Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

Thoughts on aligning your technology providers with the future you want to see

It is important to be aware of the fact that businesses you choose to interact with are led by individuals who are actively working towards their vision of what the future could be.

Your decision to engage with a business, especially one that provides technology, gives that organisation power, sway, and fuel to control not only the outcomes you feel at a personal level, but also a seat at the table of how the future of the world is designed.

This is part why-you-should-avoid-certain-businesses, but also a non-technical person’s guide of how to investigate what a business stands for, where their politics lie, and what vision they have for your future, so you can actively choose technology providers that align with your values.

Technology is the thing we interact with most every day. It’s estimated that the average person has 5,000 interactions with technology in a single day. This spans across:

• Social Media (Twitter/X, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, TikTok, etc)

• Browsers (Chrome, Safari, Mozilla, Brave, etc)

• Hardware (Apple, Microsoft, Google, Dell, etc)

• Software (Microsoft, Amazon, Google, etc)

• eCommerce (Amazon, ASOS, etc)

• AI (OpenAI, Anthropic, MidJourney, etc)

• Cryptocurrencies (Cyrpto.com, Kraken, OpenSea, etc)

• Telco Providers (Vodafone, Verizon, Orange, etc)

The growth of tech companies is often guided and facilitated by investors who directly benefit from their success. Even if a company’s mission is to solve a significant human problem, its funding—whether from a VC firm or another financial backer—comes with external priorities. As a result, its success can inadvertently contribute to extreme wealth accumulation, the rise of tech-driven extremism, the proliferation of the alt-right, and the expansion of surveillance capitalism.

The broligarchy

The tech industry has provided wealth to numerous individuals over the two large boom cycles of the past 30 years, but extreme wealth has been consolidated amongst a small group of men whose power and influence over the future of our planet are becoming more and more significant.

The broligarchy (the portmanteau of bro and oligarchy) is commonly considered to be Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos - some of the wealthiest and well-known men on the planet, but the VC funds that supported these businesses are just as influential. These men include the likes of:

1. Marc Andreessen - Andreessen Horowitz (a16z)

2. Peter Thiel - Founders Fund

3. Balaji Srinivasan - Formerly a16z, advisor to Pronomos Capital

4. Chris Dixon - Andreessen Horowitz (a16z)

5. Nat Friedman - Former CEO of a16z-funded Github

6. Patrick Collison - Co-founder of Stripe

7. John Collison - Co-founder of Stripe

8. Reid Hoffman - Associated with Peter Thiel

9. Daniel Gross - YCombinator

10. Sam Altman - YCombinator

11. Joe Lonsdale - Co-founder of Palantir

12. Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss - Co-founders of Gemini

13. Dryden Brown - CEO of Praxis

The collective net worth of this list of individuals including Musk, Zuckerberg and Bezos is estimated to be in the realm of 900 billion dollars, collectively they have wealth higher than the current GDP of Switzerland (est 850 billion dollars).

Beyond massive wealth, these individuals are also in the drivers seat of the primary technological connection points we interact with every single day; from the 33 minutes the average person spends on Instagram every day, to the web infrastructure running 10% of all websites, to the AI models that use your interactions as training data.

With every subsequent second and cent spent on these businesses, we facilitate the future that the tech elite want to build for us, and it is becoming increasingly important that we as individuals make choices that support the future we are aligned to.

The Broligarchy Vision

In this post I will not explain in any great detail the vision of these individuals, however, I encourage you to seek the information through the links below that explain their desire for wealth consolidation, implementation of new societal structures, the creation of a peasant class with no social mobility, and ability to conduct warfare:

• Venture Capital Extremism

• What Is The Network State

• Status of the Network State

• Implications of Cryptocurrency

• Unregulated Medical Experimentation

• Prospera: The Network State in Honduras

• Pronomos: Network State Financier

• El Salvador: Crypto Colonialism

• Venture Capital and Trump

• Day One: Venture Capital Takeover

• Venture Capital and the Genocide

• Weapons Startups

Practical Steps for Identifying The Broligarchy

As mentioned, the interaction points we engage with are what we have power over. I encourage you to do the following:

1. Understand where you invest interaction points:

   1. Look through your app usage on your devices and see what apps you are using the most

2. Investigate their leadership teams, funding levels, and firms that are providing funding

   1. Crunchbase: A platform that provides detailed information on startups, including their leadership teams, funding history, and investors. https://www.crunchbase.com

   2. AngelList: A platform that allows startups to raise funding and provides information on their leadership teams, missions, and funding partners. https://angel.co

   3. LinkedIn: A professional networking site that allows you to research companies and their leadership teams, including their job titles, experience, and connections. https://www.linkedin.com

   4. Glassdoor: A job search site that also provides information on companies, including their leadership teams, salaries, and reviews from current and former employees. https://www.glassdoor.com

   5. EquityZen: A platform that provides information on private companies, including their leadership teams, funding history, and investors. https://www.equityzen.com

   6. PitchBook: A platform that provides detailed information on private companies, including their leadership teams, funding history, and investors. https://pitchbook.com

   7. CB Insights: A platform that provides information on startups, including their leadership teams, funding history, and investors. https://www.cbinsights.com

   8. PrivCo: A platform that provides detailed information on private companies, including their leadership teams, funding history, and investors. https://www.privco.com

   9. SEC EDGAR: A database of publicly traded companies that provides information on their leadership teams, funding history, and investors. https://www.sec.gov/edgar

3. Identify founders, funders, and visions that do not align with your personal vision of the future

4. Seek alternatives:

   1. In an up-coming post, I will go in-depth as to the alternatives we have available, but to start:

      1. Privacy-focused alternatives

         1. Search Engines: DuckDuckGo, Startpage, Brave Search

         2. Messaging: Signal, Session, Element (Matrix)

      2. Open-source options

         1. Design Tools: GIMP (Photoshop alternative), Inkscape (Illustrator alternative), Kdenlive (video editing)

         2. Social Media: Mastodon, Pixelfed (Instagram alternative)

      3. Community-owned platforms

         1. OpenStreetMap

         2. Creative Commons

      4. Decentralized services

         1. Marketplaces: OpenBazaar, Origin Protocol

Closing remarks

The tech elite may have a significant head start in shaping our digital future, but individual choice remains a powerful force for change. If we embrace alternative options, and make conscious decisions about our technology usage, it is a small but meaningful step toward reclaiming agency over our future.

The future isn't set in stone – it's being actively designed by those who hold power in the tech industry. But power isn't just about wealth or influence; it's about collective action and informed choices. By understanding who benefits from our digital interactions and making mindful decisions about the technologies we use, we can help shape a future that aligns with our values rather than those of the tech elite.

This journey toward digital independence isn't about perfection – it's about progress. Start small, stay informed, and remember that every interaction counts. The future of technology should serve humanity as a whole, not just the interests of a wealthy few.