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GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

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Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#111

Post by navigatesol »

PunchTornado wrote: post #45
tomohawk wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After ethnically cleansing, who is left / moves in? The perpetrators. I'm sure you will figure it out if you think about it a little more.

don't bother, they re pro russian trolls. a lot of comments here seem to accept russian annexation

>a lot of comments here seem to accept russian annexation

As with many situations occurring in nations where borders are arbitrarily drawn, the situation is more complex than you let on.

Everything is "fine" when there's a peaceful stasis between Ukraine and Russia, but with Ukraine cozy-ing up to NATO, Russia was left in a pinch: a) the have a huge Russian national population in the area now under control of a possibly hostile government, and b) they lose a huge piece of strategic geography, with the Crimea's access to the Black Sea. How should they have reacted?

Not every thing is so easily put into good guy/bad guy boxes.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#112

Post by kokonaci »

tomohawk wrote: post #34
antisemiotic wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By that logic USA should be blocked too, right?

Oh, yeah - forgot about Crimea/Russia shooting down MH17 airliner.

Have you forgot about USA bombing Serbia with uranium?

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#113

Post by celticmusic »

cdmckay wrote: post #98
AmericanChopper wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya know what was actually disgusting? The war in Iraq, or any other recent regime change the US executed. If economic warfare is the way it’s done now, then that’s great. Let the casualties be inconvenienced github users, rather than ya know, actual casualties...

You realize that sanctions also kill people through lack of supplies like medicine being available, people being unable to economically support themselves, and, if the sanctions cause the government to collapse, all the death that results from that. So let’s not pretend sanctions are somehow nonviolent.

and yet, that will be less than the war in iraq.

It's github. I would personally be inconvenienced, but not terribly so. I cannot imagine their life is going to crash in some meaningful way for not having access to github.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#114

Post by rjzzleep »

r3bl wrote: post #52
gtirloni wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, for a well-known project, they won't miss GitHub visibility benefits. They can host the git repository anywhere. Self-host an issue tracking system or find a non-US company that does that (and is not required to follow US sanctions due to trade agreements, that'll be hard). It's an annoyance, for sure.

The problem is that they'd require a payment method to rent the server somewhere else or to use a non-US company that doesn't offer a generous free plan. The most prominent payment providers (Visa, MasterCard, PayPal) are all US-based. > (and is not required to follow US sanctions due to trade agreements, that'll be hard). I really don't know much about sanctions against Syria and Crimea, but Iranian developers could…

Even before the US withdrew a lot of financial institutions wouldn't allow doing any kind of transactions with iran.

It's not like the sanctions were actually dropped even though they were supposed to. That was the whole point of the critiques of the JCPOA.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#115

Post by 24gttghh »

whataboutist wrote: post #64
tomohawk wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, yeah - forgot about Crimea/Russia shooting down MH17 airliner.

Did you also forget about the US shooting down Iran Air Flight 655?

So, you mean where the US at least kinda-sorta apologized and paid restitution? I hate the Regan years as much as the next person, but this is a false equivalence. I didn't see Russia/Donblast apologize after MH-17...

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#116

Post by saberience »

tomohawk wrote: post #23

Crimea: Illegal occupation by Russia. Ethnic cleansing. Syria: Using chemical weapons, sponsoring terrorism Iran: Assisting Syria; Actively developing nukes they say they will use, nuclear proliferation, biggest sponsor of terrorism, .... On the other hand, some people can't use an internet service. Oh! The inhumanity! Get a sense of proportion.

"biggest sponsor of terrorism" ???

Citation needed please because by any metric at all, the US is the world's biggest sponsor of terrorism. Where do you think the Taliban and Isis got their weapons? What about Contra? Learn your history.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#117

Post by celticmusic »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #71
dijit wrote: post #2

Same as Gitlab then[0]. US Sanctions should not affect internet services (so long as they are provided for free)[1], but political pressure appears to be very strong. Personally I find it quite abhorrent, and would cite this as a reason not to use US based companies in future. [0]: https://about.gitlab.com/2018/07/19/gcp-move-update/ [1]: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/...

> Personally I find it quite abhorrent, and would cite this as a reason not to use US based companies in future. Then I’d highly recommend that you try doing that. I consulted for a company once that tried this, and it was an absolute nightmare. Every single piece of technology they used was worse than second rate. Making comments on HN is really easy, backing them up with action, in this case, is not.

this is true for a lot things.

They're called keyboard warriors for a reason.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#118

Post by zelon88 »

wickerman wrote: post #36
dijit wrote: post #2

Same as Gitlab then[0]. US Sanctions should not affect internet services (so long as they are provided for free)[1], but political pressure appears to be very strong. Personally I find it quite abhorrent, and would cite this as a reason not to use US based companies in future. [0]: https://about.gitlab.com/2018/07/19/gcp-move-update/ [1]: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/...

The amount of harassment that citizens of any state that the US claims to hate at any given time endure on a daily basis is disgusting. Exiled iranians living outside of Iran for 20 years have got their bank accounts closed solely for being Iranian. I can't help but think that these internet services will be going that way in the future. The fact that the "free software" community is not putting their foot down for t…

While I believe in the GNU definition of free software, how are we to maintain a community that's truly open-source when the parties you speak of don't believe in free software themselves? Are we really to give them the best our world has to offer so they can use it to suppress people and act against their interests? Do we let them use our libraries and tools to make their world smaller for their citizens? Do we let them steal our code to change it to hurt others and then not reciprocate it back in? Do we let them take the best we have to offer with such obvious mal-intent?

If it were a difference of culture or opinion that's fine. But you're allowing rogue authoritarian states to use our technology while taking an adversarial stance to our primary purpose; the free transfer of knowledge and information. We don't need to accommodate that. They need to accommodate the freedom their people are entitled to.

Think about it. Which developers in North Korea or Iran are using Github? Answer: The ones the government lets use Github.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#119

Post by AmericanChopper »

cdmckay wrote: post #98
AmericanChopper wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ya know what was actually disgusting? The war in Iraq, or any other recent regime change the US executed. If economic warfare is the way it’s done now, then that’s great. Let the casualties be inconvenienced github users, rather than ya know, actual casualties...

You realize that sanctions also kill people through lack of supplies like medicine being available, people being unable to economically support themselves, and, if the sanctions cause the government to collapse, all the death that results from that. So let’s not pretend sanctions are somehow nonviolent.

These countries are run by some of the most violent and oppressive regimes in the world. Let’s not pretend that the US is responsible for the quality of life of the people living there.

These sanctions are entirely non-violent. The actual word you’re looking for is harmful. They’re designed to be harmful, economically. Responding to regimes like this with economic pressure is most certainly preferable to actual violent conflict. Which would be guaranteed to kill thousands of innocent civilians.

Given recent history, if you think electing to use non-violent methods to sanction these governments is disgusting, then I really don’t think there’s anything I could say to you.

If the regime in Iran falls. It won’t be because of US sanctions. It will be because that country has been operated by a brutal dictator for decades, and the Iranian people grew tired of being the enemy of their own government.

Re: GitHub confirms it has blocked developers in Iran, Syria and Crimea

#120

Post by swiley »

tallanvor wrote: post #105
majia wrote: post #26

If Crimea was unwillingly annexed by Russia, then the sanction is punishing the victim instead of the criminal. If Crimea people genuinely supported the unification with Russia and received sanction for that, then it is a blatant attack on Crimean people's freedom.

The idea is to try and make it unsustainable for Russia to hold. --They have to pour money into the region to keep control of it due to people in the region being unhappy, out of work, etc. I'm not saying it's necessarily a good strategy, mind you.

That’s horrible. I was unaware of this until now and I’m deeply upset by it. :(
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