IT did not take long for the tech industry to become the new establishment, and to assign itself the rights and responsibilities that come with such prosperity.
In 2010, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett unveiled the Giving Pledge, a take on the old industrialist Gospel of Wealth for a new era of the superrich. Since then, many of Silicon Valley's most moneyed founders and chief executives, including Larry Ellison, Elon Musk, Pierre Omidyar, Tim Cook, Sheryl Sandberg and Mark Zuckerberg, have signed on to give most of their wealth to a vague "philanthropy."
Peter Thiel, the serial tech-firm founder, entrepreneur, investor, libertarian and presumptive Donald J. Trump delegate, is not a signatory, but apparently feels no less passionately about using his wealth to make his world a better place.
Last week, Thiel revealed that he had funnelled "in the ballpark" of $10 million to legal support for plaintiffs suing Gawker Media, most notably Terry Bollea, a.k.a. Hulk Hogan, who recently won a $140 million judgment against the company for defamation. Thiel made no secret of his grudge against Gawker, since the company's Valleywag blog revealed his homosexuality in a 2007 post that lampooned the straight male culture of Silicon Valley more than Thiel himself. (Thiel is, notably, an investor in the tech site Pando, a media property that regularly insults him in more direct terms.)
But as Thiel tells it, his action in the Gawker case was not about him, or about quashing free speech, but about litigation finance in a case with the potential to do a great deal of public good. In an interview with The Times, he called it "one of the greater philanthropic things that I've done. I think of it in those terms".
Portraying a $10 million investment in crushing one's enemy as a charitable act of justice that will make the world a better place is galling. But students of history can hardly be shocked. Tech's elite, lauded for their originality, are influencing media, politics and society at large with a kind of venture philanthropy, much as their industrial predecessors did more than 100 years ago.
Andrew Carnegie's Gospel of Wealth was ostensibly intended to inspire the self-made industrialists of the late 1800s to improve public life for the less fortunate, no matter how their industries might affect those less fortunate. By example, Carnegie funded public halls, libraries and education, and established foundations to continue donating his money after his death.
Cornelius Vanderbilt and Leland Stanford each used significant portions of their personal wealth to found idealistic universities, while John D Rockefeller donated millions to education and scientific research amid criticism that good deeds couldn't clean his dirty money.
Whether their money came from oil, hotels, railroads or data, titans of industry have long held enough power to both influence the American political system directly and to hack it when necessary. Old money maintains the status quo, while new money openly endeavours to change it.
The robber barons of the 19th and 20th centuries were kings of infrastructure. The people with towering wealth today are kings of information. The rise of Silicon Valley is best understood as a new industrial revolution in this tradition. In many ways, it's not at all revolutionary in the strict definition of that term.
In recent years, many of the industry's elite have pledged financial support to schools, hospitals, police stations and homeless shelters, all while many of the industry's companies have avoided paying taxes that would fund those same vital public institutions.
The "super-angel" investor Ron Conway has funnelled his wealth into efforts to improve gun safety beyond legislation. Depending on whom you ask, Mark Zuckerberg's investment of billions into his own charitable fund for future giving was a grand statement in that Gospel of Wealth tradition - or a public relations stunt and an enormous tax dodge.
Any philanthropy seems legitimate when it aligns with your own goals. Even Thiel's support of free speech is apparently complicated: In addition to the Gawker legal offense fund, he has also donated to the Committee to Protect Journalists and speaks passionately about preserving freedom for the kinds of journalists he presumably believes do not work at Gawker.
To many of Gawker's critics, Thiel is a hero on a charitable crusade for justice. It would be safe to say that this is how his fellow Silicon Valley philanthropists would also define their giving. They are under a presumptive mandate to improve society according to their own values, purely because they have made a lot of money while most everyone else has not. The Gospel of Wealth dictates that this is not only their ability, but their responsibility.
© 2016 The New York Times News Service
In 2010, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett unveiled the Giving Pledge, a take on the old industrialist Gospel of Wealth for a new era of the superrich. Since then, many of Silicon Valley's most moneyed founders and chief executives, including Larry Ellison, Elon Musk, Pierre Omidyar, Tim Cook, Sheryl Sandberg and Mark Zuckerberg, have signed on to give most of their wealth to a vague "philanthropy."
Peter Thiel, the serial tech-firm founder, entrepreneur, investor, libertarian and presumptive Donald J. Trump delegate, is not a signatory, but apparently feels no less passionately about using his wealth to make his world a better place.
Last week, Thiel revealed that he had funnelled "in the ballpark" of $10 million to legal support for plaintiffs suing Gawker Media, most notably Terry Bollea, a.k.a. Hulk Hogan, who recently won a $140 million judgment against the company for defamation. Thiel made no secret of his grudge against Gawker, since the company's Valleywag blog revealed his homosexuality in a 2007 post that lampooned the straight male culture of Silicon Valley more than Thiel himself. (Thiel is, notably, an investor in the tech site Pando, a media property that regularly insults him in more direct terms.)
But as Thiel tells it, his action in the Gawker case was not about him, or about quashing free speech, but about litigation finance in a case with the potential to do a great deal of public good. In an interview with The Times, he called it "one of the greater philanthropic things that I've done. I think of it in those terms".
Portraying a $10 million investment in crushing one's enemy as a charitable act of justice that will make the world a better place is galling. But students of history can hardly be shocked. Tech's elite, lauded for their originality, are influencing media, politics and society at large with a kind of venture philanthropy, much as their industrial predecessors did more than 100 years ago.
Andrew Carnegie's Gospel of Wealth was ostensibly intended to inspire the self-made industrialists of the late 1800s to improve public life for the less fortunate, no matter how their industries might affect those less fortunate. By example, Carnegie funded public halls, libraries and education, and established foundations to continue donating his money after his death.
Cornelius Vanderbilt and Leland Stanford each used significant portions of their personal wealth to found idealistic universities, while John D Rockefeller donated millions to education and scientific research amid criticism that good deeds couldn't clean his dirty money.
Whether their money came from oil, hotels, railroads or data, titans of industry have long held enough power to both influence the American political system directly and to hack it when necessary. Old money maintains the status quo, while new money openly endeavours to change it.
The robber barons of the 19th and 20th centuries were kings of infrastructure. The people with towering wealth today are kings of information. The rise of Silicon Valley is best understood as a new industrial revolution in this tradition. In many ways, it's not at all revolutionary in the strict definition of that term.
In recent years, many of the industry's elite have pledged financial support to schools, hospitals, police stations and homeless shelters, all while many of the industry's companies have avoided paying taxes that would fund those same vital public institutions.
The "super-angel" investor Ron Conway has funnelled his wealth into efforts to improve gun safety beyond legislation. Depending on whom you ask, Mark Zuckerberg's investment of billions into his own charitable fund for future giving was a grand statement in that Gospel of Wealth tradition - or a public relations stunt and an enormous tax dodge.
Any philanthropy seems legitimate when it aligns with your own goals. Even Thiel's support of free speech is apparently complicated: In addition to the Gawker legal offense fund, he has also donated to the Committee to Protect Journalists and speaks passionately about preserving freedom for the kinds of journalists he presumably believes do not work at Gawker.
To many of Gawker's critics, Thiel is a hero on a charitable crusade for justice. It would be safe to say that this is how his fellow Silicon Valley philanthropists would also define their giving. They are under a presumptive mandate to improve society according to their own values, purely because they have made a lot of money while most everyone else has not. The Gospel of Wealth dictates that this is not only their ability, but their responsibility.
© 2016 The New York Times News Service