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Gilded Rage – Why Silicon Valley went from libertarian to authoritarian

86 points by adamors 1y ago

techblueberry 1y ago
I have so many questions - but seasteading. Isn't the problem that to have true economic freedom you have to have free trade? I mean like 100 billionaires on an island like Greenland, if they get embargoed by all the other countries -- like how many people do they have to have on their island to have the economic base to keep being billionaires and having their "freedom" Because - like I want to live on an off-grid homestead in the middle of nowhere - that's my idea of freedom, but I don't get the impression that's Peter Thiel's definition of freedom. So maybe this is why they're realizing they have to have authoritarianism over the largest economy of the world in order to have their "freedom". But one thing I think that's notable about a sort of schism in political thinking; is that it's interesting that the far left would say that both parties are the same and that both are bought by billionaires, but it's amazing how much the billionares would seem to say the opposite; maybe the Democrats lost because they turned away from Silicon Valley and Musk pumped hundreds of millions into Trump's campaign?
- dboreham 1y ago
  The fact that you can win an election just by "pumping hundreds of millions" into a campaign that includes many highly unpopular policies seems like the underlying problem here?
  - nradov 1y ago
    Money in politics is a problem, but pumping hundreds of millions into a campaign doesn't guarantee a win. In the last presidential election, the losing candidate actually spent more. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/kamala-harris-campaign-spent-277-million-final-weeks-rcna182923 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/kamala-harris...
- juujian 1y ago
  The Democrats have their problems, and no one should give them a free pass. The Atlantic hit the nail on the head when they called it the HR-ification of the Democratic Party. The party apparatus is mostly just appropriating positions, that's their idea of leadership. Hillary Clinton's weaponization of rules and procedures against Bernie Sanders is a great example of that. That is a far cry from the open corruption of the Republican party however. Allowing the CEO of ExxonMobil to become the Secretary of State. Doing pay for play and accepting lavish gifts from Silicon Valley royalty. The Trump coin grift and dishing out pardons for crypto scammers. Both sides is a gross oversimplification.
  - cudgy 1y ago
    So, the side that is more open about their corruption is the one that deserves to be voted out? That leaves the more secretive and professionally corrupt in power, right?
    - techblueberry 1y ago
      I mean, that’s what happened, whether we like it or not.
  - Ekaros 1y ago
    Technocracy shouldn't be inherently wrong choice. Especially when states really do depend increasingly on technology and productivity. In that view selecting a CEO in high role in government is probably a reasonable option. What are alternatives? Career politicians? Career bureaucrats? Maybe a CEO with proven history could be reasonable choice. Now if oil companies are bad or good, is much more political question. And really up to voters. Vote for party which supports your political direction.
    - nradov 1y ago
      Rex Tillerson wasn't even a terrible Secretary of State, all things considered. We've certainly had much worse.
    - dns_snek 11mo ago
- Apreche 1y ago
  > but it's amazing how much the billionares would seem to say the opposite; The Democratic establishment are in favor of maintaining the status quo, which is very favorable to corporations and the wealthy. The Republicans think even the status quo isn’t billionaire friendly enough. They want to go as far as possible as quickly as possible to eliminate even more of the middle class. Their real goal is to disenfranchise labor entirely, hence the push for “AI” and eliminating jobs. Of course billionaires prefer one over the other. But from the perspective of the left, both are unacceptable. Neither of these options will actually pull in the other direction, tax the rich, restore the wealth of the middle class, etc.
  - brightball 1y ago
    This is quite literally the opposite of what is happening. Republicans started going after CDL drivers who were issued licenses when they can’t read road signs in English. The result is basic economics…truckers who speak and read English get paid more now. Whether we are talking about healthcare, student loans, public school or even housing…everywhere the federal firehose gets aimed in the name of helping things get more expensive and hurt the middle class. The disaster that is the ACA was easy to see coming before it was even formed. The Ben Carson plan is the only economically viable plan that could have reduced the cost of healthcare, but we got ACA instead and costs have skyrocketed every since.
    - techblueberry 1y ago
      https://www.freightwaves.com/news/truck-driver-wages-downshifting-in-2025 https://www.freightwaves.com/news/truck-driver-wages-downshi...
      - jeffbee 1y ago
        Facts, in my HN?
    - wtfwhateven 1y ago
      >This is quite literally the opposite of what is happening. No it isn't. Parroting unproven narratives and lies manufactured by the state department only discredits your claim.
- lapcat 1y ago
  > the far left would say that both parties are the same This is a hyperbole. The two parties are not exactly the same, though they are the same on a number of issues, such as support for the military-industrial complex and Israel. Here's what Noam Chomsky said: "In the US, there is basically one party - the business party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations on the same policies." The way I would put it is that there are sane billionaires and insane billionaires, though they both have the economic interests of the billionaire class at heart. The insane billionaires want to disrupt everything and eat the world, while the sane billionaires just want to keep the quiet status quo of their dominance, and so they play "nice". > maybe the Democrats lost because they turned away from Silicon Valley and Musk pumped hundreds of millions into Trump's campaign I doubt that Musk's money changed the election outcome. Indeed, Musk's financial meddling in the subsequent Wisconsin Supreme Court election turned a lot of people against his candidate, who lost. The purpose of Musk's contributions was to buy influence with Trump, which worked, at least for a while.
  - techblueberry 1y ago
    Exaggeration maybe, hyperbole? I literally can’t go a day browsing Reddit without seeing like 10 people say both sides are the same.
- MangoToupe 1y ago
  I think it's a mistake to project any kind of ideology onto these freaks. They'll say anything as a means to their personal ends. Why do you think Thiel has been babbling about the antichrist?
- georgefrowny 1y ago
  Libertarianism is "freedom" only for the top slice and always has been. Depending on how principled you want to be about what happens to the underclass, you have a choice. Either exert control privately, by removing state protections for people and using corporate strength. Or you can co-opt the existing government to act on your behalf. You can mix and match, where you weaken parts of government which protects and strengthen that which controls. Whether the jackboots have a national emblem or a company logo on them doesn't make a lot of difference to the necks.
- casey2 1y ago
  There are quite a few scifi novels of libertarian societies that rely on constant surveillance to assure that NAP isn't violated. I'd say the central theme is that eventually technology will solve these disputes so the fundamental system shouldn't allow any political leeway that will slow progress (why solve technical problems when you can just be made whole by the government). Someone else might want to live were you live, who gets to decide who lives there? You both live in identical virtual copies. The goal is to sidestep politics entirely wherever it appears Where it falls apart (aside from its total amorality) is that technological progress is secondary to scientific progress and if science says in 100 billion years the universe is over, then there is no technical solution, I don't want people increasing entropy and killing me sooner before then.
- jeffbee 1y ago
  Embargoes are just the beginning of the problems with this idea. After you renounce the protection of nations, they are free to literally nuke you. The very first thing that would happen to seasteaders is that a navy would roll up and sink their shit.
vessenes 1y ago
I told myself this would be rage bait and I shouldn’t click. And I clicked. So I got what I deserved. But > Andreessen struck me as interesting because he made Netscape, the first real usable browser and it really did change things in a fundamental way. Then he ends up—caricaturing, but not too much—flacking Bored Ape NFTs. Obviously not a stupid man, but it’s got to feel like something of a comedown. Krugman trying to take the piss while he literally makes his living off substack, an a16z funded platform designed to give creators very different platforms and thus finances than they had six years ago, and clearly doesn’t even know it is infuriating. Earlier he makes fun of Andreessen making fun of experts, and … it would be hilarious irony if people didn’t so heavily credential him to opine on things like this. okay I stopped there. Perhaps the rest of the interview is super well informed and therefore based on reality enough to draw some useful conclusions.
- nabla9 1y ago
  > makes his living off an a16z platform That's some record level grandstanding.
  - vessenes 1y ago
    No it’s almost certainly true. If you’d like some estimates you should read up on scott Alexander’s pre and post substack revenues. For writers with large followings substack is like a 10-100x monetization boost over other options. Source: my publishing company published three books of Scotts essays during COVID, hit number one two and four on the essay category on Amazon, and generated less than one fiftieth of Scott’s first year of substack revenues based on his public comments.
    - nabla9 1y ago
      Check up what the word grandstanding means.
      - vessenes 1y ago
        Perhaps you missed the point of my story - publishing books is not lucrative. Or the second point - I have direct knowledge of economics for famous authors
Razengan 1y ago
Money/Power?
mc32 1y ago
It's hard to take a book seriously when it leverages clickbait inspired titling to entice readers --I wish authors of serious topics would avoid this. It may have valid points, but when you are serious, you really should avoid the temptation lest you taint your opinion with crassness. It may preach to the choir; ideally you'd want to reach a wider audience.
- techblueberry 1y ago
  What about the title is clickbait? I don’t think this fits into my standard definition of clickbait. It feels colorful, but an accurate description of the point that is trying to be made. Usually clickbait to me has some attempt to deceive the reader that the point their trying to make is more salacious than it actually is.
  - mc32 1y ago
    Leveraging gilded age to gilded rage is a bit sophomoric to me. Are they raging? It’s unnecessary. It’s okay for a blog post but not a book.
    - techblueberry 1y ago
      Yes, they are raging, watch interviews with Marc Andreesen, he seethes. I think this is spot on, if not undersold.
    - techblueberry 11mo ago
      Maybe it is in fact too on the nose: https://people.com/donald-trump-hosts-great-gatsby-themed-halloween-party-as-americans-brace-for-snap-benefits-to-expire-11841745 https://people.com/donald-trump-hosts-great-gatsby-themed-ha...
- adamors 1y ago
  It’s not a clickbait title, it succintly sums how the author percieves the dominant feeling of these people > Silverman: I think it’s [the anger] pretty palpable. That’s one reason why I call it a “gilded rage,” it’s that you hear it from them. We do hear from these people directly on social media and these long interviews they give on podcasts—some of them have their own podcasts—or speeches they give publicly. They’re all content creators now. > The emotion that often comes through is this sort of wounded anger, they feel victimized. Some of it is a bit in the style of classic right wing victimology, but it’s also, “the people don’t appreciate them enough and the world they’re trying to make,” whether it’s tech critics or regulators. But I think also they share a lot of the anti-woke grievances of the last few years, Musk very explicitly in his transphobia. The sense that progressive politics has somehow gone too far and has made everyone else’s lives oppressive and miserable seems to be an idea they share, despite all their wealth and power and the fact that I don’t think those left wing ideas had a major effect on tech. But, in some cases, I think it’s also personal. You hear someone like Bill Ackman say that, “Harvard turned his daughter into a Marxist,” or Elon Musk has talked a lot about his child coming out as trans. He said, “the woke mind virus killed my son.” That’s how he came up with this idea of “the woke mind virus”. He seems very angry about that.
ModernMech 1y ago
SV was always authoritarian tho. Look at the structure of the companies, they are all run top down with a CEO and a strict corporate hierarchy (the notable exception being Steam I guess). That's how authoritarians prefer things. Contrast with the way academic departments are run, where there is a Chair and a Dean, but faculty rotate and serve in those roles for limited terms.
- roxolotl 1y ago
  That’s the point the interviewee is trying to make. The libertarian era was an anomaly not the actions of today.
- lapcat 1y ago
  Most small businesses run this way too, though. There are just fewer levels of hierarchy in a small business.
  - ModernMech 1y ago
    My family was run this way as well. How many time did I hear my dad say "This isn't a democracy." :P
- clanky 1y ago
  [flagged]
- delichon 1y ago
  The libertarians I know are all authoritarian with regards to their own property, including their shares of stock. They object to centralized control, not to control. They see authoritarian control of their own company as an example of a decentralized locus of control. If there are libertarians who disdain detailed control of their own property I haven't met them. If they leverage their property to help centralize control, they're something other than libertarian.
- tasty_freeze 1y ago
  Your line of logic isn't specific to silicon valley -- corporations everywhere are largely run top-down by a CEO in a corporate hierarchy.
jrexilius 1y ago
I'm confused, is the assertion here that this is the first time silicon valley tech people and their companies got involved in partisan politics? Is it really short memory or selective memory? example: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/11/when-the-nerds-go-marching-in/265325/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/11/when-...
- elif 1y ago
  The criticism was "authoritarian" and not "partisan" as you claim
throwpoaster 1y ago
Thiel pointed out that (paraphrasing): “libertarianism is the safe way to be right-wing in Tech, because it’s not politically credible. You can be safely ignored.” Left authoritarians have more in common with Right authoritarians than with the broader Left. You saw this in Germany and Russia when their respective authoritarianisms collapsed and the same people simply changed teams. The argument implicit in the headline is therefore perhaps better expressed as two thoughts: why did the tech right get tired of being ignored, and how did they go about flipping the authoritarian structures that already existed?
- mindslight 1y ago
  > libertarianism is the safe way to be right-wing in Tech The deeper lie is that libertarianism is right wing. So-called right wing Libertarianism is fallacious - ultimately a product of the corporate neutering of political organization just like the main parties. I certainly understand why right- "Libertarianism" is highly appealing - stick to these small core set of axioms, and you will be free, and everything that appears to be bad will actually be justified because it's merely a result of people exercising freedom. It makes it sound like we just need to simplify things. If we just perform a rewrite and avoid giving into the temptation to make bloat, don't you know we will all be free? The fallacy is easy demonstrated, but requires the reader to suspend the mainstream indoctrination asserting a dichotomy between government and corporations (promulgated in the "Libertarian" dogma by the lemma that a corporation is definitionally incapable of exercising coercion). In actuality - a government is a corporation, and corporations can exert coercive power like government. What we consider a corporation is merely a partial version of what we consider a government. If we're in need of a particular product or service and there are many corporations to choose from, we feel more free (just as if we could choose between multiple governments!). If there are only a handful of corporations to choose from, especially if the executives all implement similar policies in lockstep, then the dynamic feels much less free. If there is only one corporation to choose from, then we have a de facto government that can coerce us up to the limit of needing that product/service. Essentially any authoritarian/totalitarian government can be transmuted into an axoimatic right-"Libertarian" utopia simply by reframing its government as a singular corporation with which every citizen has a lifelong contract of onerous terms. And so the only way to approach libertarianism is to set the metric as a society's constructive outcomes for its citizens having effective freedoms. As for the original topic, the Thiel quote shows that Thiel never actually was a libertarian, or at least least as long as he's been relevant. Rather the only "freedom" he is interested in is his own "freedom" to coerce others. And as he's gained more power, that "freedom" mask has been slowly flaking off. This is the exact shape of Silicon Valley's surveillance industry as a whole - "disrupting" the world merely to make centralized web/apps that exert fine-grained top down control. "Freedom" for their founders, not for their users. That's not freedom, it's just new systems of control. And now that this new crop of nouveau riche have entrenched themselves, they want to shamelessly start exercising their power.
clanky 1y ago
This transition isn't unique to Silicon Valley but rather is baked into the imperatives of libertarianism/liberalism itself. Once the fiction of gains for the broad working class cannot be upheld, the resulting unrest has to be quelled. At that point anyone in a position of influence has to either abandon liberalism (the economic side of it at the very least) or embrace authoritarianism.
- ZeroGravitas 1y ago
  Or put a slightly different way: libertarians were always lying about their noble anti-government ideas. They just hated the thought of the government helping women, minorities or the poor. And anything that threatened fossil fuel interests. When they see the chance to seize the government and actively punish those groups they drop their fake ideals immediately.
  - seneca 1y ago
    > Or put a slightly different way: libertarians were always lying about their noble anti-government ideas. They just hated the thought of the government helping women, minorities or the poor. And anything that threatened fossil fuel interests. This is an extremely lazy form of argument and isn't really worthy of HN.
- walleeee 1y ago
  Can you characterize the binary choice in your last sentence in more detail? I don't see how one excludes the other
  - clanky 11mo ago
    The resulting unrest can only be suppressed by abandoning basic civil liberties, or by adopting New Deal style reforms. Either one amounts to an abandonment of libertarianism.
- dahart 1y ago
  It seems like you lumped liberal and libertarian together, is that accurate? If so, why? Aren’t they quite different economic and political philosophies?
usrusr 1y ago
"It's not really freedom when you are not free to try elevating yourself to god-emperor" Libertarians hate it when others claim that the defining property of libertarianism is taking liberties with that entire "where another person's freedom begins" thing.
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
daft_pink 1y ago
I think we leftists totally miss is that we have a two party system in America and most Americans think both suck and that we’re faced with choosing between the best of two bad options. Someone like Paul Krugman can’t comprehend the libertarian might think that Trump is the best of two bad options.
general1465 1y ago
It is a logical conclusion. Every form of libertarianism will eventually warp into authoritarianism after strongest entities emerge from chaos of competition. Competitive environment disappears the moment when at least one entity has enough mass to steamroll others. Major ideological flaw which libertarians refuse to see.
avmich 1y ago
Great conversation. Mentioning Hughes, Chinese advances, pretty good.
neilv 1y ago
Someone flagged this interesting discussion that a lot of people need to hear, and is especially relevant to tech industry. I emailed hn@. [flagged] Gilded Rage – Why Silicon Valley went from libertarian to authoritarian (paulkrugman.substack.com) 56 points by adamors 2 hours ago | flag | hide | past | favorite | 50 comments
- adamors 1y ago
  Thanks, it is now unflagged.
QuantumGood 1y ago
Oligarichies always form, and those that sustain, devolve towards self-serving.
- abandonliberty 1y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy I came up with this idea, too, but was beaten to it by at least 100 years.
1vuio0pswjnm7 1y ago
Self-preservation Krugman: They needed to own the government, or at least temporarily own the government in order to get out of their own messes? Silverman: In a lot of cases, yes.
tim333 1y ago
I'm not sure that have gone authoritarian beyond trying to get along with the president of the moment? They were shunning anyone even thinking of voting Trump not so long ago and will probably go back that way the next time the Democrats win. Here's HN from 2018 discussing an article on Silicon Valley being a left wing echo chamber https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16406861 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16406861

86 points by adamors 1y ago

I have so many questions - but seasteading. Isn't the problem that to have true economic freedom you have to have free trade? I mean like 100 billionaires on an island like Greenland, if they get embargoed by all the other countries -- like how many people do they have to have on their island to have the economic base to keep being billionaires and having their "freedom" Because - like I want to live on an off-grid homestead in the middle of nowhere - that's my idea of freedom, but I don't get the impression that's Peter Thiel's definition of freedom. So maybe this is why they're realizing they have to have authoritarianism over the largest economy of the world in order to have their "freedom". But one thing I think that's notable about a sort of schism in political thinking; is that it's interesting that the far left would say that both parties are the same and that both are bought by billionaires, but it's amazing how much the billionares would seem to say the opposite; maybe the Democrats lost because they turned away from Silicon Valley and Musk pumped hundreds of millions into Trump's campaign?

dboreham 1y ago
The fact that you can win an election just by "pumping hundreds of millions" into a campaign that includes many highly unpopular policies seems like the underlying problem here?
- nradov 1y ago
  Money in politics is a problem, but pumping hundreds of millions into a campaign doesn't guarantee a win. In the last presidential election, the losing candidate actually spent more. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/kamala-harris-campaign-spent-277-million-final-weeks-rcna182923 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/kamala-harris...
juujian 1y ago
The Democrats have their problems, and no one should give them a free pass. The Atlantic hit the nail on the head when they called it the HR-ification of the Democratic Party. The party apparatus is mostly just appropriating positions, that's their idea of leadership. Hillary Clinton's weaponization of rules and procedures against Bernie Sanders is a great example of that. That is a far cry from the open corruption of the Republican party however. Allowing the CEO of ExxonMobil to become the Secretary of State. Doing pay for play and accepting lavish gifts from Silicon Valley royalty. The Trump coin grift and dishing out pardons for crypto scammers. Both sides is a gross oversimplification.
- cudgy 1y ago
  So, the side that is more open about their corruption is the one that deserves to be voted out? That leaves the more secretive and professionally corrupt in power, right?
  - techblueberry 1y ago
    I mean, that’s what happened, whether we like it or not.
- Ekaros 1y ago
  Technocracy shouldn't be inherently wrong choice. Especially when states really do depend increasingly on technology and productivity. In that view selecting a CEO in high role in government is probably a reasonable option. What are alternatives? Career politicians? Career bureaucrats? Maybe a CEO with proven history could be reasonable choice. Now if oil companies are bad or good, is much more political question. And really up to voters. Vote for party which supports your political direction.
  - nradov 1y ago
    Rex Tillerson wasn't even a terrible Secretary of State, all things considered. We've certainly had much worse.
  - dns_snek 11mo ago
Apreche 1y ago
> but it's amazing how much the billionares would seem to say the opposite; The Democratic establishment are in favor of maintaining the status quo, which is very favorable to corporations and the wealthy. The Republicans think even the status quo isn’t billionaire friendly enough. They want to go as far as possible as quickly as possible to eliminate even more of the middle class. Their real goal is to disenfranchise labor entirely, hence the push for “AI” and eliminating jobs. Of course billionaires prefer one over the other. But from the perspective of the left, both are unacceptable. Neither of these options will actually pull in the other direction, tax the rich, restore the wealth of the middle class, etc.
- brightball 1y ago
  This is quite literally the opposite of what is happening. Republicans started going after CDL drivers who were issued licenses when they can’t read road signs in English. The result is basic economics…truckers who speak and read English get paid more now. Whether we are talking about healthcare, student loans, public school or even housing…everywhere the federal firehose gets aimed in the name of helping things get more expensive and hurt the middle class. The disaster that is the ACA was easy to see coming before it was even formed. The Ben Carson plan is the only economically viable plan that could have reduced the cost of healthcare, but we got ACA instead and costs have skyrocketed every since.
  - techblueberry 1y ago
    https://www.freightwaves.com/news/truck-driver-wages-downshifting-in-2025 https://www.freightwaves.com/news/truck-driver-wages-downshi...
    - jeffbee 1y ago
      Facts, in my HN?
  - wtfwhateven 1y ago
    >This is quite literally the opposite of what is happening. No it isn't. Parroting unproven narratives and lies manufactured by the state department only discredits your claim.
lapcat 1y ago
> the far left would say that both parties are the same This is a hyperbole. The two parties are not exactly the same, though they are the same on a number of issues, such as support for the military-industrial complex and Israel. Here's what Noam Chomsky said: "In the US, there is basically one party - the business party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations on the same policies." The way I would put it is that there are sane billionaires and insane billionaires, though they both have the economic interests of the billionaire class at heart. The insane billionaires want to disrupt everything and eat the world, while the sane billionaires just want to keep the quiet status quo of their dominance, and so they play "nice". > maybe the Democrats lost because they turned away from Silicon Valley and Musk pumped hundreds of millions into Trump's campaign I doubt that Musk's money changed the election outcome. Indeed, Musk's financial meddling in the subsequent Wisconsin Supreme Court election turned a lot of people against his candidate, who lost. The purpose of Musk's contributions was to buy influence with Trump, which worked, at least for a while.
- techblueberry 1y ago
  Exaggeration maybe, hyperbole? I literally can’t go a day browsing Reddit without seeing like 10 people say both sides are the same.
MangoToupe 1y ago
I think it's a mistake to project any kind of ideology onto these freaks. They'll say anything as a means to their personal ends. Why do you think Thiel has been babbling about the antichrist?
georgefrowny 1y ago
Libertarianism is "freedom" only for the top slice and always has been. Depending on how principled you want to be about what happens to the underclass, you have a choice. Either exert control privately, by removing state protections for people and using corporate strength. Or you can co-opt the existing government to act on your behalf. You can mix and match, where you weaken parts of government which protects and strengthen that which controls. Whether the jackboots have a national emblem or a company logo on them doesn't make a lot of difference to the necks.
casey2 1y ago
There are quite a few scifi novels of libertarian societies that rely on constant surveillance to assure that NAP isn't violated. I'd say the central theme is that eventually technology will solve these disputes so the fundamental system shouldn't allow any political leeway that will slow progress (why solve technical problems when you can just be made whole by the government). Someone else might want to live were you live, who gets to decide who lives there? You both live in identical virtual copies. The goal is to sidestep politics entirely wherever it appears Where it falls apart (aside from its total amorality) is that technological progress is secondary to scientific progress and if science says in 100 billion years the universe is over, then there is no technical solution, I don't want people increasing entropy and killing me sooner before then.
jeffbee 1y ago
Embargoes are just the beginning of the problems with this idea. After you renounce the protection of nations, they are free to literally nuke you. The very first thing that would happen to seasteaders is that a navy would roll up and sink their shit.

vessenes 1y ago

I told myself this would be rage bait and I shouldn’t click. And I clicked. So I got what I deserved. But > Andreessen struck me as interesting because he made Netscape, the first real usable browser and it really did change things in a fundamental way. Then he ends up—caricaturing, but not too much—flacking Bored Ape NFTs. Obviously not a stupid man, but it’s got to feel like something of a comedown. Krugman trying to take the piss while he literally makes his living off substack, an a16z funded platform designed to give creators very different platforms and thus finances than they had six years ago, and clearly doesn’t even know it is infuriating. Earlier he makes fun of Andreessen making fun of experts, and … it would be hilarious irony if people didn’t so heavily credential him to opine on things like this. okay I stopped there. Perhaps the rest of the interview is super well informed and therefore based on reality enough to draw some useful conclusions.

nabla9 1y ago
> makes his living off an a16z platform That's some record level grandstanding.
- vessenes 1y ago
  No it’s almost certainly true. If you’d like some estimates you should read up on scott Alexander’s pre and post substack revenues. For writers with large followings substack is like a 10-100x monetization boost over other options. Source: my publishing company published three books of Scotts essays during COVID, hit number one two and four on the essay category on Amazon, and generated less than one fiftieth of Scott’s first year of substack revenues based on his public comments.
  - nabla9 1y ago
    Check up what the word grandstanding means.
    - vessenes 1y ago
      Perhaps you missed the point of my story - publishing books is not lucrative. Or the second point - I have direct knowledge of economics for famous authors

Razengan 1y ago

Money/Power?

mc32 1y ago

It's hard to take a book seriously when it leverages clickbait inspired titling to entice readers --I wish authors of serious topics would avoid this. It may have valid points, but when you are serious, you really should avoid the temptation lest you taint your opinion with crassness. It may preach to the choir; ideally you'd want to reach a wider audience.

techblueberry 1y ago
What about the title is clickbait? I don’t think this fits into my standard definition of clickbait. It feels colorful, but an accurate description of the point that is trying to be made. Usually clickbait to me has some attempt to deceive the reader that the point their trying to make is more salacious than it actually is.
- mc32 1y ago
  Leveraging gilded age to gilded rage is a bit sophomoric to me. Are they raging? It’s unnecessary. It’s okay for a blog post but not a book.
  - techblueberry 1y ago
    Yes, they are raging, watch interviews with Marc Andreesen, he seethes. I think this is spot on, if not undersold.
  - techblueberry 11mo ago
    Maybe it is in fact too on the nose: https://people.com/donald-trump-hosts-great-gatsby-themed-halloween-party-as-americans-brace-for-snap-benefits-to-expire-11841745 https://people.com/donald-trump-hosts-great-gatsby-themed-ha...
adamors 1y ago
It’s not a clickbait title, it succintly sums how the author percieves the dominant feeling of these people > Silverman: I think it’s [the anger] pretty palpable. That’s one reason why I call it a “gilded rage,” it’s that you hear it from them. We do hear from these people directly on social media and these long interviews they give on podcasts—some of them have their own podcasts—or speeches they give publicly. They’re all content creators now. > The emotion that often comes through is this sort of wounded anger, they feel victimized. Some of it is a bit in the style of classic right wing victimology, but it’s also, “the people don’t appreciate them enough and the world they’re trying to make,” whether it’s tech critics or regulators. But I think also they share a lot of the anti-woke grievances of the last few years, Musk very explicitly in his transphobia. The sense that progressive politics has somehow gone too far and has made everyone else’s lives oppressive and miserable seems to be an idea they share, despite all their wealth and power and the fact that I don’t think those left wing ideas had a major effect on tech. But, in some cases, I think it’s also personal. You hear someone like Bill Ackman say that, “Harvard turned his daughter into a Marxist,” or Elon Musk has talked a lot about his child coming out as trans. He said, “the woke mind virus killed my son.” That’s how he came up with this idea of “the woke mind virus”. He seems very angry about that.

ModernMech 1y ago

SV was always authoritarian tho. Look at the structure of the companies, they are all run top down with a CEO and a strict corporate hierarchy (the notable exception being Steam I guess). That's how authoritarians prefer things. Contrast with the way academic departments are run, where there is a Chair and a Dean, but faculty rotate and serve in those roles for limited terms.

roxolotl 1y ago
That’s the point the interviewee is trying to make. The libertarian era was an anomaly not the actions of today.
lapcat 1y ago
Most small businesses run this way too, though. There are just fewer levels of hierarchy in a small business.
- ModernMech 1y ago
  My family was run this way as well. How many time did I hear my dad say "This isn't a democracy." :P
clanky 1y ago
[flagged]
delichon 1y ago
The libertarians I know are all authoritarian with regards to their own property, including their shares of stock. They object to centralized control, not to control. They see authoritarian control of their own company as an example of a decentralized locus of control. If there are libertarians who disdain detailed control of their own property I haven't met them. If they leverage their property to help centralize control, they're something other than libertarian.
tasty_freeze 1y ago
Your line of logic isn't specific to silicon valley -- corporations everywhere are largely run top-down by a CEO in a corporate hierarchy.

jrexilius 1y ago

I'm confused, is the assertion here that this is the first time silicon valley tech people and their companies got involved in partisan politics? Is it really short memory or selective memory? example: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/11/when-the-nerds-go-marching-in/265325/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/11/when-...

elif 1y ago
The criticism was "authoritarian" and not "partisan" as you claim

throwpoaster 1y ago

Thiel pointed out that (paraphrasing): “libertarianism is the safe way to be right-wing in Tech, because it’s not politically credible. You can be safely ignored.” Left authoritarians have more in common with Right authoritarians than with the broader Left. You saw this in Germany and Russia when their respective authoritarianisms collapsed and the same people simply changed teams. The argument implicit in the headline is therefore perhaps better expressed as two thoughts: why did the tech right get tired of being ignored, and how did they go about flipping the authoritarian structures that already existed?

mindslight 1y ago
> libertarianism is the safe way to be right-wing in Tech The deeper lie is that libertarianism is right wing. So-called right wing Libertarianism is fallacious - ultimately a product of the corporate neutering of political organization just like the main parties. I certainly understand why right- "Libertarianism" is highly appealing - stick to these small core set of axioms, and you will be free, and everything that appears to be bad will actually be justified because it's merely a result of people exercising freedom. It makes it sound like we just need to simplify things. If we just perform a rewrite and avoid giving into the temptation to make bloat, don't you know we will all be free? The fallacy is easy demonstrated, but requires the reader to suspend the mainstream indoctrination asserting a dichotomy between government and corporations (promulgated in the "Libertarian" dogma by the lemma that a corporation is definitionally incapable of exercising coercion). In actuality - a government is a corporation, and corporations can exert coercive power like government. What we consider a corporation is merely a partial version of what we consider a government. If we're in need of a particular product or service and there are many corporations to choose from, we feel more free (just as if we could choose between multiple governments!). If there are only a handful of corporations to choose from, especially if the executives all implement similar policies in lockstep, then the dynamic feels much less free. If there is only one corporation to choose from, then we have a de facto government that can coerce us up to the limit of needing that product/service. Essentially any authoritarian/totalitarian government can be transmuted into an axoimatic right-"Libertarian" utopia simply by reframing its government as a singular corporation with which every citizen has a lifelong contract of onerous terms. And so the only way to approach libertarianism is to set the metric as a society's constructive outcomes for its citizens having effective freedoms. As for the original topic, the Thiel quote shows that Thiel never actually was a libertarian, or at least least as long as he's been relevant. Rather the only "freedom" he is interested in is his own "freedom" to coerce others. And as he's gained more power, that "freedom" mask has been slowly flaking off. This is the exact shape of Silicon Valley's surveillance industry as a whole - "disrupting" the world merely to make centralized web/apps that exert fine-grained top down control. "Freedom" for their founders, not for their users. That's not freedom, it's just new systems of control. And now that this new crop of nouveau riche have entrenched themselves, they want to shamelessly start exercising their power.

clanky 1y ago

This transition isn't unique to Silicon Valley but rather is baked into the imperatives of libertarianism/liberalism itself. Once the fiction of gains for the broad working class cannot be upheld, the resulting unrest has to be quelled. At that point anyone in a position of influence has to either abandon liberalism (the economic side of it at the very least) or embrace authoritarianism.

ZeroGravitas 1y ago
Or put a slightly different way: libertarians were always lying about their noble anti-government ideas. They just hated the thought of the government helping women, minorities or the poor. And anything that threatened fossil fuel interests. When they see the chance to seize the government and actively punish those groups they drop their fake ideals immediately.
- seneca 1y ago
  > Or put a slightly different way: libertarians were always lying about their noble anti-government ideas. They just hated the thought of the government helping women, minorities or the poor. And anything that threatened fossil fuel interests. This is an extremely lazy form of argument and isn't really worthy of HN.
walleeee 1y ago
Can you characterize the binary choice in your last sentence in more detail? I don't see how one excludes the other
- clanky 11mo ago
  The resulting unrest can only be suppressed by abandoning basic civil liberties, or by adopting New Deal style reforms. Either one amounts to an abandonment of libertarianism.
dahart 1y ago
It seems like you lumped liberal and libertarian together, is that accurate? If so, why? Aren’t they quite different economic and political philosophies?

usrusr 1y ago

"It's not really freedom when you are not free to try elevating yourself to god-emperor" Libertarians hate it when others claim that the defining property of libertarianism is taking liberties with that entire "where another person's freedom begins" thing.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

daft_pink 1y ago

I think we leftists totally miss is that we have a two party system in America and most Americans think both suck and that we’re faced with choosing between the best of two bad options. Someone like Paul Krugman can’t comprehend the libertarian might think that Trump is the best of two bad options.

general1465 1y ago

It is a logical conclusion. Every form of libertarianism will eventually warp into authoritarianism after strongest entities emerge from chaos of competition. Competitive environment disappears the moment when at least one entity has enough mass to steamroll others. Major ideological flaw which libertarians refuse to see.

avmich 1y ago

Great conversation. Mentioning Hughes, Chinese advances, pretty good.

neilv 1y ago

Someone flagged this interesting discussion that a lot of people need to hear, and is especially relevant to tech industry. I emailed hn@. [flagged] Gilded Rage – Why Silicon Valley went from libertarian to authoritarian (paulkrugman.substack.com) 56 points by adamors 2 hours ago | flag | hide | past | favorite | 50 comments

adamors 1y ago
Thanks, it is now unflagged.

QuantumGood 1y ago

Oligarichies always form, and those that sustain, devolve towards self-serving.

abandonliberty 1y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy I came up with this idea, too, but was beaten to it by at least 100 years.

1vuio0pswjnm7 1y ago

Self-preservation Krugman: They needed to own the government, or at least temporarily own the government in order to get out of their own messes? Silverman: In a lot of cases, yes.

tim333 1y ago

I'm not sure that have gone authoritarian beyond trying to get along with the president of the moment? They were shunning anyone even thinking of voting Trump not so long ago and will probably go back that way the next time the Democrats win. Here's HN from 2018 discussing an article on Silicon Valley being a left wing echo chamber https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16406861 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16406861