The current Republican spin for this is that "we'll leave it to the states", and I'm sure a lot of folks like you who are holding their nose and voting for Trump are eager to believe that they won't use the Comstock Act to ban abortion nationwide. But if you genuinely believe that then boy can I get you one hell of a deal on that bridge you mentioned. Mike Johnson has admitted this is bullshit: https://x.com/atrupar/status/1814046827848806630?s=51&t=C88t5nKljm77sIWE0jrjRQ&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
This is a flawed premise article from the beginning. Let me tell you as someone who is deeply ingrained in the Silicon Valley tech community, Democrats have not lost tech. The Republicans / Conservatives / Libertarians have won over a few billionaire tech people that were conservative mainly to begin with. You are using anecdotes as evidence, very unintellectual at best and drivel at worst. There has always been a small sliver of libertarians in Tech and will remain so.
I appreciate your newsletter immensely but you blindly think tech is always the answer to our problems. It's not. Tech is just a tool and without regulation and oversight, it can be used for good and evil. RealPage is tech but all it has led to is collusion among property managers to artificially increase rent. We need tech and American Dynamism to lead us to further prosperity in the 21st century but we also need regulation and oversight to reign in the worst abuses.
I don't disagree that we need regulation and oversight in the least.
Re: the premise, the number of non-billionaires in tech I've spoken to who've sheepishly told me that they're seriously considering voting for Trump really surprised me. Obviously, it hasn't fully lost tech, but the trajectory is not good.
Doesn’t this have a lot to do with numbers? Even in the Bay Area the Dem-Rep vote split is like 70-30, so you’re bound to run into Republicans wherever you go. I even know many Republicans personally who support the GOP mainly for tax and regulations. I liked many of the points you brought up, and I do think that if Dems adopted a Matt Yglesias or Ezra Klein style liberalism that emphasizes competence, efficiency along with the usual liberal policies of government investment & welfare, they’d win over most of the tech billionaires as well.
This is the first cycle where I've had to recognize that the costs have gone up to voting Dem. I'm a pre-seed AI founder. Between Khan at the FTC, the executive memo on AI, and Gensler's bad faith actions towards crypto, the trend runs directly counter to what I believe American Innovation should be. Now, I'd never vote Trump because I wouldn't be willing to cut off my arm (Democracy) to make an extra buck, but I'd love for us to take a step back as a party and reassess this trajectory. Kamala has a clear opportunity to do so.
Packy's observations about "Everything Bagel Liberalism" are spot on. It should be alarming that investments are conditional on whether they support special interests.
Lifetime techie here. Just (very short) words of advice: be briefer. And don't spend so much time clearing your throat at the beginning: get right to it.
I think you're onto something here, but the fundamental zero-sum mentality of the Elizabeth Warren types will NEVER go away. It goes back to Karl Marx and the "labor theory of value." It's who they are.
Capital based economies are zero-sum. There is a finite amount of capital in the economy. To be a capitalist means you have to have capital, which means having a lot of money. Capitalism is the very rewarding to people that take the most capital resources while putting out the least effort per unit of capital. Sometimes thats through increased efficiency. Sometimes that's by stealing value in a myriad of ways.
Dems are a very big tent party. You’ve got everyone from Marty Yglesias and Mark Kelly and Josh Shapiro to AOC and Warren. The former Dems are who the party should be rallying behind as they are pro growth and generally competent, and from the looks of it, Harris will likely pick Shapiro or Kelly for VP.
What data actually indicates that the Democrats have “lost tech”? A few high profile tech celebrities are Republican, but famous tech billionaires are also some of the Democrats’ biggest donors, and rank and file tech workers are unreservedly liberal.
There’s always been a weird libertarian fringe, and now there’s a bit of MAGA, too. But the media narrative that the tech industry has gone Republican seems to be supported by anecdote, not evidence.
Great article. I'm a longtime tech-optimist Democrat -- my first presidential vote was 1988 (Bush), and I switched to Bill Clinton in 1992 because he and Gore were embracing tech (the "information superhighway"). I still believe in the party broadly but agree that its approaches to economics have become burdensome and counterproductive. It's been interesting to see Matt Yglesias and Ezra Klein go from leftist Wapo bloggers to "establishment shills."
That said, one thing that's troubled me is how much of right-wing tech leadership has largely focused on culture and tax rates instead of policy. The first political tweet I remember seeing from Paul Graham was about how an entrepreneur who paid a higher capital gains tax might see his lifetime earnings go from $100 million to $50 million -- it seemed like a weird out-of-touch thing to focus on during the Trump era.
The Facebook backlash was not just about 2016. It was also about how much dissembling and blame shifting there was from Zuckerberg afterward, and the growing recognition that social media was making us all miserable.
And as a crypto guy, I agree that Gensler has gone way too far, and I hope Kamala comes up with a better approach. At the same time, crypto is so full of scams and bad faith operators that it more often resembles a globalized MLM -- Amway for Twitter influencers -- than a truly innovative platform. Very few people want to admit that 95% of the excitement is around price action. There is no first-use experience that excites you in the same way social media or ChatGPT did.
Edit: a lot of right wing Twitter blamed Democrats for SBF, but ignored that he was only able to pull off his scam by setting up *outside the US regulatory regime.* Elon and others predicted SBF would get off easy because of his donations to Democrats, yet it was the Biden DOJ that put him in prison for a very long time.
Great take! To add to the Facebook point, also let's not forget how Tech companies like to close the door behind them when them make it. The number of lawsuits that Facebook handed out to squash smaller tech companies is not trivial. And set dangerous legal precedent.
I think a point being missed here is that as new industries become older established industries they tend to get comfortable with their power. Which maybe is just my way of realizing Pete really did say it as concisely as you can.
Cards on the table: I'm 0-2 voting for Trump, soon to be 0-3, for the simple reason that POTUS is not Amateur Night. I don't give auto-credence to self-proclaimed "experts", but there is a time and place for experience and expertise. I do think that Trump is getting a second look from others because he has 4 years under his belt, but I also find his general integrity to be lacking, and he's too much of a weathervane. That last point doesn't absolve others' integrity issues, though. Historically, I have defaulted to the GOP, but have voted for many Democrats in my lifetime since I was able to first vote in 1986.
That said, I think tech is turning against the Dems for the following reasons:
1) The "precautionary principle"--well known regarding environmental concerns, I see it leaking into other business sectors. The purpose of technology is to replace big problems with smaller ones, in an iterative, almost agile fashion. But if you dwell on the NEW smaller ones too much before they could even happen, you won't solve the big ones. The Precautionary Principle is anti-agile.
2) There are "enough" Democrats that embrace some form of Marxism, whether it be traditional economic socialism or the power dynamics of the Successor Ideology (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Successor_ideology) , and to varying significant, non-zero degrees. And it's hard to separate the two. In any case, it's anti-business. Especially anti-risky-business, like tech, that needs massive amounts of merit and money.
3) The Dems have abandoned the Libertarian Lite worldview of social liberalism combined with economic moderation. However, the GOP has kept their social conservatism (although that shows some inconsistent signs of moderating) and definitely is swinging more economically progressive. Not sure where that leaves tech, though, unless it's an individual decision of which is the lesser evil.
4) Regarding "tech being richer", this could simply be a function of the USA needing more money, and tech being where the money is, per Willie Sutton.
7) The Progressive Left has become less tolerant of dissenters, on a whole laundry list of issues. That means that Dems have to carry and stick to a larger checklist of positions, each with their own seat at the table.
This is a great piece. It really resonates with me even though I am not a techie (just an old school corporate raider). I found the entire piece impactful and vitally important but nothing more so than the emphasis on capitalism and its benefits. I say this as I do a nearly daily battle with supposed business people and with certain "financial/business" journalists regarding the vitalness of capitalism and what it has and can produce. I am constantly making the argument that capitalism is the only system that provides the freedom for an individual to realize their full potential in addition to its historical and ongoing major impact on the quality of life and the need for and power of more innovation.
By and large, this argument falls on deaf ears. The constant refrain from these "business people" and "financial journalists" is to play the "evils of neo-liberalism card" and the need to keep increasing the involvement of the federal government in business across the board.
I wish tech more success than I have had with changing the minds of these post-modern influenced and self-righteous people who at some core level view business, and espeically those highly successful entrepreneurs, as "bad" and government as "good."
Interesting take. Just remember not all your readers are a) American b) believe the techno industralist movement is confined to the USA. Some of us may have lived in America but we are building great things all over the world / regardless of who is the American President.
As neither a Republican nor a Democrat, but as an obstinate Independent who did his Ph.D. in AI and computational linguistics in 1977 and started several "AI companies" in 80's and 90's and was early involved in crypto 2013, I have bet my entire career on the proposition that technology is the most consequential lever of change - positive and negative. I concur with much of the tone and admonition of the prior commenter, but I think the article is flawed in important ways. The belief in the unbridled good of "American"laissez - faire technology is naive, parochial, and dangerous. Tech is an instrument that is shaped by power, ego, and economic interests . Let loose without thoughtful guidelines and accountability, it concentrates power, accentuates inequities and could easily destroy the planet. The biosphere is not fungible and our current financial and economic models function on the premise of commodification and fungibility. Turning the world - rural internet - American space and Defense policy over to the Elons or the "Zucks" is a very bad idea. This is what happened with railroad, food, banking, energy, transport in the Gilded Age and it took Teddy Rosevelt to curb those forces of concentration of power. To ignore the context in which the value of technology is directed and appropriated is simple journalistic negligence. Witness the concentration of power and lack of accountability of social media and big tech. They are more powerful and more influential and unaccountable in many respects than the government. And you want to give them and their "save the world" demagogues more license? (The Fourth Estate has evaporated!) One can have a vibrant tech sector without total capitulation to its Titans. Consider the role of DARPA and the government in innovation. Where would Elon be without huge subsidies? Now consider the pressure of "tech" and Wall Street to influence SCOTUS decisions beginning with Citizens United, Voting Act, Dobbs, Chevron and the notorious Trump Immunity decision. Is bad crypto-regulation more consequential than upending the rule of law? Do listen to Vitalik. He has a penchant for seeing the bigger picture. Having served in government, it can be grossly inefficient, captive special internal and external interests and even corrupt. I do believe next generation biotic AI technologies and digital assets can lead to more effective, accountable forms of "sentient and distributed governance" based on science and first principles. Yet the ethos of SV Libertarians, the "New Right", JD Vance, Peter Thiel et al, is in fact very reactionary. While espousing "individual freedoms", the Tech Trumpites are literally calling for a theocratic monarchy. Why? Because they "unselfishly" want a new moral order ? Or perhaps it is a way to protect and enhance the powers of their legacy interests? This is an old story. Democrats need to be less preachy ( especially Elizabeth Warren), shed their penchant for punitivity, and process and focus on measurable impacts. They need to project policies for a future that is transformed by sentient technologies and life sciences that is good for everyone and the planet. Like their Republican cousins, however, they are still captive to Left-Right Cartesian dualisms and the industrial technologies, economics, and ideologies of 17th century classical mechanics.
An important question. But I think you've completely glossed over not just the issue of wealth in tech, but wealth at the exploitation of user's data, their mental health, their beliefs in institutions, enablement of fraud, etc.
The reason AI is getting so much scrutiny now isn't because social media made Zuckerberg a billionaire... it's because he did so off the backs of election subversion, genocide in Myanmar, amplifying hatred and intolerance, etc.
"It’s that they think there’s more of a chance he’ll let them do what they do best, and that if he does, they’ll do more good for the world than he does bad."
Maybe that's correct on a macro level but I would like to see how you feel about that statement if you are personally affected by "the bad he does". Oh wait, you are white, male and heterosexual so you will be fine. I hope everyone realizes their privilege of endorsing a candidate who is running on a platform like Trump and shrugging off all criticism by saying that he will enable tech to do more good for the world. We all saw enough of "the bad", putting democracy at risk and affecting minorities and women during his first term and for years, maybe decades to come. No need to give this a second try.
As a techie-turned-policy and political staffer-turned-techie, I view this slightly differently. The issue isn’t how the Democrats lost Tech. It’s that tech has lost its DNA, which enabled it to be the coherent bloc it was in the Obama era, and it’s impossible to look at the industry through the same monolithic lens that you once could. Tech is now witnessing what other industries have long faced when working with the government. When you have opposing sides to every issue, you ultimately leave your fate up to the political predisposition of the governing parties. Democrats are more apt to listen to consumer protection groups, advocacy groups, and groups representing the “public interest.” They believe that Government is the solution and that lawmaking, rule-making, and regulatory action are the best ways to ensure industries behave as they want.
Conversely, the Republican nature (which did shift quite a bit under the Trump administration) is to stay out of picking winners and losers within industries and allow the markets to work their will. As tech grew and people were lobbying on either side of each issue, it became clearer that these weren’t issues that could or should be quickly regulated into submission. Short of causing irreparable harm to our national security (see the controversial TikTok saga) or directly getting in the crosshairs of certain members’ pet issues (or vocal constituencies), the Republican goal is to be light touch.
You correctly point out that it was relatively easy for tech companies to avoid thinking about the burden of government regulations while they were focused purely on software. And yes, as you point out tech is into all sorts of material industries with heavy regulation. But I would argue that the majority of tech companies or startups aren’t interested in “making the world a better place” and that their frustration stems from believing they know how to make the world a better place than the other side does. Perhaps that is the case with a few visionaries (Musk and Thiel are two examples you cite). But for the most part, companies and founders don’t seem to care about making the world a better place - they care about getting their ideas out the door as fast as possible and scaling to show traction quickly to prove the validity of their idea. It’s not that they’re just in it for the money (one motivation you point out), and it’s not that they have a view of how to change the world. They have taken heed of the sage startup advice to “niche down” and make a profit. Changing the world and doing things that won’t scale is for someone more noble.
In the section “Someone Else Makes the World a Better Place Better Than We Do” you cite the pervasive self-interest (egos?) of tech founders and lawmakers duking it out over who can make the world a better place. You then list out a bunch of regulations that you point out issues with. What happened to founders who clearly saw the market dysfunction of regulated industries, the exact problem the end consumer (person) faced, and took a risk with the legal interpretation of the existing statute to build a software solution that would attract users and delight them with the solution? Sure, the Travis Kalanick and Airbnb Founders could have perhaps stood to have cultivated some equanimity with lawmakers once their products showed some traction, but waiting for the Government to listen and write laws that equally weigh out the concerns of both sides and are ultimately favorable for new business models is looking at this a bit backward. Perhaps this is a chance for investors in particular - but also founders to think a little more like their risk-taking, visionary predecessors about what a better world would look like, how to build those products, and how to attract so many users that it’s impossible to ignore the outdatedness of these regulations. I suspect that vision extends beyond enterprise tooling and AI for AI’s sake.
This isn’t about one side or another “winning” the totality of tech. It’s about tech owning its mantle as the biggest contributor to our economy, that it is no longer able to speak in a monolithic voice, and that it must mature into a body that can operate within regulated industries that may want to keep it out. And that sure, Government and Politicians can be allies in transforming those industries to be more fair – but that looking to the Government as its ultimate arbiter will always leave it wanting.
I've got another answer to explain the tiny crop of defectors for Trump--that suspiciously similar crop of defectors.
Short answer is that San Fran's wealth has finally gotten it into the door of the *real* party, the East Coast party, where the laws and government and media and old-school power are. San Fran has zero experience with these. Zero. And like most extremely wealthy provincials, San Fran doesn't understand what it's seeing in its new circumstances, and apparently doesn't even realize that there's a *very* good reason for every single thing it's yammering about in the foyer.
I'm not inclined to let a bunch of weirdos eff around unsupervised with a potential existential threat for any reason, when said weirdos have apparently also been stunned into submission by a local school board. SF is one of a handful of dystopian American cities. I wonder why the bros don't run for office and fix it. They sure have the money and connections. If they can't evn do that, I got some real doubts about any Mars colony they might try to build. I have zero doubt about which is more important.
VC bros don't take over SF politics because they really, really do not understand it. It is obviously a huge mistake to believe that SF is newly wealthy. You'd have to have the history education of a 5-year-old to believe that. Have they not heard of Getty, Stanford, and Hearst? If a person doesn't know who Dede Wilsey is, they are never going to take power in San Francisco. If they don't understand the reactionary politics of Chinatown and Sunset, they cannot take power in SF.
Getty, Stanford, and Hearst are parvenus compared to Astor, Forbes, duPont, and Vanderbilt; to think their wealth is in any comparable to those East Coast families--and the *amount* is immaterial, typically the toughest thing to grok--is, I think, San Francisco's problem in a nutshell. (And Wilsey only moved West after her second husband took her there...)
But the point remains. If they can't muster up the juice to elect a school board, much less a City Council, much less a mayor, how on God's green earth do they think they're at all qualified for national entree? I mean, you've provided a very helpful requirements list...can their dev team not build it?? Is it...possible...that this might involve approaches and methods that they're...not good at? Possibly *totally ignorant of*? That, ah, They're Just Not That Into You, my brosephs?
Heh. They want to woo Ms. D.C., they're about to meet some *real* Chads.
I think a big difference between the Trump supporters in tech and Democratic politicians in general is that the Trump supporters don't want to be responsible for collateral damage. unintended consequences or uneven distribution of be of benefits. They see it as a cost of progress. These are political issues but they would prefer that politicians ignore them also. These are some of the smartest people and best leaders in our country, yes their time is extremely valuable but it seems as though if they give any thought to solutions all they can do is parrot something about UBI. I don't take UBI very seriously, so I haven't looked into these proposals, What taxes are being proposed to pay for UBI ?
I find Crypto to be very telling. First, it is not what it claims to be. It is neither safe nor anonymous. It is used to perpetrate numerous frauds. But its supporters claim we need it because blockchain will be a critical technology. Well as it is not safe that is certainly questionable. And why can you not develop other blockchain use cases if crypto is regulated?
Great points. We should also consider the philosophy of symbolism over substance. Most tech leaders hire highly competent people and expect the same of those leading government agencies. Tech leaders hold their teams accountable for results so they may also consider this in their political calculations.
Well said. An overlooked moment in the big Trump-Biden debate was T saying, "You never fire anyone."
Whatever else you think of him, a President Trump's reaction to the Secret Service failing so incompetently in its job would be, "You're fired!" to everyone responsible.
Roe v Wade was overturned and women are being denied live-saving medical care because of Trump. He's even bragged about it. And J.D. Vance has expressed support for bans on abortion without any exceptions (https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/17/politics/kfile-jd-vance-abortion-comments/index.html).
The current Republican spin for this is that "we'll leave it to the states", and I'm sure a lot of folks like you who are holding their nose and voting for Trump are eager to believe that they won't use the Comstock Act to ban abortion nationwide. But if you genuinely believe that then boy can I get you one hell of a deal on that bridge you mentioned. Mike Johnson has admitted this is bullshit: https://x.com/atrupar/status/1814046827848806630?s=51&t=C88t5nKljm77sIWE0jrjRQ&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
This is the future for women in this country under a Trump administration: https://x.com/theryanhamilton/status/1792504436335456421?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Read that and tell me how the tech industry's right to innovate is more important than a woman's right to bodily autonomy.
Why do you think that’s the case, Will?
👆 Bingo. 🎯 Seems similar to what I wrote here: https://open.substack.com/pub/notboring/p/why-the-democrats-lost-tech?r=jrlj8&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true&commentId=63437694
Thanks for your addition to the conversation!
This is a flawed premise article from the beginning. Let me tell you as someone who is deeply ingrained in the Silicon Valley tech community, Democrats have not lost tech. The Republicans / Conservatives / Libertarians have won over a few billionaire tech people that were conservative mainly to begin with. You are using anecdotes as evidence, very unintellectual at best and drivel at worst. There has always been a small sliver of libertarians in Tech and will remain so.
I appreciate your newsletter immensely but you blindly think tech is always the answer to our problems. It's not. Tech is just a tool and without regulation and oversight, it can be used for good and evil. RealPage is tech but all it has led to is collusion among property managers to artificially increase rent. We need tech and American Dynamism to lead us to further prosperity in the 21st century but we also need regulation and oversight to reign in the worst abuses.
I don't disagree that we need regulation and oversight in the least.
Re: the premise, the number of non-billionaires in tech I've spoken to who've sheepishly told me that they're seriously considering voting for Trump really surprised me. Obviously, it hasn't fully lost tech, but the trajectory is not good.
Couple things:
1) Regulation is not an on/off, either-or position. Some regulation makes the machine run better. Some makes it run worse.
2) People tend to be socially punished harsher if they adopt right-of-center positions today. That might change in the future.
Doesn’t this have a lot to do with numbers? Even in the Bay Area the Dem-Rep vote split is like 70-30, so you’re bound to run into Republicans wherever you go. I even know many Republicans personally who support the GOP mainly for tax and regulations. I liked many of the points you brought up, and I do think that if Dems adopted a Matt Yglesias or Ezra Klein style liberalism that emphasizes competence, efficiency along with the usual liberal policies of government investment & welfare, they’d win over most of the tech billionaires as well.
Were they big manly men, by any chance?
This is the first cycle where I've had to recognize that the costs have gone up to voting Dem. I'm a pre-seed AI founder. Between Khan at the FTC, the executive memo on AI, and Gensler's bad faith actions towards crypto, the trend runs directly counter to what I believe American Innovation should be. Now, I'd never vote Trump because I wouldn't be willing to cut off my arm (Democracy) to make an extra buck, but I'd love for us to take a step back as a party and reassess this trajectory. Kamala has a clear opportunity to do so.
Packy's observations about "Everything Bagel Liberalism" are spot on. It should be alarming that investments are conditional on whether they support special interests.
Khan is the best thing that happened to anti trust. Thank you very much
Lifetime techie here. Just (very short) words of advice: be briefer. And don't spend so much time clearing your throat at the beginning: get right to it.
I think you're onto something here, but the fundamental zero-sum mentality of the Elizabeth Warren types will NEVER go away. It goes back to Karl Marx and the "labor theory of value." It's who they are.
Love the meta-advice: be briefer (in two words)
Thanks. I've never been an editor for money, but I'm sure we could work something out!
Capital based economies are zero-sum. There is a finite amount of capital in the economy. To be a capitalist means you have to have capital, which means having a lot of money. Capitalism is the very rewarding to people that take the most capital resources while putting out the least effort per unit of capital. Sometimes thats through increased efficiency. Sometimes that's by stealing value in a myriad of ways.
Dems are a very big tent party. You’ve got everyone from Marty Yglesias and Mark Kelly and Josh Shapiro to AOC and Warren. The former Dems are who the party should be rallying behind as they are pro growth and generally competent, and from the looks of it, Harris will likely pick Shapiro or Kelly for VP.
What data actually indicates that the Democrats have “lost tech”? A few high profile tech celebrities are Republican, but famous tech billionaires are also some of the Democrats’ biggest donors, and rank and file tech workers are unreservedly liberal.
There’s always been a weird libertarian fringe, and now there’s a bit of MAGA, too. But the media narrative that the tech industry has gone Republican seems to be supported by anecdote, not evidence.
Great article. I'm a longtime tech-optimist Democrat -- my first presidential vote was 1988 (Bush), and I switched to Bill Clinton in 1992 because he and Gore were embracing tech (the "information superhighway"). I still believe in the party broadly but agree that its approaches to economics have become burdensome and counterproductive. It's been interesting to see Matt Yglesias and Ezra Klein go from leftist Wapo bloggers to "establishment shills."
That said, one thing that's troubled me is how much of right-wing tech leadership has largely focused on culture and tax rates instead of policy. The first political tweet I remember seeing from Paul Graham was about how an entrepreneur who paid a higher capital gains tax might see his lifetime earnings go from $100 million to $50 million -- it seemed like a weird out-of-touch thing to focus on during the Trump era.
The Facebook backlash was not just about 2016. It was also about how much dissembling and blame shifting there was from Zuckerberg afterward, and the growing recognition that social media was making us all miserable.
And as a crypto guy, I agree that Gensler has gone way too far, and I hope Kamala comes up with a better approach. At the same time, crypto is so full of scams and bad faith operators that it more often resembles a globalized MLM -- Amway for Twitter influencers -- than a truly innovative platform. Very few people want to admit that 95% of the excitement is around price action. There is no first-use experience that excites you in the same way social media or ChatGPT did.
Edit: a lot of right wing Twitter blamed Democrats for SBF, but ignored that he was only able to pull off his scam by setting up *outside the US regulatory regime.* Elon and others predicted SBF would get off easy because of his donations to Democrats, yet it was the Biden DOJ that put him in prison for a very long time.
Great take! To add to the Facebook point, also let's not forget how Tech companies like to close the door behind them when them make it. The number of lawsuits that Facebook handed out to squash smaller tech companies is not trivial. And set dangerous legal precedent.
I think a point being missed here is that as new industries become older established industries they tend to get comfortable with their power. Which maybe is just my way of realizing Pete really did say it as concisely as you can.
Behind only G.Soros SBF was Biden's largest contributor...still waiting for The Big Guy to return those stolen funds.
And yet Biden’s DOJ sent him to prison. Ingrate.
Weird take.
https://www.opensecrets.org/2020-presidential-race/joe-biden/contributors?id=N00001669
Cards on the table: I'm 0-2 voting for Trump, soon to be 0-3, for the simple reason that POTUS is not Amateur Night. I don't give auto-credence to self-proclaimed "experts", but there is a time and place for experience and expertise. I do think that Trump is getting a second look from others because he has 4 years under his belt, but I also find his general integrity to be lacking, and he's too much of a weathervane. That last point doesn't absolve others' integrity issues, though. Historically, I have defaulted to the GOP, but have voted for many Democrats in my lifetime since I was able to first vote in 1986.
That said, I think tech is turning against the Dems for the following reasons:
1) The "precautionary principle"--well known regarding environmental concerns, I see it leaking into other business sectors. The purpose of technology is to replace big problems with smaller ones, in an iterative, almost agile fashion. But if you dwell on the NEW smaller ones too much before they could even happen, you won't solve the big ones. The Precautionary Principle is anti-agile.
2) There are "enough" Democrats that embrace some form of Marxism, whether it be traditional economic socialism or the power dynamics of the Successor Ideology (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Successor_ideology) , and to varying significant, non-zero degrees. And it's hard to separate the two. In any case, it's anti-business. Especially anti-risky-business, like tech, that needs massive amounts of merit and money.
3) The Dems have abandoned the Libertarian Lite worldview of social liberalism combined with economic moderation. However, the GOP has kept their social conservatism (although that shows some inconsistent signs of moderating) and definitely is swinging more economically progressive. Not sure where that leaves tech, though, unless it's an individual decision of which is the lesser evil.
4) Regarding "tech being richer", this could simply be a function of the USA needing more money, and tech being where the money is, per Willie Sutton.
5) There are enough people on the Left that firmly believe in degrowth (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Degrowth ).
6) Regulatory capture, as mentioned.
7) The Progressive Left has become less tolerant of dissenters, on a whole laundry list of issues. That means that Dems have to carry and stick to a larger checklist of positions, each with their own seat at the table.
Our two party system is broken. A fact that I think is related to many of the points this article discussed.
This is a great piece. It really resonates with me even though I am not a techie (just an old school corporate raider). I found the entire piece impactful and vitally important but nothing more so than the emphasis on capitalism and its benefits. I say this as I do a nearly daily battle with supposed business people and with certain "financial/business" journalists regarding the vitalness of capitalism and what it has and can produce. I am constantly making the argument that capitalism is the only system that provides the freedom for an individual to realize their full potential in addition to its historical and ongoing major impact on the quality of life and the need for and power of more innovation.
By and large, this argument falls on deaf ears. The constant refrain from these "business people" and "financial journalists" is to play the "evils of neo-liberalism card" and the need to keep increasing the involvement of the federal government in business across the board.
I wish tech more success than I have had with changing the minds of these post-modern influenced and self-righteous people who at some core level view business, and espeically those highly successful entrepreneurs, as "bad" and government as "good."
Some of the self-righteous you speak of don't view government as good. They just see corporate as being worse than big government.
Interesting take. Just remember not all your readers are a) American b) believe the techno industralist movement is confined to the USA. Some of us may have lived in America but we are building great things all over the world / regardless of who is the American President.
As well you should! :)
LFG, everyone, everywhere.
As neither a Republican nor a Democrat, but as an obstinate Independent who did his Ph.D. in AI and computational linguistics in 1977 and started several "AI companies" in 80's and 90's and was early involved in crypto 2013, I have bet my entire career on the proposition that technology is the most consequential lever of change - positive and negative. I concur with much of the tone and admonition of the prior commenter, but I think the article is flawed in important ways. The belief in the unbridled good of "American"laissez - faire technology is naive, parochial, and dangerous. Tech is an instrument that is shaped by power, ego, and economic interests . Let loose without thoughtful guidelines and accountability, it concentrates power, accentuates inequities and could easily destroy the planet. The biosphere is not fungible and our current financial and economic models function on the premise of commodification and fungibility. Turning the world - rural internet - American space and Defense policy over to the Elons or the "Zucks" is a very bad idea. This is what happened with railroad, food, banking, energy, transport in the Gilded Age and it took Teddy Rosevelt to curb those forces of concentration of power. To ignore the context in which the value of technology is directed and appropriated is simple journalistic negligence. Witness the concentration of power and lack of accountability of social media and big tech. They are more powerful and more influential and unaccountable in many respects than the government. And you want to give them and their "save the world" demagogues more license? (The Fourth Estate has evaporated!) One can have a vibrant tech sector without total capitulation to its Titans. Consider the role of DARPA and the government in innovation. Where would Elon be without huge subsidies? Now consider the pressure of "tech" and Wall Street to influence SCOTUS decisions beginning with Citizens United, Voting Act, Dobbs, Chevron and the notorious Trump Immunity decision. Is bad crypto-regulation more consequential than upending the rule of law? Do listen to Vitalik. He has a penchant for seeing the bigger picture. Having served in government, it can be grossly inefficient, captive special internal and external interests and even corrupt. I do believe next generation biotic AI technologies and digital assets can lead to more effective, accountable forms of "sentient and distributed governance" based on science and first principles. Yet the ethos of SV Libertarians, the "New Right", JD Vance, Peter Thiel et al, is in fact very reactionary. While espousing "individual freedoms", the Tech Trumpites are literally calling for a theocratic monarchy. Why? Because they "unselfishly" want a new moral order ? Or perhaps it is a way to protect and enhance the powers of their legacy interests? This is an old story. Democrats need to be less preachy ( especially Elizabeth Warren), shed their penchant for punitivity, and process and focus on measurable impacts. They need to project policies for a future that is transformed by sentient technologies and life sciences that is good for everyone and the planet. Like their Republican cousins, however, they are still captive to Left-Right Cartesian dualisms and the industrial technologies, economics, and ideologies of 17th century classical mechanics.
An important question. But I think you've completely glossed over not just the issue of wealth in tech, but wealth at the exploitation of user's data, their mental health, their beliefs in institutions, enablement of fraud, etc.
The reason AI is getting so much scrutiny now isn't because social media made Zuckerberg a billionaire... it's because he did so off the backs of election subversion, genocide in Myanmar, amplifying hatred and intolerance, etc.
👆🎯 Yes.
"It’s that they think there’s more of a chance he’ll let them do what they do best, and that if he does, they’ll do more good for the world than he does bad."
Maybe that's correct on a macro level but I would like to see how you feel about that statement if you are personally affected by "the bad he does". Oh wait, you are white, male and heterosexual so you will be fine. I hope everyone realizes their privilege of endorsing a candidate who is running on a platform like Trump and shrugging off all criticism by saying that he will enable tech to do more good for the world. We all saw enough of "the bad", putting democracy at risk and affecting minorities and women during his first term and for years, maybe decades to come. No need to give this a second try.
As a techie-turned-policy and political staffer-turned-techie, I view this slightly differently. The issue isn’t how the Democrats lost Tech. It’s that tech has lost its DNA, which enabled it to be the coherent bloc it was in the Obama era, and it’s impossible to look at the industry through the same monolithic lens that you once could. Tech is now witnessing what other industries have long faced when working with the government. When you have opposing sides to every issue, you ultimately leave your fate up to the political predisposition of the governing parties. Democrats are more apt to listen to consumer protection groups, advocacy groups, and groups representing the “public interest.” They believe that Government is the solution and that lawmaking, rule-making, and regulatory action are the best ways to ensure industries behave as they want.
Conversely, the Republican nature (which did shift quite a bit under the Trump administration) is to stay out of picking winners and losers within industries and allow the markets to work their will. As tech grew and people were lobbying on either side of each issue, it became clearer that these weren’t issues that could or should be quickly regulated into submission. Short of causing irreparable harm to our national security (see the controversial TikTok saga) or directly getting in the crosshairs of certain members’ pet issues (or vocal constituencies), the Republican goal is to be light touch.
You correctly point out that it was relatively easy for tech companies to avoid thinking about the burden of government regulations while they were focused purely on software. And yes, as you point out tech is into all sorts of material industries with heavy regulation. But I would argue that the majority of tech companies or startups aren’t interested in “making the world a better place” and that their frustration stems from believing they know how to make the world a better place than the other side does. Perhaps that is the case with a few visionaries (Musk and Thiel are two examples you cite). But for the most part, companies and founders don’t seem to care about making the world a better place - they care about getting their ideas out the door as fast as possible and scaling to show traction quickly to prove the validity of their idea. It’s not that they’re just in it for the money (one motivation you point out), and it’s not that they have a view of how to change the world. They have taken heed of the sage startup advice to “niche down” and make a profit. Changing the world and doing things that won’t scale is for someone more noble.
In the section “Someone Else Makes the World a Better Place Better Than We Do” you cite the pervasive self-interest (egos?) of tech founders and lawmakers duking it out over who can make the world a better place. You then list out a bunch of regulations that you point out issues with. What happened to founders who clearly saw the market dysfunction of regulated industries, the exact problem the end consumer (person) faced, and took a risk with the legal interpretation of the existing statute to build a software solution that would attract users and delight them with the solution? Sure, the Travis Kalanick and Airbnb Founders could have perhaps stood to have cultivated some equanimity with lawmakers once their products showed some traction, but waiting for the Government to listen and write laws that equally weigh out the concerns of both sides and are ultimately favorable for new business models is looking at this a bit backward. Perhaps this is a chance for investors in particular - but also founders to think a little more like their risk-taking, visionary predecessors about what a better world would look like, how to build those products, and how to attract so many users that it’s impossible to ignore the outdatedness of these regulations. I suspect that vision extends beyond enterprise tooling and AI for AI’s sake.
This isn’t about one side or another “winning” the totality of tech. It’s about tech owning its mantle as the biggest contributor to our economy, that it is no longer able to speak in a monolithic voice, and that it must mature into a body that can operate within regulated industries that may want to keep it out. And that sure, Government and Politicians can be allies in transforming those industries to be more fair – but that looking to the Government as its ultimate arbiter will always leave it wanting.
I've got another answer to explain the tiny crop of defectors for Trump--that suspiciously similar crop of defectors.
Short answer is that San Fran's wealth has finally gotten it into the door of the *real* party, the East Coast party, where the laws and government and media and old-school power are. San Fran has zero experience with these. Zero. And like most extremely wealthy provincials, San Fran doesn't understand what it's seeing in its new circumstances, and apparently doesn't even realize that there's a *very* good reason for every single thing it's yammering about in the foyer.
I'm not inclined to let a bunch of weirdos eff around unsupervised with a potential existential threat for any reason, when said weirdos have apparently also been stunned into submission by a local school board. SF is one of a handful of dystopian American cities. I wonder why the bros don't run for office and fix it. They sure have the money and connections. If they can't evn do that, I got some real doubts about any Mars colony they might try to build. I have zero doubt about which is more important.
VC bros don't take over SF politics because they really, really do not understand it. It is obviously a huge mistake to believe that SF is newly wealthy. You'd have to have the history education of a 5-year-old to believe that. Have they not heard of Getty, Stanford, and Hearst? If a person doesn't know who Dede Wilsey is, they are never going to take power in San Francisco. If they don't understand the reactionary politics of Chinatown and Sunset, they cannot take power in SF.
Getty, Stanford, and Hearst are parvenus compared to Astor, Forbes, duPont, and Vanderbilt; to think their wealth is in any comparable to those East Coast families--and the *amount* is immaterial, typically the toughest thing to grok--is, I think, San Francisco's problem in a nutshell. (And Wilsey only moved West after her second husband took her there...)
But the point remains. If they can't muster up the juice to elect a school board, much less a City Council, much less a mayor, how on God's green earth do they think they're at all qualified for national entree? I mean, you've provided a very helpful requirements list...can their dev team not build it?? Is it...possible...that this might involve approaches and methods that they're...not good at? Possibly *totally ignorant of*? That, ah, They're Just Not That Into You, my brosephs?
Heh. They want to woo Ms. D.C., they're about to meet some *real* Chads.
I think a big difference between the Trump supporters in tech and Democratic politicians in general is that the Trump supporters don't want to be responsible for collateral damage. unintended consequences or uneven distribution of be of benefits. They see it as a cost of progress. These are political issues but they would prefer that politicians ignore them also. These are some of the smartest people and best leaders in our country, yes their time is extremely valuable but it seems as though if they give any thought to solutions all they can do is parrot something about UBI. I don't take UBI very seriously, so I haven't looked into these proposals, What taxes are being proposed to pay for UBI ?
I find Crypto to be very telling. First, it is not what it claims to be. It is neither safe nor anonymous. It is used to perpetrate numerous frauds. But its supporters claim we need it because blockchain will be a critical technology. Well as it is not safe that is certainly questionable. And why can you not develop other blockchain use cases if crypto is regulated?
Great points. We should also consider the philosophy of symbolism over substance. Most tech leaders hire highly competent people and expect the same of those leading government agencies. Tech leaders hold their teams accountable for results so they may also consider this in their political calculations.
Well said. An overlooked moment in the big Trump-Biden debate was T saying, "You never fire anyone."
Whatever else you think of him, a President Trump's reaction to the Secret Service failing so incompetently in its job would be, "You're fired!" to everyone responsible.
I'm impressed by all that you cover in this article but am surprised at how you seem to excuse how immoral people like Trump are.
Morality is the first consideration for me. It matters more than party affiliation or promises.
Does the person have integrity.
Trump has been clear for years that he does not.
I'm far more likely to excuse Democrats misunderstanding the benefits of capitalism than I am to excuse a racist misogynist bully.