Laura Kalbag

The Prodigal Techbro

Written by Maria Farrell on The Conversationalist.

“Prodigal tech bro stories skip straight from the past, when they were part of something that—surprise!—turned out to be bad, to the present, where they are now a moral authority on how to do good, but without the transitional moments of revelation and remorse… It’s a teleportation machine, but for ethics.

(While we’re thinking about the neatly elided parts of the prodigal tech bro story, let’s dwell for one moment on the deletion of the entire stories of so many women and people of color barely given a first chance in Silicon Valley, let alone multiple reinventions.)

The prodigal tech bro doesn’t want structural change. He is reassurance, not revolution. He’s invested in the status quo, if we can only restore the founders’ purity of intent.”

The lot of this is infinitely quotable. And if you’re a person in tech who is starting to care about justice, equality, ethics and so on, please please read the exceptional advice at the end of the article.

Read ‘The Prodigal Techbro’ on the The Conversationalist site.

Tagged with: systemic change, privacy washing, status quo.