2k16 what's the worst enormous tech company?

don't worry, the trump administration is on this

voted amazon in the poll. i'm worried that my friends who work at whole foods will have worse working conditions and compensation as a result of the buyout. i've been boycotting AMZ mostly because of how they treat their fulfillment center employees, and was thinking that the WF acquisition would make the boycott impossible. but maybe i can cut way back on shopping at WF and spend more time at local health food stores.

probably hard to cut out WF altogether as it's the closest supermarket to where i live. anyway i'm not sure but i suspect jeff bezos might be the antichrist and we haven't seen his final form.

i can usually get everything i need at trader joe's and the korean or japanese market

i'll pick up a couple things at whole foods but i can avoid it, though after surgery i've been going there just about everyday out of convenience. luckily that'll stop come friday

trader joe's will never come to hawaii :(( we do have nice japanese markets though

yeah, you know i probably could live without WF easier than i was thinking

do people not shop at 'regular' supermarkets anymore

In the naaaaame of love (between a man and a woman)
What more in the name of love? (between a married man and a woman)
In the name of love (between a man and a woman)
What more in the name of love? (and only a man and woman)

oops, wrong thread

I've never set foot in a Whole Foods or Trader Joe's. My brother is a manager at the nearest WF though.

fwiw i shop at the good ol regular supermarket two doors down from WF every chance i get, but i'm a sucker for a few things over at whole paycheck. the bulk and meats departments in particular have been draws for me, and my friend gerald is a cheesemonger there so i usually get some expensive but really delicious cheese from him

Karl's interjection has amused and confused me. Always thought it was "Once more in the name of love".

I just grabbed it off of genius because they seemed really smart! I was unwilling to go back to the source material

https://gizmodo.com/exclusive-heres-the-full-10-page-anti-diversity-screed-1797564320/amp

TLDR indeed

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/23/silicon-valley-big-data-extraction-amazon-whole-foods-facebook

Thanks for the link, Karl. The info/tech giants are super creepy. I recommend Eric Schmidt's book cowritten with Jared Cohen, "The New Digital Age". Creepiest shit I have ever read.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/30/us/politics/eric-schmidt-google-new-america.html?_r=0

kowtowing to massive corporate donors is basically the point of most think tanks, though

creeeeeepppppppyyyyyy

http://nymag.com/selectall/2017/10/does-even-mark-zuckerberg-know-what-facebook-is.html

Congratulations, nobody understands you or your company anymore. supreme slime mold of the internet.

Decent article. Here's the key bit, I think: “Facebook has the same kind of attentional power, but there is not a sense of responsibility. No constraints. No regulation. No oversight. Nothing. A bunch of algorithms, basically, designed to give people what they want to hear."

And here we are now with an reality TV show president in the most terrifying US political climate I've ever experienced.

*a reality

oh for the halcyon days when the media and govt would work together to sell us bullshit wars

let's run footage of some kid being shot after this promo for Ellen cos media is responsible

and lucky us, now we have new media to sell us on all kinds of other bullshit too, hooray

The delicious irony of Facebook buying a print ad to address their digital malfeasance. https://t.co/fwiUifqv56

— Gary Shteyngart (@Shteyngart) October 4, 2017

https://www.recode.net/2017/10/11/16458490/amazon-google-alphabet-corporate-conference-call

As of today neither of those asshat conglomerates is cracking the top two I don’t think. FB and Twitter can’t go out of business fast enough imo

Almost literally ran into Jeff Bezos the other day as he was walking out of and I was entering my friend's bar, Bevy, here in Honolulu. I was wondering what the black cars outside were for... It was my chance to tell him to treat his warehouse workers better but I was caught off guard and missed it :(

Jeff B has personal protection security. It's paid for by the company so they have to disclose it in the annual report every year.

Heh, I figured the tough looking drivers were also his bodyguards.

http://mashable.com/2017/10/23/facebook-explore-publisher-post-organic-reach-drop/#VEQYakHvYPqS

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/why-its-good-to-have-a-real-audience

The sourcing on this seems somewhat opaque. But Mashable is reporting that Facebook is testing a new system which would remove publishers from your Facebook timeline unless the publishers pay Facebook. This, frankly, doesn’t terribly surprise me. It’s how monopolies operate.

The Mashable article says the test is only underway in Slovakia, Sri Lanka, Serbia, Bolivia, Guatemala, and Cambodia. (Here’s a similar write-up in another industry publication.) Notably, those are countries I suspect would generate considerably less industry attention than if you ran the test in the US or France. As I said, the sourcing on the story seems a little fuzzy. We may find out the details are a bit more complicated. But the broad outline seems clear: Facebook is testing a new regime that will require publications to pay Facebook if they want to show up in users feeds.

but *i* want publications to show up in *my* feed when i put them there

Facebook doesn't give a shit what you want!

crying

News: Facebook 2016 elections team provided advertisers with a blueprint of a divided America, carving up electorate https://t.co/LJFbm7tzii pic.twitter.com/ehMvCAodMC

— Alex Kantrowitz (@Kantrowitz) October 30, 2017

While we're on Facebook...

New by me: Facebook misinformation is fast becoming a global humanitarian crisis. https://t.co/VHcRn32EV7

— Kevin Roose (@kevinroose) October 30, 2017

Horrifying. Maybe I change my vote to FB next year

Welcome to app hell. You need an app or a printed QR code to use the bathroom here. pic.twitter.com/hYbHcsOOrN

— One Bright Light (@onebrightlight) November 5, 2017

This is quite something:

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/this-city-hall-brought-to-you-by-amazon/

Chicago has offered to let Amazon pocket $1.32 billion in income taxes paid by its own workers. This is truly perverse. Called a personal income-tax diversion, the workers must still pay the full taxes, but instead of the state getting the money to use for schools, roads or whatever, Amazon would get to keep it all instead.

what the fuck

nationalise the tech giants

I hope we get it!

I can accept that with great wealth comes great fraudulency, but lol! - this is seriously taking the piss!

"Most of the HQ2 bids had more traditional sweeteners. Such as Chula Vista, California, which offered to give Amazon 85 acres of land for free (value: $100 million) and to excuse any property taxes on HQ2 for 30 years ($300 million). New Jersey remains the dollar king of the subsidy sweepstakes, having offered Amazon $7 billion to build in Newark."

New Jersey deserves it

Maybe they can put it next to American Dream

This is quite a useful resource:

https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/prog.php?parent=amazoncom

this is ridiculous. these municipalities should be redirecting their constituent's money toward subsidizing new stadiums for major sports teams instead

Which I thought was Chicago's plan in the first place.

https://i.imgur.com/RldxxB5.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/U05bz8X.jpg