Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

iphoneincanada.ca

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

451–460 of 634 posts

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#451

Post by solaceb »

wbl wrote: post #441
thatjamesdude wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whilst I agree with the specifics here, the problem is the general case. I don't agree that you should be allowed to post people's private, identifying data to a public forum without consent. This HAS to apply equally, because the idea that there is a universal set of right and wrong is incredibly naive. A better argument here is how the laws aren't applied equally. TrueCaller was used by the Chinese to harass and at…

When I was a kid the phone book came every year. It had the telephone numbers and addresses of just about everyone.

The specific issue here is that the shared information is targeted at a specific group and seems likely to be used with dangerous intent

That doesn't characterize a general record of numbers/addresses, which more or less ensures some basic anonymity as connecting names to numbers doesn't do much outside some other qualifier, like, these people are the police who are suppressing our cause

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#452

Post by hexbinencoded »

Don't use corporate apps and platforms for popular movements. They make the rules and they continue their inverted totalitarian takeover of public commons when more people depend on them for civic activities. Furthermore, they cooperate with intelligence services. It's too big of a risk to depend on them.

And, they used craptacular Telegram instead of Signal. Dumb.

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#453

Post by threatofrain »

croissants wrote: post #367
zepto wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you planning to dox Apple employees? That seems like the logical conclusion if you think they have blood on their hands. It seems like a little much to call Apple an ‘enabler’ for being against doxing. Just because protesters use a tactic doesn’t mean everyone needs to support it, especially if it is a tacit call to violence.

Is the argument you're making "if you see someone doing something bad, you should not only call it out as such, but also be willing to do something bad to stop it"? That doesn't make sense to me unless there's really no other option to prevent a much greater evil. I think we're still at the point in this story where normal consumer and media pressure can be effective.

Normal consumer pressure can get out of the way of a nations internal affairs and nothing much else. The number one remedy people are asking of Apple is to back off and be more laissez faire.

I, too, can cheer on HK, whatever that means...

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#454

Post by rpdillon »

tzs wrote: post #381
nickpp wrote: post #209

So it was fine when Apple banned Infowars but now it’s different? This is exactly what those free speech advocates meant when talking about slippery slopes: you either support free speech or censure. There is no middle ground. Disclaimer: I think Infowars is pure, evil sh*t.

So let's say I'm a book seller, offering books on a variety of topics. Some particular country does not allow books promoting religions other than their official religion. What am I supposed to do? Refuse to sell books on pet care or calculus or gardening in that country because I can't sell books about Druidism?

Not at all! Just let folks shop at different bookstores.

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#455

Post by Klinky »

dantheman wrote: post #432
Klinky wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Odd how the markets optimize for colluding with dictators and human-rights violating regimes. Such prosperity they bring the world.

Odd how every non market alternative is normally one of those human right violating machines and actively collaborates with them -- far more than those in markets do.

Who is the largest trading partner of the US? China. Also the market is global these days, it is very hard to isolate oneself, without strong policies and market regulation. The market alone is not ushering in new eras of freedom, it's feeding the beasts, and no one really puts their money where their mouth is.

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#456

Post by 29083011397778 »

birdyrooster wrote: post #448
wbl wrote: post #441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was a kid the phone book came every year. It had the telephone numbers and addresses of just about everyone.

I’m pretty sure people were consenting to have their number listed there in their agreement with their Telco.

You actually had to pay for an unlisted number, IIRC

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#457

Post by ethbr0 »

thatjamesdude wrote: post #380
tripzilch wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So what do you do if you are Apple? Nothing because Apple has ZERO, no place meddling in this business. Just hear yourself, "it's against the TOS" versus people on the streets trying to save their own country from a stolen election and a dictator?? OF COURSE the TOS of a tech company is completely irrelevant in this situation. TOS aren't even laws, they were just created by a profit driven corporation for legal pro…

Whilst I agree with the specifics here, the problem is the general case. I don't agree that you should be allowed to post people's private, identifying data to a public forum without consent. This HAS to apply equally, because the idea that there is a universal set of right and wrong is incredibly naive. A better argument here is how the laws aren't applied equally. TrueCaller was used by the Chinese to harass and at…

> I don't agree that you should be allowed to post people's private, identifying data to a public forum without consent.

The problem with that belief is enforcement.

Because illegal numbers [0] are trivially shared, the only viable enforcement to prevent their sharing must have incredibly broad reach.

This ultimately collapses down into "users cannot be allowed to own and operate their own general purpose computer."

And while I'm open to arguments as to why the above is a straw man (I disagree), if you believe the above enforcement scheme is for the greater good then we have very different ideas about individual freedom and the relative value thereof.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegal_number

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#458

Post by Anon1096 »

DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #6

Through what right or means can Apple demand this, though? Telegram is a platform for user-generated content and it seems odd for Apple to single-out those 3 channels/groups specifically - what about the hundreds of thousands of other objectionable groups on Telegram? And why Telegram in particular? Why doesn't Apple give the same ultimatum to Facebook to pressure them to block access to militant ethnonationalist gro…

With this kind of policy Apple's hypocrisy really shines bright. An app like Reddit is allowed, meanwhile Telegram not only has to not show porn channels to users, but now has to ban content from the whole platform or be removed from the App Store. On Reddit, there by far more porn accessible to users, and probably more "incitement of violence" too. There's no way to support Apple here. Just another example of the tyranny of the App Store.

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#459

Post by RangerScience »

thatjamesdude wrote: post #380
tripzilch wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So what do you do if you are Apple? Nothing because Apple has ZERO, no place meddling in this business. Just hear yourself, "it's against the TOS" versus people on the streets trying to save their own country from a stolen election and a dictator?? OF COURSE the TOS of a tech company is completely irrelevant in this situation. TOS aren't even laws, they were just created by a profit driven corporation for legal pro…

Whilst I agree with the specifics here, the problem is the general case. I don't agree that you should be allowed to post people's private, identifying data to a public forum without consent. This HAS to apply equally, because the idea that there is a universal set of right and wrong is incredibly naive. A better argument here is how the laws aren't applied equally. TrueCaller was used by the Chinese to harass and at…

> This HAS to apply equally

No, it really doesn't. IMO it has to apply consistently. And it's easy to maintain cohesion / consistency here: If you have different rights, you get different rights.

Police have additional rights, particularly when acting in the course of their jobs - specifically, they have the right of violence. Seems reasonable to give up the "right" of protection-from-griefing.

Re: Apple tells Telegram to take down protestor channels in Belarus

#460

Post by arielm »

Interesting to note - downloads from the App Store are much lower than from Google Play.

In belarus it’s about 3 to 1. Globally it’s about 10 to 1.

This isn’t to say any of this is good, but I wonder if Telegram can behave differently by platform (ex. A blacklist of channels on iOS).

Post reply on HN