Marc Benioff
He’s the CEO and co-founder of San Francisco-based Salesforce, one of the world’s largest software companies, which owns the popular messaging service Slack and is worth nearly $300 billion. He also owns Time magazine.
When I ask Benioff about the properties in the anonymous LLCs, things seem to take a turn. He starts speaking more quickly and fidgets with a piece of paper in his hand. He’s reluctant to go through the holdings, and his adviser on the Zoom call jumps in to say we can discuss later.
A couple of days before the interview, Benioff texted the same NPR colleague again, asking for intel on my story. Then he called me and demanded to know the title of this piece. During that call, he also mentioned he knew the exact area where I was staying. Unnerved, I asked how he knew, and he said, “It’s my job. You have a job and I have a job.” During the interview, he brings up more personal details about me and my family.
I leave the meeting disconcerted and still unclear about what exactly is happening with his land in Waimea.
The following day, I drive around with a photographer to take pictures of the town and Benioff’s projects. We go to the property he described as a community center and are confronted by one of his employees. The photographer explains we’re there to take photos of the outside of the building. Shortly afterward, I get a text from Benioff. His employee seemed to think we were “snooping,” and he says he’s escalating the incident to NPR CEO John Lansing. Lansing confirmed he spoke with Benioff, without going into detail — the NPR newsroom operates independently, and the CEO is not involved in editorial decision-making. Benioff didn’t respond to my question about the purpose of this call.
He’s buying farmland. Billionares are preparing to profit from the coming climate apocalypse by buying land and water. Marc Benioff isnt the only one. Hawaii is a great idea, niiiice and defensible. the future is gonna be fucking exciting folks, i cannot begin to tell you how terrified i am that we wont kill these fucking punks in time to save ourselves
I think it’s kinda crazy that him and zuck chose Hawaii for their doomsday bunker, especially considering they chose the same small island.
Hawaii may be defensible now, but climate change is going to make it a whole lot harder. Microenvironments like small islands are prone to systemic collapse when exposed to rapid changes.
I just don’t really see how the benefits of isolation really overcome the negative effects of climate change will surely bring.
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One day Hawaii might become the next Taiwan.
Edit to add: By the lack of downvotes, I must not have been clear. I meant that, after the revolution, the surviving capitalist class would retreat to a “USA” consisting of only Hawaii. Much like the Republic of China now consists of only Taiwan.
It’s not safe from drones, bombers, and naval bombardment.
What makes you think they don’t/won’t have anti-aircraft and anti missile defences? I’m pretty sure they don’t plan on going down peacefully…
Then you just do that to their supply ships off island.
We won’t. The future will look like now but worse off and people will have just adjusted to keep living and trying to pretend to be happy in it by buying more even as the class that can shrinks. And complaints will be answered with angry responses of people needing to smile more and not ruin their fun times. It’s easy to just not go against the flow and argue that people drowning deserve it and that it will just bring you down when you try to help them.
Isolation is probably gonna rise further. And humans will adapt because the ones that don’t will die. Simple as that.
There are people far dumber than him that have already figured out that retreating to your own island in times of global crisis is a momumentally stupid idea.