91–100 of 638 posts
Beyond that I find it outrageously unethical.
This link might give you a perspective https://twitter.com/stewart/status/391346582764789760
So you're assuming it's due to ethnic prejudice, based on nothing but the ethnicity of Slack's CEO?
Wow. This seems rather unprecedented and unnecessary, based upon the lack of action in this regard by other companies I don't know why Slack would do this. If for instance this kind of arbitrary action took place on GitHub I could see it having a detrimental impact to free software projects. This is another good reason to choose Zulipchat and other self-hostable platforms instead of proprietary SaaS solutions.
As someone mentioned in the twitter thread, this could happen to any product: Google, Facebook, even taking the bus!
Why don't you use a free alternative as Matrix? If you self host, then you are the only one who controls who your users are.
It's not always your choice, and getting an organization to switch may be quite hard. Although Slack seems to be trying to help by pulling a stunt like this.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Iran's been on my list of "wanna go" destinations for a while (Food and architecture mainly). Looks like I'd have to choose between that and having any connection with a US based company. Great.
Everyone I have ever met that has been to Iran absolutely raves about it. I've never met a single person that didn't extend their stay, and doesn't rate it as hands down the best country they have ever been to. It's very, very high on my list. But if you have an American or British passport you currently can't go without an escort. (I'm an Overlander, I drove AK-Argentina and am now driving right around Africa. I've…
This worked even in Iran, and she met up with a Norwegian-Iranian family; but her government assigned minder/'translator' wouldn't let her sleep in their house. She counted as a journalist and there's no way Iran would let a loose journalist float around their society interviewing unsupervised ordinary people for the TV.
Pity, it does look like an interesting place to visit.
As an outsider, I am really surprised by how deep-rooted America's hostility is towards Iran. Shi'ite Iran certainly has human rights issues, but as far as terrorism is concerned the majority of them are orchestrated by Sunni groups. 9/11 hijackers, Al Queda, Islamic State, Paris attackers - are all Sunni.
Because of the fairly harsh anti-US rhetoric circulated by the Iranian government to its citizens since the revolution (itself because of our previous support of the Shah and current support of Israel) for purposes of maintaining power, it's easy to say "Look, Iran hates America."
The Shia / Sunni distinction is largely lost on the average American.
And just as a personal note, almost every Iranian I've met in the US has been an awesome person. They've got a fascinating history and culture.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Face recognition will solve that for you.
Good luck guessing ethnicity for Iran. There will be many who look less middle-eastern than your average "Californian with a tan". You'd have the same problem with most near-east or Mediterranean countries. Being at the crossroads for a few millennia will do that to a place.
A couple of our employees from Syria also got blocked today. They were using Slack from Syria though. EDIT: I don't understand why they ban/block the account rather than "simply" block access from IPs from the country. This seems really strange and overreaching.
How do you have employees in Syria? It’s a violation of federal sanctions. Edit: In the US, UK, and EU.
Wow. This seems rather unprecedented and unnecessary, based upon the lack of action in this regard by other companies I don't know why Slack would do this. If for instance this kind of arbitrary action took place on GitHub I could see it having a detrimental impact to free software projects. This is another good reason to choose Zulipchat and other self-hostable platforms instead of proprietary SaaS solutions.
Totally agree about going to the self-hostable path. I would add as an alternative, looking for non-US products, maybe from neutral countries. As someone mentioned in the twitter thread, this could happen to any product: Google, Facebook, even taking the bus!