this post was submitted on 15 Dec 2023
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A WIRED investigation just revealed Mark Zuckerberg's years-long construction of a lavish, bunker-equipped sprawling compound in Hawaii.

The details:

The nearly completed Koolau Ranch spans 1,400 acres with over a dozen buildings, 30 bedrooms, off-grid power and food, helipads and underground bunkers with blast-resistant doors.

Costs eclipse $270 million — with reports of extreme NDAs muzzling hundreds of workers, lawsuits targeting landholders, and Zuckerberg reps allegedly clashing with press.

Political ties abound as the Chan/Zuckerberg donations flow, including hiring a former council chair and funding a former vice chair's nonprofit.

While tech entrepreneurs have a history of doomsday prepping, Zuck sounds like he’s taking this Hawaiian hideaway to the next level.

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[–] SteefLem@lemmy.world 71 points 9 months ago

These fuckers are building this world to their liking with there social shit and whatever else. And guess who is the first to run from there own creation. These fucking asscocks are the biggest fucking cowards there are.

[–] Zrybew@lemmy.world 54 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

First of all, bravo to the bunker building industry, to manage to sell doomsday preping to all these rich folks.

Now, from a practical standpoint, how cool it's to have $300m laying around for your little hobby? Because that's what this is, a hobby.

If society collapse, that Shit may buy them a couple of years tops, of a very miserable life.

They won't Fuck scape to Mars or to a bunker. We'll eventually eat the rich like a fucking French revolution and spend few generations cleaning the mess.

[–] cestvrai@lemm.ee 23 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I see it as my duty to fart into every billionaire bunker air intake I come across.

[–] vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works 3 points 9 months ago

If my fart you mean pump carbon monoxide then im with you, that or mustard gas.

[–] winterayars@sh.itjust.works 10 points 9 months ago

Dude's fucking a significant chunk of Hawaii for his hobby.

[–] Nobody@lemmy.world 41 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The second the shit hits the fan, the security guards are going to shoot him in the head and take over the island, and that's if he hasn't pissed them off enough to torture him first.

[–] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 13 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

I never get stuff like this. If civilization collapses, do these guys think they’re actually going to find people to deliver them to their bunkers? And if they do, they’re going to tell the people that brought them there to fuck off? You don’t get a spot? And even if you do get a spot inside, what’s going to happen? You’re the chauffeur and are gonna be zucks bitch cleaning everything and doing dishes for however long you’re stuck inside?

All these thechbro bunkers are absurd. They think they’ll actually make it to them, that they won’t be overrun eventually (or whatever security they hire won’t turn on them) or that life in a post apocalyptic world is worth living. Guess slowly killing yourself with a hoard of alcohol is better than dying with the rabble?

[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 28 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I think you all are missing the upside here.

There's every chance we can all chase him into the bunker and never let him out again.

[–] RubberElectrons@lemmy.world 6 points 9 months ago

I like how you think.

[–] GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world 23 points 9 months ago (2 children)

The few wealthy people I've met, not billionaires but $100+ millionaires, seem to have a limited skill set. They have "people" to do the work. I've always wondered how they would fair in a post-apocalyptic world?

Personally I'd rather have those people that can MacGuyver a solution out of rubber bands and mud.

All this to say that ol' Zuck should probably hire some good ol' boys/girls to do his work for him or he's screwed.

[–] Pons_Aelius@kbin.social 14 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Even the people who have survival skills but have grown up in modern society would struggle to survive long term in a complete break down scenario.

The people most likely to make it through?

The residents of north sentential island and other people still living a subsistence life style.

[–] GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago

Yep. I think "The Road" by Cormack McCarthy is probably the closest to what a post-apocalyptic world would look like and that shit is bleak.

[–] aStonedSanta@lemm.ee 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

10000% agreed. Sure you are rich enough to somehow live through. Along with other Richie’s. Who actually can hunt or knows electronics and wiring? Lol

[–] sizzler@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] aStonedSanta@lemm.ee 2 points 9 months ago

For sure. I meant in the billionaire class that would survive in these fantasies of theirs.

[–] DJDarren@thelemmy.club 20 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Have these fuckers not read World War Z? The rich won’t get to just hide in bunkers, they’ll get eaten just the same as the rest of us.

[–] bruhduh@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago

Fallout 3 tenpenny tower quest be like

[–] alucard@sopuli.xyz 19 points 9 months ago (1 children)

This vibes like a Bond villain

[–] theneverfox@pawb.social 2 points 9 months ago

They've been using distopian cautionary tales as a how-to guide, maybe they've gotten into action movies and thought "hey, that guy is just like me! Maybe I need a giant compound to keep me safe from government agents and heroes trying to give me my just desserts"

[–] aprnu@feddit.ch 19 points 9 months ago (1 children)

with plans for a huge underground bunker

The future was revealed

[–] Fredselfish@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago

We now know where he will be hiding.

[–] burliman@lemm.ee 19 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Their wealth is almost entirely composed of equity, which topples if the world fails. All the cash they have to build these mansions is derived from this. The value of cash itself is derived from this. The only things of worth in a post-apocalyptic world are the tangible things they bought with cash while it was worth something. Shelter, food generation, defense… those are still worth something, along with more important things: physical skills and practical knowledge.

They will find themselves in their mansion-bunker, surrounded by people who they have paid to be there, in a world where the currency they use to pay them has failed. Do they not see what will happen? Even if their plan involves complete self-isolation, how do they plan on maintaining these massive properties and fixing things when they break? Perhaps they have a plan to close themselves off to some smaller, easier to maintain part of it. But then what is the whole point if all you have is solitary confinement? Even if it all works and they can survive it, they will eventually emerge into a world that has failed, where their wealth means little to nothing and the skills that built that wealth are as useful as ornamental testicles on a monster truck.

Why do they put their money toward projects like this, instead of towards ways to make the world more stable so that it doesn’t fail in the first place. If I had the immense wealth they have, which was completely contingent on the world and people that it stood upon, I would do everything I could to make sure the world would not fall apart. And if it wasn’t enough and it was failing still, I would spend even more until almost nothing was left. Building a fortress in a failing state is stupid, and history can tell you that with 5 minutes of reading.

In all their supposed intelligence, it seems they haven’t thought it through much… or I am missing something glaring.

[–] danielbln@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Boston Dynamic dogs, Tesla Optimus, and so on. Why pay humans if you can automate them and have drones do all those tasks for you.

[–] burliman@lemm.ee -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] danielbln@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago (2 children)

End game is bots maintaining themselves, automated production lines for parts etc.

[–] bruhduh@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago

Factorio game be like

[–] Croquette@sh.itjust.works 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Yes but every system is bound to fail. If you depend on robots for maintenance and their auto maintenance breaks, you are in a lot of trouble.

[–] sizzler@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago

It's a system you don't have to pay and won't revolt. You still aren't getting what we are saying.

[–] a9249@lemmy.world 4 points 9 months ago

In all their supposed intelligence, it seems they haven’t thought it through much

They are brainwashed by capitalism. Unable to perceive a world where money becomes worthless.

[–] Senex@reddthat.com 17 points 9 months ago (1 children)

A live volcano chain is not somewhere I would build a bunker.

[–] 14th_cylon@lemm.ee 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

the probability of a zombie apocalypse AND a volcano eruption happening at the same time is probably not that high.

and as a location for a weekend house, hawaii has nice climate and is significantly closer to california than new zealand...

[–] Senex@reddthat.com 2 points 9 months ago

But it would make a great movie!

[–] paddirn@lemmy.world 17 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

“And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.”

Masque of the Red Death

[–] TheHobbyist@lemmy.zip 17 points 9 months ago

It's almost as if he was trying to hide from prying eyes... And get some... What was it again... Privacy?

[–] MysticKetchup@lemmy.world 15 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] SCB@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Wouldn't you?

I win the lottery and have a couple hundred million to blow and "Bond Villain Lair" is like #1 on my list of shit to do.

#2 is "buy a bunch of land and surplus military equipment and play Warhammer 40k with actual tanks" and I feel like those two things fit nicely together.

[–] neuracnu@lemmy.blahaj.zone 12 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] aStonedSanta@lemm.ee 5 points 9 months ago

This sounds worth a read what is his reputation like as an author?

[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 11 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

When people start fighting each other for bits of food because climate change has made it impossible to feed 8 billion of us, the rich will camp out in their bunkers until they can move to mars.

[–] Doorbook@lemmy.world 5 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Doesn't climate change means that sea level is raising and most of the islands and cities near water around the world will be gone in a few years?

[–] anteaters@feddit.de 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Even accelerated by climate change the sea lavel rise is a slow process with about 1 meter per 100 years.

[–] Doorbook@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

I thought it is sooner 😔

[–] bruhduh@lemmy.world 9 points 9 months ago

Another one became super villain

[–] Railison@aussie.zone 7 points 9 months ago

Gentlemen, welcome to my Hawaiian island retreat lair.

[–] onlinepersona@programming.dev 5 points 9 months ago

Got through 1/3 of the article. It feel artificially lengthened and information is scattered to be repeated a few paragraphs later. Felt like reading the story of an old man who keeps telling the same story over and over.

The price of a guilty conscience?

[–] Nomad@infosec.pub 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

So he has about 30 people including himself he actually cares about.