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Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

businessinsider.com

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Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#331

Post by glangdale »

pvg wrote: post #329
glangdale wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both you and GP are overly in love with HN's prohibition of snark, to the point that you don't seem to be able to read any meaning into anything that seems a little snarky. Frankly, I think HN's official stance on snark is regrettable - the net effect is that, no matter how absurd or obnoxious the proposition, we need to shift the Overton Window by acting as if the proposition is worthy of Serious Discussion. I think…

you don't seem to be able to read any meaning The GP comment (about the Peace of Westphalia) is bananas and the dementors might be a little uptight when it comes 'snark' but you're way past snark - 'lol, reading comprehension much' is not snark it's just crappy namecalling. You should edit it out.

I am not overly convinced that paraphasing what I said to be way snarkier than it is, then referring to it as "crappy namecalling" is entirely valid.

You have even truncated my original quote to make it seem snarkier:

"to the point that you don't seem to be able to read any meaning into anything that seems a little snarky" -> "you don't seem to be able to read any meaning"

What I find tiresome is the overuse of the word 'snark' on HN to mean 'you disagreed with me but didn't show my arguments the hushed reverence of the drawing room'. As a result, every conversation at HN rapidly silts up with people straight-facedly raising disingenuous absurdities. We didn't quite make it to the Nazis, but seriously? "Apartheid-era South Africa should have been left alone because something something Westphalia."

You are exactly right: the comment is bananas. It is past due that it should be allowed to call a comment 'bananas' on HN without people crying out for teacher to come Save Them From The Snark.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#332

Post by pvg »

glangdale wrote: post #331
pvg wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you don't seem to be able to read any meaning The GP comment (about the Peace of Westphalia) is bananas and the dementors might be a little uptight when it comes 'snark' but you're way past snark - 'lol, reading comprehension much' is not snark it's just crappy namecalling. You should edit it out.

I am not overly convinced that paraphasing what I said to be way snarkier than it is, then referring to it as "crappy namecalling" is entirely valid. You have even truncated my original quote to make it seem snarkier: "to the point that you don't seem to be able to read any meaning into anything that seems a little snarky" -> "you don't seem to be able to read any meaning" What I find tiresome is the overuse of the w…

I'm not a huge fan of snark as a stand-in for everything non-bland either. But that's beside the point, when you start telling people how they are incapable of reading or absorbing your great insight (which is basically what both of your responding comments say), you're past snark and into snarl.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#333

Post by int_19h »

romwell wrote: post #322
int_19h wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The logic here is very, very simple: You don't help bad people do bad things. Period. End of discussion. If they still do it without your help, that's unfortunate; and yes, you should probably do something to stop it. But if they do it with your help, then you are directly responsible for it, and the rest of us have a moral obligation to hold you responsible.

>The logic here is very, very simple: You don't help bad people do bad things. Period. End of discussion. Yes, that's the logic behind Zero Tolerance everything, and also FOSTA/SESTA. It makes one look/feel good to say it. The downside? It doesn't help address the problem . Again, effect of the ban on women is missing from your answer.

The effect of the ban on women will be nearly nil, since the system was in place before apps existed. If there is any difference, it'll be positive, because the "guardians" won't bother setting the notifications up.

And comparing this to FOSTA/SESTA doesn't make any sense. Those laws didn't ban something that is unambiguously evil - they banned a whole bunch of random stuff under the guise of targeting sex trafficking. The equivalent here would be if I was demanding that Google and Apple ban all tracking apps in general, on the basis that they're used by "guardians".

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#334

Post by sjwright »

rapind wrote: post #297
sjwright wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if BMW decided to limit their cars to roads approved by BMW, that’s their prerogative. Who are you to tell a private company what products they’re allowed to make? The correct solution is for consumers to buy the product that suits their needs. It’s worth pointing out that the BMW approved roads have much better fatality statistics than the unapproved roads, and there’s almost guaranteed to be an approved road that g…

What? If I buy the car, I own the car. BMW has no say in where I drive it. I could only see this argument if I was borrowing / leasing the car from BMW. You'd have to change what ownership means for this to make sense.

In this hypothetical I'm not saying that you wouldn't have the right to hack your BMW to let it drive on any road, if you are able to. But BMW aren't obliged to make it drive every road by default, nor are they obliged to make it easy to hack.

And lest you think this is an absurd example, we're already heading down this exact path with drones, of which many now default to being geo-fenced from flying in restricted zones. It won't be long before these restrictions become nominally impossible for laypeople to switch off without some kind of security key.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#335

Post by appleflaxen »

xyzzy123 wrote: post #102

I am surprised that no-one has brought up a neutrality argument yet. The app is legal within Saudi Arabia and in fact published by their government. Are we to take down any app which violates anyone’s morals? Or just the morals of particular countries? If an app is blasphemous by the standards of say Mormonism or Islam, should we take it down? After everyone is done, how many apps will be left? If we enforce some mor…

it's the golden rule: would you want this app used against you? if not, then it should be taken down.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#336

Post by romwell »

int_19h wrote: post #333
romwell wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The logic here is very, very simple: You don't help bad people do bad things. Period. End of discussion. Yes, that's the logic behind Zero Tolerance everything, and also FOSTA/SESTA. It makes one look/feel good to say it. The downside? It doesn't help address the problem . Again, effect of the ban on women is missing from your answer.

The effect of the ban on women will be nearly nil, since the system was in place before apps existed. If there is any difference, it'll be positive, because the "guardians" won't bother setting the notifications up. And comparing this to FOSTA/SESTA doesn't make any sense. Those laws didn't ban something that is unambiguously evil - they banned a whole bunch of random stuff under the guise of targeting sex traffickin…

If the effect on women will be nearly nil, then does it all become a PR question?

In that case, couldn't it be useful to keep the app if only to keep track of how many people this policy affects?

I drew analogies to FOSTA because even FOSTA's intended effect (as stated) was negative. Yes, it actually made it a bit more difficult to do sex trafficking online (along with adversely affecting tons of other people). As a result, traffickers are harder to catch.

The "don't deal with the bad guys" approach sounds great, but even an embargo doesn't often work: see what years of sanctions got us with Cuba, NK, and Iran (in terms of improving the lives of people in those countries).

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#337

Post by BigFish12 »

slg wrote: post #128
geofft wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neutrality is a moral viewpoint in itself. It's the viewpoint that nobody is actually wrong, that simply by being a country you have a right to have your moral views respected. In the specific case of app stores, it's the viewpoint that everyone deserves to have the things they're doing made more efficient, and that helping anyone speed up their work is virtuous. (Neutrality, by the way, is IBM's present defense of D…

"If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality." ~Desmond Tutu

In situations of injustice, choosing the side of the oppressor is not always a bad thing, It's sometimes beneficial to let oppressor get it's way. You need to look and evaluate the whole picture before making a decision because constant local optimization is not always the best global strategy. Your goal is to win the war, not the battle.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#338

Post by int_19h »

romwell wrote: post #336
int_19h wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The effect of the ban on women will be nearly nil, since the system was in place before apps existed. If there is any difference, it'll be positive, because the "guardians" won't bother setting the notifications up. And comparing this to FOSTA/SESTA doesn't make any sense. Those laws didn't ban something that is unambiguously evil - they banned a whole bunch of random stuff under the guise of targeting sex traffickin…

If the effect on women will be nearly nil, then does it all become a PR question? In that case, couldn't it be useful to keep the app if only to keep track of how many people this policy affects? I drew analogies to FOSTA because even FOSTA's intended effect (as stated) was negative . Yes, it actually made it a bit more difficult to do sex trafficking online (along with adversely affecting tons of other people). As a…

Because it matters for assigning responsibility. Same reason why we jail crime accomplices, even if they can prove that the crime would have happened if not for their participation.

What you propose is basically assisting in oppression on the basis that it would have been even worse otherwise. That is a recurring theme in apologetics, especially so in WW2. They don't sound at all convincing, and I'm not aware of anybody getting off the hook with such claims.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#339

Post by cerberusss »

sjwright wrote: post #280
ox_cable wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yupp, because so many apps are open source.

Apple isn’t stopping anyone from open-sourcing their apps.

That's an interesting argument you bring up here. Why aren't more people open-sourcing their apps? Especially with a client-server architecture, you can simply keep the server part closed. I'm an iOS developer, but there's usually not all that much of interest in the iOS client.

Re: Apple, Google criticised for Saudi Absher app that tracks women

#340

Post by rjf72 »

rjf72 wrote: post #131
pault wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy shit, I can't believe this is happening in the 21st century.

There's far more egregious things. For instance in Western Africa there remains massive child slavery. The reason this is relevant, as if it wasn't by itself, is that that slavery is then facilitated in bringing you your tasty chocolate treats from companies such as Nestle, Hersheys, Mars, and more. This has been going on for decades and has been brought to court multiple times - the companies always win with general…

In an ironic coincidence it seems that AP has now removed that article from their site with no notice or explanation. It is still available in Google's cache -- swap to text-only or disable scripts to avoid AP's script from killing it on load. This [1] seems to be the same article. That link is also available on archive.org [2] should it be the case that the articles are facing legal threats from the chocolate industry.

[1] - https://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/commentary/article/Chil...

[2] - https://web.archive.org/web/20190209104955/https://www.mysan...

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