Edwin Martin
Paris Marx🚨 THE FINAL TWO 🚨
From thirty-two candidates, we’ve now made it to the final round where Elon Musk and Peter Thiel will face off for the crown.
Who will win? You decide!
🗳️ Cast your ballot: https://twsu.forms.app/wpit25-final
Live results are not available this round. The winner will be announced on our livestream for Patreon supporters after voting closes at 7pm ET, and soon after on social media.
Become a supporter: https://patreon.com/techwontsaveus
Here’s the full bracket to see how we got here! Plus, you can also cast a vote for third place this year, between Sam Altman and Mark Zuckerberg.
Vote now: https://twsu.forms.app/wpit25-final
Hasko 🇪🇺🦄🌻@parismarx as European I need to say Elon Musk is the worst of the worst.
F4GRX Sébastien
fabriziob@lontrachen @parismarx As someone from the EU living in Denmark, definitely Peter Thiel.
Elon Musk is a petty loser with too much money to express his small dick energy, but Peter Thiel is instrumenting EU countries to become police states.
I know Elon Musk has made a lot of damage in the USA with DOGE, but that is none of my business (especially according to most USA citizens I interact with).
Anyway, I feel for the South Africans, represented by these 2 nazis.
Maya@fabriziob @lontrachen @parismarx The governments are expanding their surveillance capabilities with or without Thiel. Take it from someone working in the industry, in EU.
Musk, on the other hand, is actively trying (and succeeding at) influencing global politics, social consensus, the Overton window, etc. He owns and actively influences the discourse on one of the biggest social media sites in the world, finances and promotes fascists worldwide (like the AfD in Germany), etc.
I'll admit, when you're not in a position where your human rights are being debated, Thiel and his surveillance may be more of a threat, but to marginalized communities, Musk is far worse.
@engideer yepp. Peter Thiel can develop the shit he wants, but it is the european leaders who want to use it. They don't need to, they want.
Musk is actively manipulating european politics, the last federal election in Germany, UK, his public feud against the EU, the war on labor rights in sweden etc.
RRB@lontrachen @engideer @fabriziob @parismarx Peter Thiel is less of an attention hog, but he is at least as bad. He is more dangerous, because he is not ketamine-addled
@lontrachen @engideer @parismarx
One thing that many do not realize is that Peter Thiel is making totalitarian surveillance extremely affordable.
Stasi used to cost 25% of the GDP of East Germany. By 1989 it relied on 500,000 to 2,000,000 collaborators as well as 100,000 regular employees, and it maintained files on approximately 6,000,000 East German citizens—more than one-third of the population.
Palantir Gotham is priced at $141K per core, for a perpetual license, easily hidden.
Zuri (he/him) ❌️👑 🕐 CET@fabriziob @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx That's a poor comparison: If you wait 50 years, almost anybody with a little tech and business skills can offer this cheaper (they would vary in how much but they'd be cheaper one way or another). He might be more affordable "inflation-adjusted", but that'd be at least complex to determine
@shaedrich @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx
1989 is not even 40 years ago and I am sure that we can find way higher expenditure in China today.
Fact is, you pay less because you are at the same time providing training data.
@fabriziob @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx Doesn't matter if it is 10 years or 100. It was an almost random number. My point was that—unless we have an apocalypse that throws us back decades or centuries—it's not an easy comparison and your point would be better made without. I'm not saying, you're wrong, I'm just pointing out that the comparison isn't helping the case. Not more and not less.
China on the other hand, is exactly that kind of comparison, I was asking for instead 👍🏻
@fabriziob @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx However, I wonder why this is. Because I would expect China's surveillance to be way better integrated. Have they ever expressed interest in Palantir?
On the other hand, Palantir is—at least in some western places—not used for the entirety of the state but more selectively, whereas China has an encompassing system.
@shaedrich @fabriziob @lontrachen @parismarx Yep, multiple different systems with different capabilities are being used. Gotham is just one of them (and not necessarily the cheapest!) (though with insane capabilities)
@shaedrich @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx
A lot of what we are told about China is not factually correct.
For example, social scoring was implemented only in some districts for tests that even failed.
@fabriziob @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx Okay, interesting. Do you have sources for that, so I can read up on that a bit?
@shaedrich @lontrachen @engideer @parismarx
I think in both cases the monetary resources expense is not the problem and that's why I didn't mention them even though I heard about calculations of up to 25% of GDP.
The real difference is human resource requirements and subsidization due to returns given by collected data (or at least that is the claim).
Bruno Girin@parismarx all 4 people are very worthy finalists.
Derick@parismarx So hard to choose. They all deserve an award for being awful.
Drumchord@parismarx I have to admit that my first intention was Musk but after a good thought I chose Thiel cause I really think that asshole is more dangerous right now. Either way both are worthy contenders.
Jesse Alexander, WB2IFS/3#dylannroof oh, yeah tech only 🤔
Thomas Bohn@parismarx hard decision but I think one is clearly the worse one
Michael Gemar@parismarx It’s a tough one — Musk is more publicly awful, but Thiel is more effectively dangerous.
estelle@parismarx who is worse, kefka or sephiroth with three living brain cells
Perrin42"Whoever wins, we lose."
Timothy Wolodzko@parismarx why would you insist on having only one winner?
Thee Mighty Peculia 🍄@parismarx They're all ghouls but Musk is also a loud mouthed idiot.
StarkRG@parismarx Oh, darn, I can't decide, I guess we'll just have to execute them both.
@f4grx @shaedrich @parismarx Sending stuff to the Sun is extremely difficult. It's actually a lot easier to yeet them out of the solar system altogether. Even that, though, is energy intensive. We'd be better off mulching them, composting them, and then using the result to fertilize a forest.
@StarkRG @f4grx @parismarx That would give "reforestation" a whole new meaning 🤯
Maki 🔻 🌹@parismarx Musk is a schizofrenic clown. There's someone behind him making him dance. Thiel is delusional as well, but also very, very dangerous. I vote Thiel as being the worst of them.
Ray McCarthy@parismarx
How appropriate. A NAZI and a Vampire. One made the other rich.
How appropriate. A NAZI and a Vampire. One made the other rich.
gbsills@raymaccarthy @parismarx Come on! Be fair! They are both NAZIs.
@gbsills @parismarx
I'm thinking there is no rule forbidding the Undead being NAZIs?
I'm suspicious of all the YA stories since 1990s where Vampires are sexy and even at high school. I don't think John Polidori, Emily Gerard, George MacDonald, Bram Stoker, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, Jules Verne and Philip Burne-Jones are all wrong (1819 - 1897. Origins with the Sumerian Lamia. Similar Celtic evil creatures.
@parismarx When it comes to being a piece of shit, nobody beats Elon Musk although Peter Thiel definitely gives it his best shot.
Eugen Neuber@parismarx why not have both?
RalphStark 🖤 :fcknzs: :pride:No doubt the evilst and worst human in tech ist Thiel. Musk is too much a junkie and too unsmart, he's worth to be a second Hitler, but Thiel is the puppetplayer of the second Hitler. But he chose to play the puppet Vance, because he isn't that addicted to drugs.
yuhasz01Worst person in tech(ie, anti-democracy, anti-compassion evil turd)?
Drop a "deuce", a tie, both of them
I am Jack's Found 404Antichrist what an asshole.
Keith@parismarx yeah these two could even compete for worst person alive (though they would probably loose to Putin)
@keydelk @parismarx Though Putin is an easy choice, we solely see Putin in terms of his war with Ukraine. Besides that, Russia is still not a very friendly, democratic country, but it'd be a little too easy to say, he doesn't have competition when considering more areas
Primetime@parismarx Peter Thiel without a doubt. He operates in the shadows to undermine democracy in the western world.
Leo@parismarx damn this is impossible
MostlyTato@parismarx
Please tell me this is Thunderdome rules, pleeeeease....😜
Please tell me this is Thunderdome rules, pleeeeease....😜
derptron@parismarx Are we measuring effective evil or intentional evil?
If the measure is effective evil there's not even a contest here. Theil destroys the arena. Sends in his dogs with their 50cals.
Intentional...I think maybe still but there's a chance Musk stays in the fight.
Abel Gonzalez@parismarx Crowd voting can be entertaining, but it often collapses very different ideas, actions, and impacts into a single popularity contest. What criteria are voters actually using to compare influence here, outcomes, ideology, or visibility?
George Liquor, American@abelbitez @parismarx In the absence of stated criteria, we use our own. That's not difficult
@liquor_american @parismarx That’s fair, but when criteria are implicit and individualized, the result reflects aggregation of preferences more than a comparable measure of influence. At that point, the outcome says more about the audience than about the subjects.
Thiel because his evil is more effective
@parismarx
@parismarx
Paul Emerson@parismarx @JasonAnthonyGuy That’s a coin flip for me!
Jason Anthony Guy@emersunn I’ll admit when it came to it, my finger hesitated a fraction of a second.