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Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

reuters.com

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Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#111

Post by ageek123 »

andrepd wrote: post #102

It amazes me still how much power in our "democratic" system is help completely outside of the control of the public. How some people, by virtue of owning capital, are vested with such powers that can make or break the lives of millions. Theirs are the decisions that can kill thousands or cause suffering to millions. Democracy is not a boolean. It's a continuum. To me, it means "power held by the people whom it conce…

Huh? If the government wanted to ban facial recognition, they could do it. Our democratic system absolutely has the power to ban it. It hasn't been done, presumably because there isn't a public consensus that it should be banned.

If you're arguing for public ownership of companies, that's literally communism -- so not "democratic." But we don't need communism to regulate facial recognition.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#112

Post by mindgam3 »

One of the things that blows my mind about the current tech landscape is that Microsoft now appears to occupy the moral high ground with its stance calling for regulation on facial recognition.

I grew up with a profound distaste for Microsoft's anti-competitive business culture under Gates. But now I have to give credit where it's due. Even Apple, which has come out with strong statements on privacy, is lagging behind MSFT in this area as far as I can tell.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#113

Post by dragonwriter »

cge wrote: post #89
richthegeek wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SE are not working class. At best they are at the top end of the middle range, and generally above 100k is considered 'upper middle'.

The idea of SE as working class is from categorization based on labor relations, not on income. In a Marxist-theoretic framework, for example, SE are clearly working class.

Software engineers quite often have and derive substantial income from capital holdings; when they do they are, in a Marxist framework, of the petit bourgeoisie (the middle clsss between working class [proletariat] and major capitalists [haut bourgeiosie].)

But, yes, some software engineers are working class, as well, the profession largely being split between the proletarian intelligentsia and petit bourgeois intelligentsia.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#114

Post by eternalban »

andrepd wrote: post #102

It amazes me still how much power in our "democratic" system is help completely outside of the control of the public. How some people, by virtue of owning capital, are vested with such powers that can make or break the lives of millions. Theirs are the decisions that can kill thousands or cause suffering to millions. Democracy is not a boolean. It's a continuum. To me, it means "power held by the people whom it conce…

A Brief History of Neoliberalism, 2005:

http://rebels-library.org/files/d3Thompson-1.pdf

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#115

Post by lotsofpulp »

munk-a wrote: post #60
xfitm3 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surprisingly difficult. Winding down from Amazon personally has taken months, but thats futile. At work I spend 8 figures a year on AWS.

AWS definitely has competitors you can switch to pretty easily, I think Amazon's retail side is the harder portion to jettison.

The retail side is very easy to jettison. Most of the goods can be found at target, Walmart, Best Buy, Costco, or Newegg. At least it was for me.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#116

Post by ma2rten »

ageek123 wrote: post #111
andrepd wrote: post #102

It amazes me still how much power in our "democratic" system is help completely outside of the control of the public. How some people, by virtue of owning capital, are vested with such powers that can make or break the lives of millions. Theirs are the decisions that can kill thousands or cause suffering to millions. Democracy is not a boolean. It's a continuum. To me, it means "power held by the people whom it conce…

Huh? If the government wanted to ban facial recognition, they could do it. Our democratic system absolutely has the power to ban it. It hasn't been done, presumably because there isn't a public consensus that it should be banned. If you're arguing for public ownership of companies, that's literally communism -- so not "democratic." But we don't need communism to regulate facial recognition.

If you hadn't replied first, I would have replied the exact same thing as your first paragraph - also starting with "Huh?".

That said, public ownership of companies is not necessarily undemocratic. It's just a bad idea for different reasons. USPS would be an example in the US of publicly owned company.

I believe that Marx even originally intended communism to be democratic. The regime in the USSR was supposed to be transitory.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#117

Post by torstenvl »

ShroudedNight wrote: post #99
matz1 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends on your mortality. I see it morally right to use it on my enemy.

How does one use them on one's enemy without also using them against the long-term population in their affected area?

By ensuring that they have an automatic deactivation.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-landmines/u-s-halts-u...

"While retaining stockpiles, the United States has not used persistent mines for some time. The last field of persistent mines under U.S. control was in Guantanamo, Cuba, and was removed in 1999, the State Department official said."

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#118

Post by solveit »

roenxi wrote: post #93
mc32 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Public corporations, private corporations, state-owned, party-controlled corporations. It doesn’t matter. At least public corporations are known to bow to pressure. I think ownership is irrelevant. What matters is lawfulness and what remains lawful after pressure or indifference from the constituencies. Hand in hand with this is the rule of law. Some countries on paper have great liberties and rights for their people…

> What matters is lawfulness and what remains lawful To expand on that idea - if something is both lawful and profitable, you have to have an almost absolute consensus amongst the people capable of doing it that it should not be done. Otherwise, potentially even if 1 person thinks it is fine, then they will be the one to do it. Typically this is the main strength of the economic system - jobs that people don't want t…

> if something is both lawful and profitable, you have to have an almost absolute consensus amongst the people capable of doing it that it should not be done.

Sure, but you just need a weak consensus amongst everyone that it should not be done to make it unlawful.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#119

Post by snorrah »

dv_dt wrote: post #44
godzillabrennus wrote: post #3

Love that the article says people can use the AWS support system to report issues with the technology. That's a black hole of no return if you are a paying customer much less someone random off the internet.

Can one report an AWS issue from a TSA inspection room?

No, you can call your lawyer instead.

Re: Amazon shareholders reject facial recognition ban

#120

Post by vonmoltke »

itslennysfault wrote: post #98
mc32 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Public corporations, private corporations, state-owned, party-controlled corporations. It doesn’t matter. At least public corporations are known to bow to pressure. I think ownership is irrelevant. What matters is lawfulness and what remains lawful after pressure or indifference from the constituencies. Hand in hand with this is the rule of law. Some countries on paper have great liberties and rights for their people…

There are B-Corps (benefit corp) in many states that have charters that include bylaws that are as important or at least equally as important as profitability. IMO all health providers should have to be B-Corps that have patient health as their #1 above profit.

"B-Corp" is a certification[1]. It has no force of law anywhere. It has nothing to do with a benefit corporation[2], which does.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/B_Corporation_(certification...

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benefit_corporation

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