Last week, George Soros' investment fund sold off its remaining stake in Facebook.
This week comes the suggestion that the billionaire and his Open Society Foundations may be ready to invest in a fight against the giant technology companies Silicon Valley is famous for.
Axios, in a post on Tuesday, followed up with a Soros representative to see what his intentions were given that Soros has proven himself to be a vocal critic of Big Tech so far this year. At this year's influential World Economic Forum in Davos, Soros specifically singled out Facebook and Alphabet-owned Google as a "menace."
Laleh Ispahani, Open Society Foundations acting co-director of U.S. programs, said in a statement to Axios that Soros' Davos speech "reflected rising concern about the effects of a handful of giant internet platforms having so much influence."
Ispahani then suggested the Foundations' resources could come into play: "We’re certainly examining new ways we might address those concerns in ongoing conversations not just in the U.S. but among our foundation colleagues globally.”
Besides Soros getting rid of Soros Fund Management's Facebook shares last week, he also penned an op-ed titled "The Social Media Threat to Society and Security." Here's a bit of what he had to say:
US-based IT monopolies are already tempted to compromise themselves in order to gain entrance to these vast and fast-growing markets. These countries’ dictatorial leaders may be only too happy to collaborate with them, in the interest of improving their methods of control over their own populations and expanding their power and influence in the United States and the rest of the world.
There is also a growing recognition of a connection between the dominance of the platform monopolies and rising inequality. The concentration of share ownership in the hands of a few individuals plays some role, but the peculiar position occupied by the IT giants is even more important. They have achieved monopoly power while also competing against one another. Only they are big enough to swallow start-ups that could develop into competitors, and only they have the resources to invade one another’s territory.
The owners of the platform giants consider themselves the masters of the universe. In fact, they are slaves to preserving their dominant position. They are engaged in an existential struggle to dominate the new growth areas that artificial intelligence is opening up, like driverless cars.