And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway • Hacker News Board

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#221

Post by midtake » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 9:44 AM UTC

This article is painfully shortsighted about Egypt's moment in the Arab Spring.

(1) the problematic Vodafone message in question is presented as "without attribution" but it very clearly starts with the words "The Armed Forces asks"!

(2) it makes it seem like the government was naturally unpopular in Egypt and clinging on to power in desperate ways when in reality the online anti-state dissent turned out to be astroturfed by "shadowy" Western organizations, which ironically ended up being the Islamic Brotherhood's ace up their sleeve as their justification for taking control.

So basically, wtf is his point regarding the Arab Spring? The author sounds painfully naive like it's still 2011, this sort of deliberate naivete makes it difficult for me to trust the rest of the article.

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#222

Post by tonnydourado » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 9:51 AM UTC

You can't technology your way out of social problems. The conflicting requirements raised throughout the article are, indeed, ultimately unsolvable.

The only way to stop an oppressive government from abusing the emergency notification system for propaganda is to fight against the oppressive government until it stops existing, then keep fighting to prevent it from existing again.

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#223

Post by rithdmc » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:11 AM UTC

soco wrote: post #220

boomlinde wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw a video about a fatal oil drilling accident where the resulting investigation found that an operator had ignored the alarm which indicated the underlying issue because there were other alarms sounding for things he'd been told to ignore because they were benign. This is apparently common enough cause of problems that there is a term for it (other than "crying wolf"): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alarm_fatigue…

And because of this, no browser of mine is allowed to send notifications, and also no app by default - they have to prove themselves useful first. Sorry fellow developers working on notifications, your work goes to the drain (mostly).

I recently unsubscribed from a grocery delivery service becuase they kept pushing adverts through their app. I gave them notification permission so I could see when my delivery is nearby, not so they could spam me. Voting with my wallet on this one.

(For the curious, a subscription means free delivery. The subscription costs 10 euro a month, and if you don't have a subscription, the delivery fee is around 4 euro)

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#224

Post by scns » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:22 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #187

rmunn wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In any society, you're going to have diverse views of "the right thing." Not only that, but you're also going to have people disguising their personal, selfish ambitions for power or money (or both, those two ambitions are usually found together) by pretending to other people that they want "the right thing". Most politicians operate this way. (I can't say "all" because there are some examples in history of politic…

> selfish ambitions for power or money Free markets are designed around a selfish ambition for making money. You can only make money by pleasing your customers. And hence free markets are the greatest mechanism for prosperity. There's nothing wrong with making money that way.

> You can only make money by pleasing your customers.

Are you sure?

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#225

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:23 AM UTC

soco wrote: post #220

boomlinde wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw a video about a fatal oil drilling accident where the resulting investigation found that an operator had ignored the alarm which indicated the underlying issue because there were other alarms sounding for things he'd been told to ignore because they were benign. This is apparently common enough cause of problems that there is a term for it (other than "crying wolf"): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alarm_fatigue…

And because of this, no browser of mine is allowed to send notifications, and also no app by default - they have to prove themselves useful first. Sorry fellow developers working on notifications, your work goes to the drain (mostly).

[deleted]

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#226

Post by GJim » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:32 AM UTC

logifail wrote: post #18

Last week I had boarded a flight at LHR and the crew were just starting their safety briefing when everyone's phones went off with that wildfires 'emergency' alert message. I was unimpressed with the message, along with the (non-UK) crew.

I'm puzzled why your entirely factual and relevant statement documenting your experience has been downvoted.

Would a downvoter care to explain themselves?

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#227

Post by nrr » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:34 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #193

vkou wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How well do free markets resolve basic problems of resource distribution? Like, say, the tragedy of the commons?

Free markets do not resolve the tragedy of the commons. The fix is to not have commons. For example, we are running out of fish in the ocean from overfishing. But there's no shortage of cows and chickens, despite massive consumption of them. The former is the commons, the latter is private property.

I fear that this conflates open and closed access with exclusive property rights. It isn't untrue that asserting exclusive property rights on something makes it closed access[0], but there are other mechanisms for achieving closed access of a resource, like enforced regulation.

Slightly more formally, an assertion of exclusive property rights is a sufficient condition for something to be closed access, but it isn't necessary.

Though, admittedly, that does depend on what one's definition of a free market is. Is it unfettered commerce, consumer protections and suchlike be damned? Is it a system of commerce that ensures equitable access? I'm personally of the mind that, as long as I trade with certificates that bear Caesar's face (or trade with proxies for such certificates, like a MasterCard), he gets to make the rules in exchange for my being able to lean on his legal system to protect my interests, so I find that the equitable access angle is nice.

(Likewise, trading with Bitcoin or Ethereum or whatever the in-vogue cryptocurrency is today means that the code makes the rules, and I get to pay for the privilege of having my transactions indelibly entered into the distributed ledger and for the code governing those transactions to be buggy and exploitable. I'm still scratching my head at it.)

At the risk of building a strawman here, I'll caution that it's logically inconsistent to expect the state to enforce exclusive rights while also urging that strict regulation of a shared commons is an illegitimate market intervention.

--

0: That is, unless the title holder grants license, but that's a whole other conversation.

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#228

Post by cucumber3732842 » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:40 AM UTC

boomlinde wrote: post #210

decimalenough wrote: post #118

> But it is easy to see why some people feel this might open the gateway to messages which, at best, are irrelevant If you're in South Korea, you can expect to get around half a dozen emergency notifications every day . Typical contents include "it's cold, so dress warmly", "roads are icy, so drive carefully", and "Mrs Kim, 79, suffers from dementia and was last seen in Seoul wearing a black coat". You can set your p…

I saw a video about a fatal oil drilling accident where the resulting investigation found that an operator had ignored the alarm which indicated the underlying issue because there were other alarms sounding for things he'd been told to ignore because they were benign. This is apparently common enough cause of problems that there is a term for it (other than "crying wolf"): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alarm_fatigue…

In the US spewing all the alarms at the line level employees and fatiguing the shit out of them is a direct (and predictable, but of course everyone who complained in advance got sneered at by the usual demographics) result of OSHA policy. Same bunch of moronic incentives that result in there being a policy against everything and employees technically violating the rules to work normally. Whenever you see an alarm fatigue workplace there's usually a rule in the rulebook that says they have to stop what they're doing for every alarm until it's triaged and documented. This is how the rules financially incentivize the company to act even if it's stupid and results in more screw ups.

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#229

Post by s1artibartfast » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:42 AM UTC

blooalien wrote: post #108

roenxi wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's a "good person" exactly? There are many wildly different definitions. People do generally want to be good people but it is a fairly basic don't-upset-the-neighbours form of good. You can't rely on them to consider any specific act as being good or bad.

> What's a "good person" exactly? I was taught that a "good person" tries to actually care about their fellow humans and other lifeforms on this planet enough to try to live a life that contributes toward a positive future that we'll all benefit from, while choosing not to support the hatred, greed, and ignorance of those people who would work toward the opposite of that. Problem with that sorta fantasy is that it do…

People are good but you have an unrealistic standard for good

Re: And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

#230

Post by t-3 » Wed, Aug 19, 2026, 10:44 AM UTC

decimalenough wrote: post #118

> But it is easy to see why some people feel this might open the gateway to messages which, at best, are irrelevant If you're in South Korea, you can expect to get around half a dozen emergency notifications every day . Typical contents include "it's cold, so dress warmly", "roads are icy, so drive carefully", and "Mrs Kim, 79, suffers from dementia and was last seen in Seoul wearing a black coat". You can set your p…

> You can set your phone to filter these out, but then you'll also miss the notification about North Korea commencing artillery bombardment.

Considering most of SK's population is in Seoul, and Seoul is within range of NK artillery, wouldn't most people be aware before the notification came anyways?