Google is a surveillance capitalist. It is a factory farm that extracts from and exploits people. Why do you want to create a “Google of Europe?” Why do you want Europe to capitulate to Silicon Valley’s digital imperialism and become its taxpayer-paid R&D department? (1/N)https://twitter.com/AchimMuellers/status/1000989525391413248 …
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Europe must stop investing in startups; especially with taxpayer money. Startups are a Silicon Valley brand. They’re disposable businesses designed to either fail fast or grow exponentially (like cancer) and exit (be sold) to other surveillance capitalists or to the public (IPO)
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Startups are the long-tail of surveillance capitalism that the monster eats to sustain itself. If unsuccessful, the EU taxpayer foots the bill. If successful, they are snatched up by the Googles and Facebooks. EU becomes Silicon Valley’s taxpayer-supported free R&D department.
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We can do so much better in the EU if we have a bit of imagination and the courage to look beyond the toxic Silicon Valley model of technology. Instead of startups, we should be funding ethical technology and sustainable businesses: let’s call them stayups.
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We should take what works from the Silicon Valley model and leave the toxic funding and business model. What works? Funding small organisations that compete with each other and work iteratively. What doesn’t? An incentive model based on surveillance-based growth and exits.
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So let’s fund businesses that, if successful, cannot be sold. We must move beyond VC/equity capital and remove exits from the equation. Let’s only fund business models that are ethical (see https://ind.ie/ethical-design ).
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Let’s stipulate that getting commons funding means the products of the business must also be shared back with the commons. That’s the only way to avoid a tragedy of the commons and build a healthy public sphere. It would also encourage not just competition but also sharing.
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Silicon Valkey’s model of technology (surveillance capitalism) is not the only way to fund and build technology. It’s just one very toxic way to do so. Let’s do better in the EU. We can, should, and must fund ethical tech from the commons for the common good. (End)
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Replying to @aral
I was with you right up to "let's do better in the EU" and now I can't because, you know, the will of the people and all that.
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:( Europe, then :) Basically, let’s do better everywhere but practically, we have more of a chance with the EU for funding. That said, it’s decentralisation and grassroots democracy – cities – that I have the most hope in. And that goes for the UK too. In or out of the EU :)
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