>This sounds more like a problem with taking a company public than it does with capitalism in general
I don't disagree, but it's sort of difficult to disentangle the incentives to take a company public from "capitalism in general", at least as it's practiced in the world today.
I'd point to Valve as the paradigmatic example of "not-evil corporation", precisely because it's GabeN's private hat empire and he can do things like fund the big unwieldy rocket of Steam Machines, which can then jettison the much more capable craft of Proton -- neither of which The Shareholders would have been comfortable with.
Would there have been pressure to go public and become normal if Valve didn't have access to Steam's money-printer? How about if Valve's charismatic hat-emperor was no longer at the helm? Maybe so, but I think that suggesting that "the sirens call of "infinite wealth"" can corrupt anyone is capitalist apologism when there are strong counterexamples in similar forms of expression. Moreover, suggesting the mere act of going public generates "monopoly money" and "infinite wealth", suitable to corrupt even the most principled, strikes me as parroting a just-so story about vulture capitalism's obvious unstoppable dominion.
I don't disagree, but it's sort of difficult to disentangle the incentives to take a company public from "capitalism in general", at least as it's practiced in the world today.
I'd point to Valve as the paradigmatic example of "not-evil corporation", precisely because it's GabeN's private hat empire and he can do things like fund the big unwieldy rocket of Steam Machines, which can then jettison the much more capable craft of Proton -- neither of which The Shareholders would have been comfortable with.
Would there have been pressure to go public and become normal if Valve didn't have access to Steam's money-printer? How about if Valve's charismatic hat-emperor was no longer at the helm? Maybe so, but I think that suggesting that "the sirens call of "infinite wealth"" can corrupt anyone is capitalist apologism when there are strong counterexamples in similar forms of expression. Moreover, suggesting the mere act of going public generates "monopoly money" and "infinite wealth", suitable to corrupt even the most principled, strikes me as parroting a just-so story about vulture capitalism's obvious unstoppable dominion.