By Mae Anderson, AP Technology Writer
David Heinemeier Hansson has made a name for himself as one of the tech industry's more prominent iconoclasts and industry critics. The Danish programmer is a successful entrepreneur who has testified before Congress to argue that Big Tech firms should be more regulated and started an anti-Facebook campaign. He is chief technology officer of Basecamp, which makes workplace collaboration software, and is also the creator of a widely used software development framework called Ruby on Rails.
Hansson discussed remote work in the age of the pandemic and why Big Tech's power should be limited. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: Basecamp is mostly remote. Has the pandemic affected how you work?
A: So Basecamp has been been remote for about 20 years and we have all the systems and processes in place to be able to make that a pleasant experience. But I think what's important to look at with the pandemic is that it's not just remote work, it's remote work during a pandemic. So we have a lot of parents at the company. About half the people at Basecamp have families who all of a sudden have to deal with childcare at home or a spouse who has to share the one home office there. So the pandemic part of it has definitely been difficult.
Q: Now we've been doing this for a few months, we've seen many companies basically switch to remote mode. Have you seen other companies making mistakes switching to remote work?
A: The number one mistake I've seen from other companies suddenly being forced to go remote has been that they tried to recreate the office remotely. So if what happened at the office was a bunch of meetings early on Monday morning, those just turned into some calls.
And this whole idea that you can recreate the office remotely is a nonstarter. It's not a great way to work. Most companies, when they work in the office, work in a very synchronous way that's dictated around a meeting schedule that mandates where people have to be at a certain time.
Getting rid of that and switching to an asynchronous work style where people don't have to be at a certain place at a certain time is the key to unlocking both the productivity and the sanity of anyone working remotely during a pandemic.
Q: You have been critical about companies like Apple and Google being monopolies. Why do you think they're dangerous?
A: The power that Google, Apple, Amazon, Facebook and others have right now to dictate the terms of the digital economy, to capture the lion's share of all economic activity is unprecedented, astounding and incredibly dangerous.
From 2000 to 2010, I think most people uncritically looked at these companies with just applause. Oh, isn't Google amazing? Isn't it wonderful we can connect to old classmates on Facebook? Look at all these wonderful devices. Apple is putting out.
That was the honeymoon phase where these companies faced very little critical reception. That's not the case anymore. I don't think there's a lot of people who are just cheering on. Oh, isn't Facebook just universally amazing? Isn't it wonderful that Apple has an iron grip on all distribution of software to the iPhones in such a way that they can shake down individual software makers for 30 percent of the revenue?
I think some of these storylines now have taken over this uncritical applause that these companies used to have. And that's a huge, powerful and important change that's paving the way for these regulatory actions. I mean, virtually all energy that goes in to legislation or regulation comes from public perception changing.
Q: Is the way to fix this through regulation?
A: I think these companies are now so large that they are to some extent immune from the normal pressures of competitive forces that normal companies operate under. If a normal company that does not have a monopoly continues to do bad things to piss off large numbers of their partners, vendors and customers, those partners, vendors and customers will simply choose another option.
That can't happen when you have a monopoly. When there literally is no choice than to go through, say, the App Store to sell software to iPhone users. All you can do is kick and scream. And Apple knows this. T
What needs to happen is regulatory action, whether that is mandates on these companies' behaviors such as preventing them from monopoly abuses, of dictating terms of payment services, or, in Google's case, opening up their search index to other search engines so that they can use that.
Q: Can you talk about your Facebook Free campaign? What is it exactly?
A: So in 2018, well, in advance of what's been going on recently with the advertising boycott, Basecamp came to the conclusion that we should not be voting for more Facebook in the world. We had run some tests, an advertising test in 2017 that used Facebook, and we felt icky doing that.
The Facebook machine is a massive engine of privacy and exploitation where targeted advertising violates the privacy of the recipients. And we thought, you know, why are we in this? Why are we doing this? Are we doing it just because everyone else is doing it? That's not a good reason. We need to stop.
So we decided we would not spend any advertising dollars on any of Facebook's platforms. We didn't want more Facebook in the world. In 2020, clearly, we're no longer early on that. And hopefully it will stick and hopefully it will help change what Facebook is and again, not so much because Facebook is afraid of losing this revenue, but because public opinion will be in part turned by this, which will again fuel legislative and regulatory actions so that we get out of this dystopian hellhole that is a Facebook dominated world.
“Heretic” and “Maria” Set As Red Carpet Premieres At AFI Fest
The American Film Institute (AFI) has announced that Heretic, the psychological thriller starring Hugh Grant, and Maria, based on the life of opera singer Maria Callas starring Angelina Jolie, will round out the Red Carpet Premieres section at this year’s AFI Fest. The Heretic Gala Screening will take place on Thursday, October 24, and the Maria Gala Screening will be held on Saturday, October 26. The complete Red Carpet Premieres section includes the world premieres of Music By John Williams, Robert Zemeckis’ Here, Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl and Clint Eastwood’s Juror #2. All Red Carpet Premieres will take place at the historic TCL Chinese Theatre. The full lineup for AFI Fest 2024 will be unveiled on October 1.
“At the heart of AFI Fest is an unwavering dedication to celebrating the best in global cinema--together,” said Bob Gazzale, AFI president and CEO. “We look forward to uniting artists and audiences once again to be inspired by the art form in a powerful sense of community.”
Heretic follows two young missionaries (Sophie Thatcher and Chloe East) who are forced to prove their faith when they knock on the wrong door and are greeted by a diabolical Mr. Reed (portrayed by Grant), becoming ensnared in his deadly game of cat-and-mouse. The film is directed by Scott Beck and Bryan Woods and produced by Stacey Sher, Beck, Woods, Julia Glausi and Jeanette Volturno. The film will be released nationwide by A24 on November 8.
Directed by Pablo Larraín, Maria presents a tumultuous and beautiful depiction of one of the world’s most renowned artists and reimagines the legendary soprano in her final days in Paris, as Callas (Jolie)... Read More