Big Tech are the new Soviets
2 days ago
- #Big Tech
- #Cloud Capital
- #Technofeudalism
- The 'Magnificent Seven' (Google, Meta, Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Amazon, Tesla) dominate discussions with their AI-driven trillion-dollar valuations, sparking both optimism and fear about the future.
- Capitalism's evolution from competitive markets (Adam Smith's vision) to monopolistic conglomerates (Schumpeter's justification) highlights the shift towards centralized economic power.
- Peter Thiel's 'Competition is for losers' reflects a new era where Big Tech doesn't just monopolize markets but replaces them with algorithmic 'cloud fiefs,' akin to Soviet-style economic planning.
- Amazon's algorithm functions like Gosplan, matching buyers and sellers without true market dynamics, extracting 'cloud rents' and manipulating behavior through data surveillance.
- Unlike industrial-era monopolists (e.g., Ford, Edison), Big Tech's 'cloud capital' produces no tangible goods but entrenches a 'technofeudalism' where users and producers are exploited for data and rents.
- Governments increasingly rely on Big Tech's cloud infrastructure (e.g., AWS, Google), outsourcing core functions and becoming dependent on 'techlords,' mirroring feudal power structures.
- In conflict zones (Ukraine, Gaza), cloud capital extends its reach through AI-driven military tools (e.g., Palantir, Project Nimbus), blending surveillance and warfare with corporate control.
- Free-market ideologues ignore that capitalism has birthed 'cloud capital,' which destroys markets and replicates Soviet-style planning, effectively killing traditional capitalism.