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1. Meredith Whittaker (mer__edith@mastodon.world)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:03:12 JST Meredith Whittaker

   If I wanted court drama I'd read Stendhal, who understood how power works and spent hundreds of pages illuminating characters whose desire for it blinded them to this reality.

   Or, it was Microsoft all along...

   • Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:13:00 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     @Mer__edith “A not-for-profit that owns a for-profit” is the biggest red flag. Absolute bullshit (due to the power dynamics; as you state). Basically a for-profit with an ethics-washing PR strategy.

     (Mozilla is another great example. A “not-for-profit” that purports to exist to protect our privacy but would cease to exist the moment Google stopped paying it ~half a billion dollars a year. That takes donations while paying its CEO millions of dollars. “Not for profit” indeed.)

   • Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:13:33 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Ben F.

     @Sammael99 @Mer__edith Microsoft reminded them who the daddy is.

   • Ben F. (sammael99@imaginair.es)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:13:41 JST Ben F.

     in reply to

     @Mer__edith Seems like I'm missing a couple of new developments. What happened after the CEO was fired by the board ?

   • Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:30:47 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Kote Isaev

     @koteisaev Well, I’m sure their CEO appreciates your donation, Kote. Five million dollars a year doesn’t grow on trees, after all.

   • Kote Isaev (koteisaev@mastodon.online)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:30:48 JST Kote Isaev

     in reply to

     • Aral Balkan

     @aral And this all gone so far I even doubt it even can be solved at individually, except may be by getting rid of IT at all, and rollback personal life to pre-internet life. Political decision impossible at all because of nature of existing political system.
     I an feel sad about that, and I still donating to Mozilla Foundation and Thunderbird, just as gesture of protest.

   • Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:50:41 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Ben F.

     @Sammael99 @Mer__edith https://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft/satya-nadella-furious-with-blindside-ousting-of-sam-altman

   • Ben F. (sammael99@imaginair.es)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:50:42 JST Ben F.

     in reply to

     • Aral Balkan

     @aral @Mer__edith Could you share a link to a news item describing said daddy action ?

   • Aral Balkan (aral@mastodon.ar.al)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:55:03 JST Aral Balkan

     in reply to

     • Kote Isaev

     @koteisaev I hear you, man, I hear you. I guess the only practical answer is, we do what we each can in our own little ways and hope that it all adds up.

     But, yes, you hit the nail on the head. None of this is a problem of individual responsibility. It is systemic. And while I believe everything we do matters, we must affect systemic change if we are to chart a different (hopefully better) path forward.

   • Kote Isaev (koteisaev@mastodon.online)'s status on Monday, 20-Nov-2023 22:55:04 JST Kote Isaev

     in reply to

     • Aral Balkan

     @aral As it all looks hopeless, I just don't know what to do about all this global mess which "should not be a concern of an individual by design".