until you understand that it is not countries and peoples that are at war, but elites are at war - you will continue to be a victim of your false beliefs.
Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
671–680 of 1001 posts
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#672This is the first European conflict of the internet era where one side gets economically isolated in a very radical way. A lot of theories about modern economic warfare and its effects, are being tested in the real world - stuff like "Country X cannot wage war because the economic blowback would destroy them". I expect the Chinese are watching it attentively, to name one interested party (eh). If this strategy works,…
> "Country X cannot wage war because the economic blowback would destroy them" Note that a common corollary to that is that countries cannot afford to impose sanctions on others because the economic blowback would destroy them (even sanctions against "smaller" countries, due to how global liquidity works). This is more readily acknowledged by academics, and essentially cancels out the whole theory; but for some reaso…
> essentially cancels out the whole theory
Ish. As a country, when you have 30 economic partners, losing one is not the end of the world; whereas losing 25 of them definitely hurts. Obviously that's more difficult the bigger the partner is (e.g. from an European perspective, sanctioning the US would have a much bigger impact than sactioning Russia), so really it's a question of size and proportion more than anything.
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#673They have 1700 staff in Ukraine, by far the majority of their employees, so it's not surprising that they see things differently to others. https://www.namecheap.com/careers/ukraine/
I wish they included that bit in their outreach based on a lot of comments in this thread. It probably would've helped add some additional perspective into their decision making.
(This is one of those threads where we also thank dang for this service.)
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#674Here my two cents as someone that has visited, lived in, or good friends in authoritarian regimes such as East Germany, Russia, North Korea, Iran, Hong Kong: - in a democracy, the population is responsible for what the government does. Conversely, the more authoritarian the regime, arguably the less culpable the population is. (Of course, people shouldn't have allowed an authoritarian figure to gain power... indeed.…
> arguably the less culpable the population is This may be, but it begs the question: who is most responsible, then? Certainly not the people outside of Russia, yes? If the Americans invaded Russia, for the sole purpose of arresting Putin, this would result in worldwide, humanity ending nuclear devastation, including in Russia. It simply must be the Russian people that hold the most culpability for holding Putin to a…
Putin is responsible, and the higher-ups.
But since Putin does have fairly high approval, the population is somewhat responsible too.
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#675Here my two cents as someone that has visited, lived in, or good friends in authoritarian regimes such as East Germany, Russia, North Korea, Iran, Hong Kong: - in a democracy, the population is responsible for what the government does. Conversely, the more authoritarian the regime, arguably the less culpable the population is. (Of course, people shouldn't have allowed an authoritarian figure to gain power... indeed.…
Those are good points, but I don't quite agree because there's a few things to add to the list:
- Putin's popularity jumped up during the invasion to 69% - which is a lot.
- Only 5% of Russians believe that Russia is responsible for the incursion, while 50% believe that the problem is NATO (I understand at least part of this is due to heavy propaganda)
- While the choice for war is a bit ambiguous and probably errs one way or the other depending on how much propaganda buy in there is, the fact of the matter is that Russians will ultimately, proudly accept the annexation of Ukraine as their vassal state and buy into the notion of that broader destiny of Neo Russia that Putin is pushing for. The 'We Are One People' is enough to elicit the cultural chauvinism among the population so that while they may not support conflict, they will accept, and possibly promote the outcome without any regard for the self-determination of the Ukranians.
(Obviously, this is due to a lot of propaganda and lack of real exposure to other information, but it is what it is.)
- Chinese citizens are broadly happy to see the crackdowns in Hong Kong (i.e. "Why do those they believe they should have special rights, especially when they are attacking China!"), and fully accept the 'regional internment' of the Uyghurs, including re-education prisons for many specific individuals purely on the basis of their ethnicity. Similarly the eradication of Tibet as an entity. And of course, the possible invasion of Taiwan that we might see in the coming years.
There is a degree of complicity among the population, at least for the nationalist claims, especially to the extent they look past the materiality of some of the violence etc.
Second, is that the citizens probably need to be informed of the issue. While the sanctions might form a bit of a blip in the Ruble, it's not going to affect most people's lives particularly dramatically, it may just slow the economy down in largely imperceptible ways to the general population. Many will blame 'NATO' for their disinvitations to sporting events.
It's dramatic for a Western-connected software developer who has the means to get a flight, and who cares about Ruble/USD exchange, but not likely for most of the plebes.
Therefore - it might be a good idea to do 'populist sanctions' - like shutting down all the Starbucks, McDonald's, IKEAS, Netflix, Hollywood films, Nikes, NBA games, televised football of all kinds - all those things and more.
I'd say include iPhones/Android but probably we want to maintain for them an outlet for information from the outside, and frankly to collect data if we need it. But we could dramatically reduce what's available in the App Stores, stop selling a bunch of variations and product lines etc.
None of that is hugely material at all, it's not going to harm anyone frankly, it won't hugely affect the economy, but it's a 'really strong daily reminder' of the fact that 'they are excluded' from the system. No more 'nice lattes', because 'we don't like you right now'.
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#676We haven't blocked the domains, we are asking people to move. There are plenty of other choices out there when it comes to infrastructure services so this isn't "deplatforming". I sympathize with people that are not pro regime but ultimately even those tax dollars they may generate go to the regime. We have people on the ground in Ukraine being bombarded now non stop. I cannot with good conscience continue to support…
There is a lot of talk of innocent people. Yes they are. But this is war. As Kharkiv is getting plastered by Uragan as we speak, to break down the territorial defence units and creating a lot of collateral. So killing businesses and destroying livelihood of Russia will help in the long term war.
This is not going to get resolved any time soon I do not think. As much damage as can be done to Russia now should be done.
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#677I was surprised by this, until I realized that one of Namecheap's offices is in downtown Kharkiv. Today, the Russian military bombed Kharkiv with cluster munitions [1]. Civilians were killed, possibly including children [2]. Given the severity of the situation, I'm surprised that Namecheap has not opted for more drastic measures- for example, redirecting Russian web traffic. Simply transferring Russian businesses to…
Indeed. I would've been sorely tempted to post all Russian customer information including payment details to Ukrainian social media to exploit as they are able. Until this is over I regard every single entity inside the borders of the Russian Federation as persona non grata. Public, private, living or dead. I'm not about to be the guy who postured about legality and politeness when it turns out some of my customers were history's next SS.
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#678Here my two cents as someone that has visited, lived in, or good friends in authoritarian regimes such as East Germany, Russia, North Korea, Iran, Hong Kong: - in a democracy, the population is responsible for what the government does. Conversely, the more authoritarian the regime, arguably the less culpable the population is. (Of course, people shouldn't have allowed an authoritarian figure to gain power... indeed.…
I have no problem making life harder for Russians, having them cancel their holiday in Turkey, wait in line a bit, move to a new VPN. Maybe that will make some realize that something is wrong with their entire government and they need to revolt and change that fast. This after Aleppo and the rest. I think that the government of a country is a lagging metric of the value of its people.
I'm not sure I agree.
This somehow reminds me of how Putin, in his ridiculous speeches, cited NATO involvement in Serbia and Iraq as a reason to attack Ukraine. Of course, the western politicians responsible for those decisions are now gone, because unlike Putin, they respected term limits.
The US hasn't had a perfect track record in the "wars of choice" department. The US voter does have some moral responsibility for it. The flaw, however, would be in saying as Putin does that the US political system is totally invalid for this, or justifies bad behavior elsewhere.
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#679Quoted post unavailable.
That’s a huge ask considering the sheer scale of people jailed for protesting. You’re not wrong, this person’s problems are dwarfed by those who are dead or might soon be dead. I’m just not sure protesting is actually a sane solution given the potential consequences. Like, who knows what happens to jailed protesters. Are they going to be okay? Is it worth it? I don’t have the answers, just trying to point out that it…
Estimated 6 k. Of 144 million in ~60 cities.
That's 100/ city.
I'm not so sure about the claim "sheer scale of protesting". We are a IT forum and I would think that the overlapping demographics with 'us' is more aware than the other 99,9% that isn't reading here.
Please don't misread my comment. There are multiple reasons why people won't dare to protest too, outside of being ill informed ( eg. Rural areas only using TV, according to what I read).
Re: Namecheap: Russia Service Termination
#680We haven't blocked the domains, we are asking people to move. There are plenty of other choices out there when it comes to infrastructure services so this isn't "deplatforming". I sympathize with people that are not pro regime but ultimately even those tax dollars they may generate go to the regime. We have people on the ground in Ukraine being bombarded now non stop. I cannot with good conscience continue to support…
How about you just stop collecting taxes in Russia instead of cutting them off? Either way, I'm noting you down for BDS. I suggest you also employ people in Palestine, Somalia, Yemen, Iraq, Myanmar, Kashmir, etc.
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