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Comment by ipsocannibal | Hacker News Reader

One wonders what Trump and Zuckerberg talked about over their several dinners.

I always found it odd that people expect tech companies to be leaning either way. Their goal is to be as good friends with whoever has power as possible.

If they cared about ethics they wouldn’t have the supply chains or be in the markets they are.

Of course they cozied up to Trump, why wouldn’t they? The only reason Facebook is pretending to take democracy and truth seriously now, is because they have data that tells them they need new political friends post November.

Not many people really did until the ousters of Brendan Eich and James Damore sort of kickstarted the narrative that tech companies are universally dominated by left-wing activists (despite the strong right-libertarian capitalist streak in startup culture.)

The cynic in my thinks that the previous libertarian policies were the bait needed to get people to hand over control over their lives and allow their friendships to be intermediated, and the new authoritarian policies are the hook.

The cynic in me thinks that's a convenient pretense to maintain belief in a vast left-wing conspiracy despite evidence to the contrary.

I think it's more about being a power broker than left-wing ideology.

This graph shows overwhelming financial support of big tech employees for Democrats:

https://www.vox.com/2018/10/31/18039528/tech-employees-polit...

Employees don't determine the policies or agenda of a company, nor do they donate to political parties on behalf of or at the behest of their employer (at least not legally.) And that same article claims that donations by those tech companies' own political action committees favored Republicans.

At best it shows that individuals donate based on personal political ideology, and that tech hub demographics favor the left over the right, whereas the companies themselves donate in order to further their business interests, rather than a politically activist agenda.

"Employees don't determine the policies or agenda of a company" - No other industry has employees playing activists at their jobs than technology. What do you think the Spotify employees are trying to do with the whole Joe Rogan thing.

>No other industry has employees playing activists at their jobs than technology.

I take it you're unaware of the existence of unions or feminists or people of color or the disabled, then, because plenty of industries have had their share of politically active employees.

"Employees don't determine the policies or agenda of a company"

There are some interesting exceptions.

Thousands of employees had objected to Google's involvement with Project Maven. Project got cancelled.

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/ne...

If you're starting a pool, I'd like to put $20 on "Zuck tried to talk tech policy, but really they only talked about Trump."

And how about $5 on "how to drink water in public" while we're at it?

It's difficult to imagine conspiracy there, friend.

You imagine Zuckerberg as pretty incompetent, but I think he's got some brains.

It's not hard to imagine how to talk policy to Trump. "Wow, you are the best president ever. So smart and strong. Also very good looking. I will hurt your enemies if you give me a tax break."

Make sure you get paid in advance, of course.

Given that everyone is going crazy in the news recently about Facebook censoring a very major right wing news story and Facebook and Twitter are being subpoenaed over the actions to speak before congress about it, that seems unlikely.

I'm not sure why this is downvoted (maybe a lot of FB employees are here). But this is a valid question. 'Deals' with politicians is how engaging with DC works (quid pro quo is the norm).

If you suggest this site has astroturfing you'll be chastised for not following the site guidelines even though it's perfectly possible that there is astroturfing

I honestly found it quite scary to leave comments on HN these days. You have no idea whether it's going to get upvotes or get downvoted to oblivion. It's one of these feelings when you're speaking to a small child who can get a tantrum any time of the day :)

When you start thinking of everybody in a group of thousands as one person, it's a mental health red flag IMO. Quite common, but suggests taking a break.

I don’t think they actually believe that HN is a small child. Taking a break is a good idea.

You just provided one more reason why I'm afraid of commenting ;)

P.S. Of course I didn't mean that HN is a small child.

You shouldn't worry about votes. Those are irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

On another note, this is one of the places where things are still ok. Some media platforms I gave up on to keep my sanity.

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