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We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

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Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#601
post #576

I have a counter question - what about Google's support to the US Government? Have people forgotten the PRISM project? The US Government has backdoors at almost every big tech company.

People have forgotten. Hey, as long as our searches are not censored!!

In all seriousness, I find this current dragonfly outcry ridiculous when you consider the NSA dragnet that’s currently monitoring most if not all US web traffic.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#602

I find it ironic that these employees complain about an unethical search-engine project but have no issues stalking & violating the privacy of billions of people across the world.

Quite. For everyone who signed this I bet there are 100 salivating over what they could do in a country with no privacy concerns whatsoever.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#603

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> who hesitated Source? I was not aware there was any hesitation or even disagreement from Apple's side. Is there an Apple statement saying they disagree w/ Chinese government requests similar to the statements saying they disagree w/ US government requests? In their absence, is it safe to assume they agree since they have shown that when they disagree they make public statements?

They didn't really hesitate, they just dodged questions. Apple moved their user data and keystore to local datacenters in China [1]. Apple even updated their TOS and forced their Chinese users to accept (or drop service) to reflect this. As of July, these datacenters were nationalized [2], giving the Chinese government access to all Apple user data. It took only two years to go from refusing the FBI request for one u…

fyi neither of your links work.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#604

If you think that denying information to Chinese people because their Orwellian government demands it is the same as the stone you use to grind your obviously conservative axe on, you may need to pause and think a bit more on it.

Labeling someone's thoughtful arguments ('conservative') serves only to invalidate those arguments via an appeal to emotion or an association fallacy.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#605

It really pains me how Google has changed. When I was younger I always wanted to work there. Now that I've graduated college, I would probably never want to work there.

That’s because you were more naive when you were younger and now you’re not.

People are fooling themselves if they think any for-profit company doesn’t put profits first.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#606

And if the employees placed thier values over profits, why are they still there? I wonder if they are going to refuse their stock based compensation?

> btw if I quit on Feb 1, I'm walking away from half a million dollars in stock. This has some serious monetary consequences for me. https://twitter.com/lizthegrey/status/1067469950594486272

They can also quit now or yesterday. Why Feb 1? Also most of these folks will get another job that will provide a compensation that largely makes up for unvested stock they haven't got yet. They aren't really walking away from anything, and this seems like a virtue-signaling pat on one's own back.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#607

It really pains me how Google has changed. When I was younger I always wanted to work there. Now that I've graduated college, I would probably never want to work there.

I agree. However, for every person who doesn't want to work there, five others are willing to join the company, especially those who live overseas and are willing to work for pennies.

As long as homes in the bay area are regularly going for $2m and Google is one of the extremely few companies that has an attainable $400k+ TC... I don't see a shortage of people applying in the bay area either.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#608
post #578

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if Google did not remove blacklisted sites from results, users clicking on the link would still not be able to load the site because it's China censoring the content, not Google. How do you feel about Google respecting the EU's right to be forgotten? Over 40,000 requests from politicians have been received to remove themselves from search results. Do you agree with Google abiding by this form of censorship? Whic…

You can solve this "if against Z, then what about X"? Think of the user. Does a user benefit from being able to clear a permanent record, long after punishment has been served? Does a user benefit if Google facilitates government spying? You can be for the right to be forgotten (and admit to its abuses by politicians and rich hucksters), and against government censorship. This distinction is powerful and therefor oft…

> Does a user benefit if Google facilitates government spying?

Yes. Chinese users will most definitely greatly benefit from having a censored Google in China instead of having just a censored Baido.

The only people who won't benefit from it are self entitled 20-year-old Google employees across the ocean who in reality don't give a shit about Chinese people, what they want, or how the average Chinese person feels like, but care a lot about appearing righteous in front of their peers.

I find the idea of rich western individuals debating in their exclusive social club the theoretical moral faults of allowing to give the Chinese access to modern technology extremely condescending, and completely disconnected for any actual concern or understanding of real people. It's obvious that all of those people would feel better with themselves if people in China rotted for eternity with their existing tools, as long as they don't have to hear anything about it.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a universal argument for doing anything that makes a profit in the short term. Usually, apologists for corporate immorality bring up fiduciary duty, as if it explains and justifies things. But the argument falls apart if you poke at it even a little, because it completely omits the other side of the argument. Why doesn't Google start a restaurant chain, or start making PCs, or selling servers, or licensing so…

I agree, but there is an extent to which these companies by law are forced to operate against the positive value of their brand [0]; see Dodge vs. Ford Motor Co. I realize it's not the same, just that there's some amount of precedent. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co .

And there's been pushback from subsequent cases, from that very article:

The general legal position today is that the business judgment that directors may exercise is expansive. Management decisions will not be challenged where one can point to any rational link to benefiting the corporation as a whole.

Re: We are Google employees – Google must drop Dragonfly

#610
post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which reality is it distorting? Is the old desktop search reality? Why is it more real than mobile results? In truth, none of them are reality. Google Search is an algorithmicaly curated list of web pages - it’s an unfortunate error to believe it represents any reality other than Google’s opinion of what its users want in that second.

> it’s an unfortunate error to believe it represents any reality other than Google’s opinion of what its users want in that second. That was also true when search results were purely based on terms entered, barring the domain name affecting the default language, and user configuration. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filter_bubble > A filter bubble – a term coined by Internet activist Eli Pariser – is a state of intell…

Google consensus has never been a good way to verify words or meanings. Just look up the definition of the word "definition" in google. The google supplied definition matches no major dictionary online.
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