Drop Dropbox • Hacker News Board

Re: Drop Dropbox

#991

Post by ryguytilidie » Fri, Apr 11, 2014, 4:22 PM UTC

vacri wrote: post #974

ryguytilidie wrote: post #972

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a really serious grasp at straws. Its ironic to accuse someone using hyperbole of being hyperbolic while point out that a lynch mob is something completely, 100% different than what they said? Bizarre.

The literal meaning of 'lynch mob' is a group of people out to hang an individual. The colloquial meaning of 'lynch mob' is a group of people out to destroy an individual, either socially, professionally, financially; in some way causing a significant downfall. The shrill mob attacking Eich could be characterised as a lynch mob - they were out for his downfall. It's abundantly clear, given that there has been very li…

Wow that is some seriously awful debating.

So because people have been constantly misusing a word in an attempt to exaggerate the wrongs of their opponents, someone is being hyperbolic to even ask that we stick somewhere remotely close to the actual definition of the word?

It doesn't really accomplish anything more than calling your opponents "literally hitler". It means nothing, its an insane, irrational exaggeration and the only reason you would say it is to make your opponents look bad in lieu of having an actual, rational argument to make your opponents look bad.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#992

Post by ryguytilidie » Fri, Apr 11, 2014, 4:24 PM UTC

humanrebar wrote: post #602

ryguytilidie wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"But I don't know that I can go on the same kind of crusade for which I faulted the Eich lynch mob." This is so insanely hyperbolic I don't even know where to begin. We're now using the term "lynch mob" for a situation where people a) boycotted the product and b) wrote a lot of things about how what Brandon did was wrong and how he is the wrong choice for CEO. So, lynch mob, which means, "a mob that kills a person fo…

"so insanely hyperbolic"

The litmus test for mental problems: throwing a tantrum about the word choices of a stranger on the internet. Hope you get those fixed!

Re: Drop Dropbox

#993

Post by a8000 » Fri, Apr 11, 2014, 4:25 PM UTC

hackuser wrote: post #874

nilved wrote: post #758

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I hope this extends to opposing the Obama administration, which has continued and extended war, torture, and the patriot act. Of course it does. That's the logical conclusion. Why wouldn't it? There isn't any informed person in 2014 who is unable to realize Obama has been worse than Bush as far as torture and war go.

How has Obama been worse about torture than Bush? AFAIK he stopped the torture programs that Bush started. He should do more, such as prosecuting the torturers. We will see if he releases the key information in the Senate report. But I wouldn't call him worse.

Obama went back to just killing suspected terrorists, instead of torturing them.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#994

Post by kenrikm » Fri, Apr 11, 2014, 5:06 PM UTC

nickff wrote: post #918

kenrikm wrote: post #788

Earlier quoted context omitted.

WW2 Democrat, Korea Republican, Vietnam Democrat, Grenada and Panama Republican (if they even count), First Gulf War Republican, Kosovo Democrat, Second gulf war / Afghanistan Republican. To me it seems that there is not clear pattern, the most I can get out of it "if there is a president, then we might go to war"

Truman was the president when the US stepped in to help South Korea, and he was a Democrat, not a Republican.

Good catch, for some reason I thought Ike was in power at that point.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#995

Post by gress » Fri, Apr 11, 2014, 5:09 PM UTC

sigzero wrote: post #944

gress wrote: post #755

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree - it's a lot more powerful than that. If it becomes generally known that politicians unethical actions will limit their opportunities in the corporate world after they leave office, it produces a strong incentive to behave more ethically.

Does it? She probably thinks she behaved ethically. It sure hasn't done anything for politicians in general either.

This isn't something that has happened much yet. It will have an effect if it becomes a regular pattern.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#996

Post by jqm » Fri, Apr 11, 2014, 8:06 PM UTC

I just deleted my Dropbox account. It was a free account anyway. I found it contained about GB of files I hadn't accessed in a couple of years.

Then I realized....

What a wise move on the part of Dropbox to bring Rice on board. They probably will free up a few Petabytes of space from non-paying geeks:)

Re: Drop Dropbox

#997

Post by vacri » Sat, Apr 12, 2014, 4:53 AM UTC

ryguytilidie wrote: post #991

vacri wrote: post #974

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The literal meaning of 'lynch mob' is a group of people out to hang an individual. The colloquial meaning of 'lynch mob' is a group of people out to destroy an individual, either socially, professionally, financially; in some way causing a significant downfall. The shrill mob attacking Eich could be characterised as a lynch mob - they were out for his downfall. It's abundantly clear, given that there has been very li…

Wow that is some seriously awful debating. So because people have been constantly misusing a word in an attempt to exaggerate the wrongs of their opponents, someone is being hyperbolic to even ask that we stick somewhere remotely close to the actual definition of the word? It doesn't really accomplish anything more than calling your opponents "literally hitler". It means nothing, its an insane, irrational exaggeratio…

One of the reasons I can't take your criticisms of debating seriously is that your debate style includes "you must have a mental illness, ha ha", seen below.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#998

Post by facepalm » Sat, Apr 12, 2014, 9:23 AM UTC

king_jester wrote: post #989

facepalm wrote: post #526

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gay marriage really isn't such an obvious case. Marriage means subventions by the government. So I suppose you could argue that the subventions are really for promoting families with the ultimate goal of having children. Even though gay families can adopt, you could argue that promoting gay marriage does not bring more children into the world. Not saying that is my opinion, or that marriage is currently perfectly des…

> Marriage means subventions by the government. Marriage is not a subvention. You are not granted a cash bonus for being married. You access differences in tax consideration, yes, but that is not the same as getting direct payment. Moreover, there are a variety of legal rights that are available to married couples vs. non-married couple and non straight couples deserve access to those rights just the same as anyone e…

"You access differences in tax consideration, yes, but that is not the same as getting direct payment."

Of course it is. The public pays money for it.

"Moreover, there are a variety of legal rights that are available to married couples vs. non-married couple and non straight couples deserve access to those rights just the same as anyone else."

As I said, I am not against it. I would argue that those rights are also a subvention.

"Marriage isn't granted or denied to straight people based on their ability to have or not have children, this argument does not hold water"

I'm aware of that - my point is that I can understand if people think about it that way. Also I think there have throughout history been special rules for marriage if a couple can't get children. For example it might have been legal to get another wife, things like that. I don't think you can argue that children have no bearing on marriage whatsoever.

Especially since presumably the "right to adopt" is the main issue people have with gay marriage. Don't know about the US, but where I live, the only other significant right married people get is bringing their spouses into the country (giving them citizenship). Things like "visit your spouse in hospital" or "split your income for tax reductions" can be arranged in other ways.

"this is a question of discrimination of the most basic kind."

That is just hate speech, not an argument.

"That there is a bigger problem compared to gay marriage doesn't negate the fact that some people are still being denied the ability to marry and access the rights that come with that status."

Of course not - my point is that many who now feel like "good people" because they support gay marriage at the same time fight for denying people health care. I just wanted to illustrate that things are not always as obvious as people think.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#999

Post by burntroots » Sat, Apr 12, 2014, 4:12 PM UTC

drivingmenuts wrote: post #961

burntroots wrote: post #879

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Brendan Eich gave $1000 to an organization people don't approve of. A guy made a joke at a convention about dongles and got fired. A whole lot of Sci-Fi authors were prevented from publishing at Tor because they identify themselves as politically conservative. This particular pattern has been growing over the last decade or two. The politics in question are growing more extreme and the required level of political…

I won't disagree with you - more and more, people wear their politics on their sleeves and have their ears plugged to any view to which they don't agree. This isn't restricted to leftists going after conservatives, nor conservatives going after leftists. It's everywhere. I think it's one of the side-effects of living in a society where so much information is available. In the past, we could know the politics of peopl…

This situation has nothing to do with technology. It's not some passive "I won't listen to this guy because he disagrees with me" stance. People are going out of their way to make sure people who have political opinions they disagree with can't work. All three of my examples show this. And there are many, many more examples. Academia and public education are two, just off the top of my head.

It started with conservative christians. Now that the most undesirable element is gone, the purges have expanded to anybody who isn't as extreme as the loudest member. As time goes on, the required politics have gotten more and more extreme. There's no evidence of this trend slowing down or stopping.

Re: Drop Dropbox

#1000

Post by RoadLinds » Mon, Apr 14, 2014, 9:36 PM UTC

EliAndrewC wrote: post #839

grellas wrote: post #538

Think about what it means to the HN culture to have a subject that normally would have been flagged out of existence as overtly political suddenly be featured front and center in the apparent belief that ideological purity is now a litmus test for who can serve on a board of directors in the startup world. In a free society, people can unite in their business ventures even though they might be far apart in how they v…

Debates on Brendan Eich and Condoleezza Rice seem to boil down three separate questions: 1) Is there any belief or action not directly related to someone's job that should disqualify them from their position? 2) If the answer to #1 is yes, does this specific issue cross that threshold? 3) Does the answer to #1 change based on their position within a company, e.g. a regular employee vs a CEO? I've seen well-reasoned a…

I think there are three very different questions to consider here:

1) Should an employee be held accountable for his/her political beliefs. (Heck no.)

2) If someone with different political beliefs than I runs a company, will I boycott it? Ex - Owner of Whole Foods is against Universal Healthcare, so I'm boycotting, though I approve of him running the company. In such a case we support our ideologies through capitalism.

3) Should someone who runs a technology company - a multi-billion, multi-national that shapes our future and impacts our daily work lives & culture - should someone who actively holds and acts upon prejudice be allowed to run such a powerful company? No.

That third one is important - and somewhat scary - to consider. We've crossed a threshold. Large technology companies - and many startups - are literally creating the future. We are shaping the world in a way that goes way beyond the capacity of companies in decades past. There is a far greater responsibility to consider.