Marc Andreessen Pro-Colonialism Tweet Riles India Tech World
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
FYI it was socialism that held back the Indian economy during the 70s and 80s.
And it was colonialism that drained the country's wealth for over two hundred years.
Here, Mr. Andreessen, educate yourself: https://www.google.com/search?q=bengal+famine
So the previous comment was quite accurate. The Mughals of Babur were far removed from the Mughals of Bahadur II.
People were glad to get rid of them and their wars which crippled India.
Britain kicked them out and (mostly) unified India.
Not to say I have any idea what would have happened without colonialism, but thinking that India would have retained their share of world GDP is naive.
Owning India is what allowed Britain to fund its own development (as well as all its international wars). The british destroyed india's local textile sector (which was world-famous), shipped all the cotton to Britain, and sold clothes BACK to Indians. That's how this industrial revolution happened.
This is what Mahatma Gandhi opposed and encouraged Indians to make their own yarn. That's where his association with the "charkha" and swadeshi movement comes from.
Just to be clear, I'm not saying pace of development wasn't seriously set back through colonialism, I'm questioning specifically this percentage of GDP argument.
If India wasn't a colony, wealth would not have concentrated in GB, likely slowing Down their development and Maybe even making them more open to local conflicts.
Provided the French or Dutch didn't conquer more of India, and, it's hard to argue that wealth remaining in India would have not have resulted in more trade and local development.
We can definitely say that having someone come to your country, and clearly stop you from building the best product you can build, sell or pruchase, impoverishes your country.
You can see in Russia, in the absence of any colonialism, the enormous struggle which there was to transform an economy dependent on manual labour, and with an elite dependent on feudal social structures, into a modern economy. I would separate the issues of abuses/crimes and the issues of development in the sense that the abuses were perpetrated due to moral failings, of power-hunger, racism, and greed, but development is not just about morality, it's about having the right policy and the right trajectory for society. In terms of development, the really damaging attitude was that India's ancient culture should not be disturbed to make way for industrialization, and this was an opinion shared by many well-meaning British and also Indians, pre and post independence.
Which is exactly what he says he meant:
The original was catastrophically dumb. Was it because it's what he actually believes, or because he didn't spend more than fifteen microseconds considering his words? Beats me. Fun to watch, though.
The original statement may have different interpretations, but none of them result in mapping "anti-colonialism" to "socialism." There's just no way to get from A to B actually looking at what was said.
Then he comes along and says he meant something completely different. No relation to the original statement. Apparently a moment of total brain confusion.
Do we take him at his word? I suppose we could, but then we're basically giving everybody a free pass to retroactively alter any statement they've made in any way if they don't like the reaction.
For what it's worth, I don't dislike Mr. Andreessen and have only a vague idea of who he even is (something to do with Netscape, right?).
And only a single stupid interpretation results in mapping "against anti-colonialism" to "pro colonialism", but you chose exactly that one.
And now, apparently a self-righteous hypocrite who is arguing against net neutrality because it suits his financial interests in Facebook.
There isn't a charitable interpretation to what he said. There's only a "damage control" interpretation. And that one doesn't really fit well with the fact that he blocked people who retweetted (and hence gave more prominence) to his original tweet.
Any other (more sane) interpretation might be a really, really profoundly stupid statement, as well. I don't care and am not qualified to argue those.
The point is that we can't have meaningful conversations when so many people jump immediately on the misinterpretation of a statement that is most useful for bringing out the hate for the one who spoke it.
Agreed.
The exercise in measuring charitability is merely academic in this instance. The bottom line is a VC has said a really stupid thing which goes against his earlier pronouncements on NN, because he literally has money on the line as an FB investor. Which ever way you look at it, he sounds like an out-of-touch corporatist.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11073021
The exercise in measuring charitability is merely academic in this instance.
If we value having any kind of meaningful discussion then does it really not matter that we criticize on the grounds you mention and not just seize on the opportunity to mischaracterize a statement as pro-colonialist?
It's not a mischaracterization. Just because he now regrets calling his opponents "anti-colonialists" (or rather because the internet made him regret it) does not mean I have to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Did he explicitly state that he thinks India would be better off under colonial rule? No.
Did he call opponents of Free Basics "anti-colonialist"?
If he's uninformed about what colonialism did to India, then he should shut his mouth about it. But that would be too hard seeing as he has personal interest in Facebook getting a monopoly there and offering a second-class internet experience without having to invest anything into bandwidth (which would be paid for by the state).
Besides, the so-called "explanation" of his views in further tweets makes it look even worse because "anti-colonialism" is apparently very close to "nationalism". So those filthy Indians are actually being nationalists for telling poor little Mark to go fuck himself and his idea of a cheaply done monopoly.
... which is still different from being in favor of or somehow defending colonialism (leaving aside the notion that he must think of them as "filthy" Indians).
We can criticize Andreessen for any among a giant pile of good reasons for doing so, while understanding that in this instance he was talking about something like anti-Westernism and should have used something like that phrase instead of the one he did.
100% of your dislike for him remains and is well-founded without undermining your argument with the belief that he really thinks those "filthy Indians" ought never to have escaped colonial rule.
(I have zero motivation to defend Andreessen on anything he's actually said or done -- I just object to the misinterpretation and mischaracterization going on here because it destroys valuable conversation and debate.)
Those are not my words -- I am responding to those words.
@pmarca referred to the post-colonial anti-colonial mix of nationalism, socialism, abuse/power that afflicted many ex-colonies
is itself pretty obtuse -- it's basically saying that post-colonial societies like India still haven't quite "grown up" yet, and don't really know what's best for them. Hence, their rejection of the wondrous gift to humanity that is Free Basics.
The criticism of FreeBasics would have gone to Reliance (an Indian company) if Facebook hadn't started this high-decibel campaign with two full pages of ads with heading "What Net Neutrality activists are not telling you". FB wanted the attention so they got it.
Ah, that's so much better. /s
If you understand the affects of colonialism of 200 years - economic and other exploitation - sluggish is pretty much the best case you can expect after freedom. Comparing to other colonies India has done fairly well for having being nearly destroyed and rebuilt.
Indian share of world economy went from 23-24% before colonialism to less than 4% under colonialism. India's share of World Trade went from 27% to 2% under colonialism.
India's healthcare worsened during colonialism because all the resources were exported to Europe for cheap and in abundance
India's literacy was worsened during colonialism and was just close to 10% during Independence.
India's revolutionaries who opposed colonialism and raised against the British were brutally killed or hanged under British rule.
Anyone who spoke against the colonialism were jailed.
British Divide and Rule policy still affects India today.
Whether the economy would have declined less in the absence of colonialism is really impossible to answer. But to cite colonialism as the only reason is wrong, especially since the decline coincides roughly with the scientific and industrial revolutions that occurred in Western Europe and later, America.
Also India pre 1947 was a civilization; a 2000+ year old one. Closest analogy is Europe. Do people vex about the existence of Belgium (a small country)?
India went from exporting finished goods to exporting raw materials from the 1780's to the 1860's. Coincidence?
To repeat what I said below:
the industrial revolution in textiles kicked into high gear in England in 1822, a good 50 years or so after India was under effective company rule. And textiles was an industry where India had a comparative advantage before company rule. Wonder where Britain got all that raw material to make textiles from?
From wikipedia: During the period, 1780–1860, India changed from being an exporter of processed goods for which it received payment in bullion, to being an exporter of raw materials and a buyer of manufactured goods.[20] More specifically, in the 1750s, mostly fine cotton and silk was exported from India to markets in Europe, Asia, and Africa; by the second quarter of the 19th century, raw materials, which chiefly consisted of raw cotton, opium, and indigo, accounted for most of India's exports.[21]
Starting in the 1830s, British textiles began to appear in—and soon to inundate—the Indian markets, with the value of the textile imports growing from £5.2 million 1850 to £18.4 million in 1896.
Right around 1830 was when the American Southern cotton plantation system took off, and more or less completely displaced Indian cotton on the world market[1] because it was cheap, cotton gins were efficient, and it was a whole lot closer to ship it from Mobile or Charleston to Birmingham, than to go all the way down around the Cape and back.
Opium became a huge export for India because it was the only thing other than bullion the Brits (and Americans, and Dutch, and Portuguese) could hit on to trade profitably in the China market. Then, later, that cash crop was undercut by cheaper product produced in Turkey, and by Chinese domestic production.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cotton_gin#Effects_in_the_Unit...
There is about 70 years from the start of company rule to the 1830's. If you're not allowed to manufacture textiles in that time period, what exactly do you think would happen? You'd maintain a comparative advantage?
On opium: In India, its cultivation, as well as the manufacture and traffic to China, were subject to the British East India Company (BEIC), as a strict monopoly of the British government.[7]
Opium, like most industries, only benefited the British. So it would be more accurate for you to say the British used the Indians to start exporting opium.
So lets recap. People that mostly export textiles suddenly finds themselves 1) unable to make their own textiles, 2) forced to plant cotton and other crops for sole benefit of the British. So you have a whole civilization barred from selling finished goods. Gee wonder what happens to them.
[1] Taxation of salt has occurred in India since the earliest times. However, this tax was greatly increased when the British East India Company began to establish its rule over provinces in India. In 1835, special taxes were imposed on Indian salt to facilitate its import. This paid huge dividends for the traders of the British East India Company. When the Crown took over the administration of India from the Company in 1858, the taxes were not replaced.
The stringent salt taxes imposed by the British were vehemently condemned by the Indian public. In 1885, at the first session of the Indian National Congress in Bombay, a prominent Congress Leader S.A.Swaminatha Iyer raised the issue of the salt tax.[1] There were further protests throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries culminating in Mahatma Gandhi's Salt Satyagraha in 1930. This sathyagraha was followed by other sathyagrahas in other parts of the country.
After the arrest of Gandhi, Sarojini Naidu lead the sathyagrahis to Dharasana Salt works in Gujarat and was arrested by the police. C. Rajagopalachari broke the Salt Laws at Vedaranyam, in Madras Province in the same year. Thousands courted arrest and were imprisoned in large numbers. The administration eventually relented and invited Mahatma Gandhi to England to attend the Second Round Table Conference. Gandhi's Dandi March got wide news coverage and proved to be a turning point in the history of India's independence movement.
The salt tax, however, continued to remain in effect and was repealed only when Jawaharlal Nehru became the Prime Minister of the Interim Government in 1946.
Now imagine an alternate scenario where America comes along and says, no China, you can only make plastic and metal parts. I have the machines that can make components. You have to sell these parts to me at fixed artificially low prices. I will then finish them in my factories and sell them to you. No other country can sell in your market. Suddenly you have 1BN people you can practically shoot smartphones at and make money.
70 years later Brazil starts making tons of smartphones. Great. They still can't sell in China. Brazil wins, America wins, China loses.
Please cite this very interesting piece of information.
Est. world GDP, 1750: $128 billion - India @ ~22% = $28 billion
Est. world GDP, 1950: $4 trillion - India @ ~ 4% = $163 billion
You would enjoy this as well -https://www.change.org/p/british-government-england-uk-india...
America was last a British colony, but it was far from a uniform culture of expat British. And it reinvented itself violently upon rebellion. Into something quite new in the world. Or at least not seen in a long time. And definitely not British.
Yes, the American government was a new thing, but it was built on a foundation already understood by the founding fathers.
I often wonder about the world in the British had given seats in the House of Commons to its bigger colonies. Distance and communications speeds were problems as well as the government's attitude toward the colonies. It probably would have been cheaper than the world spanning war they ended up fighting with France during the American Revolution.
Ironically the representative would have spoken in favor! But because he was not heard at all (and his objection dismissed as irrelevant), that put colonists in the same bucket as slaves and women - those who were not heard in government. That was what was intolerable.
No, a true sentiment always.
I am talking about actual MPs from the colonies not the consult after the fact system and definitely not the way they ignored and ridiculed Benjamin Franklin.
Apart from that, I agree wholeheartedly. The US phenomenon cannot be reduced to "some rogue British colony that stroke it rich".
The 'Americans' were the occupiers. Native Americans have quite a tale to tell about brutality.
It seems to be conveniently forgotten that many tribes were complicit in aiding and abetting Europeans in exterminating their rivals as well. Cortez conquered the Aztecs with 600 Spaniards... and 200,000 Tlaxcalans. The Iroquois confederation did most of the work of exterminating other native populations throughout the Great Lakes region.
-that said lets not sweep the brutality against native Americans under the rug.
Instead of implying that Marc Andreessen is uneducated or ignorant, explain your disagreement civilly, without name-calling or mud-slinging. If the issue is too sensitive for you to do that, it's probably best to refrain from replying until you've cooled down enough to remain civil and present a legitimate counter-argument.
The Iranian people finally rose against the imperial influence of the British and ejected all British citizens in the early years of the fifties. Mossadegh, the prime minister, rose to prominence on an anti-english platform, initially demanding a 50% share of profits and reasonable treatment of Iranian labour. The British, under Attlee as well as with Churchill back in control, selfishly rejected all attempts at comproimise, and produced several internal reports that spoke of how inferior the Iranians were as a race.
Finally, having lost their influence, the English turned to the US for assistance in overthrowing the democratically elected government. Truman resisted, but Eisenhower relented, with John Foster Dulles enthusiastically moving forward with a coup. The Shahs absolute power was reestablished, and his oppressive rule paved way for the Islamic revolution two decades later.
One of many illustrative examples of how the English could never be considered benevolent rulers.
(As described in All the Shah's men, by Stephen Kinzer)
The Shah was not a puppet. Puppets dance to the tune of puppet master & master would not replace said puppet with Ayatollahs.
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was an Iranian Nationalist and the story of 20th century in Iran is far far more nuanced than the caricature painted by (very interested) partisans such as Kinzer.
Do the research. This [2] is the Iran that the "puppet's" father, Reza Pahlavi ("the Great") inherited. Exceptional moves by the "puppet's" father began with establishment of an independent National Bank (which did not please "master" in City of London). And continued until Iran was actually considered a geopolitical threat to the gang that started the Trilateral Commission [3].
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Persian_Oil_Company
[2]: http://www.chaonix.com/DL/National_Geography_April_1921.pdf
[3]:https://youtu.be/DqrHQpRHwws (Don't be confused. Jimmy here is saying Iran is /too/ stable and my friend Zibig & our friends like to see massive instability in this region until "the great game" is won.}
[minor typo edits; link fix; final edit note corrected NG pdf link.]
Having said that, I think Kinzer do your view more justice than I did in my summary. I do apologize for over simplifying things.
Britain Does Owe Reparations https://youtu.be/f7CW7S0zxv4
That's a rather Orwellian choice of words, and appears to be flying under the radar while everybody gets upset at the other stuff.
Let's call it what it really is: connectivity to a couple of services which also happen to be connected to the Internet. "Partial Internet connectivity" is about on the same level as "partial pregnancy."
This makes it funny that you name his wording "Orwellian" while subliminally reproducing this carefully crafted and politically loaded understanding of what qualifies as internet.
It in fact already is seeking political influence on a grammatical level.
But that's not at all what we're talking about here, right? The service in question allows connecting to just two sites or something?
He is entitled to his opinions about colonialism. People that care about it will respond.
He's a pretty big investor in Facebook. That's why he's willing to ignore the net neutrality implications - because it benefits him.
..basically the pop culture version of a regulatory debate.
That's a nice objective view of free basics. I honestly believe, as I believe the parent to your comment does, that free basics really is bad for the internet and that none of the big players supporting it, e.g. the board of Facebook, are ignorant of the massive walled garden effect that they expect and hope it will create.
At this point I think it's pretty close to an evil plan. Imagine a privately run "public" transit system that dropped you off inside buildings with no exterior doors. You'd be hard pressed to argue that the creators of such a system would not be aware of the effects it would have om the businesses inside such buildings, much less that they're creating this network out of the kindness of the hearts to honestly just give people who are in need access to transportation.
(little straw-many but i reallt hate the idea and implementation of free basics)
It just bugs me that the whole debate always needs to be drown to the lowest common denominator of political understanding. There is little positioning left if everthing is always pressed in shallow us versus them identities.
Both sides have better and worse arguments for their position.
Ultimately, in my opinion, the issue comes down to solid antitrust mechanisms. To use your picture: If it is a transit system which sparks the idea of mobility in a previously immobile and unconnected society: I wouldn't stop it as long as there is room for other suppliers that might compete with exit-door featured stations.
(I understand it's a self-serving move by FB but on those grounds alone one can be opposed to anything.)
Freebasics campaign was so flawed and the desperation in willfully misleading people was not even on an acceptable moral terms. Facebook spent a whooping 100 Crore INR for promotion and used the term "Free Internet". More about this here: http://blog.savetheinternet.in/what-facebook-wont-tell-you-a...
Andreessen/zuckerberg is setting a very bad example here. These tweets are a testimony to the desperation and an act of trying to flex muscle. Tech industry luminaries are least expected to be willfully trying to rob the basic rights of a common man. Sadly we would remain silent partners to the spoiling fabric - if we don't vehemently oppose.
Yes, probably a really stupid thing to say, and perhaps wrong for many reasons.
No, he did not say India should have kept Britain as its colonial power, or any of the other incredible interpretations now flying around the Twittersphere.
Jonny Axelsson: Anti-semitism not the opposite of semitism. Now whether anti-colonialism is a thing is another thing. Americans, esp. right-wing, have Humpty Dumpty appoach to redefining words but in context is clear: @pmarca referred to the post-colonial anti-colonial mix of nationalism, socialism, abuse/power that afflicted many ex-colonies
Marc Andreessen: Exactly.
https://twitter.com/pmarca/status/697281882401026048
[Please disagree with Andreessen's point, not with my point that he really didn't say take India back to British colonialism but said something else that perhaps is almost as stupid.]
Some of the comments even in this thread are disgusting, and they are getting plenty of upvotes; and I find it curious how a community that usually decries this sort of thing becomes so quick to engage in it.
I have zero qualifications to have an opinion on the question you raise.
(edit: in this case, I suspect it might be "for better" and not "for worse" in effect, but I still suspect the ulterior motive.)
I don't know where this perception of an anti-west sentiments is coming from.
Once again, Twitter shows us why it shouldn't be used for nuanced conversation.
However, if you look at a lot of the rhetoric that has been used it is heavily influenced by anti-colonialism. (Don't let this Western company come in and colonize our Internet.) I suspect the debate would have been quite different if it were ex. Flipkart offering Free Basics.
And now they're being called "anti-west".
In case you don't know, the whole movement started as opposition to Airtel Zero and people downvoted en-masse Flipkart's app on Play Store because it was participating in Airtel Zero. Facebook brought attention to itself by a 40m$ ad-campaign, demonizing and slandering the activists AND DDoSing the regulator.
But you can certainly find plenty of people who equated Free Basics with digital colonialism. [1] Whether it is I don't have an opinion on.
Of course, anti-colonialism is not the only reason to support net neutrality (nor do I think it's the best one).
[1] http://www.thehindu.com/business/Industry/fear-of-facebook-c...
First sentence
>then suggesting the country would have had stronger economic growth if it had stayed under British rule rather than become independent in 1947.
Actual tweet, at the bottom
>Anti-colonialism has been economically catastrophic for the Indian people for decades. Why stop now?
But this fracas really distracts from the more important issue - "net neutrality" (Colonialism is dead after all, at least early 20th century style..) The Indian government seems quite appropriate in their concerns. This whole 'denying poor people free stuff' is very likely seen as a subterfuge. Maybe 'owning' parts of the net is the new colonialism.
Yes. We live in a sound bite news era and if you can interpret the sound bite (tweet) in a wholly different way than intended and shout it loud enough, the original truth of the statement doesn't matter. Many of the headlines about political candidates are contradicted by the actual speeches, but SNL, late night, and reporters can make money off their interpretations.
He didn't literally "say" that, but it's (nearly) irrelevant to point that out. The bigger point is that what he indisputably did say was, by itself, utterly idiotic and offensive.
And I am making the point that employing this misinterpretation to criticize him undermines the important, substantive reasons to criticize him.
(It is somewhat ironic that you make your point by rewriting my words in a way that significantly changes their tone, and likely changes how readers would interpret them.)
But (if you mean this idea that he specifically wants to bring back British colonialism) I don't anyone thinks that he meant that. So it seems like a weird charge to defend him against.
If that's not what you meant (by "the assumption people are making"), please clarify.
(It is somewhat ironic that you make your point by rewriting my words in a way that significantly changes their tone, and likely changes how readers would interpret them.)
Sorry, I was just trying to simplify your text to make it easier to respond to that what seemed to be the core import of what you were saying.
The Internet hate machine on this issue has been driven almost entirely by that very thought. Andreessen's even been forced to say, "To be clear, I am 100% opposed to colonialism, and 100% in favor of independence and freedom, in any country, including India."
https://twitter.com/pmarca/status/697488911350652928
Why would anyone have to make such an absurd clarification if that wasn't exactly what has become a widespread interpretation?
The original title of the Bloomberg article (which has since been rewritten, and is the submitted article for this HN thread) was "Marc Andreessen Pro-Colonialism Tweet Riles India Tech World," with subheds to the same effect.
Without dissecting what Bloomberg may or may not have meant with their temporary headline, it seems you're (mistakenly) assuming that people have been somehow reacting more to Bloomberg's (since retracted) one-line description of what Andreessen said than by the substance he actually did say (and his immediate follow-up remarks, which to say the least, weren't particularly apologetic). Most readers on HN go straight to the source, and don't attach much weight to catchy headlines.
Why would anyone have to make such an absurd clarification if that wasn't exactly what has become a widespread interpretation?
It's a fairly typical form of ass-covering to categorically "reject" a position one didn't actually make (as a way of deflecting attention from from the somewhat more nuanced, but just the same, boneheaded and disturbing statement that one did, in fact, make).
You'll notice he isn't trying to explain just what he did mean by his initial tweet, right? That's because he knows there's no way he can really salvage himself.
And BTW:
The Internet hate machine on this issue
It's not a "hate machine." Andreessen did say something pretty darn stupid and and offensive (his subsequent and less than entirely convincing attempts to talk his way down from what he said notwithstanding). And is being rightly called out for it.
Following two incidents are enough to educate what a gift british colonoalism was for India:
1. Firing on Poor people http://www.sikh-history.com/sikhhist/events/jbagh.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jallianwala_Bagh_massacre
2. Artificial Famine took Millions of Lives: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943
> “Anti-colonialism has been economically catastrophic for the Indian people for decades. Why stop now?”
The context is: India’s telecom regulator this week blocked Facebook's free, but limited internet service.
Indian telcos, Indian consumers and Indian public pay for FreeBasics. Fair of them to decide whether they want this scheme or not.
All in all the ruling class has the same arguments now as they have always had, "What's best for everyone is what's best for me" and they are always hurt when everyone doesn't agree.
In light of that, how Marc Andreesen thought it was a good idea to wrap his defense of Free Basics in a defense of colonialism is beyond imagining. But it does illustrate how certain stars of the tech world, some of whom have their claques on HN, can get pretty far disconnected from the real world.
In 1947, the British departed with 24/7 pressurized water across the developed parts of India.
Now, the British-built water system has all but collapsed. Instead of pressurized water, the water comes weakly and only intermittantly. What difference does that make, you ask?
Well, if a pressurized system leaks, the leak causes water to leave the pipe. In a non-pressurized system--coupled with the user-side pumps that are used to pull in more water--leaks flow INTO the water line, bringing contamination with it. Couple that with the common practice of placing fresh water and sewer lines in the same trench and everytime somebody pumps that water toward them, they are pulling in fecal matter that leaked from the adjacent sewer lines, which also leak.
That's why Indians often cannot drink their water without going through reverse osmosis. This is just an example of how India frittered away a resource the British brought them.
But when, in the end, the whole system was a huge scam meant to get resources out of India and into Britain, everything comes into a larger perspective.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/patna/Reverse-osmosi...
We just saw reports of Flint, Michigan and multiple cities having excessive lead and contamination in water supply etc. I wouldn't use that to suggest British need to come back and take over the US.
Marc chose to do us a favor, and show us his true colors last night. And Twitter was the perfect vehicle for that.
1. The "ruling" really is just protecting existing telcos' businesses.
2. Something about India being held back by corruption and bad politics.
(Not that I agree with the above.)
What would happen in USA if a big Chinese company set up free over mobile network access to select websites?
It's always annoying when poor countries act all uppity in the face of mega corporations.
It's eye-opening.
It was also penalized by HN software called the 'flamewar detector' which reacts to overheated discussions, which this certainly is.
It's high time HN brings in more transparency to the whole system. I am sure the current system can be totally rigged since there is zero clarity.
HN need to adopt badges to denote each major upward/downward state transition. Users can notice discrepancy and help fine tune the system(not just flamewar detector). Better solution would be to open source few parts which play a role in fixing rank. As a community driven success story - users are not here to serve elitism nor to serve someones personal pocket. The sooner HN realizes the importance of clarity and willingness to work with community - the longer it will respected.
> Anti-colonialism has been economically catastrophic
> for the Indian people for decades. Why stop now?
Can someone tell me what it actually means, or is the suggestion that these policies weren't economic suicide?
Really, what on earth was he thinking when he wrote those tweets. And it's not the first time he pulls a gaffe like this either.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angus_Maddison#/media/File:1_A...
Basically, India and China together represented the largest percentages of the world's GDP, until they were colonized, after which their contribution plunged. Of course, the decline was multifactorial - colonialism wasn't just one specific thing, and there were seeds of instability that colonists took advantage of - but the larger historical trend seems pretty clear.
..because I think the message in its context is only that using the anti-colonialism gesture is not a useful policy trick to counter facebooks free basics initiative for Indians.
On the other hand it's twitter. And they have to be outraged about something.
Big countries can block global monopolies like Facebook.
Marc Andreessen is an extraordinarily influential person in tech, and that influence is based on his reputation. If a nobody like me tweeted something dumb, everyone would just ignore me. Nobody ignores Andreessen, though. Maybe it would be better for the world if his Twitter feed and mine were treated similarly, but that's not how the world works, and we have to respond to the world as it is.
Furthermore, part of his continuing influence, 20 years after Netscape, is the continuing impression that he is a clear thinker about issues facing the tech world. (See, elsewhere in this thread, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11072721 .) There are two valid discussions at play here. The first is whether Free Basics is a good idea; the second is whether Andreessen is in fact the insightful thinker he appears to be. (The specific subdiscussion about whether rejecting Free Basics is a form of anti-colonialism, incidentally, is only valid if we take it as a given that Andreessen's ideas are worth listening to in the first place.) For the second one, a record of him just not being a good or well-informed thinker is in fact refuting the central point of that argument.
This comment itself is further argument that more people here could stand to read it. You've literally ignored the ideas within and just made an ad hominem argument based on the author instead.
If for example you wanted to discuss The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins, the first step would not be to "not use the ideas described within (e.g. genetics and biology research)". Ignoring the topics within and attacking the author for what he later wrote about Atheism or how he behaved in interviews would a mindblowingly terrible way to critique his book about biology.
When discussing or critiquing an essay, the first step is to actually address the ideas inside of it. Attacking the character of its author or other things they may have said about unrelated topics is not a rational substitute.
In this case, geofft's comment is flawed on multiple levels. Aside from making a purely ad hominem argument against the 2008 essay How to Disagree, its specific attack was the author's twitter usage that occurred more than five years later.
If you think that anything I say is invalidated because I put ad hominems at the top of my comments, well, uh... I'm not sure how to explain this to you, but....
(Oh, and if you think this is about Twitter usage alone, I'd like to amend my personal attack to remove the words "on Twitter", and then direct your attention at http://www.idlewords.com/2005/04/dabblers_and_blowhards.htm .)
To answer your question, no I don't think your usage of ad hominems invalidates everything you say. It does detract from the quality of the discussion and the pleasantness of the site, though. It also detracts from your ability to communicate effectively.
I completely agree with geomark's comment (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11072755). There are a lot of comments on this article that are little more than name calling, personal attacks or uncharitable assumptions.
And that reputation is based on his position as an early luminary that made direct and real contributions to the progress of the field, and his continued ability to make great picks for VC. Andreessen, like Paul Graham, is one of the few VCs who actually understands the technical underpinnings of what's going on, which seems to seriously enhance a VC's performance.
Andreessen's political beliefs are totally irrelevant. Frankly, it wouldn't matter if he were a neo-Nazi.
But for the goal of improving society by this investment, instead of worsening it? A successful neo-Nazi VC would be terrifying.
To answer your question, first of all name calling and attacking the people instead of the ideas makes for a nasty and unproductive conversation—basically like youtube comment discussion.
Secondly you're on the site he built. The guidelines clearly say, "When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names." If you dislike the guidelines or feel that they are "terribly condescending", then maybe this isn't the ideal site for what you want.
is there anything in my comments that you think is out of line? did I attack anyone ad hominem or use weasel words or other forms of deceptive rhetoric?
judge for yourself. my standards of conversation are perfectly fine though, in my opinion. in fact, nearly ALL of the conversation in this thread has been perfectly fine.
my question for you is: why are you so sensitive about the tone of the conversation? is it that you're unhappy that so many people are deeply offended by Marc Andreesen's comments and it makes you uncomfortable to confront that disagreement?
I do not appreciate your insinuation about my own opinions. It's way off base and uncalled for. Referring to pg by the title used for N. Korea's dictator is also obnoxious.
I care about the civility of discussions because without it, they get both less pleasant and less constructive. This entire thread has been an exhibit of that.
How does Bloomberg lead with this "fact"? Facebook's offering is not Internet service, but a whitelisted pipe. Does Bloomberg normally willingly eat up and repeat corporate propaganda?
That being said, this whole uproar is just more proof that social media is totally, utterly broken. Let me explain.
While I think Marc is on the board of an evil company and that his thought process on this matter is incredibly ignorant, I really appreciate the fact that he shares his point of view. I don't just appreciate it, I respect it. Maybe he's got a point. Maybe he doesn't. I won't know unless I hear what he's got to say, and then spend some time thinking it through. This is what intelligent, thinking people do. Before they turned into kettle pots of blind activism, this is what people went to college to learn to do. This is what makes living in a free-speech democracy so great -- people say totally crazy shit, some people agree, some people don't, it's all good.
Maybe the education system broke down or something, but people are no longer capable of dealing with viewpoints that differ from their own. They immediately label the person with whom they disagree, shame them (look at all of those screen grabs! Oh my!), and broadcast their displeasure to the world. We live in a world where people are supposedly taught to embrace those with different views -- that you and your best friend and your daughter's husband and your next door neighbor might not actually have the same exact views, but you can still be friends and get along just fine -- but this sort of tempered nuance attracts zero attention in a click-like-share world. Tolerance gains no attention in the world of social media; "disgust," "outrage," and other such intolerant reactions attract a crowd of views.
People should be thanking Marc Andreesen, the Facebook board member, for being so utterly candid about his thought process. Those in disagreement should cite facts to educate him. I'm sure he has his own facts that form his opinions (and surely, he does). Maybe his opinions won't change, and maybe those of the dissenters won't either. You know what, that's okay! That's LIFE. Life isn't about being right, it's about being alive. You can think Marc is a total moron on the India topic and still be his friend. We don't all have to agree on everything. It's WEIRD if we did -- there's nothing real about it. As I like to say, "a friend with whom you've never disagreed is a potential enemy you never knew you had."
Social media justice isn't justice, it's a modern-day mockery of the freedom of thought we fought so hard to attain. This shit is broken, folks. I don't know why Marc bothers with it, but I guess he is one of those people who thinks social media is the future of human discourse. I'm not. And that's okay.
Besides isn't it the intolerant who shape the society around them. If one wants a community whose members aren't ignorant or bigoted, why would just a live and let live approach shape the community to one's desires?
0: http://www.buzzfeed.com/williamalden/benedict-evans-wants-to...
Ouch. Please stop posting uncivil comments to HN. Even assuming you're right, putting it this way encourages the worst from others.
There are some wonderful things Twitter does, especially around real time news of non-controversial events such as natural disasters, but if the service is a net positive for the world, it's by the slimmest of margins.
I think the anti-communism of the McCarthy era was idiotic and contrary to American values. Does that make me pro-communism? Only if you're a Republican.
He's not running for political office, so his political beliefs shouldn't really make a difference. We need to be willing to accept a diversity of belief instead of feigning shock and manufacturing outrage to try to lend undue credence to our own ideas of social equality; doing that is really just an admission that the argument is on shaky ground to start with and that you don't want to allow anyone to attempt to challenge it (for fear that the ground will crack and cause the shaky belief to collapse).