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Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu

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Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#31

Post by Joeboy »

dmix wrote: post #13

Amazon is building a $600 million datacenter for the CIA. The CIA did all of the bad things listed in Dropbox article as directed by Bush and Condoleezza, and they are still actively trying to cover up torture. I've never heard anyone here not using EC2 over it? The tech scenes pitchfork mobs are wildly inconsistent. I have a feeling this one hit a nerve because Condoleezza Rice is famously hated across the internet…

I think the difference is, people have been calling for boycotts of Amazon for various reasons for years, and it's never made any difference to anything. They are too entrenched. I guess people are buoyed by the success of the anti-Eich campaign and think, perhaps correctly, that it might actually be practically possible to pressure Dropbox into dropping Rice.

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#33

Post by NotOscarWilde »

hindsightbias wrote: post #17
NotOscarWilde wrote: post #11

I think it's important to ask not only whether somebody is a good ideological representative for a company, but also whether ousting them does us any good. The parties on both sides of the Rice/Dropbox debate have good arguments: * Ms. Rice has been a very important representative of a US administration that caused a lot of people to die in Iraq and elsewhere; * but she is not the only one in the government of that d…

> solves nothing Sometimes, the best solution for bad behavior is making it have consequences. > promise before elections By that logic, Bush and Rice met their promises. They didn't say they wouldn't invade anyone, they said they wouldn't do nation building.

> Sometimes, the best solution for bad behavior is making it have consequences.

You do realize this opinion aims to punish somebody because people can't touch her using the judicial system, right?

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#34

Post by res0nat0r »

res0nat0r wrote: post #26
higherpurpose wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been trying to avoid Amazon since they censored Wikileaks with a single phone call from a politician. I'll never forgive them for that. The fact that they're working with the CIA now just adds to the pile of reasons to dislike them. Will history make a difference between IBM selling mainframes to Nazis to help their holocaust and Amazon selling servers to the CIA to help them assassinate people around the world…

Wikileaks violated the AWS TOS by publishing classified material in violation of US law.

Feel free to downvote since it doesn't fit the meme that "information wants to be free", but the statement is 100% correct.

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#35

Post by mbillie1 »

hindsightbias wrote: post #17
NotOscarWilde wrote: post #11

I think it's important to ask not only whether somebody is a good ideological representative for a company, but also whether ousting them does us any good. The parties on both sides of the Rice/Dropbox debate have good arguments: * Ms. Rice has been a very important representative of a US administration that caused a lot of people to die in Iraq and elsewhere; * but she is not the only one in the government of that d…

> solves nothing Sometimes, the best solution for bad behavior is making it have consequences. > promise before elections By that logic, Bush and Rice met their promises. They didn't say they wouldn't invade anyone, they said they wouldn't do nation building.

> By that logic, Bush and Rice met their promises. They didn't say they wouldn't invade anyone, they said they wouldn't do nation building.

I think NotOscarWilde is making a more general point about American politics here. There were many things Bush (and every other president in my lifetime) promised and failed to deliver on: lowering the debt, funding Pell grants, etc.

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#36

Post by m52go »

waps wrote: post #27
Tloewald wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And it's such a bizarre move. What's the upside?

What's the upside for any external management appointment ? A large investment, that's what.

Are you saying it makes them more capable of closing a large round? They just closed $350m barely a month ago.

If they're looking for even more funding...I don't even know. The funding game is so screwed up now. Just IPO already and let the public markets enjoy some of the upside.

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#37

Post by IanDrake »

bendoernberg wrote: post #25
dmix wrote: post #13

Amazon is building a $600 million datacenter for the CIA. The CIA did all of the bad things listed in Dropbox article as directed by Bush and Condoleezza, and they are still actively trying to cover up torture. I've never heard anyone here not using EC2 over it? The tech scenes pitchfork mobs are wildly inconsistent. I have a feeling this one hit a nerve because Condoleezza Rice is famously hated across the internet…

Better to be inconsistently principled than consistently unprincipled.

I'm pretty sure "inconsistently principled" == "consistently unprincipled".

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#38

Post by rmc »

Tloewald wrote: post #20
m52go wrote: post #12

Simply removing Condi as a board member doesn't solve anything. The move to make her a board member puts the motivations of the entire Dropbox leadership team in question. Today, Dropbox hurt its reputation very badly, regardless how this ultimately plays out.

And it's such a bizarre move. What's the upside?

Connections?

Re: Knuth: Open Letter to Condoleezza Rice (2002)

#40

Post by prohisto »

NotOscarWilde wrote: post #11

I think it's important to ask not only whether somebody is a good ideological representative for a company, but also whether ousting them does us any good. The parties on both sides of the Rice/Dropbox debate have good arguments: * Ms. Rice has been a very important representative of a US administration that caused a lot of people to die in Iraq and elsewhere; * but she is not the only one in the government of that d…

That's why I don't trust her, she strikes me as strongly colluding and justifying. We cannot trust at least Bush Jr and every person involved in Obama's Administration. It's hard to believe that we did worse than Bush.

That said, I am immediately investigating getting rid of dropbox.

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