I thought this was slightly funny.
Mark Zuckerberg is known these days for wearing t-shirts with Latin phrases on them, especially ones where he compares himself to Julius Caesar.
Bluesky made a shirt in the same style, but theirs says “a world without Caesars” in Latin.
Zuckerberg wears t-shirts comparing himself to Julius Caesar? Why is that every time I think I’m up-to-date on the latest weirdness there’s more of it?
He is comparing himself to Caesar? Maybe someone should stab him to help him out.
If you think thats weird you haven’t even scratched the surface on Zuck. He actually idolizes Emperor Augustus Caesar so much that he copied the guys haircut for most of his career. Behind the Bastards does a good job of highlighting it. If you want a quick readable version, here’s the first non paywalled article I could find. https://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-fascinated-by-augustus-future-of-facebook-2018-9
So… Zuck stans the guy who ended the Republic and turned it into a monarchy that pretended to still be a republic?
Well, that’s not concerning at all.
All of this is literally unbelievable for me. I don’t even have words to express how unexpectedly odd reading comments in this thread has been.
Thanks for the correction, it’s Augustus Cesar. Still, what an odd connection. Good article btw.
I didn’t realize Ed Zitron had another podcast
At Meta’s annual Connect event in Menlo Park, Calif., Zuckerberg wore a custom T-shirt with the Latin phrase “aut Zuck aut nihil,” or “all Zuck or all nothing,” as he revealed the first working prototype of Meta’s augmented-reality glasses.
The phrase was a play on “aut Caesar aut nihil,” which means “either a Caesar or nothing,” or more simply “all or nothing.”
Zuckerberg has long been interested in the Roman Empire. He spent his honeymoon in Rome and two of his children, August and Aurelia, are named after emperors Augustus and Marcus Aurelius.
Incidentally, fascists tend to have a hard-on for ancient Rome, but I’m sure that’s just a coincidence.
Zuck puts out this weird “pick me” or “me too” energy lately, trying to fashion himself as one compatible with Trump’s world. His interest in Rome may precede Trump’s ascension to power, but his coming out is not a coincidence in my view. And yes, a fascination with Rome started as so many other things as an “innocent” meme and became a fascist dog-whistle.
I think fascists idolizing the Roman Empire goes back as far as Mussolini. The fasces, after which fascism is named, was a Roman symbol.
I’m not racist. I’m just really into 1940’s German artillery. For the engineering, you know. /s
I’m just saying, I’m a huge fan of General Von Manstein because the guy was a military genius, one of the greats of our time, not because of the Nazi stuff. /s
Roman empire, like the nordic pagan BS is also a (extreme) right-wing fetish.
So glad to see our new PM celebrating his election win like this:
Sorry but which country is this? Can you elaborate on that photo?
Belgium.
As I said, after winning the national election.
While we have an even more extreme party (VB)he is the leader of the NVA, basically a nationalist separatist party that wants to split the country and indepence for the Flemish speaking part.
Historically they were the party that collaborated with the nazis.
While they are careful to not be associated with extremism sometimes their true nature shows.Reverse image search brings up articles for belgium referencing a nationalist party, apparently younger dude is his son?
Noted: Avoid Belgium if I ever go to Europe.
You can avoid the whole of Europe, most countries are getting closer to the 4th reich.
Almost time to send the kids to the eastern front again.No point in dunking on Muricans then if Europeans are going to do the same shit?
Oh I definitely will, always have since the other side of their uniparty is not much better for the rest of the world.
Besides those 2 factions there isn’t a significant alternative. The vast majority belongs to 1 of those 2.
The dems will eventually fall in line and collaborate, like much of the European parties did before and during WW2.
“embracing patriotism” and " banning left wing elements" as the new proposed plan for the dems is already a good step.
They have no culture of resistance, generally apathetic and pacified.
If a European country would suddenly live under the same conditions Americans do now and loong before, regardless of which side was in charge it would be in flames. I can name a few things: no social benefits, mass homelesness, authoritarian police that kill plenty people, largest percentage of people put in jail… No country would take that.
And now they want to ‘save their democracy’?
And how? By not shopping at chain X for one day or maybe change their avatar.
True warriors.
To be fair, Roman history is really cool.
True, but there is a lot of Roman history and some find it cool for the wrong reasons.
All history is cool. Roman history just has a lot to study.
Agreed. But if you’re going to fixate on one era, you could do a lot worse than Roman history.
Other cool eras to fixate on:
- Joseon Dynasty and Sejong the Great in Korea
- Chola Empire - naval empire before navies were really a thing
- Ethiopian Empire - somehow survived with strong empire neighbors
There’s a lot of really cool history, Roman history is extra cool though since you can see so much of it in Europe.
You can also hear it every day if you’re an English speaker. The Roman conquest of England greatly affected the English language.
Yes but I can’t let this chance go by to piss off the English and say they’re a German colony, the country they love to hate.
Speak a germanic language.
England, literally land of the Angle. Where are the Angle from? And who’s the other part of the Anglo-Saxons?
Ruled by…The Windsors? Doesn’t sound right.
Or did they change their Von Saxen-Gotha name for some mysterious reason in 1914?Ask them why they let their little island be conquered so many times. Romans, Vikings, Anglo-Saxons, Normans. That we know of. Did they need an infusion of culture because they have none of their own? Was it a DEI thing? We may never know.
Yeah, I can picture much of roman history in my mind and put into context. Asian history is almost like fantasy lore and no matter how much I learn about it I cannot wrap my mind around how recent tieping rebellion is even though christanity played a huge role in it.
Taiping Rebellion is a mess.
Lol his face… It’s like he knows this is a bad idea and he has no idea how he ended up there.
That or he’s just an idiot and his face always looks like that.
Poor thing is his son, molded by daddy.
You should see the video, he just looks scary in it. The empty look, no thoughts, just following orders.
His sister already had mental problems at a young age and got help, this one doesn’t know it yet.Oh. Great.
Which country is this?
Belgium
Which country? Looks like a swede in italy 😋
I wonder why all these high profile people are so fascinated with a dictator that oversaw the transformation of a republic into an empire. Just like fascists were/are. Must be just a coincidence! Just like that Musk salute from the heart.
To be fair, that was more Augustus.
The reason behind his weird android haircut is that he thought it looked Caesar-esque.
He’s not doing those roman salutes in public yet, though.
But it’s kinda funny that the oligarchs are so obsessed with Rome, famous for baking a fallen empire, while enabling the fall of the US.
And Nazis. Maybe, just maybe it has something to do with unchecked power?
Such a shame that Coppola’s movie was bad. He was onto something there.
Zuckerberg wears t-shirts comparing himself to Julius Caesar?
Yet March 15 has come and gone yet again without Zuck having a bad day.
This is my kind of monetization.
Feels way better than getting features pulled and put behind an increasingly higher paywall.
Give it time.
Who got a link? I wanna buy one
https://worldwithoutcaesars.com/
edit: fyi it’s a cool $50 after shipping
Not for me, I live in Australia. USD$80 shipped. I’ll pass
To Italy I should pay 40USD more for shipping and 17 for taxes…c’mon, decentralize and sell something from Europe!
So is lemmy or mastodon selling shirts yet? if not, why not?
I was on Reddit for 12 years with nearly a million Karma, and I got permabanned soon after the Inauguration for repeating an anti-MAGA opinion I had posted numerous times before he was elected.
I came over to Lemmy, and discovered that I was only one victim of a bloodbath, demonstrating that Reddit had decided to forego their free speech mission, and grovel for their new masters. Pathetic punk ass corporation.
I never wore a Reddit shirt, but I’d happily wear a Lemmy shirt.
I had an 11-year old Reddit account permabanned and they didn’t even give me a reason. Feels bad man
Don’t feel bad, Reddit has been sliding for a long time. Lately, every thread started with dozens of bad puns, followed by Russian bots.
I used to visit certain subs just to out the Russian Karma Farmers. I got so good at finding them that finding them became almost a game. When I identified them, I would address them directly, I would identify them for everyone else in the thread, and make fun of their lame propaganda.
Then I would address their supervisor, and tell them that this guy was terrible at his job, that I clocked him within a few hours of his registration, and hed be better off at the beet processing factory. They would disappear almost immediately, with no pushback, confirmation they were frauds.
Lemmy has fewer people, but so far all we’re really missing is the worst of Reddit.
Yeah I think I just naively didn’t notice until recently. I hate that the departure feels so political, because I mostly followed really chill subreddits. I don’t see as much active discussion here on Lemmy yet, but I love the fediverse concept and am here for seeing this place flourish.
At ease soldier! Thanks for fighting the good fight. Are bots not so much a problem on Lemmy?
It’s really refreshing to see all these new accounts on Lemmy. I came here during the first mass exodus of Reddit almost 2 years ago. So I can tell you lemmy has come along way since then. It’s exciting to see its recent growth.
I habent seen anything like the bot action on Reddit.
I miss some great subreddits, especially a lot of cool guitar subs. I still look at them, but it does bother me that Im not able to give advice to new guitarists, or even tell luthiers how beautiful I think their guitars are.
Feel you. my 8 yr old alt (my only account left) mysteriously has had a total karma of zero.
Since shortly after election strangely enough. Wonder what happened there /s.
They just go where the money is, and if that means going to a dictator, that’s what they’ll do.
Poor blue maga, while anyone with a consciense was permabanned from Reddit loooong ago by Jessica Ashoosh, now their slightly more right wing sister party has done it to them.
You had so much free speech as long as it was the US regime narrative.
Says more about you people than Reddit.
The Mastodon project put a lot of energy into a high quality plushy.
That must have been frustrating when the user base responded “but I already got my Blåhaj”
But Plushtodon is fren for Blahaj
No one’s taken my lunch money in awhile wearing Linux t-shirts. I need to up my game - I’d buy a Lemmy shirt.
TBF they’d probably take your lunch money for wearing a shirt with some latin words on it too
I imagine selling t-shirts would be against the Marxist/Leninist ideology of Lenny’s devs?
But given the volume of non-tankie instances now up and running, I’m sure some enterprising admins would be willing to give it a go.
…and as long as they’re ethically sourced (no sweatshops), high quality (materials and GSM), and reasonably priced (accounting for the other two factors) - I’m all for it!
If they are ethically made by union labor, there is nothing anti marxist about selling a shirts. 😁
Agreed. In fact seeming merch is pretty grass roots tbh. It’s how many musicians make a living
Che Guevara t-shirts seem to get sold quite a lot.
Mastodon has merch, but it sells out near-instantly.
Got a link to where this stuff can be bought when available?
https://shop.joinmastodon.org/
The stickers, pins and tote bags are still in stock. The plush is the one in high demand.
looks like only the stuffie is available now. I’d really like a shirt.
well, because everyone has the right to sell one, basically
Everyone has a right to sell a shirt with some latin words written on it too. That didn’t stop bluesky from making a bunch of money doing so.
it’s a fire shirt not gonna lie
You are thinking of Nero!
Oh fuck me, HOW in like 25 years did I not get that pun?!
Same!!
I was today years old too.
Maan, same 🤯
Best nerdy program name ever.
I got my copy of Nero from limewire. It only took 3 full wipes of windows to find one that wasn’t a Trojan.
The good old times 😁
touché
That’s cool but I’ll check back in to see which fascist technocrat is running bluesky in 8 years
In 8 years, anyone not mainlining Truth Social through their compulsory Neuralink will captured and euthanized.
Yeah, it’s kinda sad but that will probably happen.
In theory, Bluesky is supposed to be immune to that due to it being open source. In practice, I don’t know what that would look like. The architecture seems to be much less decentralized than ActivityPub (which is what Mastodon uses).
Ofcourse they ain’t making shit from custom domains. Anyone who is interested in connecting a domain to their Bsky account and has the skills or patience to learn how to probably already has a domain bought at another registrar to connect to.
Also they only make referral fees because they’re not a registrar themselves
No, its because they don’t advertise it at all. The page for buying them has the date 2023 on it.
Also most people won’t care anyway. Even big businesses are unlikely to really be that bothered.
For years everyone’s been fine with Twitter and that never had custom domains.
But up until recently, Twitter used the blue checks to verify identity. Bluesky (as far as I know) doesn’t verify anyone’s identity. Instead, your domain name is your verification.
Yeah, business are pretty much the most consistent in verifying via domain. They get shouted at for it as soon as they join. Now most brands know to do it ass a measure of, idk, good faith in the platform and its norms.
I swear there really are two types of people who learn latin…
Lawyers and biologists?
I was going for a specific type of nerd with fascist sympathies ans a very different specific type of nerd with antifascist sympathies. But also yes
Laywers and biologists. Like they said
the Classicists and the classists!
It’s the same with the Norse, its either a Nazi or someone who wants to bury a Dænaxe into a Nazi.
of course the android wears a shirt with latin phrases.
I mean why is this surprising? Custom domains are a very niche thing; the majority of people don’t know or don’t care.
Why is he doing that? Is he competing with Elon Musk on stupidity?
It occurred right around when the kingdom in orange took power. Somehow zuck thought that it would be advantageous to his interests to compare himself to Caesar during an obvious triumvirate. The orange one and phony stark would be crassus and pompey by extension. But I think commodus is a far more appropriate roman emperor for zuck to choose as his patron saint
lol well Commodus associated him self with Hercules and fought in fake gladiator matches in the arena, so they both had a lot to overcompensate for as it seems. Good match.
It’s odd to me that someone would feel the need to compensate for their socially awkward highschool years by learning Brazilian Ju-Jitsu and taking growth hormone. You’d think being rich would be enough for these people but it’s not.
For a brief period of time, I entertained the hope that the t-shirt was Zuck’s way of warning the world that the US was slipping into a fascist dictatorship, but that was not the case. It seems clear that that he wore the shirt out of hubris. It was his way of telling the world that he was the modern era’s Caeser and the two others men running the failing superstate were crassus and pompey. An absolutely mindless message given how it ended for all three of these men.
By the way, isn’t the word “commode” derived from Commodus? We should name something after Zuck. Perhaps this new strain of bird flu that’s been spreading wildly because of a lack of a federal response?
I think it is apt, and I liken Elon to cancer
That’s all well and good, but the problem remains: Namely, the fact that Meta earns far more every day than all companies worldwide earn from the sale of T-shirts put together - much, much more. And Meta pretty much doesn’t even sell anything physical (Oculus, c’mon). They mainly just sell massive reach for advertisements and PR (influencing opinions). In addition they sell, the personal data of users to make that work devilishly acuarate. As long as the vast majority doesn’t care how this business model works and what power the centralization of attention actually means even for their own reality, nothing will change, I’m afraid.
I’m going to state an unpopular opinion. Bluesky should have ads, not a personalized ads that track users, but just simple ones at the very top of the feed. Consumers today are too addicted to free services, and companies need to be financially independent so that they can support a quality product.
Alternatively, no ads and we can support it through donations or anti-oligarchy purchases like this shirt.
Ads open up a pandoras box of monetization of user data/traffic/clicks/links/additional engagement, etc.
It’s a dark, dark, dark road, and we’ve been down it dozens of times with tech giants. It never ends well.
Let’s stop having advertising be the way we fund pseudo-free services, and instead just give people options to donate or pay into it some other way. We need to end this reliance on advertising industry for revenue.
Ads are attractive to many users because they have a simple option for universal opt out (adblocking) at the cost of everyone who isn’t a Freerider.
Yes but a lot of us who do block ads block them largely because they are intolerable. I largly only started blocking ads at all because of how utterly miserable YouTube ads became.
Gotta love loading a mobile webpage and 20% of it is readable text and the rest is advertising.
Another reason why they just externalize the cost of the website onto anyone who can’t use an ad blocker or doesn’t know how.
Ads incentivize them to make the platform addicting and to prioritize ragebait because it will cause people to stay engaged in the app longer.
Agreed. Being financially independent can also foster ad investments and lead to a popularity gain
Free services? Where?
Free services don’t really exist.
Could you suggest alternate wording that succinctly conveys what the commenter obviously meant?
I probably could if I could be bothered to do that.
Which means no.
Why the first comment if you were not going to bother to elaborate?
Elaborate what exactly?
And I honestly thought that he was screwing around with me, because it was such a strangely worded sentence.
Thanks for letting us know! 🥰
😘
If you mean somebody, somewhere is footing the bill, then sure, if you torture the definition of “free” enough, then nothing on Earth is free. It is worth pointing out that if you enjoy (for example) Wikipedia, then you should donate if you can, because Wikipedia runs on donations. If you’re just trying to be a pedantic jackass, though, that’s another thing.
You’re saying this on lemmy.
What about “Tu quoque, Brute”?
Would be cool to pretend stab this guy in the metaverse to remind him what happens to Caesars.
I bet that if you tell Markie that Caesar was a probably bisexual man affected by mini-strokes and/or epilepsy, he would make those t-shirts disappear in a minute.
Ignorance is bliss.
Augustus, not Julius.
Gaius Julius Caesar, most probably bisexual as widely accepted in Roman society, rumored to have been having an affair with the King of Bithynia and affected by mini-strokes or epilepsy.
I know, but he’s obsessed with Augustus.
Oh well, Augustus was probably bisexual as well, rumored to be a bottom (which was the only thing Romans kind of picked up on) and he was well-known for his serial adultery, although I guess Markie would see this as something cool, while Augustus actually wrote laws against this behavior himself.
