How the tech industry is responding to the protests: technology is inherently equal and so should be companies.
It’s a known fact that tech and politics usually do not mix however, if there was a need to reiterate the scale of the current protests against the use of excessive force by U.S. law enforcement, the fact that tech companies are asserting their position should be an additional confirmation.
Following the protests that are taking the United Stated by storm and which are “starting fires” in other parts of the world as well, tech firms are publicly supporting the George Floyd protests.
Technology is inherently equal, it’s meant to be used by anyone regardless of skin color or ethnicity, and at the same, it gave power to the people to literally show how abuse and discrimination are still a recurring problem.
On perhaps what is the most tumultuous week the U.S. has seen in a while, Reddit founder and former CEO Alexis Ohanian Sr. stepped down as a board memeber of the company that brought him to popularity.
In a video he posted on Friday, on his Instagram account, he announced his decision and asked for his seat to be filled by a black candidate.
Throughout the video, he says among other things that he’s doing this “as a father who needs to be able to explain his black daughter when she’ll ask “what did you do?”. Ohanian is married with tennis world champion Serena Williams and the couple has a daughter, Olympia.
Stepping down from a position of leadership to open a door for someome else who’s likely gone through more struggle and marginalization than his or her white peers, is probably the most powerful statement we’ve see within the tech industry so far.
In addition to his resignation, Ohanian added that he’ll invest future income from his Reddit stock to support anti-racism initiatives and that he would start doing so with a 1M donation to Colin Kaepernick’s Know Your Rights Camp.
The declared goal of the foundation is to advance the liberation and well-being of Black and Brown communities through education, self-empowerment, mass-mobilization and the creation of new systems that elevate the next generation of change leaders.
In an open letter posted on his company’s website, Apple’s CEO Tim Cook declared that “We’ve always drawn strength from diversity, welcomed people from every walk of life to our stores around the world, and strived to build an Apple that is inclusive of everyone.”
Cook added that the company will be making unspecified donations to the Equal Justice Initiative and other nonprofits. It also will be matching two-for-one on all employee donations, throughout the month of June.
Twitter, meanwhile, swapped its standard logo for a black and white version, adding a Black Lives Matter hashtag to its bio.
More tech and digital companies publicly declared their support to the protests whether as a written public statement or with donations.
Perhaps one of the most relevant initiatives coming from the tech and innovation business is a coalition of Black founders, advocates, investors and other high-profile reps, calling out tech industry leaders to stand against the systemic abuse perpetuated on Black Lives.
The pledge, aimed at the Bay Area community, is called “Black Tech for Black Lives,” and it pulls together a set of specific, actionable commitments intended to support specific policy goals regarding issues like policing reform, local elections and by hiring and supporting more Black talent in tech.
(June 10th) UPDATE:
Reddit has appointed venture capitalist investor and entrepreneur Michael Seibel, to replace Alexis Ohanian.
He is a partner and CEO at Y Combinator, one of Silicon Valley’s most influential incubators and business accelerators that’s helped launch companies like Stripe, Airbnb, DoorDash, Coinbase, Instacart, and Dropbox.
He’s also the co-founder of Justin.tv, which eventually became Twitch.
Before becoming CEO, Seibel was also the Y Combinator first Black partner and he’s previously backed initiatives to improve diversity within the notoriously white tech industry, including BlackTech4BlackLives and BlackTechWeekend.
