[danso]

Wow. What a non sequitur at the end:

> That is, until the NSA scandal broke. Nothing made the purported libertarianism of Silicon Valley more laughable and aggregious than the fact that many of these companies are tools of secret government surveillance. This is why I had to include Paul Carr’s article about Silicon Valley’s participation in our security state infrastructure.

This is not even a complete thought, never mind a pretty blithe treatment of the actual issues involved. And also, the companies most under fire, particularly Google and Microsoft, are not "startups"

[akristofcak]

Yep. This wasn't exactly an essay, just some thoughts around a "trend" I picked up on (ie the backlash). I could write a whole separate article about the NSA but I let Carr's article speak for itself. The reason for including it was that the NSA disclosures put a different light on the tech vs society question. But yea, it could have been more developed.

[jacques_chester]

It just seemed like a lazy attempt to somehow slur those kooky libertarians, god bless 'em!

Guilt by a vague association:

* Some libertarians live in the Bay Area

* Some people in the Bay Area worked on projects, companies and systems being exploited by the NSA

* Therefore ... wait, huh?

[akristofcak]

If you read the Carr article, you might see that these associations are much less tenuous than you suggest.