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I don't get all the "entrepreneur" founder worship stuff. The disconnected tech set has produced a lot of money - and burned a lot more. They've ruined our abil

I don't get all the "entrepreneur" founder worship stuff. The disconnected tech set has produced a lot of money - and burned a lot more. They've ruined our ability to connect to each other so that we could connect on Facebook. They've ruined sidewalks with scooters, lost all of our data, participated in tracking us at all times, helped ICE deport children, and made a wage slaves out of people at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder by greasing the "gig" economy wheels with algorithms. At what point do we, as technical people, wake up and go "hey, maybe all this bullshit lingo, youth fetishism, digital isolation and community destruction is bad as a whole?" I'd rather see content about a founder who actually helped people somewhere solve some problem, and it made things better for regular people - those outside the tech bubble. It seems like all everyone wants to do is blast off with like minded people.

shadowxs76 8y ago
But this is simply wrong, at least partly. Yes, your criticisms of many of these tech founders and youth fetishism in general are right in certain ways but these existing companies help millions of people all the time. Facebook is used for a lot of vapid social media posing, but it also serves as a platform for millions of social protest and communication movements worldwide. The same for twitter (possibly even more). I've seen both used amazingly well by people at a grassroots level where I live to communicate news that the government and organized crime try to censor in normal media with deadly violence. Amazon is considered a vast exploiter of cheap labor and a crusher of "mom&pop" businesses, but it also frees millions of people to instantly sell their offerings online, while offering honestly useful savings and product access to millions of others. And as for Google, besides all the serious and real criticisms of it, there are numerous benefits too, so many of such a scale that we almost seem to take them for granted as part of the daily tech background, until we really pause to consider what that company has done for access to information at zero cost on a global scale. Tech founders of all kinds and especially the young tech founders of the giants have already helped millions and possibly billions of people all over the world. That they became billionaires and in some cases narcissistic snoops in the process doesn't eliminate what their technologies have done to benefit the world.
paulgrant999 8y ago
One of the reasons I passed on the 2000's was the only things founded were quite destructive to society as a whole. Only to be eclipsed by the 2010's (which are objectively, much much worse). I come back to it now, and the culture, is complete crap, and to be blunt, delusional.

shadowxs76 8y ago

But this is simply wrong, at least partly. Yes, your criticisms of many of these tech founders and youth fetishism in general are right in certain ways but these existing companies help millions of people all the time. Facebook is used for a lot of vapid social media posing, but it also serves as a platform for millions of social protest and communication movements worldwide. The same for twitter (possibly even more). I've seen both used amazingly well by people at a grassroots level where I live to communicate news that the government and organized crime try to censor in normal media with deadly violence. Amazon is considered a vast exploiter of cheap labor and a crusher of "mom&pop" businesses, but it also frees millions of people to instantly sell their offerings online, while offering honestly useful savings and product access to millions of others. And as for Google, besides all the serious and real criticisms of it, there are numerous benefits too, so many of such a scale that we almost seem to take them for granted as part of the daily tech background, until we really pause to consider what that company has done for access to information at zero cost on a global scale. Tech founders of all kinds and especially the young tech founders of the giants have already helped millions and possibly billions of people all over the world. That they became billionaires and in some cases narcissistic snoops in the process doesn't eliminate what their technologies have done to benefit the world.

paulgrant999 8y ago

One of the reasons I passed on the 2000's was the only things founded were quite destructive to society as a whole. Only to be eclipsed by the 2010's (which are objectively, much much worse). I come back to it now, and the culture, is complete crap, and to be blunt, delusional.