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Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

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Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#101
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it's a competitor of yt. If you download a video, they don't get ad revenue.

I've had Youtube Premium since it was introduced and I still use yt-dlp because it's the most convenient way for me to make an mp3 from a video so I can listen to it offline. I don't think they care. They probably care about music industry getting worked up about it if it was more mainstream though. This is annoying because I don't even download music, just podcasts and interviews.

They care quite a bit, yt-dlp has had to undergo some drastic changes recently to make it faster for its devs to work around frequent changes to YouTube encryption.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45898407

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#102
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As consumer I would love to see lower prices directly. Or at least have available some official store affiliate discount code which would give me same discount which would be win win for everyone.

Cut the middleman and order directly from china

Which also offers cashback through Honey and similar!

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capitalism is great at washing its hands of evil. I don't know how much slavery went into making the smart phone that I'm posting this from, but I'm sure it's not zero. I'm ethically complicit in the whole scheme. The C in ACAB stands for Capitalists. Which unfortunately, is all of us.

We're not fully complicit all of the time. You don't know how many slaves made your phone, but somebody does. If you had a choice between a phone you knew was made by slaves and a phone that wasn't I assume you'd pick the slave free version every time. While it's fine to feel guilty for your involvement in the scheme don't let that get in the way of placing the blame for it squarely on the people who set things up th…

>If you had a choice between a phone you knew was made by slaves and a phone that wasn't I assume you'd pick the slave free version every time.

At the same cost? Sure.

At different costs? We see that is not the case.

People don't. A few do, but most don't. There are many who would still prefer the more popular phone and an ethical cost is something they only mention when asked but is given only minor weight when it comes to decision making. Some might try to justify it by saying you can't be sure a phone claiming to be ethically made actually is, but how many even considered that much when making the decision?

>While it's fine to feel guilty for your involvement in the scheme don't let that get in the way of placing the blame for it squarely on the people who set things up this way and put you in this position.

Who is really at fault on a systematic level if the population decides lower costs is what they really wants regardless of what sacrifices have to be made. If we look at a less morally challenging area, say air travel, and see how many people claim to want a nicer experience, yet airlines are always focused on cutting costs. Is that the fault of the airlines? Or is it the fault of the consumers who, despite what they say, show extreme preference for lower costing tickets? We can blame any seller at the moment, but we can't ignore the market pressures that picked the sellers who stayed and the ones who went out of business.

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my experience, it’s more likely that the engineers who got far enough in the company to be working on this code believed that their willingness to work on nefarious tasks that others might refuse or whistle-blow made them a trusted asset within the company. In industries like this there’s also a mindset of “Who cares, it’s all going to corporations anyway, why not send some of that money to the corporation that…

Do you know of anyone declining to work on a project For ethical in their view ( non military non killing) ? I’ve led a sheltered life and never met one, people have told me they wouldn’t apply for a role with a company for ethical reasons maybe they even believed they would get the job

I think most people avoid this situation one step earlier by choosing the company they work for. I.e. do you accept a job in adtech, military, adult industry, etc.

I think pretty much everyone has an internal red line, of course they will vary a lot and may even move over time.

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#105
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not malware. Marketing companies stealing commission from each other isn't malware. Giving the user less than the best possible deal isn't malware. It doesn't even upload your cookies to see if you're a tester - it does that on the client.

If I click on an affiliate link that I want to use and the extension changes that without me knowing, that’s malware for me. The intent of the user may be to use a specific affiliate link.

That's not how malware is defined - Windows ain't malware just because they occasionally make Edge open instead of what you thought were your default browser. The malware definition is way more specific than simply software that doesn't always follow user intent.

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#106

Original MegaLag video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCGT_CKGgFE You'd think that if you were an engineer building and maintaing a system like this, you'd have an "are we the baddies?" moment, but guess not.

Capitalism is great at washing its hands of evil. I don't know how much slavery went into making the smart phone that I'm posting this from, but I'm sure it's not zero. I'm ethically complicit in the whole scheme. The C in ACAB stands for Capitalists. Which unfortunately, is all of us.

[flagged]

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#107
I came here to read about fraud with honey, you know, the bees-spit-and-flowers-sperm sugary stuff.

I hear there is lots of fraud where bees honey is mixed with sugars and sold off as “honey”.

I’m disappointed this is about a browser plugin that no body in their right mind should be using at all.

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From my experience, it’s more likely that the engineers who got far enough in the company to be working on this code believed that their willingness to work on nefarious tasks that others might refuse or whistle-blow made them a trusted asset within the company. In industries like this there’s also a mindset of “Who cares, it’s all going to corporations anyway, why not send some of that money to the corporation that…

Do you know of anyone declining to work on a project For ethical in their view ( non military non killing) ? I’ve led a sheltered life and never met one, people have told me they wouldn’t apply for a role with a company for ethical reasons maybe they even believed they would get the job

Sure: A couple of years ago I joined a company doing outsourced system administration. Then it was suggested I should take care of a new client: a manufacturer of weapons with a quite shady reputation. There were already other issues I had noticed. But this was the red flag for me and I left after four weeks. My then team lead was pissed and complained I should have told beforehand that I don’t want to go down that route. But it never occured to me before that to compile a blacklist of things I won’t do. And I had been in business for more than 20 years when that happened.

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> what the engineers thought when doing design reviews for a "selective stand down" feature. Possibly a version of, “I lack the freedom to operate with a moral code at work because I’m probably replaceable, the job market makes me anxious, my family’s well-being and healthcare are tied to having a job, and I don’t believe the government has my back.”

From my experience, it’s more likely that the engineers who got far enough in the company to be working on this code believed that their willingness to work on nefarious tasks that others might refuse or whistle-blow made them a trusted asset within the company. In industries like this there’s also a mindset of “Who cares, it’s all going to corporations anyway, why not send some of that money to the corporation that…

I have noticed that in addition to this perspective there are scores of developers who espouse the idea that “we just create, what people do with our work isn’t our business.”

I understand the utilitarian qualities of the argument, but I submit that there’s a reason that capital-E-Engineering credentials typically require some kind of education in ethics-in-design.

Re: Honey's Dieselgate: Detecting and tricking testers

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I click on an affiliate link that I want to use and the extension changes that without me knowing, that’s malware for me. The intent of the user may be to use a specific affiliate link.

That's not how malware is defined - Windows ain't malware just because they occasionally make Edge open instead of what you thought were your default browser. The malware definition is way more specific than simply software that doesn't always follow user intent.

It actually does fall under the definition malware. Specifically, Honey hijacks affiliate marketing tags and replaces them with their own. This falls under the definition of the “spyware” category of malware.
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