What Would I Have Done?...and The Techno Optimist Manifesto

Good morning…

I am in a state of ‘bitch and mourn’. The general term is ‘bitch and moan’ but I am close enough to people in Israel that have been mourning and of course bitching as I read the news and see the global reactions to Hamas and terrorism.

Someone in one of my Whatsapp groups shared this 9 year old video of Yaor Lapid (an Israeli centrist politician) delivering a speech about Hamas and terrorism that hopefully helps people understand why this massacre by Hamas terrorists is not a new topic or problem. If you are a jew, especially one in Israel, you understand and if you are anyone else, please take the 14 minutes and listen because it is something almost every jewish person with a memory thinks about…’What would I do?’

I live way over in Phoenix and invest for a living so yesterday, I got an email from Marc Andreessen who is a leader in the venture capital sector that shared his new ‘Techno-Optimist Manifesto.’

Personally, I want to bitch about the timing of this ‘manifesto’ , but that achieves zilch. Asking technology leaders about their feelings is a black hole that will only infuriate you as it has me.

I guess Marc’s manifesto could not wait?

There is no techno mumbo jumbo that matters to me about ‘feelings’ we should have about technology when Hamas is using most of this ‘technology’ Silicon Valley creates to rain terrorism and murder on Israel and jews.

Right now the venture community and media are pimping AI which the terrorists and fake media are using right now to breed mistrust on social media.

They are pimping crypto which the terrorists are using to buy weapons and pay terrorists.

Right now too many of the largest venture firms have too much money from Qatar and Saudi Arabia. They would be thrilled if Israeli’s and jewish people did not want to mourn and talk about the reality of how dark a moment this is and what it means.

It is always time to build and software will continue to eat the world (even when we are mourning) and optimism is important, but i’ll pass on the manifesto for now.

Anyways…have a listen if you can and have a read if you like.