Wednesday, March 05, 2025

What is Happening to America is Very Familiar to Tech Journalists

Techdirt is a news site that has written about the tech revolution for 27 years. Lately, it's writing government stories. Mike Masnick, the site's founder, explains that's because Trump's DOGE is the tech story they've been covering for years. "We've seen how technology can be wielded to consolidate power, how institutional guardrails can be circumvented through technical and legal workarounds, and how smoke and mirrors claims about "innovation" can mask old-fashioned power grabs. It's a playbook we watched Musk perfect at Twitter, and now we're seeing it deployed on a national scale," Masnick writes. "When the very institutions that made American innovation possible are being systematically dismantled, it's not a "political" story anymore. It's a story about whether the environment that enabled all the other stories we cover will continue to exist."

Posted by retort at 09:37 AM | 14 COMMENTS | permalink

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"Remember all those tech CEOs who thought they could control Trump? All those VCs who figured they could profit from chaos? They're learning a very expensive lesson about the difference between creative destruction and just plain destruction." @mmasnick.bsky.social www.techdirt.com/2025/03/04/w ... [image or embed]

-- Paul J Davies (@pauljdavies.bsky.social) March 5, 2025 at 4:05 AM

Comments

Yup

If Elmo's handling of Twitter is any guide we are in for a rough ride.

Hey. I'm a poet and don't know it!

#1 | Posted by donnerboy at 2025-03-05 10:56 AM

This is what Tech Bros do to companies they buy in the Silicon Valley, and have done forever... shock and awe take-overs where they go in, break stuff and worry about the damage later, if ever.

Which is ok as long a you don't care about Employees or Customers, or in this case you don't care about The People of the US that they serve.

Corporate Personhood has it's own President now, and he couldn't give the first ---- about, "the People".

That's all Commie stuff to Trumpers.

#2 | Posted by Corky at 2025-03-05 11:38 AM

In my somewhat checkered employment history, I once worked in tech re-purposing naughty videos around the time when they first became viewable on cell phones. Terrific salary, but I also was required to document and e-mail on Friday afternoon before leaving the building bullet-points of damn near every %#?! keystroke I made that week. Musk's demand on federal workers only served to remind me why I willingly walked away from a well-paying job and never worked a tech position again.

#3 | Posted by dutch46 at 2025-03-05 12:09 PM

When the very institutions that made American innovation possible are being systematically dismantled

Propaganda statement.

#4 | Posted by oneironaut at 2025-03-05 12:24 PM


This is what Tech Bros do to companies they buy in the Silicon Valley, and have done forever... shock and awe take-overs where they go in, break stuff and worry about the damage later, if ever.

Oh please is not how its done today in SiliconValley.

To see how ridiculously they avoid this, they actually hire outside consulting firms to tell them what to cut.

#5 | Posted by oneironaut at 2025-03-05 12:27 PM

Propaganda statement.

#4 | POSTED BY ONEIRONAUT

You should end every one of your posts that way.

#6 | Posted by donnerboy at 2025-03-05 12:27 PM

If Elmo's handling of Twitter is any guide we are in for a rough ride.

What an ill informed statement/analogy, I have been on Twitter since 2012, as a customer, it seems to be just fine.

The only reason people left is they didn't like the politics of the owner, does this mean, in your analogy, citizens will leave the country? No...

If your analogy is true, then nothing will change but it won't be bloated. Given your analogy, I really don't understand why you would want to be taxed for things that don't help citizens.

#7 | Posted by oneironaut at 2025-03-05 12:30 PM


You should end every one of your posts that way.
#6 | POSTED BY DONNERBOY

DonnerBot great come back, you broke the internet with that one.

#8 | Posted by oneironaut at 2025-03-05 12:31 PM

What an ill informed statement/analogy, I have been on Twitter since 2012, as a customer, it seems to be just fine.

Twitter is a sewer now. It's no wonder you are so comfortable there.

Since Elon Musk bought Twitter in October 2022, the social media platform's value has dropped by 72"80%, according to Axios, Fidelity, and The Washington Post www.axios.com

This means that Musk and his investors have lost billions of dollars.

#9 | Posted by donnerboy at 2025-03-05 12:36 PM

If your analogy is true, then nothing will change but it won't be bloated.

If my "analogy" is true (and of course it is) then America is about to lose trillions.

#10 | Posted by donnerboy at 2025-03-05 12:38 PM

- Oh please is not how its done today in SiliconValley.

You are even dumber than you post... and who woulda thought that was possible?

www.youtube.com

theconversation.com

#11 | Posted by Corky at 2025-03-05 12:53 PM

When someone talks about "free speech" while actively working to control speech, that's not a contradiction or a mistake " it's the point. It's about consolidating power while wrapping it in the language of freedom as a shield to fool the gullible and the lazy.

Well, I think most of us will recognize a few of the lazy and the gullible here, perhaps in this very thread.

Normally when democracies fall apart, there's also a playbook. A series of predictable steps involving the military, or the courts, or sometimes both.

But what's happening in the US right now is some sort of weird hybrid of the kind of power grabs we've seen in the tech industry, combined with a more traditional collapse of democratic institutions.

Excellent article. Thanks for sharing it, but my question is that: WTH can we do now?!?

#12 | Posted by Gal_Tuesday at 2025-03-05 03:43 PM

"WTH can we do now?!?"

We can't do anything. It's up to Republicans to do something about Trump, and they won't, from the looks of things.

Maybe once the blackouts hit this summer. But by then it will be too late. Actually the blackouts may be coming a lot sooner for people on the Canadian border. Fortunately, Border states that get electricity from Canada are mostly Blue states, so it's probably a good thing for Republicans, when Republican majority areas in Upstate New York lose power.

#13 | Posted by snoofy at 2025-03-05 03:47 PM

If your analogy is true, then nothing will change but it won't be bloated. Given your analogy, I really don't understand why you would want to be taxed for things that don't help citizens.

#7 | Posted by oneironaut

You get your info on what "don't help citizens" from 2 billionaire con men, who JUST HAPPEN to want to cripple the agencies that are investigating their crimes.

#14 | Posted by SpeakSoftly at 2025-03-05 03:54 PM

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