Comment on AI companies are violating a basic social contract of the web and and ignoring robots.txt
AutistoMephisto@lemmy.world 7 months agoExactly. Capitalism spits in the face of the concept of a social contract, especially if companies themselves didn’t write it.
WoodenBleachers@lemmy.world 7 months ago
Capitalism, at least, in a lassie-faire marketplace, operates on a social contract, fiat money is an example of this. The market decides, the people decide. Are there ways to amass a certain amount of money to make people turn blind eyes? For sure, but all systems have their ways to amass power, no matter what
nickwitha_k@lemmy.sdf.org 7 months ago
I’d say that historical evidence directly contradicts your thesis. Were it factual, times of minimal regulation would be times of universal prosperity. Instead, they are the time of robber-barons, company scrip that must be spent in company stores, workers being massacred by hired thugs, and extremely disparate distribution of wealth.
No. Laissez-faire capitalism has only ever consistently benefitted the already wealthy and sociopaths happy to ignore social contact for their own benefit.
WoodenBleachers@lemmy.world 7 months ago
You said “a social contract”. Capitalism operates on one. “The social contract” as you presumably intend to use it here is different. Yes, capitalism allows those with money to generate money, but a disproportionate distribution of wealth is not violation of a social contract. I’m not arguing for deregulation, FAR from it, but the social contract is there. If a corporation is doing something too unpopular then people don’t work for them and they cease to exist.
nickwitha_k@lemmy.sdf.org 7 months ago
Unfortunately, this is not generally the case. In the US, for example, the corporation merely engages in legalized bribery to ensure that people are dependent upon it (ex. limiting healthcare access, erosion of social safety nets) and don’t have a choice but to work for them or die. Disproportionate distribution of wealth may not by itself be a violation of social contact but if gives the wealthy extreme leverage to use in coercing those who are not wealthy and further eroding protections against bad actors. This has been shown historically to be a self-reinforcing cycle that requires that the wealthy be forced to stop.