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“My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

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Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#351

Post by acqq »

riku_iki wrote: post #339
jwieczorek wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's hardly any military work that would involve using code from GitHub in Crimea. All the R&D is done in mainland Russia. This targets common people who use GitHub for their pet projects or just regular work. In general, this thread demonstrates that here there's very little understanding about the mass psychology of Russians, and, really, any nation other than Americans. No one in Crimea is going to rebel agains…

> There's hardly any military work that would involve using code from GitHub in Crimea. All the R&D is done in mainland Russia. This targets common people who use GitHub for their pet projects or just regular work. I disagree with you, Russia has clear intent to move/restore navy projects in Crimea: https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/russian-navy-resu... US government doesn't specifically target github, but a…

> US government doesn't specifically target github, but all commercial activities in Crimea.

And the only "commercial activity" in this case is if GitHub earns some advertising money from the data collection about its user from Crimea.

> The goal of sanctions is to weaken Russia's economy in specific sectors.

And Crimea is not Russia. It's a region which voted to separate itself from the bigger state, just like Kosovo, votes of which were even militarily supported by the U.S. And if the U.S. equates Crimea with Russia... it's as wrong as equating Kosovo with Albania.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#352

Post by kragen »

wil421 wrote: post #273
jMyles wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Their Github Pages page was censored. They are unable to participate in the maintenance of an open source repository. This was done, according to Github, as a requirement to comply with the laws of its state. If that's not a free speech issue, there are no free speech issues.

Free speech applies to the US. Last time I checked Crimea was in Russia. US companies have to follow US law. I worked for a company that was fined because they still had employees working in Syria when the war started.

There has always been a certain breed of authoritarian in the US for whom freedom of speech is nothing more than an inconvenient law they might have to respect under some circumstances, but we wrote a legal guarantee of freedom of speech into the European Convention in Human Rights, the US Constitution, the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Baron Humboldt's principles of academic freedom in darkest Prussia, England's Bill of Rights, and the less explicit but still inviolate guarantees of the Republics of Rome and Athens; and of course the reason was not simply to annoy such authoritarians—however delightful that may be. Indeed, in cases such as Humboldt's, that annoyance was a cost to be borne, if not a positive menace.

Rather, it is because there is no sort of tyranny or abuse that is not aided by lies, and indeed usually dependent on them. And, although free speech permits the diffusion of lies just as it permits the diffusion of truth, the liar fears the freedom of the truth-teller far more than the truth-teller fears that of the liar; because the truth can be proved, while the lie cannot. This is why censorship in the USSR was so pervasive and costly: it had to be profound to sustain the profound tyranny of the Soviet system.

As Gorgias points out, a man who can persuade you to believe lies can enslave you and turn you against your closest allies. So freedom of speech, the freedom to demonstrate the falsity of a lie however powerful and popular the liar, is the freedom that underlies the effective enjoyment of any other possible freedom. We must be vigilant against whatever stands in the way of our freedom to be informed, whether the US, Microsoft, Putin, or merely popular opinion.

And if what stands in our way purports to be a law, that law is an immoral, illegitimate law, a law in name only, a law serving not the ends of honest citizens but if tyrants—the end of destroying justice and Law itself. Such a “law” must be utterly destroyed.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#353

Post by Kalium »

asveikau wrote: post #39
wongarsu wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Github is essentially a public library for computer code, but they happen to make money. I'm not sure I can see the difference between publishing and "doing business" in this case.

I don't know either, and I am no expert, but it sounds like Github/Microsoft lawyers may have decided it on one side or the other. I put it in quotation marks because it is my laymen's understanding of what the sanctions are intended to cover. I could be wrong and the actual boundaries could be subject to debate and disagreement.

> I don't know either, and I am no expert, but it sounds like Github/Microsoft lawyers may have decided it on one side or the other.

I think they've realized that the argument that they are a commercial publisher is quite strong. Thus they are not eager to challenge it and wind up heavily fined for sactions-busting. Especially since Microsoft is a significant supplier to US government entities.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#354

Post by jwieczorek »

Sommer_Son wrote: post #338
jwieczorek wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please, let's look at the facts. Here we have a case where the population of the territory in question would in no way describe this state of affairs as an occupation . They did vote in favour of Crimea becoming part of Russia and the international objections have to do with legal concerns, not the well-being of the population (with, at most, an exception of some Crimean Tatars, but they're a small minority). So, the…

Yes, let's look at the facts. Russia invaded Ukraine, broke into Crimean parliament and held illegal referendum _after_ that. So, sanctions were not because of the referendum, but because of invasion.

Sure, and falsified all the votes? The Crimean parliament proclaimed sovereignty against their will and so was the Ukrainian navy chief forced to switch allegiance?

When it comes to the reasons behind sanctions, there's no need to correct me, because I wrote just that: that the international reactions were a response to, in the words of the sanctioning countries, international law being violated (as if that had not happened before, see the Kosovo case), and namely the principle of territorial integrity. All I'm saying is that sanctions targetting the people who expressed their will in the referendum are counter-productive. If there were people left in Crimea, who still haven't made their mind up whose umbrella Crimea would be best off under (though comparing the mayhem state Crimea was left in after the Ukrainian rule and the investments going on there since 2014 – I doubt there are many), then acts like this will surely make them anti-American, not anti-Kremlin. This was my point.

The legality of the Crimean referendum might be an interesting question for lawyers or political scientists (especially the double standards observed in the rhetoric of the US and its satellite states). Or for us, not living there. For the people who voted in the referendum and have seen their lives improve as a result of their vote – it just doesn't matter. And that's the reality some should accept, while rejecting it leads to sloppy analysis of issues like the one discussed in this very post.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#355

Post by riku_iki »

acqq wrote: post #351
riku_iki wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's hardly any military work that would involve using code from GitHub in Crimea. All the R&D is done in mainland Russia. This targets common people who use GitHub for their pet projects or just regular work. I disagree with you, Russia has clear intent to move/restore navy projects in Crimea: https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/russian-navy-resu... US government doesn't specifically target github, but a…

> US government doesn't specifically target github, but all commercial activities in Crimea. And the only "commercial activity" in this case is if GitHub earns some advertising money from the data collection about its user from Crimea. > The goal of sanctions is to weaken Russia's economy in specific sectors. And Crimea is not Russia. It's a region which voted to separate itself from the bigger state, just like Kosov…

> And the only "commercial activity" in this case is if GitHub earns some advertising money from the data collection about its user from Crimea.

And Crimea users can use github as a tool in their commercial endeavors, and military and government applications.

> just like Kosovo, votes of which were even militarily supported by the U.S.

You make things up, Kosovo voted 10 years after US operation, when was under observation of UN peacekeepers which were located there by UN security council resolution (Russia voted for that too).

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#356

Post by Kalium »

dngray wrote: post #26

I'm from a US-friendly nation but I get terribly sad when I hear things like this. Contribution to the free software world should transcend where someone is from whether it be China, Russia, Iran or whatever new "enemy" our leaders decide. As much as I dislike Facebook for privacy related reasons, maybe it's time that more tech companies setup a Tor Hidden Service and not ask where people are from. Could this be used…

> Could this be used to protect them against having to implement sanctions against various countries if they don't actually know where their users are from?

No. That you don't know where an export-restricted good is going when you sell it or give it to someone is not an excuse. If you gave them the stuff and they take it somewhere embargoed, it's still on you for supplying the goods.

I will bet good money that a court will not be impressed by your deliberate choices to avoid being capable of meeting your obligations under the law. That's the sort of clever hack that makes judges quite angry, rather than the sort that makes them go "You got us!".

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#357

Post by acqq »

riku_iki wrote: post #355
acqq wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> US government doesn't specifically target github, but all commercial activities in Crimea. And the only "commercial activity" in this case is if GitHub earns some advertising money from the data collection about its user from Crimea. > The goal of sanctions is to weaken Russia's economy in specific sectors. And Crimea is not Russia. It's a region which voted to separate itself from the bigger state, just like Kosov…

> And the only "commercial activity" in this case is if GitHub earns some advertising money from the data collection about its user from Crimea. And Crimea users can use github as a tool in their commercial endeavors, and military and government applications. > just like Kosovo, votes of which were even militarily supported by the U.S. You make things up, Kosovo voted 10 years after US operation, when was under obser…

> Kosovo voted 10 years after US operation

At the moment of the US "operation" (honestly, war) those who had direct military support were some paramilitary troops attempting to escalate the conflict to the level to be taken seriously (specifically by the US) with the agenda of changing the established existing borders.

The war itself was against all UN decisions, it was unilaterally started by the US and NATO. The US fought for the right to enter Kosovo (and make its military bases there) and it won that as the result of its war, not from the UN.

The country from which those on Kosovo voted "out" was already economically destroyed by the actions of the U.S. -- the equivalent would be if Russia managed to not only control Crimea for a decade but also economically destroy Ukraine for two decades and then let the people vote if they want to stay in such Ukraine.

What do I "make up"? And how is that "better" from inhabitants of Crimea wanting to separate from Ukraine, where the political regime just illegally changed before that, exactly in the direction of suppressing politically all ethnic Russians in Ukraine? The inhabitants in Crimea and other parts of Ukraine could surely point to Kosovo as a precedent which gives them right to separate (and even get the military support for that). And contrary to the US in Kosovo, Russia already had a big military base on Crimea.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#358

Post by Fins »

microcolonel wrote: post #82
rcfox wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI: It's just "Ukraine", not "the Ukraine". "The Ukraine" referred to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic in the Soviet Union.

Would've been nice if we called it Ukrainia in English from then on. It would make sense with the conventions for transliterating cyrillic country names.

How so? There's no "ia" there.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#359

Post by riku_iki »

acqq wrote: post #357
riku_iki wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the only "commercial activity" in this case is if GitHub earns some advertising money from the data collection about its user from Crimea. And Crimea users can use github as a tool in their commercial endeavors, and military and government applications. > just like Kosovo, votes of which were even militarily supported by the U.S. You make things up, Kosovo voted 10 years after US operation, when was under obser…

> Kosovo voted 10 years after US operation At the moment of the US "operation" (honestly, war) those who had direct military support were some paramilitary troops attempting to escalate the conflict to the level to be taken seriously (specifically by the US) with the agenda of changing the established existing borders. The war itself was against all UN decisions, it was unilaterally started by the US and NATO. The US…

> how is that "better"

The facts are:

- US had 0 intention to join Kosovo as 51th state, and election were performed under observation of UN peacekeepers which were there per UN resolution

- Russia invaded Crimea using regular army, and within two weeks merged territory in violation of UN statute

> where the political regime just illegally changed before that, exactly in the direction of suppressing politically all ethnic Russians in Ukraine

I disagree with your assessment. Ukraine is a mess, old pro-Russia president and his party illegally changed constitution, which caused chain of events.

Re: “My GitHub account has been restricted due to US sanctions as I live in Crimea”

#360

Post by smsm42 »

pyrale wrote: post #210
smsm42 wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You confuse trade war with censorship. I'll explain the difference. Censorship is based on content: if you can say "long live Communist Party" but can't say "long live Republican Party", that's censorship. Trade war is based on origin: if you are not allowed to do trade (business) or provide services to residents of certain place, regardless of the content or purpose, that's embargo. > If that's not a free speech iss…

> Censorship is based on content: if you can say "long live Communist Party" but can't say "long live Republican Party", that's censorship. Using that definition, censoring all publications of a given group (say, black people) would not be censorship. That's a big hole in the definition.

> Using that definition, censoring all publications of a given group (say, black people) would not be censorship

It's not censorship, it's discrimination. Bad thing, but different. If it was censored because these people write about specific racial issues, it'd be censorship. If it's blanket denial regardless of the content, it's racial discrimination, not censorship. It doesn't mean it's not bad - one could argue it's even worse since it doesn't leave you any chance - you could probably talk in another way to route around censorship but you can't stop being black - but it's not that issue, it's a different one.

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