I love how they make their mission sound so humanitarian when it's really about monthly active user growth and data profiles for everyone in the world... that they can sell. This whole movement of masking profiteering as social justice is sickening.
Undersea cables started out as ventures by investors to make money. They made money, and the people who used them made money, and you get to communicate globally because of them. It's cheaper to communicate with someone halfway around the world on the internet than to mail them a letter, thanks to profiteers.
You have all kinds of nice things because profiteers created them to make money. Including the computer you used to type in your message.
As for social justice, free markets have done far more for social justice than any other system. For example, it isn't a coincidence that the success of free markets occurred at the same time as when slavery collapsed worldwide.
This is what the parent is referring to. There is nothing bad in doing business, but I agree that it is sickening to sell it as a humanitarian endeavor.
Facebook is cynical, devaluates the work of real humanitarian organizations and misleads the public on the collateral consequences of their actions.
Market economies are good, I agree. Monopolistic companies like Facebook put the markets and the economy at risk.
This cable will carry a lot of Internet traffic and that's going to have complicated effects. On the whole, more Internet access does benefit people, though.
Ultimately what matters is how much good you do in the world by improving the lives of those who have it worse. That's all that matters to those that have it worse and that's the only metric that matters here.
If you have to choose between, working for a humanitarian organization and helping out N people and working for a for profit enterprise and helping out 2N people, all other things being equal, you should choose the latter every since time because that makes all the difference for the additional N people helped out. The N people that don't get helped out because someone went to work for a real humanitarian organization get no benefit from the purity of motivation.
Anyone who chooses otherwise isn't actually motivated by helping people. They are motivated by their ego and feeding what they think is the ideologically pure thing to do.
There are few things sadder that I've witnessed than a talented person with the capacity to make the world a better place, fritter away their talent in endeavors that don't allow them to maximize the good they can do.
Having seen people work on similar problems first hand, I doubt there is any dishonesty involved. There are two groups of people involved here: investors and builders. The investors are the ones out to make money, but many of the rank and file doers that are actually doing the building genuinely believe in the good they are doing in the world. I seen't it... many times.
Heck, I've worked on such projects where I'm genuinely proud of the positive change I made in the world. Was I paid for it? Yes. Was I motivated by money? Yes. Was I also motivated by doing something good and meaningful? Yes. Being motivated by making money and doing good in the World are not mutually exclusive.
Those who wrote this blog post are very likely those whose involvement is at least partially motivated by doing good in the world.
Slavery ended around the world during the age of protectionism, not free markets.
For example, abraham lincoln who freed the slaves also declared : "Give us a protective tariff, and we shall have the greatest nation on earth"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protectionism_in_the_United_St...
The US was a protectionist anti-free trade nation until the 1950s.
You are forgetting that race based slavery began under capitalism, the genocide of native americans happened during capitalism, etc. You can't falsely cherrypick one data point and ignore all the others that refute your claim.
> race based slavery began under capitalism,
Nope. Slavery had gone on for millennia. How about the ancient Egyptians enslaving the Hebrews? How about Columbus enslaving the Indians?
(The native americans practiced slavery, too.)
Slavery died out in the northern colonies before 1800 because it was unprofitable, i.e. free markets killed it. It was dying in the south, too, until Eli Whitney revived it with his cotton gin. But that was just a temporary reprieve, it was dying again by the 1850s, and the South tried to save it by seceding.
Free markets killed slavery, because slavery simply cannot compete with them.
> the genocide of native americans happened during capitalism
As for genocide, that has happened since the Cro-Magnon killed off the Neandertals. The entire history of humanity is one of violently pushing other people off their lands. Until very recently, when societies have been getting more peaceful, along with the rise of free markets. (For example, after defeating Italy, Japan and Germany in WW2, the US (and Britain and France) gave those countries back to their citizens. How often has that happened?)
It's not only what lincoln said, it's what the US government did. We've had protectionism from the very beginning. Just because you don't like the reality doesn't mean you get to dismiss it.
> The Civil War was caused by the South's attempts to protect itself from capitalism.
Actually, it's was the exact opposite. The industrial North favored protectionism to protect manufacturing. The South favored free trade since they wanted to ship cotton to britain.
"Slave owners preferred low-cost manual labor with no mechanization. Northern manufacturing interests supported tariffs and protectionism while southern planters demanded free trade.[65] The Democrats in Congress, controlled by Southerners, wrote the tariff laws in the 1830s, 1840s, and 1850s, and kept reducing rates so that the 1857 rates were the lowest since 1816. The Republicans called for an increase in tariffs in the 1860 election. The increases were only enacted in 1861 after Southerners resigned their seats in Congress."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Civil_War
One of the major reasons for the civil war was the South's insistence on less tariffs and more free trade.
Why do you write lies after you've been proven wrong?
Once again, for the last time, slave owning south war pro-free trade, the anti-slave north was pro-protectionism. This is a matter of fact.
> The entire history of humanity is one of violently pushing other people off their lands.
Nope. And race based genocide only occurred during the age of capitalism. Also, there is a difference between "pushing other people off their lands" and systematic racial genocide under the age of capitalism.
> (For example, after defeating Italy, Japan and Germany in WW2, the US (and Britain and France) gave those countries back to their citizens. How often has that happened?)
Historically, all the time. Almost every empire in human history - from the greeks, romans, mongols, ottomans, etc. Otherwise, we wouldn't have chinese, indians, arabs, etc. Racial genocide was actually very rare. Nations conquered and formed empires. They didn't exterminate. What happened in the US, Canada, Australia, Nazi Germany, etc are outliers. Also, we didn't really give back those countries yet as we have occupying forces in all three nations. But whatever.
> there is a difference between "pushing other people off their lands" and systematic racial genocide under the age of capitalism.
The reservations and Indian nations within the US suggests the former, not the latter.
> the greeks, romans, mongols, ottomans
They didn't give their conquered territories back. They installed puppet governments that obeyed the conquerors. Japan and Germany are not puppets of the US.
> race based genocide only occurred during the age of capitalism
"By 1650, hereditary enslavement based upon color, not upon religion, was a bitter reality in the older Catholic colonies of the New World."
https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/05/peter-h-wood-strang...
Also, the slave economy collapsed during the Civil War, while the northern free economy thrived. The reason Lee was even at Gettysburg was because the Confederate army was shoeless and nearby Harrisburg had a shoe factory.
So not free trade and you were completely wrong in your original comment.
> The reservations and Indian nations within the US suggests the former, not the latter.
Actually it doesn't. Nice little pathetic attempt at denying native genocide.
> They didn't give their conquered territories back. They installed puppet governments that obeyed the conquerors. Japan and Germany are not puppets of the US.
Actually Japan and Germany are puppets. As a matter of fact we installed the governments that they current have and they are firmly within our sphere of influence. Maybe this reality makes you uncomfortable because it doesn't align wtih your agenda, but once again, you don't get to dismiss reality just because you feel like it.
> "By 1650, hereditary enslavement based upon color, not upon religion, was a bitter reality in the older Catholic colonies of the New World."
Since the catholic world gave us capitalism, what's your point?
"Capitalism in its modern form can be traced to the emergence of agrarian capitalism and mercantilism in the early Renaissance, in city-states like Florence."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism
> Also, the slave economy collapsed during the Civil War, while the northern free economy thrived.
What's your bizarre agenda? "Free economy"? Why are you being so sneaky and using weasel terminology? The "free economy" of protectionism and tariffs?
> The reason Lee was even at Gettysburg was because the Confederate army was shoeless and nearby Harrisburg had a shoe factory.
Yes, the shoe factory existed thanks to a non-free trade protectionist policy supported by the north.
To HN's credit, it's rare to come across such a dishonest and blatantly agenda driven comment. Even rarer to see one double down and continue to lie when confronted with facts and evidence.
Sure they are. Merkel does whatever Trump tells her to. The German government is sending tens of billions of dollars to the US. I'll let the rest of your post speak for itself.
Merkel does what the US tells her to do.
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/02/business/dealbook/china-a...
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-01/germany-s...
Go look up germany's problems with a major pipeline from russia because of american interests.
https://www.dw.com/en/the-unclear-future-of-nord-stream-2-ru...
Where american interests factor in, germany, japan and all the rest of our "allies" have to give way. Our troops aren't in germany, japan, etc just for show.
> I'll let the rest of your post speak for itself.
You mean the sourced factual debunking of your nonsense? Thanks for "letting it rest".
Everything you wrote has been proven wrong and yet you stubbornly keep coming back. At least you must be embarrassed considering your replies have been shorter and shorter. I won't waste any more time here, but if you are going to push an agenda, at least get the simple facts right. How about knowing what you are actually talking about before making such ridiculous comment?
A piece of advice. It's a well-known "tell" that when people argue with nastiness, it's a cover for their points being weak. Additionally, reasonable people don't care to engage in discourse with rude people.
Didn’t slaves build the pyramids? Was there capitalism then?
Have you read Sapiens by Harari? It touches on the fact that the Neanderthals and other species of humans died out ... perhaps due to genocide perpetrated by Homo sapiens, prior to the advent of capitalism by any measure.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapiens:_A_Brief_History_of_...
That is trivially false, but I think that he means that the "Atlantic Slave trade" is a) a notable recent occurrence of mass Race based slavery, and b) a capitalistic industry.
As best as I can tell, it happened within the past 800 years or so.
> Didn’t slaves build the pyramids? Was there capitalism then?
Nobody really knows. But certainly it wasn't race based slaves. There is a difference between old world slavery - I conquer you and you become slaves regardless of race vs you are slaves because you are black, asian, native, etc. Tragically, slavery was common in the past but it was "race-blind".
> Have you read Sapiens by Harari?
I watched his talks - which are interesting, but like all mass produced "pop" history, it's really not that accurate.
> It touches on the fact that the Neanderthals and other species of humans died out ... perhaps due to genocide perpetrated by Homo sapiens, prior to the advent of capitalism by any measure.
Sure, they died out most likely due to being outcompeted. But once again, being outcompeted for resources is different than modern extermination campaigns where one was simply killed for being native, aborigine, jewish, etc. Where even without any competition for resources, the native americans, aborigines, jews, etc were killed simply for being native american, aborigines, jews, etc.
"you" in this sense means tribe / village / kingdom. In ancient times this is not unconnected with race. It is likely an ethnic group with it's own language, customs, shibboleths etc.
I doubt that past peoples who violently discriminated based on culture, religion, language, accent, clothing, etc., stopped short of looks and race.
that's a myth
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/jan/11/great-pyramid-... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_ancient_Egypt
Most of Saudi Arabia/Qatar/UAE is built on "bonded labour" which is slave labour but with a better name.
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/the_end_justifies_the_means
I'd bet there's also a bit of geopolitical planning going on here as well. It will be far easier to cut african nations off from the internet if we control their access points.
As with every gift from the West, the africans probably want to be a little careful about this one. Maybe make sure they maintain a few different links that are, if not controlled by the africans themselves, at least can be controlled by Brazilians, or Russians, or Chinese.
Russia and China? The US is more trustworthy than both of them, by a lot, and if there is one thing China is good at, it is extortion.
I mean, maybe you could find a few here or there, but for the most part, I'm guessing they'll have their guard up when they trade with us. They'll especially be on their guard with any american who struts into africa telling them, "How ya' doing buddy? We're way more 'trustworthy' than that other guy you want to do a deal with!"
It's not even just the same. The end result is way better than what a purely ideologically motivated organization would have been likely to achieve, if anything.
Is there another model that has had similar success?
Nobody with any sense is going to ding you for that.
In this case FB benefits, and Africa benefits. There is no conflict to sweep under any carpet.
Or, to make it more concrete: I got some really tasty bread from a bakery this morning. I'm happy that the bakery made a profit from that, because otherwise they would have shut down years ago and then I wouldn't have been able to get fresh fancy focaccia. I wasn't exploited; I was fed.