Meta is a terrible company but you're saying it should be illegal for the founder of a company to remain in control of the company as it grows.

Why on earth would anyone start an initiative which could spiral out of their control? If my company did great harm, I'd prefer it to be my fault, not the fault of a board or government that is completely insulated from the effects of their actions.

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lokar 21 hours ago | parent | next [-]

A narrower argument would be that (at a huge scale), you should not be able to separate the economic interest in a company from control of the company.

The founder can keep control, just don’t sell all of your ownership.

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soulofmischief 21 hours ago | parent [-]

But on what basis?

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lokar 20 hours ago | parent [-]

Public limited liability companies are a creation of law and government. We can make whatever rules we think best benefit society.

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loeg 17 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Yes, but the question is why do you believe that particular rule would benefit society.

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soulofmischief 19 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

But on what basis?

We can probably both agree it's difficult or impossible to construct an ethical basis for the unilateral preference of the group over the individual, an easy counterexample is queer rights. So we can't just make whatever rules we think best benefit society: there are ethical limits, and many demographics in the world who still seek liberation from State oppression.

Therefore, any encroachment on the rights of the individual over the rights of the group must be justified. A monopoly on violence is not justification. I am not saying your suggestion is flat-out unethical. But I seek to understand the basis on which you're claiming we as a community have the right to prevent someone from retaining control of their company. I could see one trying to make the case that if the owner commits a serious and relevant crime it might be best to prevent him from doing further harm, but you seem to be suggesting some arbitrary threshold after which a person is not allowed to retain control of their company.

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tomtheelder 19 hours ago | parent | next [-]

On the basis that public corporations are exclusively a legal construct which can, and indeed already do, have arbitrary rules. Should the individual wish to maintain control over their company they can simply keep it private indefinitely.

	▲	lokar 18 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		And, we have granted them limited liability. Not something anyone, or any group is entitled to. It’s appropriate to condition that special treatment towards our goals.
	▲	soulofmischief 19 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		"Because we can make arbitrary rules" is not a justification or basis. Again, I am not saying it cannot or should not be done; I am asking for the justification. "Because I can" sounds like what my grandfather used to say while beating the shit out of me for questioning his cult-derived arbitrary doctrine. We can do better than that.

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lokar 18 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

On the basis that they are not entitled to limited liability. It’s an enormous grant from the public. We have every right to add conditions.

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soulofmischief 15 hours ago | parent [-]

I am going to ask a third time, on what basis? "Because" is not a justification and you're going to have to do better than that. If you cannot provide a justification then you cannot even begin to establish that it is in the public's best interest.

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lokar 14 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I explained, you pretend I did not.

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soulofmischief 13 hours ago | parent [-]

You said "because we give them limited liability". I know you are capable of understanding why that isn't a reason. It does not even reference the proposition in question. I guess you are not interested in actually defending this proposition, and that is fine. I'm going to turn my attention away from your pointless interjection now and just talk to OP, who actually took the time to engage.

	▲	lokar 13 hours ago \| parent [-]
		You are exhausting. You should probably not go out in public.

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14 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[deleted]

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lenerdenator 17 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> Meta is a terrible company but you're saying it should be illegal for the founder of a company to remain in control of the company as it grows.

Correct. Well, at least with majority control vested in one single person with no accountability to anyone, which is the exact case with Zuckerberg. It doesn't matter what the board at Meta wants to do with him right now, he's got majority voting control.

> Why on earth would anyone start an initiative which could spiral out of their control?

Well, you see, there used to be this axiom we lived by: great reward comes with great risk. If you wanted to grow your company and possibly become wealthy beyond your wildest dreams, you would have to accept the conditions placed on you by investors.

We've now tossed that second part of that statement, "great risk", out the window, with a predictable result: you have people doing bad things who are accountable to absolutely no one, at least not in any way that a civilized society would consider acceptable, and they're harming others. Humans go power-mad sometimes.

> If my company did great harm, I'd prefer it to be my fault, not the fault of a board or government that is completely insulated from the effects of their actions.

That might be how you would prefer it, but it's not the way the business world prefers things. The entire point of incorporation as a legal concept is to separate your personal holdings from those of the business in the event that there's a liability placed on the business. Otherwise, people wouldn't start an initiative because, as you put it, it could spiral out of their control.

If they don't incorporate, once a court proceeding dictates that they've injured another party and must liquidate and transfer all of their assets to the injured party, they must do so, desire for control be damned.

Since Zuckerberg is legally separate from Meta, and cannot be held personally liable for wronging others through his role as CEO in most cases, it's not unreasonable to expect him to be accountable to other parties through less-severe means, like losing his job should the board of the investors that he approached find him to be acting against their best interests.