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Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

reuters.com

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Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#621

Post by lostmsu »

anticodon wrote: post #619
lostmsu wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It all already happened in ... Georgia Hm, let's see Russia: https://tradingeconomics.com/russia/gdp Georgia: https://tradingeconomics.com/georgia/gdp

What it should prove? Where exactly should I look? Well, it's kind of obvious, that Georgia is poverty-stricken country. It's possible to visit Georgia for anyone. Millions of tourists from Russia visits Georgia every year. We can see that there's extreme poverty in Georgia everywhere. Unemployment, energy shortage, lack of future perspectives. These problems will get only worse due to COVID-19 and global energy cris…

You can simply click Compare, then pick the other country.

> Unemployment, energy shortage, lack of future perspectives.

Have you been in Russia outside of >500k cities? Even Tver, one of the oldest and most famous, is going precisely nowhere.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#622

Post by lostmsu »

mrtksn wrote: post #614
lostmsu wrote: post #602

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The app is up. Have you ever heard about a butterfly effect? And this is not even a butterfly's wing flap.

That’s something that the public would do. It’s not up to the corporations. Govt says take that down, the company takes it down, public outrage ensues, govt takes a step back, the company brings it back. The good thing about governments is that you actually pick the management. Even in not so democratic places it is common and acceptable to take down poor managers through any means. With companies, you only can hope…

> That’s something that the public would do. It’s not up to the corporations.

Corporations consist of people.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#623

Post by a1369209993 »

tablespoon wrote: post #536
whimsicalism wrote: post #514

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is a good exemplification of the "freedom as non-interference" view that Pettit criticizes. This conception has become very popular in the 20th century, especially among libertarians. The image of society given by your picture does not resemble real life. Facebook and I are not equal actors akin to neighbors disputing over what gets put in their front yard. It is this recognition that we are not equal neigh…

> The image of society given by your picture does not resemble real life. Facebook and I are not equal actors analogous to neighbors disputing over what gets put in their front yard. You're never going to have a society that equal. Do you all the sudden have the right to put signs up at my house because it's bigger or on a busier street than yours? Should you be able to put chapters in the books I write because no on…

> Do you all the sudden have the right to put signs up at my house because it's bigger or on a busier street than yours?

No, I have the right to put signs up at your house because you put up a bulletin board and actively invited anyone in the neighborhood to put signs on it.

It's either open to the general public or it's not, and if you pick "not", the onus is on you to at least refrain from actively and ubiquitously contradicting that.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#624

Post by a1369209993 »

2xpress wrote: post #608
megabless123 wrote: post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would anyone expect profit moticated companies like Google or Apple to have higher moral standards than the elected representative US goverment where it operates from itself? Because elected representatives are not moral authorities

Indeed a good point. Had the US elected representatives had better morals none of this would have ever happened. It would have been pre-empted decades ago. But we have no influence over their morals, only an ability to vote for or against them. Those elected by definition are the best people available. So if they don't have good morals that means the whole society does not have good morals. I suppose the best we can…

> Those elected by definition are the best people available.

If by "available", you mean political candidates, then yes. If you mean of the society in general, then no, quite the opposite, actually.

> So if they don't have good morals that means the whole society does not have good morals.

No, it means two of the worst people in the society (namely, the 'republican' candidate and the 'democratic' candidate) do not have good morals. This a slightly stronger measure than the society's minimum level of morals, but not by very much, and says nothing about average or about particular non-politician cases.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#625

Post by ogma »

deelly wrote: post #282
oliwarner wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that by this point, all this is expected behaviour. If companies don't want to be complicit in these crimes, they need to extricate themselves from the country and cut all ties. If they do want to put profit ahead of everything else, then whatever, but you don't get to defend them as doing the right thing for their employees. They're enabling the whole situation. [Edit to bring in a sister question] "Why don't…

* If companies don't want to be complicit in these crimes, they need to extricate themselves from the country and cut all ties. You live in a quite simple world, no?

    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *  
    *                                               *
    * /     \             \            /    \       *
    *|       |             \          |      |      *
    *|       `.             |         |       :     *
    *`        |             |        \|       |     *
    * \       | /       /  \\\   ____ \\       :    *
    *  \      \/   ___~~          ~____| \     |    *
    *   \      \__~                    ~__\    |    *
    *    \_     \        _.______  .______\|   |    *
    *      \     \______// _ ___ _ (_(__>  \   |    *
    *       \   .  C ___)  ______ (_(____>  |  /    *
    *       /\ |   C ____)/      \ (_____>  |_/     *
    *      / /\|   C_____)       |  (___>   /  \    *
    *     |   (   _C_____)\______/  // _/ /     \   *
    *     |    \  |__   \\_________// (__/       |  *
    *    | \    \____)   `____  ___'             |  *
    *    |  \_          ___\       /_          _/ | *
    *   |              /    |     |  \            | *
    *   |             |    /       \  \           | *
    *   |          / /    |         |  \           |*
    *   |         / /      \__/\___/    |          |*
    *  |           /        |    |       |         |*
    *  |          |         |    |       |         |*
    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#626

Post by sershe »

ansible wrote: post #589
tialaramex wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're from Russia, what part of the Democratic party looks like "leftism" to you?

The "left wing" in the USA is the "center-right" in other parts of the world. We're still a ways away from basic stuff like universal health care that every other developed country has.

Not really... somebody posted here recently, I cannot find a comment; supposedly posting CDU (German center-right party) policies into the recent NYT poll gets you lumped with trumpist wing of GOP. Many policies that are considered right-wing in the US enjoy broad support in European countries (e.g. official languages). Some things practiced Europe, like the Danish "immigrant ghetto" policies, would cause the US left to melt down so hard they'd burn a hole thru the Earth and come out in the Indian ocean (to be clear, I don't support or don't know/care enough to have an opinion about most of this stuff).

Universal healthcare is provided by many countries from Singapore, that few would call left-wing; to outright totalitarian regimes, e.g. modern Russia. It's an indicator of statism, not leftism; I am not a big fan of that either, but non-leftist statism (a-la Singapore) is ok and totally different from what I'm talking about. Tangentially but helpfully, I would recommend looking up the difference between social democracy and democratic socialism, as described by democratic socialists.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#627

Post by tdsamardzhiev »

emilsedgh wrote: post #612
tailspin2019 wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interested in your thoughts on what would help? From your point of view?

I'll try my best, but obviously these are just my thoughts and a lot of other people don't necessarily agree with me. I think all authoritarian governments rely on a chunk of their population to stay in power. This population can be very small, but sufficient. In order to maintain their popularity they rely on: 1. Lack of education 2. Strong propaganda 3. Poverty 4. Social welfare 5. Religion & ideology 6. Fear of en…

> So my question after this story is, do you think Google leaving Russia will end up helping Russians get more educated, more wealthy, more connected to the free world?

Maybe, if the alternative is them cooperating with the dictator government for more effective surveillance and enforcement? Google from 2021 isn't Google from 2006.

I mean, 20 years ago I'd 100% agree with you, but modern-day big tech is... yikes! The only thing it'll do is prevent the emergence and spread of more open (and certainly harder to track) tech.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#628

Post by sershe »

tialaramex wrote: post #524
sershe wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I see it, one party has gone dumb, and the other party is obviously going evil (I am from Russia so you can guess what I think of leftism). The question is whether you prefer your government dumb or evil; I think dumb is... the lesser of two evils. But I can agree on the timing aspect, I'd vote for Obama OR Romney over literally any politician prominent in 2021.

If you're from Russia, what part of the Democratic party looks like "leftism" to you?

I am of course comparing to the USSR, not modern Russia. Pretty much the entire "progressive" wing of the party, with its anti-capitalism and fostering massive welfare state dependency, as well as the recent focus on "oppression" and "power", and purity testing.

I am pretty meh/cynical about the economic aspects, actually; sure, I think these are bad ideas, but unless they run the thing entirely into the ground, I believe there's going to be enough for me until old age at this point, and of course I view legally abusing government programs as libertarian activism - e.g. if there's universal healthcare it would make it so much easier to retire early and use it for all it's worth ;)

What I am actually genuinely afraid of is the cultural garbage, esp. as it infiltrates the education system. See the capitalism/socialism approval polls among the young people, etc. USSR has collapsed when I was 7, but I was still brainwashed enough that I remember asking my parents about the English Premier League - how come they have soccer in England? I was surprised because I thought it was a capitalist system where everyone was oppressed, so at 6-7 or whatever I didn't understand how they could have a soccer league. That was of course while living with 2 STEM MSc parents and a sister in a 700sqft 2-room flat, not being able to afford a car, and knowing nothing about the actual living conditions in England.

From what I know about the school systems in big cities (I know some people who work at schools who are pretty left-wing and they talk about this stuff as if it was a good thing, plus from the news/leaks to right-wing sources), the oppression/anti-capitalist propaganda is rampant, and the current "far-left" wing of the Democratic party are very popular. If it's between this stuff and dumb nationalist rednecks with whom I disagree on 90% of pretty much everything, I'm going to throw my lot with the rednecks.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#629

Post by bradgessler »

Here we go again, “AppleGoogle should stand up to the government!”

This is a very naive view of how these companies work. They are so massive that they have to figure out how to operate __lawfully__ under wildly different jurisdictions. When they operate in countries like Russia that have different values than the United States, people get upset and blame the company.

What we should really be doing is blaming the governments and try holding them to account.

The only other option, which is crazy, would be for these massive tech companies to acquire their own militaries so they can impose their values on the world.

Imagine an iPhone 18 commercial that touts privacy. It would show a fleet of Apple aircraft carriers with Apple bombers and Apple special forces teams standing by to coerce a government official that wants to search your iPhone to stand down.

It’s kind of a silly joke, but at some level that’s where we’re at.

Re: Google, Apple remove Navalny app from stores as Russian elections begin

#630

Post by anticodon »

lostmsu wrote: post #621
anticodon wrote: post #619

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What it should prove? Where exactly should I look? Well, it's kind of obvious, that Georgia is poverty-stricken country. It's possible to visit Georgia for anyone. Millions of tourists from Russia visits Georgia every year. We can see that there's extreme poverty in Georgia everywhere. Unemployment, energy shortage, lack of future perspectives. These problems will get only worse due to COVID-19 and global energy cris…

You can simply click Compare, then pick the other country. > Unemployment, energy shortage, lack of future perspectives. Have you been in Russia outside of >500k cities? Even Tver, one of the oldest and most famous, is going precisely nowhere.

Yes, I've traveled almost everywhere in Russia, and some regions are poor. But even poorest of Russian regions are richer than Georgia. And this discrepancy will increase, not in favor of Georgia.
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