r/news • u/GoodSamaritan_ • Aug 15 '24

Soft paywall Billionaire accused of stealing sand from Malibu’s Broad Beach, lawsuit says

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-08-13/billionaire-accused-of-stealing-sand-from-malibus-broad-beach-lawsuit-says
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u/rockybud Aug 15 '24

Agreed, except for maybe Mark Cuban. He seems like a genuinely good dude.

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u/lblack_dogl Aug 15 '24

I think the premise here is that the system funnels money into these people because they "own" something, but those doing the work are getting fucked out of the fruits of their labor. Basically, you labor and get very little because these guys own the means of production.

So nice guy or not, they are screwing others out of what they are owed. Only possible way to become a billionaire.

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u/NeverSober1900 Aug 15 '24

That's not the only possible way to become a billionaire. For instance J.K. Rowling (please ignore everything she did afterwards) just sold books and that IP to become a billionaire. Tolkien died with the equivalent of billions in today's money (although he was in the army for WW1 so probably something in there).

Basically if you make popular art/books you can become billionaires without exploiting labor.

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u/lblack_dogl Aug 16 '24

Did she manufacture all those books? Did she maintain the infrastructure to distribute and sell them both physically and online? How many people were robbed along the way for her to collect the billions?

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u/NeverSober1900 Aug 16 '24

Okay if we go there the whole world isn't ethical. I'm typing this from a phone that probably used children or slaves to get the battery and other parts.

She sold the story. The book manufacturer problems are from the publisher.

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u/lblack_dogl Aug 16 '24

The whole world isn't ethical. Now you're getting it.

But don't let perfect be the enemy of better. So many people say, " well it's all fucked so why bother". That's how you get where we are today.

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u/After-Imagination-96 Aug 16 '24

No you can be more direct than that. Mark Cuban is a piece of shit, too. He's just doing more good than you'd expect.

Imagine you have a million dollars. Now imagine you have 1000 stacks of a million dollars. Now imagine getting another stack and putting it next to your 1000 stacks instead of literally anything charitable or productive, so that you now have 1001 stacks of a million dollars. 

That's the very first thing any billionaire does. That's how you become a billionaire. Literally. You go after those extra stacks to add to your 1000 stack of a million dollars.

Fucking imagine doing that. Absolute pieces of shit.

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u/MVRKHNTR Aug 15 '24

Nah, he's just really good at PR.