A tech billionaire is quietly buying up land in Hawaii. No one knows why | Hacker News Reader

A tech billionaire is quietly buying up land in Hawaii. No one knows why

npr.org

58 pointsmakerdiety23 comments

> A couple of days before the interview, Benioff texted the same NPR colleague again, asking for intel on my story. Then he called me and demanded to know the title of this piece. During that call, he also mentioned he knew the exact area where I was staying. Unnerved, I asked how he knew, and he said, "It's my job. You have a job and I have a job." During the interview, he brings up more personal details about me and my family.

Yikes

Sounds like the reporter should keep digging. You don't threaten someone for no reason...

Sounds like we should all start digging

How many more examples do people need that this entire class are purely power hungry psychopaths?

You’ll never talk them out of the belief system.

Once again Silicon Valley was too on the nose with their Benioff portrayal https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aP5pt1bvutQ

Sounds like benioff was out reporting the reporter

Yeah, I was all ready to go with the interpretation that Benioff is just doing lots of philanthropy, and then that happened. Also:

> When I ask Benioff about the properties in the anonymous LLCs, things seem to take a turn. He starts speaking more quickly and fidgets with a piece of paper in his hand. He's reluctant to go through the holdings, and his adviser on the Zoom call jumps in to say we can discuss later.

It would be one thing to say, with conviction "I'm not ready to talk about those just yet, but when I am, I'll get back in touch". But to get cagey to the point that your advisor interjects and changes the subject? Not great.

Benioff, CEO of Salesforce. Used to work for Ellison, CEO of Oracle and who owns 98% of Lanai.

He controls ~81,967 times more wealth than an average American. (I am assuming the median wealth in the US is $122,000). I know that this is controversial but maybe there should be a cap on this metric. I don't know what it should be and how to implement it, but such concentration of wealth, and consequently power, can be dangerous.

This doesn’t seem big. The guy doing it is open about who he is. He resides locally. When he starts building he’ll have to file for a permit, and presumably explain his intentions.

The guy has native spiritual advisors (plural!).

By the time you have billions money is pointless to hold endlessly. Land is something you can buy that no one else can say they have the same. Take that to the max and you want land where land is scarce and desireable. Hawaii is a perfect fit.

His behavior in response to the interview says he’s feeling guilty about something. Wonder what the real story is.

Haven’t read article, but maybe cause he wants to have entire island for himself?

Simulations of ww3 are usually China vs USA... and directly between them is Hawaii... not smart. Zuckerberg and Benioff should be buying Patagonia or something.

China has no capacity to project any power into the pacific. They are pinned in on all sides by US and her allies bases.

China bought many a naval bases in the Pacific. They have a developed fleet including aircraft carriers and intercontinental missiles. They also have their own spy satellites constellation and has the technology and money to expand them. How come that they can not project their power to the Pacific?

The biggest reason is because it is a recent ambition.

The US Navy on the other hand had to fight the Philippine-American War in 1899.

There is also no point in talking about forces in separation. There is a unification with the air force.

To me, to really understand the US Military, look up the B-2 spirit videos on youtube and look up the 4.5 megaton explosion video on youtube.

The full fleet of B-2 spirit have about 116 of 4 megaton explosions. These are 1 megaton bombs though so they have 400+ of those. 400 megaton bombs being dropped by an invisible UFO.

Then force projection to do what? Invade the US? We have enough guns to arm every man, woman and child in the US. It is estimated there are 12 billion rounds of ammunition sold in the US every year.

It is fun to talk about these things in the abstract but all out war with the US is basically delusional. The PLA has done an amazing job of catch up but to surpass the US you have to become the most deadly unified force that has ever existed. That is no easy task and Americans love war. There is not that many years in America's existence that it was not involved in war in some way.

The biggest constraint of the US military is manpower / personnels (active duty). That is why the US strategy after the Vietnam war has been to first economically weaken a country with sanctions before militarily invading it.

> 400 megaton bombs being dropped by an invisible UFO.

They are not invisible since at least 20 years. Remember bombing of Serbia ?

https://hn.algolia.com/?query=A%20tech%20billionaire%20is%20...

Because he's a billionaire... So why not. He has more money than a can reasonably be spent.

Doomerism

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