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Um, the "techno-feudal economy" he describes is capitalism--at least as long as people refuse to exercise their market power by not doing business with companie

by pdonis 3y ago

Um, the "techno-feudal economy" he describes is capitalism--at least as long as people refuse to exercise their market power by not doing business with companies that treat them like expendable resources instead of customers.

madaxe_again 3y ago
It is and it isn’t. Capitalism comes in many flavours, and the flavour that has emerged right now is the same which emerged around the 17th century - that is to say, absurd wealth concentration and states being powerless against their elites - which generally resulted in revolution, or the mass export and mollification of would-be revolutionaries through colonialism. Part of the problem was, is that serfs, sorry, consumers, do not have market power in the face of vast monopolies which have achieved regulatory capture. They eventually realise, when sufficiently pissed off, that they do have power, en masse - but now more than ever we have an endless mire of distraction, and mass learned helplessness - are you with the People’s Front of Judea, or the Judean People’s Front? Oh, who cares, they’re bringing the lions out.
- pdonis 3y ago
  > vast monopolies which have achieved regulatory capture I agree that this is a key issue, but the solution is simple: don't give governments the powers they would need for regulatory capture to work. Unfortunately, this solution is vilified by the very same monopolies who don't want to give up their privileged position, so it is extremely difficult for it to get traction. (And as far as the leftist ideas of Varoufakis are concerned, they make this problem worse, not better: in the kind of system he envisions, the entire economy is regulatory capture.)
AlexandrB 3y ago
The playbook of many tech giants has been to treat their users like customers while burning through VC funds to obtain a dominant market position, then start treating them like expendable resources once it's time to cash in. I'm not sure how I can exercise my market power to avoid this strategy as I'm unfortunately not privy to the long term business plans of every company I interact with.
- pdonis 3y ago
  > I'm not sure how I can exercise my market power to avoid this strategy That's easy: don't be misled by "free" services which obviously aren't actually free because they obviously require significant costs to produce. That's how tech giants like Google and Facebook actually got their dominant market positions: not just by using VC funds to build the infrastructure needed, but by deliberately not charging their users for the service and instead going for the ad-supported business model. In terms of market power, this is (or at least should be) obvious: if you aren't paying for the service, you don't have any market power, and that's not a good position to be in.

by pdonis 3y ago

madaxe_again 3y ago

It is and it isn’t. Capitalism comes in many flavours, and the flavour that has emerged right now is the same which emerged around the 17th century - that is to say, absurd wealth concentration and states being powerless against their elites - which generally resulted in revolution, or the mass export and mollification of would-be revolutionaries through colonialism. Part of the problem was, is that serfs, sorry, consumers, do not have market power in the face of vast monopolies which have achieved regulatory capture. They eventually realise, when sufficiently pissed off, that they do have power, en masse - but now more than ever we have an endless mire of distraction, and mass learned helplessness - are you with the People’s Front of Judea, or the Judean People’s Front? Oh, who cares, they’re bringing the lions out.

pdonis 3y ago
> vast monopolies which have achieved regulatory capture I agree that this is a key issue, but the solution is simple: don't give governments the powers they would need for regulatory capture to work. Unfortunately, this solution is vilified by the very same monopolies who don't want to give up their privileged position, so it is extremely difficult for it to get traction. (And as far as the leftist ideas of Varoufakis are concerned, they make this problem worse, not better: in the kind of system he envisions, the entire economy is regulatory capture.)

AlexandrB 3y ago

The playbook of many tech giants has been to treat their users like customers while burning through VC funds to obtain a dominant market position, then start treating them like expendable resources once it's time to cash in. I'm not sure how I can exercise my market power to avoid this strategy as I'm unfortunately not privy to the long term business plans of every company I interact with.

pdonis 3y ago
> I'm not sure how I can exercise my market power to avoid this strategy That's easy: don't be misled by "free" services which obviously aren't actually free because they obviously require significant costs to produce. That's how tech giants like Google and Facebook actually got their dominant market positions: not just by using VC funds to build the infrastructure needed, but by deliberately not charging their users for the service and instead going for the ad-supported business model. In terms of market power, this is (or at least should be) obvious: if you aren't paying for the service, you don't have any market power, and that's not a good position to be in.