Silicon Valley: A Reality Check
slatestarcodex.com/2017/05/11/silicon-valley-...
slatestarcodex.comPosted May 12, 2017, 1:38 PM UTC
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slatestarcodex.comthe writing style is horrible. 10 paragraphs all start with "while..."
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It's like you missed the point he was making about what the media produces vs. what SV produces.
I don't read SSC much myself, but it's not one of the more popular blogs in existence out there because the writing style is "horrible."
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missed the point? the point is not new, original, insightful. but when your writing style is so bad yes it's hard to finish reading the article. Kim K is super popular, what does popularity have to do with anything? unless your measure in life is popularity, which then just makes you a sad person.
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Kim K is popular for her fat ass. This blog is popular for the writing. Are you trying to argue its writing style is similar to TMZ? Because the content is clearly not the same.
Yes, you missed the point of why he started every sentence with while X (thing about media company) Y (thing about SV). Did you miss the point of the article? I don't know or give a shit. But you specifically missed the point of why he started six paragraphs with "while" considering it wasn't because he's a stupid person who only knows words like while.
Maybe go cool off with some great writing like Harry Potter or whatever purple prose bullshit you think is amazing.
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Are you Scott? Or just a troll? I don't like his writing style. Why do you care so much? So many fucking trolls on here.
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Thanks, it did!
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still horrible style. just because something has a wikipedia entry doesn't make it desirable.
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They're not saying it's desirable because it has a wikipedia entry, just pointing out that it has established rhetorical value.
Given this is meant to be a point-by-point refutation I think it's an appropriate and effective use of anaphora.
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What a load of apologist crap!
When Capitol Hill screws up, tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis get killed.
When Wall Street screws up, the country is plunged into recession and poor families lose their homes.
When Silicon Valley screws up, ^something ^something Wi-Fi enabled juicer.
No, let me fix that for you.
When Silicon Valley screw up, we get social media like Facebook, Twitter and Reddit which become an easily-manipulated platform for other countries to swing our presidential election.
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Careful cunty. FSB not approve this talk.
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While Vox was busy writing about how Juicero “says a lot about the state of Silicon Valley right now”, Silicon Valley was leading a revolution in solar power that’s resulted in a 1500% increase in cell installations over the past few years.
And this only happened because most of the housing units in SV are single family detached houses owned by sudden millionaires. This is exactly what people are talking about when they say SV has a problem: the changes may be good but they only go to the rich people who bought homes before the boom. Everyone else has to commute past the big gas power plant PG&E has adjacent the San Mateo Bridge.
Thirteen of them had an altruistic or international development focus,
This is another reason why people take issue with SV's line of thought: altruism does not pay, businesses are not charities (unless they're used for money laundering and tax evasion). The demands of investors are totally incompatible with the demands of almsgiving.
So I would recommend people stop talking about how Silicon Valley only makes ridiculous overpriced juicers.
Nobody says that, however the highest value companies in SV are ones that don't actually make money. Juicero is the most plainly obvious example, but the same also applies to Uber, Twitter or Youtube none of which are actually profitable. This is a major issue because, as we live in a capitalist society, it scares potential investors away.
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the changes may be good but they only go to the rich people
Remember when rich people had those gigantic cell phones back in the 80s?
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Motorola is run out of Chicago and Microsoft is run out of Bellevue. Phone technology (including smartphones) are not exclusive to SV, even if Apple was the first company to successfully bring a touchscreen phone to market. But they're also a small minority compared to everyone else, everyone has a TV in their house too but most of the gains from them go to Hollywood an Cable TV executives.
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I mean that cell phones were expensive and exclusive products that became so much cheaper over time, to the point that they are now ubiquitous. The same will happen with solar power, unless we all die first.
Are you upset that companies develop products in exchange for money?
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No, I'm upset that most of the stuff being developed is garbage which scares away investment. This affects everyone's ability to actually get newer and better products that do work.
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the highest value companies in SV are ones that don't actually make money...Uber, Twitter or Youtube...
Imma let you in on a little secret. Ready? (hushed voice) it's called...Apple.
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Apple, Google, Facebook all make tons money.
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Oh snap the Tenderloin is in the valley!
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The demands of investors are totally incompatible with the demands of almsgiving.
...and? Almsgiving isn't the only way to change things. We may wish to consider the possibility that a profit motive is not inherently an unethical thing.
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These places also employ lots of people. Essentially you have a handful of super rich VCs just paying the wages of everyone who works for uber, twitter, etc.
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Man... This author sure is sensitive. Grow another layer of skin. Jesus Christ.
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The author is a psychiatrist who lives in the Midwest. What does the thickness of his skin have to do with anything?
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if he's a psychiatrist living in the midwest what does he know about SV?
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At least as much as all the faraway writers who piled on the Juicero story.
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big difference. the juicero story is a very specific example. here the author is trying to make wide ranging statements on an entire region/industry/sector. I can say Kim K is an example of sex sells, but without truly understanding the entire entertainment industry I would be foolish to say that only sex sells.
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Come on, Raldi.
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I'm not sure what you're trying to say. Judging by our comment scores, neither is anyone else.
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The guy felt compelled to leap to the defense of Silicon Valley because they got teased about an aspect of it's ridiculousness. He goes on to say how tech saves lives and shouldn't be ridiculed for a ridiculous invention like this juicer which had millions in VC backing.
I mean, can't he just laugh about it with the rest of us instead of feeling like it was his duty to remind people that not all of tech is bad?
He's just making it worse and reminding us of that juicer that we all forgot about. He should have thicker skin.
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Actually, the real problem with SV is that social media has had a leveling effect. By democratizing the press a powerful medium for communications has been handed over to a vast army of imbeciles and created a malicious ignorant hive-mind that seems bent on destroying the world.
It's a shocking outcome that strikes at the core of what the Internet was intended to provide and calls into question ideas like liberal democracy and the trajectory of Western Civilization.