[kwlug-disc] AI and social justice

[Doug Moen]

> The primary objective of any public company is to deliver profits to the shareholder. Increasing profits is the primary way, because profits are always greater than taxes, it's always a net win. After profits the secondary job is to deal with profits, which can include tax savings measures, but also (re)investment. 

I prefer to rely on non-profit companies when I can. I use Linux (developed by a non-profit) instead of Windows. I use Codeberg (non-profit) instead of Github. GrapheneOS (non-profit) instead of Google Android or iOS. The open source ecosystem is heavily based on non-profit organizations, and I like the results better than the old days of Windows and commercial Unix. If this is "communism", then I think it delivers better results than capitalism. I like my current software stack much, much better than what I could get in the bad old days of closed source capitalist software. I don't think it is communism, since a large decentralized network of non-profits bears no resemblance to the Soviet state, its authoritarian government, and its planned economy.

Imagine if OpenAI had remained non-profit, instead of being subject to a hostile takeover by a raging narcissistic sociopath. Because that was the beginning of the current AI bubble and all our social problems with AI. Non-profits don't raise trillions of dollars of funding and funnel it into the gleeful destruction of society for the benefit of the elite.

The for-profit model is not inevitable, or the only possible model. Capitalism, or in particular monster scale capitalism funded by vulture capitalists, can be defeated. Enshittification is a social problem caused by the wrong corporate structures and the wrong incentives.
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