing power

42 points by electic 10y ago

eli_gottlieb 10y ago
I feel like these kinds of Valley-flattering articles can only continue as long as the Department of Justice and Department of Labor continue to enforce antitrust and labor laws leniently. Google and Facebook are monopolies, Uber's profit margins shrink whenever the drivers decide to stick up for themselves and demand legal rights and status as employees, and a who's-who list of tech companies have been declared guilty in court of colluding to suppress engineers' salaries and bargaining power. I look forward to seeing the interesting technologies the tech sector will concoct and market when the strong arm of the law finally forces it to concoct and market technologies rather than collecting monopoly rents or exploiting disadvantaged labor. http://thebaffler.com/videos/graeber-thiel#.VxPmqyZyhyQ http://thebaffler.com/videos/graeber-thiel#.VxPmqyZyhyQ
- 55acdda48ab5 10y ago
  Another question that's coming up more and more is whether companies like Facebook and Twitter need to be regulated by the FCC as broadcasters or telecoms. Facebook and Twitter have been blatantly influencing feeds and content for political ends and at some point people are probably going to decide they shouldn't be allowed to do that.
  - shanacarp 10y ago
    It is mixed regulation. The FCC relies as much on the presence of Nielsen, which is private, as broadcasters do. Twitter, Facebook, et al, don't have a Nielsen.
- narrator 10y ago
  Uber is a bad example because it's losing billions every year. It may just evaporate when the current bubble pops. In my opinion, they are mistreating employees because they are getting desperate to find a way to make the business profitable.
  - eli_gottlieb 10y ago
    >Uber is a bad example because it's losing billions every year. IMHO, that's what makes it a good example. It can only make money by driving its drivers' wages well below what they themselves will accept or what competing, traditional taxi companies currently pay. With the spigot of VC cash turned off, Uber is exposed as having little viable business model besides straightforward exploitation. There's basically nothing innovative or original about them that lets them make money off nothing but an app for coordinating other agents' labor. The drivers are either incredibly exploited wage-workers or independent contractors who therefore don't need Uber, but can't be both.
    - meddlepal 10y ago
      Has anyone explored why Uber is hemorrhaging so much money? Is it just over expansion?
      - sjg007 10y ago
        They are in a battle for China.
    - DanielDent 10y ago
      The problem with your narrative is that: (1) Traditional taxi companies don't usually have employees. They mostly have independent contractors - just like Uber (2) In many areas, taxi drivers actually pay the taxi company for the right to use the taxi. They do so because the taxi company owns or rents a government license required to operate a taxi. If the exercise is to compare being a taxi driver for Uber or a taxi driver for a traditional taxi company, in many areas, there is no case to be made that Uber offers worse working conditions.
      - eli_gottlieb 10y ago
        Well in that case, app or no app, it's a good thing taxi drivers' godawful working conditions have come under public scrutiny.
      - deleted 10y ago
- gaur 10y ago
  > Google and Facebook are monopolies Which markets are Google and Facebook monopolizing?
  - tyingq 10y ago
    Google seems to recognize they are at, or near, a monopoly in search. Senator Herb Kohl: "But you do recognize that in the words that are used and antitrust kind of oversight, your market share constitutes monopoly, dominant -- special power dominant for a monopoly firm. You recognize you're in that area?" Eric Schmidt: "I would agree, sir, that we’re in that area....I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding of monopoly findings is this is a judicial process."
  - eli_gottlieb 10y ago
    Search, and nonprofessional social networking, respectively. As noted below, Eric Schmidt has already de facto admitted to Google holding a monopoly position.
- kenshaw 10y ago
  Are you advocating making the US government larger in order to force the US private sector to shrink?
  - iforgotmyhnuser 10y ago
    Because that is heresy.
  - eli_gottlieb 10y ago
    Heretical though it may be, yes, I am in fact suggesting that the US government enforce its existing competition laws, which are already on the books, in order to force a few megacorps down to a size where they will be subject to fair market competition and will have to come up with a business model besides monopoly rent.
forgetsusername 10y ago
>Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook wield influence comparable to that of Andrew Carnegie and John Rockefeller Can anyone point to any influence these people are actually having on American politics? I mean, according to the tinfoil hat brigade, the Rockefellers are behind every second conspiracy on the planet. How will these other obscenely rich folk get a pass? I think the political tides have already shifted. The 1% are the 1%, regardless of whether we think iPhones are cool. I'll bet on Tim Cook and Mark Zuckerberg having less influence going forward.
- mrdrozdov 10y ago
  Perhaps Zuckerberg and political media, Cook and privacy?
- ethbro 10y ago
  That's the tragedy of Citizens United. They would have less influence if they couldn't turn dollars into votes. Unfortunately, they can, and so a few billion dollars buys a fair amount of political support.
  - yardie 10y ago
    Have you paid any attention to the news lately? The number 1 and number 2 candidates of the republican and democrat parties are small money candidates that are embarrassing the shit out of both national parties. The GOP golden boy, Jeb Bush, has had to bow out. Even with a $100mm war chest voters still weren't buying it. The only thing CU has done is put into law what everyone kind of already knew.
    - ethbro 10y ago
      Trump is a populist running on his party base's concerns after they've been whipped up for the past decade about how evil everyone else is. And reaping the long-term consequences of the Southern Strategy of the 1950s/60s Republican party. Also, he's #121 on the Forbes 400 richest Americans. Sanders is funding from small donors, but he's #2 in a two person Democratic primary race. I'm not seeing an explanation here that consoles me about money not having an oversized impact on American democracy. And "what everyone kind of knew" (but was illegal) is far different from 'explicitly condoned by the Supreme Court.'
cmarschner 10y ago
Remarkably, as American, Russian, and Chinese Entrepreneurs amass these giant amounts of wealth, Europe is largely left out and remains more of a middle class society. Will this in the long run be beneficial or not?
- yummyfajitas 10y ago
  People in America, India and China are pushing technology forward. We've gotten GOOG/FB/Uber/Tesla from the US; WeChat/WePay/mobile stuff + Shenzen ecosystem from China; Infosys, Oyo (and hopefully smart cities) from India, etc. Imagine what we might have gotten from Europe if they weren't held back by bureaucracy, fear of failure, egalitarianism, and whatever else prevents Europe from competing with the valley. (It's certainly not a lack of smart people - see all the Europeans who do well in the Valley.) It's hard to see how holding Europe back could possibly be beneficial (of course I'm not a mercantilist).
  - exwardna 10y ago
    Can you expand a bit on the bureaucracy in Europe? Do you think it's hard to create a limited responsibility company in Europe? Is it better in China?
    - CM30 10y ago
      Have you seen that law about taxes for ecommerce in Europe? In the US, the shop collects tax for the country the shop is based in. In Europe, the shop has to pay taxes related to the country the people buying the products are in. This significantly increases the complexity of running an ecommerce business in Europe. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-supplying-digital-services-to-private-consumers/vat-businesses-supplying-digital-services-to-private-consumers#eu-vat-rule-change https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-supplying-dig... It was an idea with some logic behind it, but it basically cripples European internet businesses compared to US ones by making taxes that much complicated to calculate.
      - 10y ago
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
russell 10y ago
This article seemed rather inane to me, complaining about Cook's standing up for privacy and Zuckerberg's anti-Trump speech or his new foundation, while ignoring the $900 million that the Koch brothers are pouring into down-ticket campaigns or hundreds of millions more from Sheldon Adelson. Somehow the emphasis on political influence got misplaced.
nitwit005 10y ago
The 'robber barons' had enough power to get the police and national guard deployed to violently put down strikes and to protect employees working during strikes. None of these CEOs have anywhere near that kind of influence. They have lobbied quite a bit, but quite a few of those lobbying efforts have failed.
- gozur88 10y ago
  In the late 1800s there wasn't any legal support for organized labor. Companies had the right to simply fire everyone who went on strike. After that it's just a question of moving squatters off your property, and for that you go to the police. That's not a question of CEO political influence - the laws unions needed to survive hadn't been passed yet.
  - nitwit005 10y ago
    No, they also got the police to deploy to remove them from public places, which was clearly protected speech. Violence by their hired security against employees, clearly illegal, was politely ignored. They rather blatantly controlled the police in some cases.
    - gozur88 10y ago
      Well, sure, if you're going to throw in the qualifier "in some cases" you can make the case for anything. The normal state of affairs was for the workers to refuse to leave the factory, illegally, and for the local authorities to give them a lot of slack, because there were far more workers than owners. Look at the Homestead Mill strike, for example. The reason the battle itself and the eventual intervention of state militia was the local cops refused to do anything.
      - nitwit005 10y ago
        My point was that these tech CEOs don't have that kind of influence, and they don't. End of story.

42 points by electic 10y ago

I feel like these kinds of Valley-flattering articles can only continue as long as the Department of Justice and Department of Labor continue to enforce antitrust and labor laws leniently. Google and Facebook are monopolies, Uber's profit margins shrink whenever the drivers decide to stick up for themselves and demand legal rights and status as employees, and a who's-who list of tech companies have been declared guilty in court of colluding to suppress engineers' salaries and bargaining power. I look forward to seeing the interesting technologies the tech sector will concoct and market when the strong arm of the law finally forces it to concoct and market technologies rather than collecting monopoly rents or exploiting disadvantaged labor. http://thebaffler.com/videos/graeber-thiel#.VxPmqyZyhyQ http://thebaffler.com/videos/graeber-thiel#.VxPmqyZyhyQ

55acdda48ab5 10y ago
Another question that's coming up more and more is whether companies like Facebook and Twitter need to be regulated by the FCC as broadcasters or telecoms. Facebook and Twitter have been blatantly influencing feeds and content for political ends and at some point people are probably going to decide they shouldn't be allowed to do that.
- shanacarp 10y ago
  It is mixed regulation. The FCC relies as much on the presence of Nielsen, which is private, as broadcasters do. Twitter, Facebook, et al, don't have a Nielsen.
narrator 10y ago
Uber is a bad example because it's losing billions every year. It may just evaporate when the current bubble pops. In my opinion, they are mistreating employees because they are getting desperate to find a way to make the business profitable.
- eli_gottlieb 10y ago
  >Uber is a bad example because it's losing billions every year. IMHO, that's what makes it a good example. It can only make money by driving its drivers' wages well below what they themselves will accept or what competing, traditional taxi companies currently pay. With the spigot of VC cash turned off, Uber is exposed as having little viable business model besides straightforward exploitation. There's basically nothing innovative or original about them that lets them make money off nothing but an app for coordinating other agents' labor. The drivers are either incredibly exploited wage-workers or independent contractors who therefore don't need Uber, but can't be both.
  - meddlepal 10y ago
    Has anyone explored why Uber is hemorrhaging so much money? Is it just over expansion?
    - sjg007 10y ago
      They are in a battle for China.
  - DanielDent 10y ago
    The problem with your narrative is that: (1) Traditional taxi companies don't usually have employees. They mostly have independent contractors - just like Uber (2) In many areas, taxi drivers actually pay the taxi company for the right to use the taxi. They do so because the taxi company owns or rents a government license required to operate a taxi. If the exercise is to compare being a taxi driver for Uber or a taxi driver for a traditional taxi company, in many areas, there is no case to be made that Uber offers worse working conditions.
    - eli_gottlieb 10y ago
      Well in that case, app or no app, it's a good thing taxi drivers' godawful working conditions have come under public scrutiny.
    - deleted 10y ago
gaur 10y ago
> Google and Facebook are monopolies Which markets are Google and Facebook monopolizing?
- tyingq 10y ago
  Google seems to recognize they are at, or near, a monopoly in search. Senator Herb Kohl: "But you do recognize that in the words that are used and antitrust kind of oversight, your market share constitutes monopoly, dominant -- special power dominant for a monopoly firm. You recognize you're in that area?" Eric Schmidt: "I would agree, sir, that we’re in that area....I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding of monopoly findings is this is a judicial process."
- eli_gottlieb 10y ago
  Search, and nonprofessional social networking, respectively. As noted below, Eric Schmidt has already de facto admitted to Google holding a monopoly position.
kenshaw 10y ago
Are you advocating making the US government larger in order to force the US private sector to shrink?
- iforgotmyhnuser 10y ago
  Because that is heresy.
- eli_gottlieb 10y ago
  Heretical though it may be, yes, I am in fact suggesting that the US government enforce its existing competition laws, which are already on the books, in order to force a few megacorps down to a size where they will be subject to fair market competition and will have to come up with a business model besides monopoly rent.

forgetsusername 10y ago

>Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook wield influence comparable to that of Andrew Carnegie and John Rockefeller Can anyone point to any influence these people are actually having on American politics? I mean, according to the tinfoil hat brigade, the Rockefellers are behind every second conspiracy on the planet. How will these other obscenely rich folk get a pass? I think the political tides have already shifted. The 1% are the 1%, regardless of whether we think iPhones are cool. I'll bet on Tim Cook and Mark Zuckerberg having less influence going forward.

mrdrozdov 10y ago
Perhaps Zuckerberg and political media, Cook and privacy?
ethbro 10y ago
That's the tragedy of Citizens United. They would have less influence if they couldn't turn dollars into votes. Unfortunately, they can, and so a few billion dollars buys a fair amount of political support.
- yardie 10y ago
  Have you paid any attention to the news lately? The number 1 and number 2 candidates of the republican and democrat parties are small money candidates that are embarrassing the shit out of both national parties. The GOP golden boy, Jeb Bush, has had to bow out. Even with a $100mm war chest voters still weren't buying it. The only thing CU has done is put into law what everyone kind of already knew.
  - ethbro 10y ago
    Trump is a populist running on his party base's concerns after they've been whipped up for the past decade about how evil everyone else is. And reaping the long-term consequences of the Southern Strategy of the 1950s/60s Republican party. Also, he's #121 on the Forbes 400 richest Americans. Sanders is funding from small donors, but he's #2 in a two person Democratic primary race. I'm not seeing an explanation here that consoles me about money not having an oversized impact on American democracy. And "what everyone kind of knew" (but was illegal) is far different from 'explicitly condoned by the Supreme Court.'

cmarschner 10y ago

Remarkably, as American, Russian, and Chinese Entrepreneurs amass these giant amounts of wealth, Europe is largely left out and remains more of a middle class society. Will this in the long run be beneficial or not?

yummyfajitas 10y ago
People in America, India and China are pushing technology forward. We've gotten GOOG/FB/Uber/Tesla from the US; WeChat/WePay/mobile stuff + Shenzen ecosystem from China; Infosys, Oyo (and hopefully smart cities) from India, etc. Imagine what we might have gotten from Europe if they weren't held back by bureaucracy, fear of failure, egalitarianism, and whatever else prevents Europe from competing with the valley. (It's certainly not a lack of smart people - see all the Europeans who do well in the Valley.) It's hard to see how holding Europe back could possibly be beneficial (of course I'm not a mercantilist).
- exwardna 10y ago
  Can you expand a bit on the bureaucracy in Europe? Do you think it's hard to create a limited responsibility company in Europe? Is it better in China?
  - CM30 10y ago
    Have you seen that law about taxes for ecommerce in Europe? In the US, the shop collects tax for the country the shop is based in. In Europe, the shop has to pay taxes related to the country the people buying the products are in. This significantly increases the complexity of running an ecommerce business in Europe. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-supplying-digital-services-to-private-consumers/vat-businesses-supplying-digital-services-to-private-consumers#eu-vat-rule-change https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/vat-supplying-dig... It was an idea with some logic behind it, but it basically cripples European internet businesses compared to US ones by making taxes that much complicated to calculate.
    - 10y ago

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

russell 10y ago

This article seemed rather inane to me, complaining about Cook's standing up for privacy and Zuckerberg's anti-Trump speech or his new foundation, while ignoring the $900 million that the Koch brothers are pouring into down-ticket campaigns or hundreds of millions more from Sheldon Adelson. Somehow the emphasis on political influence got misplaced.

nitwit005 10y ago

The 'robber barons' had enough power to get the police and national guard deployed to violently put down strikes and to protect employees working during strikes. None of these CEOs have anywhere near that kind of influence. They have lobbied quite a bit, but quite a few of those lobbying efforts have failed.

gozur88 10y ago
In the late 1800s there wasn't any legal support for organized labor. Companies had the right to simply fire everyone who went on strike. After that it's just a question of moving squatters off your property, and for that you go to the police. That's not a question of CEO political influence - the laws unions needed to survive hadn't been passed yet.
- nitwit005 10y ago
  No, they also got the police to deploy to remove them from public places, which was clearly protected speech. Violence by their hired security against employees, clearly illegal, was politely ignored. They rather blatantly controlled the police in some cases.
  - gozur88 10y ago
    Well, sure, if you're going to throw in the qualifier "in some cases" you can make the case for anything. The normal state of affairs was for the workers to refuse to leave the factory, illegally, and for the local authorities to give them a lot of slack, because there were far more workers than owners. Look at the Homestead Mill strike, for example. The reason the battle itself and the eventual intervention of state militia was the local cops refused to do anything.
    - nitwit005 10y ago
      My point was that these tech CEOs don't have that kind of influence, and they don't. End of story.