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"Earlier this year, I noticed something in China that really surprised me. I realized I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing than in

by avs733 9y ago

"Earlier this year, I noticed something in China that really surprised me. I realized I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing than in San Francisco. I didn’t feel completely comfortable—this was China, after all—just more comfortable than at home." ~Sam Altman 12/14/2017 China is systematizing, really appifying, inequality and privilege. The public in the US is starting to push back on that same privilege. To me, Sam's quote, this article, and Erin Griffith's other recent piece[0] all make sense together in a way that really concerns me. [0]https://www.wired.com/story/the-other-tech-bubble/ https://www.wired.com/story/the-other-tech-bubble/

cohnnton 9y ago
With regards to Sam Altman, he is a clear Chinaphile, based on his essay before: http://blog.samaltman.com/china http://blog.samaltman.com/china. He ignores the facts that China is a bad actor in the world, rules its citizens with iron fist, disregards human rights and freedom, and is a possible threat to jeopardize the future progress of democracy and freedom we have around the world. People like Sam Altman are concerning, since he holds the top spot in the world's best startup accelerator. He alone can give China unlimited power in accomplishing their goals: silencing dictatorship critics, bankrupt other countries, etc.
- avs733 9y ago
  "People like Sam Altman are concerning" I think more concerning is the underlying perspective rather than his specific views on China. What you see is the assumption that one's experience generalizes and is the experience of all. The internet in many ways has made this worse rather than better because it removes some of the few remaining structures that force you to regularly and meaningfully interact with people of different life experiences (and no...your uber driver doesn't count). His views on China, based on his experiences in China, are no different than the critiques of silicon valley startup culture as a whole. THey beleive their experience generalizes. I talked about this in a class I taught once where we were trying to engage students in seeing the limits of their understanding of the user's they were designing for. I had them read an article from fortune/Inc....some magazine I can't remember or find... that was about startups related to pregnancy. The decidedly white-male founder base really stood out. If I remember, there were only 3 of the 10 startups that existed a year after the article...2 of those 3 were the 2 of 10 with female cofounders.
orthoganol 9y ago
> I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing You're reading too much into Sam's quote. This is almost certainly because East Asia has zero PC culture (homogenous populations; nothing in history), so he doesn't feel those particular pressures there that he's reacting against here. That's all.
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  Ya. I mean, Trump has far more overt supporters in Zhongguangcun than Silicon Valley. Nothing is off the table for discussion, though you only talk about Chinese politics in smaller groups.
- avs733 9y ago
  I think I read it pretty much at the surface level. I'm not interested in reading into what he meant, his choice of words is plenty to interpret. 'PC culture' is not a thing. what you call PC culture is free speech working as designed...everyone has an equal right to free speech, free action, and free thought. What you call PC culture is in reality nothing more than a group with power demanding their thinking be privileged above critique. The fact that a person with extreme financial and social power feels 'freer' expressing their point of view in a totalitarian regime than in a place where someone with lesser power might have their own free speech rights is a demonstration of how free speech fails not how it thrives. Fetishizing rights, as is becoming common in the US, is an impediment to equitable access to the power those rights give. It confuses the issue and is nothing more than a recuperative act[0] designed to reinforce existing structures of power. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuperation_(politics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuperation_(politics)

by avs733 9y ago

cohnnton 9y ago

With regards to Sam Altman, he is a clear Chinaphile, based on his essay before: http://blog.samaltman.com/china http://blog.samaltman.com/china. He ignores the facts that China is a bad actor in the world, rules its citizens with iron fist, disregards human rights and freedom, and is a possible threat to jeopardize the future progress of democracy and freedom we have around the world. People like Sam Altman are concerning, since he holds the top spot in the world's best startup accelerator. He alone can give China unlimited power in accomplishing their goals: silencing dictatorship critics, bankrupt other countries, etc.

avs733 9y ago
"People like Sam Altman are concerning" I think more concerning is the underlying perspective rather than his specific views on China. What you see is the assumption that one's experience generalizes and is the experience of all. The internet in many ways has made this worse rather than better because it removes some of the few remaining structures that force you to regularly and meaningfully interact with people of different life experiences (and no...your uber driver doesn't count). His views on China, based on his experiences in China, are no different than the critiques of silicon valley startup culture as a whole. THey beleive their experience generalizes. I talked about this in a class I taught once where we were trying to engage students in seeing the limits of their understanding of the user's they were designing for. I had them read an article from fortune/Inc....some magazine I can't remember or find... that was about startups related to pregnancy. The decidedly white-male founder base really stood out. If I remember, there were only 3 of the 10 startups that existed a year after the article...2 of those 3 were the 2 of 10 with female cofounders.

orthoganol 9y ago

> I felt more comfortable discussing controversial ideas in Beijing You're reading too much into Sam's quote. This is almost certainly because East Asia has zero PC culture (homogenous populations; nothing in history), so he doesn't feel those particular pressures there that he's reacting against here. That's all.

seanmcdirmid 9y ago
Ya. I mean, Trump has far more overt supporters in Zhongguangcun than Silicon Valley. Nothing is off the table for discussion, though you only talk about Chinese politics in smaller groups.
avs733 9y ago
I think I read it pretty much at the surface level. I'm not interested in reading into what he meant, his choice of words is plenty to interpret. 'PC culture' is not a thing. what you call PC culture is free speech working as designed...everyone has an equal right to free speech, free action, and free thought. What you call PC culture is in reality nothing more than a group with power demanding their thinking be privileged above critique. The fact that a person with extreme financial and social power feels 'freer' expressing their point of view in a totalitarian regime than in a place where someone with lesser power might have their own free speech rights is a demonstration of how free speech fails not how it thrives. Fetishizing rights, as is becoming common in the US, is an impediment to equitable access to the power those rights give. It confuses the issue and is nothing more than a recuperative act[0] designed to reinforce existing structures of power. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuperation_(politics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recuperation_(politics)