5 ms·

I’m afraid I fail to see the relevance of this post to the matter at hand. Did his company do some despicable things, and did he have anything to do with it? Ye

I’m afraid I fail to see the relevance of this post to the matter at hand. Did his company do some despicable things, and did he have anything to do with it? Yes. I think most corporations of a certain size do. The good he has done the world since then so dramatically outweighs the bad that posts like yours above just seem catty to me. I’ve found it kind of funny and ironic that Bill was always the evil one and Steve Jobs was the cool “think different” upstart, but looking back on their entire lives, Bill has done so, so much more to make the world we live in a better place for everyone.

Jedd 9y ago
FWIW I've never thought of Steve Jobs as a force for good in the world. I didn't mean to seem catty. Rather, if someone exercises some philanthropic tendencies, but the wealth that backs those things up came from illegal, immoral, unethical, or dubious business practices, should we celebrate, or be cautious about our hero worship? For my own part, I find the sentiment: > I think most corporations of a certain size do. To be particularly apologetic -- we really should be holding our elites up to higher standards than 'many people do wrong stuff, so it's okay'. Also: > The good he has done the world since then so dramatically outweighs the bad ... This attitude implicitly discounts the benefits that other people may have done with that wealth, had it not been redirected into Microsoft / Bill Gates. Yes, look, undeniably, as I said from the outset, they're doing some really good work -- but it's impossible for us to know what may have been done, or may be being done right now, in a more ethical history.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  Personally, I think we can't afford to not use the helping hand. It's not like there is a steady supply of Jesus-level saints, who had done not a single bad thing through their entire lives, and who are at the same time rich, smart, and willing to help the world.
  - Jedd 9y ago
    > Personally, I think we can't afford to not use the helping hand. Well that's just a defeatist attitude towards society and an uncaring, corrupted government (no matter where you happen to be writing that from). Comparing Jesus-level sainthood to Bill ... I can't tell if you're trolling there.
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      > Comparing Jesus-level sainthood to Bill ... I can't tell if you're trolling there. I feel I need to be direct: you seem to be failing at reading comprehension 101 all throughout this thread (I assume tiredness). I was not comparing Bill to Jesus. I was implying that you, and similar critics, think that we have streams of Jesus-scale saints who are smart, rich and ready to help, and we prefer Gates instead. But we don't have those saints. Right now, we can only choose between Gates and no one at all.
      - Jedd 9y ago
        Appreciate your directness. I think the Jesus and saint juxtaposition confused me (saints first appeared about 200-300 years after Jesus, and no one has ever claimed Jesus was a saint, etc). Anyway, thank you for your clarification. To be clear, I do not think that we have streams of 'Jesus-scale saints' who are smart, rich (as Jesus ostensibly said, that won't get you into heaven), and ready to help. I do think we have a bunch of problems, and some institutions (governments, for example) that have been developed with the intent of solving those problems. If the problems of society/ies require that we have [the head of] an organisation convicted for violating the Sherman antitrust act come to rescue us with their ill-gotten gains, then perhaps we (as a society) should be aiming higher. Mind, I'm coming at this from a naive, optimistic attitude of wanting to not need heroes in order to save us all from each other.
        TeMPOraL 9y ago
        > I think the Jesus and saint juxtaposition confused me (saints first appeared about 200-300 years after Jesus, and no one has ever claimed Jesus was a saint, etc). Fair enough. Maybe my "Jesus-level saint" expression was needlessly confusing indeed. > Mind, I'm coming at this from a naive, optimistic attitude of wanting to not need heroes in order to save us all from each other. Ok, I get that. Personally, I think I've lost that optimism some time ago now, and figured we have no option but to work with what we have, as imperfect as it is. I liked my utopian/dreamer self better, though. WRT Gates, I'm not pretending his tenure at Microsoft wasn't full of malicious actions. But then, in my mind there is a kind of quality difference between just being a huge ass in the business game, and directly trying to hurt (or kill) people. Gates was only the former, and never the latter (to the best of my knowledge), and right now his actions are actually saving lives and making more lives better. Then again, I just figured out an example that lets me emphasize more with the critics. I was never impacted directly by Microsoft's past misbehaviour, and I was a kid through most of the bad stuff that was going down. But if today the top brass of Uber was to create something similar to Gates Foundation, ... well, I'd definitely feel conflicted. On the one hand, I'm responsive to utilitarian arguments, and Uber didn't exactly go around killing people either. On the other hand, the amount of sociopathy they've displayed for the past ~5 years left such a bad a taste in my mouth, that I'm not sure if I'd be able to support that hypothetical help-the-world venture. So maybe I'm being uncharitable to you and some other critics; maybe my Uber is your Microsoft.
- davidmr 9y ago
  Just to be clear, I didn't mean to imply that it was okay. My text does read that way and I appreciate the opportunity to elaborate. I too would like the world more if there were less of that. I can't think of a lot of philanthropists off the top of my head who made their fortunes from unambiguously morally-good methods. My personal opinion is that we're probably on an upward trajectory. Comparing how Gates made his fortune with the Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, Carnegies, etc. I think Microsoft comes out on balance a bit better.
  - Jedd 9y ago
    Thank you for your thoughtful follow-up. I agree that we're probably on an upward trajectory -- and that's a very good thing indeed.

Jedd 9y ago

FWIW I've never thought of Steve Jobs as a force for good in the world. I didn't mean to seem catty. Rather, if someone exercises some philanthropic tendencies, but the wealth that backs those things up came from illegal, immoral, unethical, or dubious business practices, should we celebrate, or be cautious about our hero worship? For my own part, I find the sentiment: > I think most corporations of a certain size do. To be particularly apologetic -- we really should be holding our elites up to higher standards than 'many people do wrong stuff, so it's okay'. Also: > The good he has done the world since then so dramatically outweighs the bad ... This attitude implicitly discounts the benefits that other people may have done with that wealth, had it not been redirected into Microsoft / Bill Gates. Yes, look, undeniably, as I said from the outset, they're doing some really good work -- but it's impossible for us to know what may have been done, or may be being done right now, in a more ethical history.

TeMPOraL 9y ago
Personally, I think we can't afford to not use the helping hand. It's not like there is a steady supply of Jesus-level saints, who had done not a single bad thing through their entire lives, and who are at the same time rich, smart, and willing to help the world.
- Jedd 9y ago
  > Personally, I think we can't afford to not use the helping hand. Well that's just a defeatist attitude towards society and an uncaring, corrupted government (no matter where you happen to be writing that from). Comparing Jesus-level sainthood to Bill ... I can't tell if you're trolling there.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    > Comparing Jesus-level sainthood to Bill ... I can't tell if you're trolling there. I feel I need to be direct: you seem to be failing at reading comprehension 101 all throughout this thread (I assume tiredness). I was not comparing Bill to Jesus. I was implying that you, and similar critics, think that we have streams of Jesus-scale saints who are smart, rich and ready to help, and we prefer Gates instead. But we don't have those saints. Right now, we can only choose between Gates and no one at all.
    - Jedd 9y ago
      Appreciate your directness. I think the Jesus and saint juxtaposition confused me (saints first appeared about 200-300 years after Jesus, and no one has ever claimed Jesus was a saint, etc). Anyway, thank you for your clarification. To be clear, I do not think that we have streams of 'Jesus-scale saints' who are smart, rich (as Jesus ostensibly said, that won't get you into heaven), and ready to help. I do think we have a bunch of problems, and some institutions (governments, for example) that have been developed with the intent of solving those problems. If the problems of society/ies require that we have [the head of] an organisation convicted for violating the Sherman antitrust act come to rescue us with their ill-gotten gains, then perhaps we (as a society) should be aiming higher. Mind, I'm coming at this from a naive, optimistic attitude of wanting to not need heroes in order to save us all from each other.
      - TeMPOraL 9y ago
        > I think the Jesus and saint juxtaposition confused me (saints first appeared about 200-300 years after Jesus, and no one has ever claimed Jesus was a saint, etc). Fair enough. Maybe my "Jesus-level saint" expression was needlessly confusing indeed. > Mind, I'm coming at this from a naive, optimistic attitude of wanting to not need heroes in order to save us all from each other. Ok, I get that. Personally, I think I've lost that optimism some time ago now, and figured we have no option but to work with what we have, as imperfect as it is. I liked my utopian/dreamer self better, though. WRT Gates, I'm not pretending his tenure at Microsoft wasn't full of malicious actions. But then, in my mind there is a kind of quality difference between just being a huge ass in the business game, and directly trying to hurt (or kill) people. Gates was only the former, and never the latter (to the best of my knowledge), and right now his actions are actually saving lives and making more lives better. Then again, I just figured out an example that lets me emphasize more with the critics. I was never impacted directly by Microsoft's past misbehaviour, and I was a kid through most of the bad stuff that was going down. But if today the top brass of Uber was to create something similar to Gates Foundation, ... well, I'd definitely feel conflicted. On the one hand, I'm responsive to utilitarian arguments, and Uber didn't exactly go around killing people either. On the other hand, the amount of sociopathy they've displayed for the past ~5 years left such a bad a taste in my mouth, that I'm not sure if I'd be able to support that hypothetical help-the-world venture. So maybe I'm being uncharitable to you and some other critics; maybe my Uber is your Microsoft.
davidmr 9y ago
Just to be clear, I didn't mean to imply that it was okay. My text does read that way and I appreciate the opportunity to elaborate. I too would like the world more if there were less of that. I can't think of a lot of philanthropists off the top of my head who made their fortunes from unambiguously morally-good methods. My personal opinion is that we're probably on an upward trajectory. Comparing how Gates made his fortune with the Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, Carnegies, etc. I think Microsoft comes out on balance a bit better.
- Jedd 9y ago
  Thank you for your thoughtful follow-up. I agree that we're probably on an upward trajectory -- and that's a very good thing indeed.