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Ask HN: Why can't good side of Silicon Valley outsmart evil s. and Wall Street?

14 points by lapaz17 ↗ HN
In 2008 crisis, I was 11 years old. However I watched Inside Job documentary and saw how many of guys there have not been prosecuted that time. Today same scenario somewhat happens. Facebook(https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25952659),and Google (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25951390) are involved too. What can we do about it? I'm sick of all this BS. Disclaimer: I do not work in silicon valley.

29 comments

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themodelplumber
Do you really think there's a good side and an evil side?

(If so, can I ask if you think you personally have an evil side?)

lapaz17
Yes. My home country consists of relaxed people(Actually all of Mediterranean countries have this). I sometimes justify decrease rate in our currency against Dollar is the right thing. But all of loved ones of mine suffer from it, and I feel bad :(
jolmg
themodelplumber asked about you personally, though. I'm not sure what the rest of the country, the currency, or being relaxed has to do with it.
Jkvngt
Silicon Valley is definitely much more evil than Wall Street.
vmception
There are a lot tech companies helping people "outsmart evil". There is a limitation of the infrastructure to put it to better efficacy.

Silicon Valley collectively has not been able to penetrate the exchange and liquidity infrastructure that the cadre of banks of clearing firms have. This is built on relationships and an abundance of capital, the latter comes from relationships. The finance sector has a network of prestigious schools (or the finance departments in those schools), the retirement plan of heading the government agencies, and control of the money supply. This is not currently solved with technology as humans that want to recognize other humans are involved.

There have been several west coast trading venues and exchanges, nobody wants to list there.

Other Silicon Valley companies just want access and respect and integration with the current financial system players.

zwaps
I think Silicon Valley has the exact same proportion of Machiavellian executives and opportunist entrepreneurs as every other industry.

The only difference is that part of the marketing of a SV company inevitably includes the claim to "make the world a better place" and to "be different" in some way. Beyond this marketing claim, there is very little difference.

I also don't think that the cabal of financial services in NYC are the real constraint.

Instead, SV firms have found that users != customers is a good business model. It works, as long as the users can be convinced they are customers to some degree.

This business model is not ethically clean, yet very profitable. And here is the example: Robinhood markets itself precisely as I have said above. Heck, even the name!

In reality, its customer is Citadel, and its product is early data on user trades. One could say: It does the exact opposite of what its marketing would suggest - Taking profits from small investors and giving them a large hedge fund.

So really, SV is just as "bad".

notahacker
> I think Silicon Valley has the exact same proportion of Machiavellian executives and opportunist entrepreneurs as every other industry.

> The only difference is that part of the marketing of a SV company inevitably includes the claim to "make the world a better place" and to "be different" in some way. Beyond this marketing claim, there is very little difference.

This. The reason why the "good" side isn't outsmarting everyone else is because most entities that claim to be disrupting "bad guys" either aim to sell to the "bad guys" they're "disrupting" or mimic their practices with a thin veneer of difference or do worse stuff of their own. Same goes for other less organised recent events. What got sold as "getting revenge on Wall St" is a bunch of novice traders convincing each other it's really worth it even if they lose money as Citadel racks up enormous profits on market making and the 470 institutional funds invested in GME see a bump to their portfolio.

ceilingcorner
Silicon Valley is no longer about startups, in the sense of scrappy challengers to established industries. It is now about maintaining the establishment of the top ~10 tech firms.

What can you do? Build a company in your own country and fund an independent ecosystem that doesn’t rely on Big Tech’s money or ex-employees.

rajacombinator
What makes you think there is a “good side” of Silicon Valley? Genuinely curious how such naïveté can still exist in the wild.
goatinaboat
What makes you think there is a “good side” of Silicon Valley? Genuinely curious how such naïveté can still exist in the wild.

With retrospect we can pinpoint the exact moment the good side died: when Google uttered the words “don’t be evil”.

Dma54rhs
But you have to be naive this slogan ever meant anything, it was a marketing ploy until they are big enough. It paid to be the don't do evil side at the time. It's like believing all these huge companies taking part of social change campaigns for common good - its just marketing but people believe it, even the ones very distrustful of corporations otherwise.
goatinaboat
But you have to be naive this slogan ever meant anything, it was a marketing ploy until they are big enough

It was the point at which they knew they could just be blatant about adopting such a bare-faced motto and no one would bat an eyelid.

probinso
there is no good part of silicon valley. the capital incentive makes poison on its environment. People who do good work have to sacrifice an income, this means that there is no financial incentive to do good work.
valand
The capital incentive makes it susceptible to those that is willing to provide it.

There are some ways this can yield "good" result:

- "Good" investor provide money for "good" cause. This sometimes are charity, but "good" cause and raising capital isn't mutually exclusive. This relies on the investor's goodwill.

- "Good" executor trades "goods" with investor's money. Executor can use the resource available to do the "good" deed while keeping investor "happy". This is of course harder as the executor has to either constantly persuade executor or be rare, as in, nobody else can replace the executor in getting what the investor wants.

- Raise money without investor, sacrifice income. The one the parent comment mentioned.

jnerdit
It doesn't matter who the players are, because the fundamental incentive to do, anything - money - is a zero-sum game. Its a points game. The Federal Reserve, a private bank and single entity, can and will print as much money as the government will take -at interest- to fulfill the whimsy of policy makers and constituents. Fractional Reserve banking systems do not work. Ours is broken and failing. We need a complete reset.
alexmingoia
Trade is not zero-sum. Both parties to a trade benefit, otherwise there’s no need to trade. At least in the US, the EU, China, Japan, etc. money is not zero-sum, as the supply of money can increase to meet demand for credit.
jnerdit
Thanks, you're correct I had the definition of 'zero-sum' backwards in my head and for that context - let me be clear - I just have a deteriorating faith in the the USD. I personally assign less and less value to it. I just meant to point out the fact that our fractional reserve banking system is 'built-to-fail' by design.

The helicopter money and trillion dollar injections can only last if the banks are solvent - they cant be peddling' garbage debt,,,they never stopped and some market will bubble again and wash out the meek..

This constant balancing act that we play with the US economy and global markets incites fear and greed.

Back before US notes and banks, we had the goldsmith. Goldsmith takes custody of gold, and issues dollars/bonds/notch for amounts on transactions... as it is much easier to hand someone a slip of paper than moving gold around constantly. OK cool except, wait - nothing is stopping goldsmith from making multiple slips for the same stack of gold. Uh oh - The classic double spend!

Now, 2021, We have solutions to this now in the form of blockchain/crypto. It is the most easily accessible sound form of money...just not quite easy enough yet.

fsflover
The “good” side can do it, but it takes a huge effort and time, because the evil monopolies got too strong. Support and found companies which fight against the status quo and offer the solution: https://puri.sm/products.
peter_d_sherman
What a great question!

In thinking about it, I thought to myself, well that question is somewhat like "Why can't Silicon Valley fix the problems with Washington D.C.?" Or, "Why can't Washington D.C. fix the problems with Wall Street?"

Let's think of three cities -- "A Tale Of Three Cities" -- Silicon Valley, Washington D.C., and New York (AKA, "Wall Street").

Silicon Valley -- is the home of Tech.

Washington D.C. -- is the home of Government.

New York -- is the home of Finance (the financial markets, the main stock exchanges).

Each one of these places, each one of these cities -- was built on a different paradigm.

These paradigms (Tech, Government, Finance) in the way that they interact with each other, is sort of like a giant game of "Rock, Scissors, Paper"...

That is, each has different moves that it can use either for or against the others (in this game constructive as well as non-constructive actions are permitted).

But no single paradigm -- can completely dominate and control the other paradigms...

So the paradigms interact from time to time, in various different ways, sometimes constructive, sometimes destructive, sometimes neither -- to one another.

If the idea that Silicon Valley can somehow "outsmart evil s. and Wall Street", remember that to a large degree, while Silicon Valley controls tech, Wall Street controls Silicon Valley's finance...

In short, it ain't going to happen.

All of the "problems" that the world could or ever would face, are created by paradigms that in turn create systems (a City is only the outwards manifestation of this), systems that produce effects for those that control them that the people who control them want to be produced, but sometimes those effects may be to the detriment of other people and groups...

To understand this paradigm mass effect more, you might want to read about "Tragedy Of The Commons"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

But, any city that was created by a paradigm at its root -- is pretty much going to play "Rock, Scissors, Paper" with other cities that were created by different paradigms...

If someone wanted to unify and create non-destructive actions by these different groups, by these different paradigms, by these different cities -- then that person would have to know the WHY, completely and totally, of not just one -- but of all of the paradigms that they would attempt to unite...

That's no small task -- even for the greatest of Ivy-League Professors!

But, on a simpler note, I have to like this "Rock, Scissors, Paper" paradigm analogy! (I'm going to have to write a future philosophical essay on this!)

Trias11
It's a bigger picture now.

The whole US financial system is primed for overdue reset.

[dead] whydoineedone
what really ended up happening to me is after 4-6 years of meticulously following politics every day, donating to campaigns, volunteering in my spare time, etc, is that I realized that it's a waste of time, my life was passing me by, my health and personal life and finances were deteriorating/not keeping pace with my peers. So I stopped doing all that and started focusing on just improving myself.

Some will use, in my opinion, bullshit justifications of "oh, when I'm rich and powerful, I will use my influence to solve blah blah blah" "it's more effective to be very wealthy and donate money to solve problems than volunteer in your spare time at a soup kitchen" etc. I've met dozens of MBA types and otherwise that subscribe to this type of nonsense. Every one of them has been a megalomaniac. Maybe that's what I am now, too, but if so I'm not pretending to be anything else.

To give an example, I don't care what happened with GME and robinhood, though I am certain that AOC and her ilk will use this situation to justify raising taxes and regulations supposedly on the hedge funds but I'll be eating a fair share of that too. It just means I need to increase my earnings and mitigate my risk/exposure as much as I can. We can sit around and rail at the system but I am not a genius or super capable, I went to state school and wasn't a great student; I have no real business telling everyone how to organize society. It's fun to brainstorm about and that's why I love HN but I'm just going to find the best path I can through this shit and hope for the best. If you're anything like me, I advise you do the same.

hctaw
The only difference between Wall Street and Silicon Valley is that Wall Street doesn't deny their greed.
bruce511
It's all about perspective, isn't it. You can look at the same thing from two different sides, and describe it in completely different ways.

So before you can "outsmart evil" you really need to define "what evil is". You may look at Wall Street and decide they are "evil" (because they make money?) - whereas someone else might look at it and see a working mechanism that allows "companies of people" to raise funds, and ultimately share their capitalistic profits. It provides a mechanism for pensions to be invested, and generate returns, so that, um, pensions can exist.

And if there are ten people in the room you may get ten different opinions on what exactly is wrong - some of them wildly contradictory.

There is no "good" side, or "evil" side to Silicon Valley. There are lots of companies which are striving to achieve their goals - and for some of them (not necessarily all) those goals are to maximize profit. Whether that is evil, or good, or the reverse is evil or good, depends on your particular perspective.

So it may be better for you to reframe your question with a specific goal of yours in mind. Which action do you find "evil"? And perhaps more to the point, why are you trying to set the goals for such a nebulous entity as "Silicon Valley" (or "Wall Street")? Surely they are free to set their own goals?

If you agree with the goals of a specific company you can support them, if you disagree with those goals you are free to take your support elsewhere.

markus_zhang
Modeling real world in good or bad IMO is not going to fit very well.