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Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

nytimes.com

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Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#181

Post by unapologetic »

ksec wrote: post #171
nostrademons wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Eric Schmidt (also a notorious womanizer) had a saying while I was there: "More revenue solves all known problems." When everybody at the company is getting rich, they're all working on exciting problems, Fortune and Time and BusinessWeek and Playboy magazines are featuring employees on the cover, and everyone you meet is impressed at where you work, then employees are willing to overlook a large number o…

I think this sums up not just big cooperate, but large part of our society in general as well. ( May be a bigger problem in US than other parts of the world, but still a problem ) I often wonder why realistic people are called cynical, even when they are facts happening everywhere in a statistically large sums. Do others live in fairy land?

Because when you simply accept the world as is, it looks a lot like you're endorsing the status quo. Especially on this site where a lot of people seem to take a weird pseudo-detached outlook. Trying to analyze things in an almost entirely emotionless judgement free manner. I think this is seen by people as enlightened.

Personally I find it genuinely disturbing. It becomes hard to tell where this sort of detached analysis ends and where it becomes just actually not caring about or not seeing the moral issues here.

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#182

Post by LordFast »

ksec wrote: post #173
qroshan wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steve Jobs also abandoned his kid. He created a $1 Trillion company.

Oh Come on, the two story is entirely different. One was having an affair for a long time, knowingly had a child, and abandoned the child. One had a complex relationship at the time that he refuse to believe the kid was his. And he didn't "abandoned" her, he reconciled.

Ehh, that might be giving Jobs too much credit. He tried, and failed, quite a lot. But he did try.

I don't think Jobs was diddling his employees though. Big difference.

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#183

Post by harryh »

hackinthebochs wrote: post #151
rayiner wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This idea that a power differential invalidates a relationship is nonsense. Why? Seems pretty sound to me.

Because power differentials do not invalidate consent? Power differentials do not indicate coercion and people are fully capable of consenting even in the presence of power differentials. We've gotten to the point where we equate potential for abuse with abuse. Its a little ridiculous.

Surely you agree that sometimes power differentials can invalidate consent. Can sex between a police officer and another person that they have placed under arrest be consensual?

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#184

Post by rayiner »

hackinthebochs wrote: post #151
rayiner wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This idea that a power differential invalidates a relationship is nonsense. Why? Seems pretty sound to me.

Because power differentials do not invalidate consent? Power differentials do not indicate coercion and people are fully capable of consenting even in the presence of power differentials. We've gotten to the point where we equate potential for abuse with abuse. Its a little ridiculous.

Consent is the minimum required for sex to not be rape. That doesn’t mean the relationship is ethical.

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#185

Post by nostrademons »

unapologetic wrote: post #181
ksec wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this sums up not just big cooperate, but large part of our society in general as well. ( May be a bigger problem in US than other parts of the world, but still a problem ) I often wonder why realistic people are called cynical, even when they are facts happening everywhere in a statistically large sums. Do others live in fairy land?

Because when you simply accept the world as is, it looks a lot like you're endorsing the status quo. Especially on this site where a lot of people seem to take a weird pseudo-detached outlook. Trying to analyze things in an almost entirely emotionless judgement free manner. I think this is seen by people as enlightened. Personally I find it genuinely disturbing. It becomes hard to tell where this sort of detached ana…

This isn't really the site for people who want to create genuine social change in the world, other than through startups. The site guidelines say that what's on-topic is "anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity". Curiosity is more about knowing things than doing things. I think one implicit belief held by the folks who started this site is that if you do want to challenge entrenched power structures, the best way to do that is to be very circumspect about who you tell that you're challenging power structures, because you can expect to have a strong negative reaction from the power structures themselves. (Peter Thiel describes startups as "a conspiracy to change the world".)

There are other sites on the web that are attempting to organize people for large-scale social change, ones that are presumably watched (and cared about) by the FBI, as opposed to just being watched (with idle curiosity) by the FBI.

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#187

Post by celdon25 »

okaram wrote: post #174
celdon25 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the 2016 election is a good analogy, as both candidates had their share of skeletons in the closet, with the non-winning party arguably having skeletons that were more of a national security risk than a cultural one. People seem to conveniently forget this fact though.

1. That is unarguably false. 2. There were other candidates. 3. Mr Trump also won the primary.

We'll have to agree to disagree on point 1, as there's plenty of common knowledge out there that I don't need to muddy the thread with.

The parent comment was referring to the general election of 49%, and the "grab by the pussy" story broke after the primary was over, so point 3 is a straw man argument.

Edit: Sometimes I underestimate how in the dark people really are on the subject so I did a quick search to find this op ed which shows that, yes, there really were issues that voters were concerned about from a national security perspective, namely the contributions to multiple civil wars. https://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/political_co...

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#188

Post by toiletfuneral »

minikites wrote: post #125
IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that business cares only about profit is just plain wrong. The law people think of is almost never relevant. Each year, millions of business decisions are made knowing full well that it will cost a bit of money, not bring in any (or even good PR), but is the decent thing to do. As but one example: Google once gave us money for a non-profit event, in no way related to their business, with explicit instruction…

And then the shareholders punish them: https://www.vox.com/new-money/2017/4/29/15471634/american-ai... >American Airlines agreed this week to do something nice for its employees and arguably foresighted for its business by giving flight attendants and pilots a preemptive raise, in order to close a gap that had opened up between their compensation and the compensation paid by rival airlines Delta and United. >Wall Str…

Can anyone explain why they're downvoting this?

I know anecdotally My employer constantly gets in trouble during earnings calls from shareholders for doing anything remotely environmentally responsible because it impacts margins. It's pretty clear capital has no intention of being ethical at the cost of profit

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#189

Post by hackinthebochs »

rayiner wrote: post #184
hackinthebochs wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because power differentials do not invalidate consent? Power differentials do not indicate coercion and people are fully capable of consenting even in the presence of power differentials. We've gotten to the point where we equate potential for abuse with abuse. Its a little ridiculous.

Consent is the minimum required for sex to not be rape. That doesn’t mean the relationship is ethical.

I don't know of a scenario where I would say a relationship is unethical if consent is satisfied. What scenario do you have in mind?

Re: Alphabet’s Chief Legal Officer Stepping Down Amid Investigation

#190

Post by shawnz »

IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #129
seibelj wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your anecdote is true then how do you know that?

I called them and asked for money. See my use of the word "us". So, yes, maybe they did it because they knew I'd be going around using them as an example of altruism in business, 12 years later.

I think it's more likely the rationale was to support a local business, thus building a stronger community for their employees to live in, thus allowing them to be more attractive to prospective employees. Maybe they also thought it'd increase the chance that you'd apply there.
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