this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
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As a publicly traded, for-profit entity, it's mission is to create value for shareholders. Shareholder value is its product, not computers or microchips. Those are nothing more than strategies for creating that shareholder value.
Exactly. That's the "problem". It's a vehicle for greed not efficiency. Why because efficiency is defined by your intended effect. The cost of the world's resources, employees quality of life are all sacrificed for ever intensifying levels of "profit" efficiency. Which is absorbed by who?
The largest investors in the world for the most part.
It's a pipeline of inequality. Systems that were intended to be open and give power to the majority circumvented to look fair but actually provision gross inequality.
And what is the culture? You too could be a billionaire if you work hard enough. If you just contribute to the same system that is promoting inequality you too can rise up.
Am I advocating for socialism or communism? No but it's fair to say that Capitalism has failed as well.
There needs to be something better / newer that isn't as vulnerable to exploitation.
If you want to make a small dent, try and buy what you can from non-profits (hardmode), or at least private companies.
That means fuckall in the big tech arenas, but it can be done for more other things than I thought before I started doing it
What you've said is true, but it is also true that it sucks when good products go by the wayside because they don't provide sufficient shareholder value.
It absolutely sucks. And it's total bullshit. I don't mean to in any way come across as ok with it. I just think it's important to highlight what's driving things like this, because we very often have in mind that businesses exist to serve customer's needs.
And they do. It's just that consumers aren't their customers. They're in the business of selling stocks and ROI, not consumer products. The consumer products are just how they mine that value for shareholders, and like any miner, they're always going to be seekin gout the richest veins.
We deserve an Intel, or an AMD, or a whoever, that has a mission of creating quality and accessible products for the public. But under our current set of systems, we're never going to get that, because these organizations and industries don't work for us.
We're just a resource to them, to be exploited for their real customers.