how_many_times

>> The US is doing great. The rest of the world not so much.

These are going to be famous last words. The US is going to be doing horribly over the next decade, precisely because of how "great" the last decade has been. If I borrowed (or pseudo-borrowed a.k.a "printed money" because of reserve currency status) a trillion dollars and enjoyed a commensurate lifestyle, neither my awesome lifestyle nor the fact that there have been a lot of suckers to sponsor it is any indication of what the future will hold.

Soon, US will not be able to borrow any more money and sustain its quality of life. Potential lenders will spurn them: "Why, so you can borrow the money to sponsor your lavish lifestyle, and then turn around and conduct trade wars and actual wars with us? No thank you!"

China will probably do worse, because its greatest borrower, and source of economic prosperity, is going to massively default.

In comparison, this correction will mean the rest of the world is probably going do better, unless they foolishly allow themselves to be dragged into a war which one of these countries will almost certainly start as a last resort to placate any internal discontent.

>> When private sector fails, it goes out of business and other competent businesses take over.

Unless it is a bank, or an important tool for surveillance (e.g. Facebook in 2020). In which case losses are irrelevant and it is ultimately bailed out by the government.

A quick search for the word Facebook on that website reveals an uncomfortably pro-Facebook and anti-Google stance, couched amidst lots and lots of other stuff so the pattern cannot be discerned unless someone actually does a search. If the author is truly neutral as he claims, Facebook must be a saint when it comes to patent applications, which would be completely out of character. Or the author may be sponsored by a Google competitor who just happens to be pro-Facebook. Hmm... I wonder who that company might be.

Not that it makes Google's actions any better. But nowadays I doubt every single self proclaimed independent entity.

>> Is it never beneficial for a good person to work at a bad company, perhaps making it less bad?

That's an interesting thought. If carried to its logical conclusion, the 'good people' had many, many, many years to influence the direction of the company, and whatever little 'less bad' the 'good people' are doing is being completely negated by the 'more bad' that the not-so-good people are doing. So I think its fair to conclude the 'good people' are completely inept when it comes to their ability to effect any kind of meaningful change from inside of FB, and should probably leave en masse. After all, given such across-the-board ineptness, what's going to change tomorrow that couldn't have already been changed yesterday?

Facebook is going to face a massive recruitment problem from here on. To paraphrase Richard Hamming, "the only folks left there are the moral dregs".