Sir Richard Wallace’s inheritance of the vast Irish estate—around 55,000 acres centred on Lisburn, County Antrim—was not without controversy. Although Wallace was widely regarded as the illegitimate son of the 4th Marquess of Hertford, he was favoured over more direct heirs. This decision sparked tension within the aristocratic family, particularly with his cousin Francis Seymour, who later became the 5th Marquess of Hertford.
Francis believed he had the rightful claim to both the English and Irish estates and resented Wallace’s control over them, especially the Hertford art collection and the Irish lands. The dispute between them became well known, underscoring the ambiguity and tension surrounding Wallace’s position within the family. While Wallace gained the Irish estate and the contents of the Hertford House art collection, Francis inherited the title and the family seat in England—highlighting the divide between legitimacy, affection, and entitlement in Victorian inheritance.
Despite the aristocratic squabbles, Wallace maintained his role as a landlord with a reputation for philanthropy, investing in infrastructure, housing, and education across Lisburn. Nonetheless, his wealth and landownership remained rooted in the broader inequalities of the colonial landlord system in Ireland.

Sir Richard Wallace’s inheritance of the vast Irish estate—around 55,000 acres centred on Lisburn, County Antrim—was not without controversy. Although Wallace was widely regarded as the illegitimate son of the 4th Marquess of Hertford, he was favoured over more direct heirs. This decision sparked tension within the aristocratic family, particularly with his cousin Francis Seymour, who later became the 5th Marquess of Hertford.
Francis believed he had the rightful claim to both the English and Irish estates and resented Wallace’s control over them, especially the Hertford art collection and the Irish lands. The dispute between them became well known, underscoring the ambiguity and tension surrounding Wallace’s position within the family. While Wallace gained the Irish estate and the contents of the Hertford House art collection, Francis inherited the title and the family seat in England—highlighting the divide between legitimacy, affection, and entitlement in Victorian inheritance.
Despite the aristocratic squabbles, Wallace maintained his role as a landlord with a reputation for philanthropy, investing in infrastructure, housing, and education across Lisburn. Nonetheless, his wealth and landownership remained rooted in the broader inequalities of the colonial landlord system in Ireland.

A new aristocracy has emerged from within the tech sector—powerful individuals whose influence rivals, and in many ways surpasses, that of traditional political or economic elites. Figures such as Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos, among others, command not only vast personal fortunes but control over the digital platforms, infrastructures, and data that shape modern life. Unlike the hereditary aristocrats of previous centuries, their power is not rooted in land or noble title, but in code, algorithms, and network effects—and in a society increasingly dependent on digital technologies, this makes their reach deeper and more pervasive.
These tech titans wield disproportionate influence over civil society. Social media platforms dictate the flow of information, shaping public discourse and even affecting elections. Data harvested from billions of users enables companies to manipulate consumer behavior and personal beliefs in subtle, often opaque ways. Meanwhile, the privatization of digital infrastructure—from cloud computing to artificial intelligence—places critical systems in the hands of a few corporations with little public accountability.

The new aristocrat's’ wealth enables them to bypass democratic structures entirely, funding pet projects, private space programs, or even proposing experimental cities and societies governed by their own rules. Philanthropy, while often celebrated, is another avenue through which this new aristocracy exerts ideological influence under the guise of altruism. Unlike public institutions, these privately controlled ventures operate with no democratic oversight, yet have immense sway over education, healthcare, and global development.
In effect, this new tech aristocracy is reshaping civic life, often to the detriment of transparency, equity, and democratic participation. Their decisions—driven by profit, personal vision, or ideology—affect billions, yet remain largely shielded from meaningful regulation. As consumers and citizens continue to cede power in exchange for convenience, the gap between technological elites and the rest of society widens, echoing the structural imbalances of the old feudal orders.

Peter Thiel, a billionaire tech investor and prominent conservative donor, played a key role in enabling J.D. Vance’s political rise. Thiel contributed $15 million to a super PAC supporting Vance’s 2022 Senate campaign in Ohio, providing crucial funding that elevated Vance from a crowded Republican primary field. This financial backing, along with Thiel’s influence in conservative and tech circles, helped shape Vance’s platform and public image.

Vance, once a critic of Donald Trump, shifted toward a populist, nationalist stance aligned with Thiel’s ideological interests. After winning the Senate seat, Vance became a prominent voice in the new right-wing movement. In 2024, amid growing speculation and political maneuvering, he was selected as vice presidential running mate on a ticket that sought to fuse populist rhetoric with Silicon Valley-backed political power—a development that underscored Thiel’s broader project of reshaping American politics.

Curtis Yarvin, also known by his pen name Mencius Moldbug, is a controversial political theorist and software engineer whose philosophy has had a notable influence on some leading figures in the tech sector, particularly among libertarian-leaning or anti-establishment thinkers.

Yarvin is best known for founding the "neo-reactionary" (NRx) movement, which challenges democratic governance and promotes a return to monarchic or corporate-style rule. He argues for a "hard reset" of government structures, advocating for rule by competent technocrats or CEOs, akin to how companies like Apple or Google are run.

His ideas have found an audience among some Silicon Valley elites, especially those frustrated with traditional politics and bureaucracy. Notably, Peter Thiel—a venture capitalist and co-founder of PayPal and Palantir—has echoed some Yarvin-esque views, such as skepticism of democracy and admiration for efficient corporate governance.

David Holz is an American entrepreneur and technologist, best known as the founder and CEO of Midjourney, a leading AI-powered image generation platform. Prior to founding Midjourney in 2021, Holz co-founded Leap Motion, a company that developed advanced hand-tracking technology for virtual and augmented reality applications .​

AI image generators like Midjourney are often trained on massive datasets that include artworks scraped from the internet without artists' consent. This allows them to closely mimic the unique styles and creative choices of individual artists, effectively reproducing their work without credit or compensation. As these AI tools become widely used, they flood the market with cheap, derivative content, undermining the value of original art and making it harder for artists to earn a living. With copyright laws lagging behind, creators have little protection, while tech companies profit from their ideas without accountability.

Sam Altman is an American entrepreneur and investor, born on April 22, 1985, in Chicago, Illinois. In 2015, he co-founded OpenAI and became its CEO in 2019, leading the organization in developing advanced AI technologies like ChatGPT. Under his leadership, OpenAI has played a significant role in shaping the AI landscape.
SourcesLarge language models like those developed by OpenAI have sparked concern for using copyrighted material in their training without permission or compensation. These models are trained on vast amounts of online content, much of which includes protected works, raising ethical and legal issues around fairness and intellectual property. They can generate outputs that closely mimic original styles, potentially displacing creative professionals and blurring the lines of originality. The lack of transparency around the datasets used only deepens distrust, as creators remain unaware of how their work might have been appropriated. While these tools offer innovation, their development highlights unresolved tensions between technology and creative rights.

​Yann LeCun is a French-American computer scientist renowned for his pioneering work in artificial intelligence and deep learning. He is one of the key figures behind the development of convolutional neural networks (CNNs), which have significantly advanced computer vision and pattern recognition technologies. Currently, LeCun serves as the Chief AI Scientist at Meta.
Meta’s integration of AI with its vast access to user data raises serious data protection concerns. Users are often not fully informed about how their data is used, particularly when it comes to training AI systems. This lack of transparency fuels worries over digital surveillance, profiling, and targeted manipulation. Meta’s history of data-sharing with third parties, such as in the Cambridge Analytica scandal, has heightened fears around consent and misuse. Its AI algorithms, trained on potentially biased datasets, can also perpetuate discrimination and exclusion. Additionally, security breaches pose ongoing risks, especially given the scale of data involved. Questions about jurisdiction and compliance with global privacy laws further complicate matters, particularly as Meta continues to process user data across borders. Vulnerable groups, including children, face added exposure, while the opaque nature of AI decision-making leaves users with little insight or recourse.

​Demis Hassabis is a British artificial intelligence researcher, neuroscientist, and entrepreneur, best known as the co-founder and CEO of Google DeepMind. Born in London in 1976, he was a child chess prodigy and later pursued studies in computer science and neuroscience, earning a Ph.D. from University College London. In 2010, Hassabis co-founded DeepMind with the mission to "solve intelligence" and apply it to solve complex real-world problems.
DeepMind has not fully disclosed the exact datasets used to train its AI models, but its early systems like AlphaGo and AlphaFold were trained on domain-specific, publicly available data. However, its newer language models, such as Gopher and Gemini, were likely trained on large-scale web-crawled text that may include copyrighted material—similar to practices used by other AI developers—raising concerns about fair use, creator rights, and the ethical use of such content.