Silicon Valley got what it wanted | Hacker News Reader

Silicon Valley got what it wanted

bloodinthemachine.com

31 pointsdotcoma17 comments

SV, and California as an extension of that, has never been as liberal as people say it is. It has always been about money. Any "social justice" messaging a lot of tech companies professed was all a poker play in the current zeitgeist around the time. It has died down quite considerably because they see the direction the country is going--they would rather have a president that espouses populism without actually following through on most of their promises.

Were there any other major Silicon Valley companies or executives that were pro-Trump other than Elon Musk and X? The whole premise of this post seems untrue on its face.

A16Z

Also Peter Thiel I believe.

Yes Peter Thiel, but he’s the only other one I’m aware of.

That’s not exactly a groundswell of support from Silicon Valley.

Look at Palantir stock. It has gone brrrrrr since announcement.

VCs associated with All-in podcast are heavy Trump supporters. Crypto companies funded 100s of millions to Trump super pacs. Coinbase comes to mind.

Also David Sacks I believe.

I read an interesting article recently about Thiel's, Musk's and Sacks' common career paths, views and ambitions.

One point that stuck out for me was how all three of them had spent a significant part of their childhood in Apartheid-era South Africa, as part of the white ruling class (so learned of Apartheid as a good thing or even had family that belonged to the ruling class). This is well-known for Musk, but I think less so for Thiel and Sacks.

Seems to me that gives their ultra-libertarian, "anti-woke", pro-inequality views another context.

The article is in German, at https://www.derstandard.at/story/3000000243890/tech-investor...

Got a source for that?

- https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-swing-toward-...

- https://nypost.com/2024/06/26/tech/a-segment-of-silicon-vall...

- https://www.wired.com/story/donald-trump-and-silicon-valleys...

That's a difficult question to an answer. The employees of those companies were most if not entirely anti-Trump, so, if the CEO was pro Trump, then they may not have want to say anything in fear of upsetting the employees.

It must be untrue, because you’re unfamiliar with the matter?

Here are some examples

Susa Ventures https://x.com/lpolovets Craft Ventures https://x.com/davidsacks Keith Rabois (khosla Naval https://x.com/naval Balaji https://x.com/balajis

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/10/silic...

All of them...?

Those with power want deregulation, those without want regulations that constrain those with power. Just so we're on the same page, those with power is corporate America, those without is everyone else.

Trump certainly did not have the backing of all of them…

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/silicon-valley-leaders-kamal...

Bezos and Zuck moved to neutral…

That is a fairly big change.

Really I thought Bezos cancelled the WP opinion piece of endorsing Trump after they met up at Blue Origin?

no idea what you are referring to; This is what I am referring to:

https://www.npr.org/2024/10/25/nx-s1-5165353/washington-post...

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