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[...] tech companies are under fire for creating problems instead of solving them. At the top of the list is Russian interference in last year's presidential election. Social media might have originally promised liberation, but it proved an even more useful tool for stoking anger. The manipulation was so efficient and so lacking in transparency that the companies themselves barely noticed it was happening.
The election is far from the only area of concern. Tech companies have accrued a tremendous amount of power and influence. Amazon determines how people shop, Google how they acquire knowledge, Facebook how they communicate. All of them are making decisions about who gets a digital megaphone and who should be unplugged from the web.
Their amount of concentrated authority resembles the divine right of kings, and is sparking a backlash that is still gathering force.
Is it that the tech companies are creating problems for society as a whole, or merely disrupting the status quo for the old Powers-That-Be?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday October 14 2017, @03:09PM (31 children)
Earth. I just understand power dynamics better than you. Money means options, power means control. They go together like chocolate and peanut butter but they are not the same thing.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Saturday October 14 2017, @06:17PM (5 children)
Power is not money; but money is power. It is not infinite power, and sometimes it is power that must be very well understood to wield effectively, yet it is definitely power.
Some things don't respond to power - again, this kind of power is not infinite. Propaganda, even well-funded propaganda, has severe weaknesses in any context where information flows relatively freely. So there are issues where attempts to sling the shite simply fail regardless of the individual or organization trying to sling it, or the financial leverage they put behind it. Trump, for instance, has huge power, but squanders it by constantly lying in such a way that he is bound to be caught, as well as being so profoundly inarticulate that he can be ridiculed with impunity by any high schooler. The governor of Kentucky just spouted some easily proven falsehoods about pot overdoses that turned his bully pulpit into a clown show. Etc.
Some power comes from politics. That power is temporary, or at least, some of it is. If said power is wielded in certain ways, it can result in monetary gains. If wielded poorly, it can result in negative outcomes monetarily and otherwise. As always, power is generally a neutral thing until it is used. But using it doesn't mean things will go your way. Sometimes it just means you bring yourself to other people's attention more effectively (and that may mean you're more likely to get squashed.) Money... again, it's neutral until you use it.
Saying "money is power" is wholly accurate, even though money is not a guarantee of results, particularly when managed poorly. Think of it like a gun. If you aim it at your target, it multiplies your power in a way that you'll likely find to be "good." If you aim it at your foot, it's still very much a multiplication of power, but you won't like the result if you fire the thing (cough, Trump, cough.)
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday October 15 2017, @10:56AM (3 children)
All of which isn't really an argument, just another way of choosing to view power dynamics. Frankly, a less useful and correct way of choosing to view power dynamics. Money, while it can be exchanged to leverage temporary power, lends zero power by sitting quietly in your pocket; all it lends is a larger pool of possible solutions to any given problem.
Consider Clinton vs. Trump. Clinton, had she won, would currently be getting damned near everything she ever wanted out of Congress while Trump can't even get those sharing the same party affiliation to stop arguing long enough to pass a bill. Both have tons of money but only one has access to useful power in the necessary context.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Thursday October 19 2017, @11:09PM
So you missed this bit:
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Thursday October 19 2017, @11:22PM (1 child)
Also:
No. People will modify their actions simply because they know more money is available to the other party.
Would you challenge a party to a court battle on an inconclusive issue when their pockets were deep and yours were not, knowing they can bring more lawyers, wear better suits, see that more time is spent on the golf course by "someone" with the judge, see to the judge's re-election and/or other interests, and his/her family's other interests, and otherwise indirectly influence the outcome? That's power - real power to influence others well before it has to be spent. If you do knowingly go to court against such opposition, you'd better be very, very sure that the issue will go in your favor. Otherwise, you saw the power, and you ran your head right into it anyway.
Another low-hanging fruit: Those looking at someone for a prospective mate will change their evaluation based on financial status.
Etc. Circumstances of similar import exist all over society.
Simply having money can influence many types of outcomes. It doesn't always have to be spent. Which is not to say that spending it doesn't change outcomes; of course it may.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday October 19 2017, @11:38PM
Granted but almost exclusively among women. Men overwhelmingly marry down or across. Women overwhelmingly marry up. It's an evolution thing.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 15 2017, @11:43PM
"Saying "money is power" is wholly accurate"
Being "wholly accurate" is a quest that 500 page dissertations rarely manage to find even remotely within their grasp, and you presume that your one phrase is something close?
Bwah hah hah! Go the fuck back to twitter.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Saturday October 14 2017, @07:09PM (21 children)
You can have chocolate without peanut butter, and vice versa.
Money is a requirement for power, and "power" without money exists only in fiction.
There may not be a fixed exchange rate, but they definitely circulate through the same hands.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 15 2017, @01:02AM
Consider penniless burglars who break into someone else's place, steal weapons, and then use those weapons to rob other people.
Do they have money? No (certainly not initially).
Do they have POWER? Of course - why else would victims comply?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 15 2017, @03:29AM (19 children)
How much money did the Bolsheviks have when they took over Russia?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 15 2017, @03:57AM (14 children)
How much money did Gandhi have when he threw the British out of India, with peaceful resistance?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:00AM (12 children)
There's money in your pocket, then there's money in other people's hands available at your command - Ghandi had quite a bit of the latter, even if many of his followers had little or none.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:53AM (11 children)
That's a ridiculously strained argument. It completely ignores that his opponents, most particularly, the government of the UK, had vastly more money at their disposal than his "quite a bit of the latter". What's the point of asserting that power needs money and then completely ignoring the numerous examples of financially asymmetric conflicts where the poorer, far less moneyed side won? After all, we all have money, even if somehow we were perfectly penniless, we could look through a few parking lots to find some. So why isn't that enough to take over the world?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday October 15 2017, @12:33PM (10 children)
Isn't this the classical revolution - French or otherwise? A handful of aristocrats vs a sea of peasants? You could even stretch it to fit the barbarians at the gates of Rome. At times like these "money" ceases to have value in big parts of society, so, sure, then money can't buy you anything, even your life if you're on the wrong side of the mob. The whole key there is in galvanizing the mob against the moneyed class, which has numerous examples in history - brief stretches in time covering what percentage of the history of the human condition? I'll put it at 1% or less, in the periods when there was something resembling a stable currency in circulation.
Get outside of the influence of money, in the animal world to a colony of sea lions on a beach, or an island rookery, or times of chaos in human society - then different rules apply, often starting from individual strength, tools held, and skill. Start organizing more than a few thousand individuals into a cohesive society and the concept of money emerges as a meaningful way for individuals that otherwise don't know each other to interact and exchange - and that's the beginning of money based power.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 15 2017, @01:36PM (9 children)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday October 15 2017, @10:13PM (8 children)
I'd pretty much equate the fall of Rome and even the French Revolution to destruction of human society to animal, or even sub-animal levels. Unsustainable social change via low-tech murder.
Now, of course, with navies and air force and all, we have to have a functioning infrastructure to wage effective war on any significant scale - and that is run on money.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 16 2017, @12:44PM (7 children)
Militaries are run on a lot of things. Money is handy militarily to simplify logistics in some ways, but you can't do anything else with it. You can't eat it. You can't burn it in internal combustion or jet engines. And you certainly can't shoot someone else with it. This is a continuation of the same delusion. Just because you can value power to some degree with money doesn't make money power, and it certainly doesn't make money a prerequisite for power.
This whole thing is just a rationalization for elevating wimpy businesses, "corporations" above the real sources of power. But maybe that's a consequence of the cognitive dissonance that comes from trying to mitigate the harm of a form of power by using a more dangerous form of power.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday October 16 2017, @06:43PM (6 children)
Again, when it hits the fan, money becomes worthless. That's why you need a protected rear area with a functioning economy where you can continue maintenance and production.
You might manage to equip a small militia with simple rifles and small boats without an infrastructure that runs on money, but if you want anything as fancy as a tank, or a bomber more advanced than a Sopwith Camel tossing hand-grenades over the side, you'd be breaking historical tradition to be able to build and stockpile those types of weapons without a functioning economy. Even the Romans got their swords and shields made using coin of the realm to control the labor.
I, for one, prefer the yoke of the mortgage and bi-weekly direct deposit to trucks that drive around with armed men who "draft" people off the street into the army. Both are sucky outgrowths of technological progress, but at least the illusion of free will can be attained for a couple of weeks a year under the wage-slave regime.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 16 2017, @08:02PM (5 children)
Logistics and a functional economic aren't money (you are conflating the component of money with the whole). They aren't decisive either.
I can think of several wars where the losing side had the better logistics and functional economy, yet still lost (particularly, a number of colonial wars such as the two wars in Vietnam and the US Revolutionary War).
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday October 16 2017, @09:41PM (4 children)
and serious political problems preventing them from focusing their full military power and potential on the conflict.
Tell you what, run a simulation of America vs Europe, start both sides at bows and arrows level of technology - but give America money, fungible and readily exchanged, and keep Europe on a bartering economy. Which side wins 500 years later? With money, America can concentrate population in cities and maintain those cities with diverse sources of food beyond the nearby fields - potentially preventing the collapse of the Mayan empire (would be nice if they'd go ahead and use the wheel in more than toys, too...) With the high density cities, they'd have more disease, and build resistance to that disease, so on first contact it would be the Europeans dying of something horrible, not the Americans. What do you think the weapons would look like on both sides? Remember, there's no exchange of gold or silver coin in Europe, so I'm guessing that blacksmiths wouldn't get much past sword making based on trade for goats and chickens.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 16 2017, @10:31PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday October 16 2017, @11:00PM (2 children)
The point is: without money, you do limit what a society can produce. How do you setup a supply chain to make something as complex as a tank without money? How do you attempt to control politics without money? Once you've shaken every hand in town, can you really reach out to the entire state or country without money to support the political campaign? Money is what takes you out of the Germanic barbarian king / Viking / North American Indian tribe stage into a larger organized unit. Genghis Khan had a fearsome army, but it was economics that held the Mongol empire together - for a time.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday October 17 2017, @05:56AM (1 child)
And you can do that through a variety of means. Again, you are completely missing the point. The economic efficiencies introduced by money is just one of many critical aspects of creating power, military or otherwise. You are cherry picking this and assigning money artificial importance.
Quid pro quo. That's how much of it is done today as well.
Economics != money.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday October 17 2017, @12:09PM
And how do you organize quid pro quo across an empire? In Rome, it was done with money. Today, Marco Rubio's vote was bought by paying a 2008 price for his home in 2012 (roughly speaking) - that was quid pro quo, but only really practical with money. If the issue had been a tax on goat herders, it would have been far more difficult for Rubio to explain the sudden appearance of 1000 goats on his land.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:01AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday October 15 2017, @03:57AM (1 child)
Tons... You're not one of those people that think they do this shit for free, are you? And how else do you buy weapons and ammo?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:15AM
They would and did pay a considerable price to gain power. Russia is a big prize.
The Bolsheviks didn't buy the weapons needed to take over Russia. They either inherited them from existing military forces or made their own.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:06AM (1 child)
Sounds like quite a lot to me, $10 in each of 1 million hands is quite a bit more powerful than $1M in one person's hands.
If you're going to reach into historical space-time where wealth wasn't measured in money (trashed economies, feudal systems, etc.) then you have to substitute money with "things of value" - including things as simple as food.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:25AM
That's moving the goal posts. Power is another valued thing. You've just moved the goal posts to make "money" mean anything of value.
Powerful for what? Notice that this supposed scenario is quite irrelevant to the Bolsheviks. They weren't powerful due to some sort of imaginary distributed wealth. Instead a key aspect of the time that they were coming into power is that they destroyed wealth rather than created it. Their political system actually made them one of the poorer factions. Some of their opposition was relatively wealthy and also supported by wealthy countries like the UK and the US. Turns out you need more than money and weapons to have power (a lesson that I guess we'll just need to keep learning here on SN). The Bolsheviks had key aspect that was missing in the other factions - organization, unity, and viable, experienced military units.
(Score: 2) by unauthorized on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:05AM (2 children)
You don't understand shit. Power is the ability to create work. Money can be used to create work. Therefore money is power. QED
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday October 15 2017, @05:09AM (1 child)
Semantics from a Physics nerd, gotta love it.
I think where they may be missing the point is in individual vs group money and power. A lot of low-wealth people in a unified mob are, usually, quite a bit more powerful than a small group of wealthy. Until you let the wealthy use modern military force on their opponents, that really is a game changer.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Thursday October 19 2017, @11:26PM
Military force (any violent leverage at all), however constituted, is also power.
The one doesn't disqualify the other, right? Money is still power.
I'm not really thinking anyone seriously suggests that money is the only power, just as money isn't infinite power or universally applicable power.