2 ms·
This article reminds me a bit of a 'ethics' issue in one of the top-name journals, Science or Nature, some years ago. Every article was about the ethics of sha
by photochemsyn 3y ago
This article reminds me a bit of a 'ethics' issue in one of the top-name journals, Science or Nature, some years ago. Every article was about the ethics of sharing credit, granting tenure, awarding prizes, etc. Not a word about anything like the ethics of designing AI systems for the military to use in autonomous kill vehicles, reckless gain-of-function research with pathogenic microorganisms, etc.
So, here we have a discussion of how to reward and advance employees who are most aligned with the corporation's overall or specific goals, and certainly that makes sense, you want the best people in the right jobs - but everyone else is looking at Big Tech and wondering just what the goals are these days. There seems to be a lot of effort directed towards establishing monopoly power, avoiding the rise of market competition, ensuring a future of lucrative government contracts, including a big move into military AI contracts... whatever happened to 'don't be evil'?
- paulddraper 3y ago> what the goals are these days Maximize shareholder value
- RugnirViking 3y agoin my experience its a little more like "maximise how much the largest shareholders' representatives will give me a big grin and tell me about their summer vacation plans and act all friendly with me" occasionally with a more cynical view towards getting them to pay me personally more money. (where "me" here means specifically the CEO and to a lesser extent the C-Suite. Variations and echoes of this incentive echo downwards where these people then take on the role of the important shareholders) This correlates somewhat with actually maximising shareholder value, but not that exactly. For example, short term profits are good, losses can be fine if you have a good story about why its good that key shareholders believe, etc.