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Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

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Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#111

Post by baq »

dang wrote: post #80
rubatuga wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These articles are sent lower in the ranking because the mods feel they aren't very constructive

I wouldn't put it that way. It has more to do with avoiding too much repetition and making sure the front page isn't completely dominated by hot controversies, which would defeat the purpose of the site. (I hope everyone remembers what the purpose is: intellectual curiosity. See https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html .) Here are some recent explanations I've written about this: https://news.ycombinator.com/…

I greatly appreciate the amount of thought that goes into HN moderation. This is one of the very few places where popularity doesn't equal lowest common denominator content.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#112

Post by m0xte »

neighbour wrote: post #109
m0xte wrote: post #104

The privacy stance is just marketing. They have handed over iCloud keys and data to the state in China already. If they cared about privacy over market dominance that wouldn’t have happened. Unfortunately as an iOS user tied to the ecosystem this puts me in a difficult situation ethically speaking. I am sponsoring this. Perhaps I should stop buying into corporate marketing ideologies. Got burned by that before (Micro…

I have seen this posted before. Can you link me to the proof? Genuinely curious.

https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-china-apple-icloud-insight...

Fundamentally they moved their kit into a state owned data centre.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#113

Post by idlewords »

dang wrote: post #80
rubatuga wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These articles are sent lower in the ranking because the mods feel they aren't very constructive

I wouldn't put it that way. It has more to do with avoiding too much repetition and making sure the front page isn't completely dominated by hot controversies, which would defeat the purpose of the site. (I hope everyone remembers what the purpose is: intellectual curiosity. See https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html .) Here are some recent explanations I've written about this: https://news.ycombinator.com/…

I think when the story is a suppression campaign, where you see the world's most powerful company do an about-face twice in three days because of political pressure, you should think carefully about the implications of your own decision to suppress coverage and discussion of the event (which I understand is done from unrelated motives).

By your own logic, if China (god forbid) invades Hong Kong, there would be even more China/tech coverage, and therefore Hacker News will be even less likely to cover it, in favor of stories about ancient Albanian cartography or whatever else is novel and not divisive.

I urge you to reflect more on the way your "downvote stuff we talked about already" interacts with escalating crises, particularly around the topic of online censorship. I know you already reflect a lot!

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#114

Post by rjf72 »

idlewords wrote: post #101
rjf72 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This [1] is the video of the first shooting in the Hong Kong protests - reasonably safe for life for anybody who has not seen it. Something I didn't understand when I first saw the video is how the protesters were able to do what they do. An armed group of protesters moved rapidly towards their target, and manage to ambush him around a blind corner. Their target was a single police officer that seems to have temporar…

Just look at the app. It doesn't have the spatial resolution to do this, nor does it identify individual officers, and it's got a considerable lag in real time. Or look at the video preceding this incident, and you'll see that the officers ran ahead of their group, and the kids confronting them were not looking at their phones because they were busy trying not to get shot. Or come and see for yourself. Or rely on the…

> Or look at the video preceding this incident, and you'll see that the officers ran ahead of their group, and the kids confronting them were not looking at their phones because they were busy trying not to get shot.

Are you saying this video is taken out of context? Please do share any available video evidence. I assure you I tried quite hard to try to find more and this all I came up with! This is the thing that most confuses me about these protests. They are, by far, the most widely recorded protests in a developed nation - yet lengthy in context footage of the critical events events is surprisingly difficult to come by. Instead we just get snippets taken out of context that can be framed to show anything you want to show.

For instance this [1] is Reuters reporting of this video entitled "Dramatic footage captures moment when Hong Kong protester was shot." It strips out absolutely all context and splices the video together in a way that even makes it seem like it's an officer charging a protester who is simply trying to defend himself from an officer drawing a gun. It then includes clips from a police statement which, without the context of what that conflict was about, paired with the selected footage they provided sounds comically absurd.

This is absolutely propaganda, and quite ham handed propaganda at that. But of course there is also extensive propaganda coming from the Chinese side as well. It makes it all extremely difficult to have any clue of what is really happening. If you have any recommendations whatsoever on lengthy uninterrupted film footage on these events, I am absolutely all ears.

[1] - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-anniversary-hongkon...

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#115

Post by frankacter »

nneonneo wrote: post #14
idlewords wrote: post #7

This move comes after Apple re-instated the app into the app store under public pressure. This comes after Apple told Senator Howley that the decision to block the app had been a mistake: https://twitter.com/HawleyMO/status/1180214941867036672 It's important for the discussion that this app does not violate any local laws in Hong Kong. It is a safety tool. You can check out the web version here (click icons and paste…

Using a dog icon for the police isn’t exactly a great look if you’re trying to be neutral. It’s roughly equivalent to using a pig to represent the police in the US. I don’t see why they couldn’t have just used one of the standard emoji for police there - it’d be a lot less likely to offend.

As a counterpoint, I grew up with McGruff the Crime Dog, which is still used today:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGruff_the_Crime_Dog

Also worth noting that K9 Units are heavily utilized by police

https://www.police.gov.hk/ppp_en/11_useful_info/pdu/index.ht...

There is a historical precedent of that association.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#116

Post by idlewords »

rjf72 wrote: post #114
idlewords wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just look at the app. It doesn't have the spatial resolution to do this, nor does it identify individual officers, and it's got a considerable lag in real time. Or look at the video preceding this incident, and you'll see that the officers ran ahead of their group, and the kids confronting them were not looking at their phones because they were busy trying not to get shot. Or come and see for yourself. Or rely on the…

> Or look at the video preceding this incident, and you'll see that the officers ran ahead of their group, and the kids confronting them were not looking at their phones because they were busy trying not to get shot. Are you saying this video is taken out of context? Please do share any available video evidence. I assure you I tried quite hard to try to find more and this all I came up with! This is the thing that mo…

There are a number of people livestreaming all the protests, including setups where you can watch multiple streams on a page. One of the streamers is a hero who rolls up to protests in a wheelchair.

There's also lots and lots of long-form protest footage available, but you need a Chinese speaker to help you Google your way to it.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#117

Post by simonh »

m0xte wrote: post #104

The privacy stance is just marketing. They have handed over iCloud keys and data to the state in China already. If they cared about privacy over market dominance that wouldn’t have happened. Unfortunately as an iOS user tied to the ecosystem this puts me in a difficult situation ethically speaking. I am sponsoring this. Perhaps I should stop buying into corporate marketing ideologies. Got burned by that before (Micro…

It's really not a matter of ideology, it's a matter of law. They either comply with Chinese law, or they risk their employees being arrested for breaking the law, or they stop doing business in China.

I think they would argue that, given that all phones are subject to state surveillance, iPhone users in China are no worse off than if they were using another phone. Also since iPhones are generally a lot more secure than other phones against non-state attacks, they are actually better off than they would otherwise be.

That's a tough call. I have family in China, since my wife is Chinese, and they have iPhones. Would they be better off if Apple pulled out of Chine or worse off?

Well, they chose iPhones and they are more secure so isn't it up to them? They wouldn't thank me if I took their iPhones away. On the other hand, if Apple pulled out of China on privacy grounds, it would be massive news. It would not be something the Chinese government could ignore, and might conceivably raise awareness of pervasive state surveillance in China.

But people in China are already very much aware of pervasive state surveillance. They even have a social credit system based on watching everything they do. Chinese state control of public narratives is so total, I actually doubt it would make any difference.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#118

Post by simonh »

austhrow743 wrote: post #103
lilyball wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I admit to being confused what this has to do with privacy.

Privacy is good. By being better for privacy than the worlds largest advertising company/consumer spy agency, Apple announced its intent to be for all that is good in the world. That it's a shining beacon of morality. Protector of Italian virginity. China is bad. By capitulating to them after having declared themselves the enforcer of all that is good and holy, Apple has thus committed hypocrisy.

Apple has simply said it will pursue user privacy and security to the limits of what the law will allow. That is all.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#119

Post by Illniyar »

tibbydudeza wrote: post #24

This is their Blizzard moment. So Apple are just the same as Google , Facebook and the rest of them , top please their shareholders for the almighty buck. So the lesson here is to rather use the Android platform if you want "freedom".

Hkmap.live is available on the google play store. You can also sideload whatever app you want.

So not "the same" as google.

Re: Apple Removes HKmap.live from the App Store

#120

Post by epaga »

dang wrote: post #96
epaga wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably 1. flagged by a number of Chinese users and 2. auto-detected as “controversial” which often are more noise than signal. I hope this is manually set as an exception. This is an extremely important topic in the tech world and needs to be discussed.

Yes, we've manually set this as an exception. The problem is that we can't set every story as exception, or even every important story. So the complaint—"why is X, which is important, off the front page with massive points while Y, which is trivial, is on the front page with pathetic points?"—will ever be with us.

Totally agree with the rule of thumb and deeply appreciate the decision to make an exception in this case.
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