I want to agree so hard with many of the cogent points in this post.
Still, I want to complain that, like so many rants about Silicon Valley or the world in general, there is nothing constructive here. There's nothing anyone can do about the way things work as long as the VCs don't run out of money.
Does anyone have a prescription for public policy or a personal plan of action that could result in a tech economy that is healthy, productive and humane? I don't know. People still go to school for nursing. People still get engineering degrees and go to work for Ford. Lots of people attempt side projects and small businesses on the Internet without trying for exponential growth. So maybe things aren't so bad.
What is the medium pimpin' version of Uber, I wonder? Could we have a local, employee-owned driving co-op? Could we divide the pie a little differently so that drivers are happy and developers have enough incentive to make a quality product but not so much incentive that they make an exploitative one? I guess we'll have to wait for the end of the subsidy wars between Uber and Lyft before anyone can attempt it. And then, where will the leadership come from? Who will do the work of building a startup, explicitly avoiding a model allowing a big exit for the founders and investors?
People say money corrupts, but philosophers point out it is the love of money that is corrupting. Here too there is a potentially important distinction between exponential growth and the want of it.
Still, I want to complain that, like so many rants about Silicon Valley or the world in general, there is nothing constructive here. There's nothing anyone can do about the way things work as long as the VCs don't run out of money.
Does anyone have a prescription for public policy or a personal plan of action that could result in a tech economy that is healthy, productive and humane? I don't know. People still go to school for nursing. People still get engineering degrees and go to work for Ford. Lots of people attempt side projects and small businesses on the Internet without trying for exponential growth. So maybe things aren't so bad.
What is the medium pimpin' version of Uber, I wonder? Could we have a local, employee-owned driving co-op? Could we divide the pie a little differently so that drivers are happy and developers have enough incentive to make a quality product but not so much incentive that they make an exploitative one? I guess we'll have to wait for the end of the subsidy wars between Uber and Lyft before anyone can attempt it. And then, where will the leadership come from? Who will do the work of building a startup, explicitly avoiding a model allowing a big exit for the founders and investors?