You mean to imply that a business would just lie to customers? Come on, the market wouldn't permit that to happen! They'd lose all their customers! /s Edit: on a less sarcastic note, I'd be less critical of Zoom if their software were open source.
From a business model perspective, if Zoom embraced open-source, what would be their moat/value-add, compared to users downloading/forking from GitHub? Not being snarky: I'm genuinely curious what the "good citizen" (but still profitable) OS/FOSS model would look like, whether at equivalent revenue or reduced revenue.
The only "relevant" information found in the quote in the GP comment is the nationality of the CEO. How does one jump from the CEO's nationality to inevitable ties and implicit subservience to CCP?
Didn't Zoom block a US based activist on the request of the Chinese government? I'm not arguing that there is complete subservience to the CCP but this censorship seems like a line was crossed. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/11/technology/zoom-china-tia... Edit: Let me also state that I'm not entirely sure what OP's argument was, considering the comment was deleted. I'm merely stating that there seems to be some coo…
I'm aware of Zoom's track record, and it could certainly be scrutinized, criticized, or even boycotted.
What we have here is going from "CEO was born and raised in China" to "No wonder why they have to play party with CCP" and "inevitable ties and implicit subservience to the CCP". I can't see the logical connection in the absence of other information. Don't you see a problem with assuming someone's motives purely from their country of origin?
I find this story arch with Zoom amusing: 1. Pre-COVID Zoom claims it has E2E encryption for everyone. 2. During COVID Zoom grows in popularity, which prompts journalists to learn that the claims that Zoom has E2E encryption are inaccurate. 3. Zoom admits that it never had true E2E encryption, but announces they will develop it and it will only be available for paying customers. 4. Zoom gets another wave of criticism…
Another way of looking at it is that Zoom is learning from its mistakes and making improvements that the market demands. I'm no Zoom fan (I'd even use BlueJeans first), but people on HN are always so eager to crucify a company for its past. If it made mistakes, get out the tar and feathers! If it doesn't fix those mistakes, get out more tar and feathers! If it fixes the mistakes, even more tar and feathers!
This is not right. As a responsible company, they should know better. Regarding China, they have always been sidestepping the main question. They knew from the start that CCP will be intercepting calls. As an american company, this is a blatant disregard for people's trust. and its not an american thing to do. If you had friends or family who are routinely subdued in China, you will know what I am saying.
You forgot "5. Zoom gets praised for developing features in response to criticism that already existed in other products that work better." Jokes aside, with Zoom's track record, it's not worth using anymore regardless of what features they implement. Not having E2E encryption is no where near as much of a red flag as lying about it is to me.
Just curious - what other product that works better do you recommend? Webex, Skype, Hangouts/Meet, Teams all pale in comparison when it comes to quality and ease-of-use.
The only "relevant" information found in the quote in the GP comment is the nationality of the CEO. How does one jump from the CEO's nationality to inevitable ties and implicit subservience to CCP?
ignoring the quote for a second we know a few things about this CEO and zoom. 1. zoom's application is sending data to Chinese servers separate from the application functionality servers. 2. the CEO is from china, I'm going to assume he has relatives in china. 3. we know CCP is a completely fucked up government with an absolutely horrible history of civil rights violations, genocide, etc. I wouldn't put it past CCP t…
Yeah - I'm pretty sure this is the real concern and verifying a phone number is reasonable trade-off. I know this argument is often quickly dismissed on HN since people see child abuse or 'going dark' as an easy excuse for the government to leverage to get more control (and it has been used for this), but that doesn't mean the problem isn't serious or doesn't exist. See this: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/…
Indeed, E2EE will enable criminals to go undetected. And this is a real problem. However, it’s an arms race that will end with criminals having proper, strong E2EE anyways. Trying to reverse this is like trying to reverse entropy, the toothpaste does not go back into the tube. It may seem like it is still doable now , but I’d be willing to place bets that feeling will evaporate shortly. Of course, criminals are ordin…
> Indeed, E2EE will enable criminals to go undetected. And this is a real problem.
This is not the problem. The argument is hollow.
People need to take child protection laws out of political discourse, as it's now approaching silly.
Lying about a feature is exactly what Silicon Valley's "fake it till you make it" culture encourages. Crucifying Zoom over this while letting virtually every other company in the space (inc. Hangout/Meet and MS Teams/Skype) go free seems quite hypocritical from an HN community that's comprised of many startupers and startup wannabees who spend their professional lives working for entities with similar practices.
Because security can jeopardize lives, it isn't acceptable to lie about as a feature.
I find this story arch with Zoom amusing: 1. Pre-COVID Zoom claims it has E2E encryption for everyone. 2. During COVID Zoom grows in popularity, which prompts journalists to learn that the claims that Zoom has E2E encryption are inaccurate. 3. Zoom admits that it never had true E2E encryption, but announces they will develop it and it will only be available for paying customers. 4. Zoom gets another wave of criticism…
Another way of looking at it is that Zoom is learning from its mistakes and making improvements that the market demands. I'm no Zoom fan (I'd even use BlueJeans first), but people on HN are always so eager to crucify a company for its past. If it made mistakes, get out the tar and feathers! If it doesn't fix those mistakes, get out more tar and feathers! If it fixes the mistakes, even more tar and feathers!
There's no reason to think they'll change their ways anytime soon. Every time they're caught lying or doing something shady they use some bullshit explanation and 'fix' the issue only insofar it stops journalists from writing articles, but doesn't fix the underlying problems.