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On Resigning from Google

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Re: On Resigning from Google

#161

Post by neplus »

ditonal wrote: post #132
neplus wrote: post #74

This reads like a moral screed. That's fine. They're entitled to their own views, to voice those views internally, and if they aren't adopted to leave the company and write a polemic. Ultimately, two thirds of their complaints involve taking a position counter to the stated national interest of the United States. Sure, maybe they believe that national interest is wrong, morally objectionable, or whatever, but the inf…

First of all Google affects a lot more than just the USA and while HQed in the USA is in many ways an international company. Secondly, even if you take a US centric view of things, just because someone at the Pentagon claims something is the US best interests doesn't mean it is. People say, "oh we need these dangerous AI based weapons or other countries will win an arms race". Arms races benefit military contractors…

Your default perspective appears to be that U.S. domestic and national security policy is the sole remit of unelected authority figures (e.g. "...just because someone at the Pentagon claims something is the US best interests doesn't mean it is.").

U.S. domestic and national security policy is certainly refined by unelected folks within various departments and agencies, but the overarching direction comes via elected representatives selected by the people.

Senator Warren and Senator Sanders - if elected president - would likely make the contracts in question (related to oil/gas and AI in the military) obsolete. If the American people feel aligned with their views on these issues - among others - and elect them and folks like them to the house and senate then you'll see a fundamentally different set of domestic and foreign policy objectives.

> However, your position that since they're the authority figures, anybody who questions them is not an "adult", strikes me as extremely asinine and highly dangerous.

Thanks very much.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#163

Post by shadowgovt »

philwelch wrote: post #147
shadowgovt wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That depends on what one wants to do with one's labor. They'll certainly compensate you well, and they have flexible hours and treat software engineers and SREs like royalty. But Googlers who joined up 10 years ago really didn't have to also ask the question of whether their work was directly benefiting military AI projects (or merely providing an agnostic service that everyone was using; search is certainly somethin…

It's also a moderately different can of worms to work on projects like breaking enemy encryption during a war (Turing), building and programming more and more powerful computers to help design nuclear weapons (von Neumann), developing a network protocol for DARPA's national computer network (Cerf and Kahn), building microchips for bombers and missiles (Fairchild Semiconductor), and it goes on from there. Clearly, opt…

I agree. Especially when the nation that would use the drone technology has demonstrated a willingness to use said technology for reckless assassination of other country's citizens without declaration of war.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#165

Post by kinkrtyavimoodh »

hnewsshadowbans wrote: post #146
JimboOmega wrote: post #21

The post talks about Google supposedly persecuting LGBTQ employees for speaking up. But the linked articles only talk about them (possibly) getting retaliated against for protesting other issues, like border security or sexual harassment. As an LGBT person (who does her fair share of activism), I'm not clear what the LGBTQ angle is here other than if the people involved happened to be LGBTQ. It seems like even if the…

The angle is virtue signaling and potstirring. Its low hanging fruit to earn plaudits and make it seem like you're doing something. In reality like you said there is nothing to indicate the employees were fired for being gay or trans or whatever. The later reference to 'concentration camps' drives home the kind of person this guy is. Gay and trans people should be disgusted this person is using them in such a dishone…

That is the unfortunate reality of a lot of activism today. I wonder if this behavior only serves to cause general resentment in the community against LGBTQ folks because the biggest loudmouths drag down the discourse.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#168

Post by shadowgovt »

Supermancho wrote: post #157
vharuck wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is like saying the President of the United States has no effect on the country because the person in office is replaced within the span of a day every four or eight years.

> the President of the United States has no effect on the country Thats not remotely analogous as the point is about the effects of the magical disappearance of google on humanity. Your analogy wouldnt be how the disappearance of a PotUS would not cripple the US, as that contradicts your view...which I have difficulty grasping.

The sudden disappearance of the POTUS is backstopped immediately by the existence of a Vice President.

The sudden disappearance of Gmail would be significantly more catastrophic to communication online (though it would certainly be sorted out in a short amount of time as people sneaker-netted new communication addresses out and re-established the broken lines of communication).

Re: On Resigning from Google

#169

Post by rmah »

pcj-github wrote: post #122

My anecdotal observation is that Google is currently experiencing a (slight) brain drain... Many highly qualified and experienced engineers have recently left. I wonder how many 1x engineers it is going to take to maintain all that software when the 100x and 10x engineers are gone. Not a simple math problem.

Maybe it's just me, but I have doubts that 10x or 100x engineers are leaving google because of the reasons outlined in the post.

Re: On Resigning from Google

#170

Post by ci5er »

cbanek wrote: post #97
ardit33 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about google, and can't say about direct experience, but almost every tech company I have worked, LGBTQ people were treated well, and in no way discriminated against, or at least in a visible way at least.... even amazon, was pretty equal about minorities and LGBTQ folks as they treated everyone equally crap....

> LGBTQ people were treated well, and in no way discriminated against, or at least in a visible way at least.... As a minority LGBTQ person, let me say it's almost never in a visible way, but trust me, it is there. It's usually called something different, or dressed up as something else, just like how it is treated in political discourse. The fact that it's not obvious only makes it worse and more unnerving for the g…

As a sometimes engineering manager (I generally prefer to be a staffy, you know, doing analyst functions for the CEO, etc.), this is interesting to me. Can you give me any ideas on what I should be on the look-out for, in terms of behavior, among the team-mates?

I "get" that it's not visible (sort of), but I don't get how to be on guard for it, prevent it or deal with it if we can't see it. How does a manager see the signs of it, somehow, well enough, to deal with it?

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