Silicon Valley Tech Bros Are Shirking Responsibility For the Products They Create, Says Recode Founder Kara Swisher

“It’s insane that they let Russians to take over the platform and nobody noticed,” Swisher says.

Kara Swisher (right) interview Rose Marcario at TechFestNW. (Sam Gehrke)

Kara Swisher, longtime tech journalist and founder of the podcast Recode, is  "willing to call a fuck a fuck."

Those "fucks," Swisher said today at TechfestNW tend to be wealthy young Silicon Valley tech executives.

"When you look at the lack of diversity and lack of life experience in Silicon Valley," she says, "it was clear there was going to be a problem as people got wealthier and started to control more."

Swisher is critical of what she's sees as a shirking of responsibility by top executives to police what happens on their platforms.

When Facebook Live—the site's real-time video streaming—was in its infancy, Swisher went to the company headquarters to preview the function in action.

"There were some important people in the room and I said, 'What are you going to do about people who commit suicide or kill someone on the platform?'" Swisher said. "And their response was to say 'Oh Kara, you're so negative.' I was like, 'Have you not met the human race?'"

Swisher does admire the early optimistic attitudes of Facebook's founders. However, she routinely calls out an inability to address people's abuses of their platforms.

"It's insane that they let Russians to take over the platform and nobody noticed," Swisher says.

But, she notes, "Mark Zuckerberg is a lovely person. He's very earnest about trying really hard. He just doesn't have a sense of his responsibility and power. It's a Silicon Valley thing to say 'I'm a simple person'—a simple person with a private plane."

It's clear that technologies, and digitization of services, are continually moving forward, Swisher says, and regulation is key.

"The tech industry is by far the least regulated," she says. "That's a problem."

In the midst of a nationwide #MeToo Movement, Swisher is also passionate about strong female leadership across industries.

"I don't think we're angry enough," Swisher says. "And there's nothing wrong with that. The only way to make change is to make noise."

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