Being grateful doesn't always come naturally to the acquisitive, the consumptive, and the desperately self-actualizing.
Yet here are members of the tech industry about to sit around their Thanksgiving feasts, in a yurt far removed, to contemplate their own self-worth.
Perhaps they'll find the time, though, to consider some things for which they should be grateful. Here is my delicate contribution.
I'm grateful that Apple has discovered the spirit of giving. No, not just giving people smaller, cheaper phones[1] and revolutionary new laptops that look exactly like the old laptops[2]. It's giving many developers a (better) chance to make a (better) living[3]. It's giving its lawyers permission to make settlements[4]. And surely none of this has anything to do with antitrust moves against it.[5]
I'm grateful that Twitter has put little notes of concern[6] on tweets that may not be telling the truth. Well, some tweets. Well, a few tweets. Well, a few tweets from famous people. Well, a few tweets from some famous people.
I'm grateful that we've found a way to have business meetings in bed[7]. Well, from bed. At the very least, from our bedrooms. This has been the lifelong dream of many a tech executive who wakes up on a Wednesday, believes it to be a Monday and can't remember what they did on Sunday. Or on Tuesday.
I'm grateful that Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk managed to make a lot more money during the pandemic[8]. Otherwise, the people whose prime interest lies in keeping track of who's the world's most obscenely rich person today, this minute, right now, would be very upset.
I'm grateful that Microsoft