Date/Time
Thursday
5 Dec 2024
2:15 pm - 3:25 pm
Location
202 South Hall
Event Type
Non-CSTMS Event
Benjamin Shestakofsky
Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of Pennsylvania
This talk presents findings from my recent book, Behind the Startup. I draw on nineteen months of participant-observation research inside a successful Silicon Valley company to illuminate the relationship between financial systems and on-the-ground processes of technology design, development, and use.
Venture capital investors push nascent tech firms to scale as quickly as possible to inflate the value of their asset. I show how investors’ demands systematically generated organizational problems that managers addressed by combining high-tech systems with a low-wage, globally distributed workforce. With its focus on the financialization of innovation, Behind the Startup explains how the gains generated by tech startups are funneled into the pockets of a small cadre of elite investors and entrepreneurs, leaving workers and users to bear many of the costs and risks associated with technology development.
To promote innovation that benefits the many rather than the few, I argue that efforts to build more equitable technologies must be complemented by changes to the organizational, financial, and policy infrastructures that support them.
This lecture will be held both online & in person. You are welcome to join us either in South Hall or via Zoom.
For more information regarding this event, visit the UC Berkeley School of Information.