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Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

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Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#351

Post by angott »

inetsee wrote: post #323
angott wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be honest, that's also because they probably want their employees to use one of their 37 different video-conferencing apps.

China has been accused a number of times of engaging in industrial espionage. As a company developing a lot of high technology products, I think Google is entirely justified in keep Zoom out of its technology infrastructure.

If it wasn't clear, I was just being sarcastic about Google's huge number of messaging products... I fully agree with your statement, their move totally makes sense from an IP protection standpoint.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#352

Post by mindfulhack »

TechBro8615 wrote: post #344
john_moscow wrote: post #10

It is ironic how the western public generally frowns upon the silencing of dissident throught in China, and at the same time welcomes precisely the same behavior for "sensitive topics" back home.

Seriously. Just a week ago, Facebook employees went on strike because FB refused to censor Trump’s messaging. NYT reporters forced the opinion editor to resign for allowing a Republican senator to publish an op-ed. Meanwhile, I’ll bet many of those same people consider censorship of Tiananmen Square to be wrong. Apparently, there is good censorship, and bad censorship. What’s frustrating is that the proponents of “go…

People's primal need to 'kill the bad thing' is completely dysfunctional in our modern world, and on the Internet, hopelessly unrealistic. (There's always Tor. You can't completely get rid of something...not if it has enough interest.)

I even feel bad for the platforms due to this push and pull, with them always in the middle. Always being pressured one way or another: 'Allow this content, you're censoring us!' or 'Take down this content, it's abhorrent!'

Since the companies are the organisational equivalent of sociopaths anyway, surely they can make the hard decisions. Why not just have filters? If users don't want racist, terrible content, then just tick a box in their settings that will tune their personal algorithm to not show it! Then it's their fault they're only siloing themselves further into their own echo chamber - not the platforms'.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#353

Post by BLKNSLVR »

criddell wrote: post #99
duxup wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” -Martin Luther King Jr. This observation seems more immediate these days internationally than ever.

This feels like the kind of thing that the CEO of Zoom should be asked about under oath by a congressional committee. It's supposedly a US company so it would be interesting to see just what influence the Chinese government has over it and why.

This applies fairly universally. As in any company based in country Z and operating in countries A through Y with differing laws.

It's an intractable problem that's always been present, but what were once 'edge cases' are now front and centre as a result of technology bringing the world closer together, and therefore highlighting the areas of conflict.

Case in point: Australia's law that enforces software companies to create a backdoor in encryption for reasons of law enforcement[0][1][2].

[0]https://www.wired.com/story/australia-encryption-law-global-...

[1]https://www.theregister.com/2018/08/14/oz_encryption_backdoo...

[2]https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2018/12/new_australia...

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#355

Post by mellow2020 »

deathgrips wrote: post #214
gonehome wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are advantages to the efficiency of authoritarian power, but how do they handle peaceful transition of power? How do they handle abuse? A lot of democratic stability comes from it being hard to change things quickly, separation of power, and the existence of a lot free speech so it's hard to cover things up. Ultimately, with a dependence on the people. I could be persuaded that there are better ways to structur…

>There are advantages to the efficiency of authoritarian power, but how do they handle peaceful transition of power? Europe had hereditary transitions of power, which were about as peaceful as any other form of transition of power. In Rome you would choose your successor and he would be the next emperor. > I probably could not be persuaded that limits on speech and government censorship are good long-term for the hea…

> Do you think Americans are using free speech well?

I think that's irrelevant, since being a free individual is the main reason being alive and healthy is desirable, not the other way around. If people just existed to keep an abstract group of people alive, with no person in that group actually mattering, actually being allowed to develop as the person they are, not the group they are in -- what's the point of having people at all? What would we be doing that insects or algae aren't already doing much better?

> Just because it's supposed to work that way doesn't mean it actually works that way.

Sure, but if it's not even supposed to work that way, or is even supposed to work the opposite, then that's still a lot worse.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#356

Post by peterkos »

Twixes wrote: post #25
gonehome wrote: post #7

This kind of thing is the exact reason why I was disturbed by the Keybase.io sale to Zoom and abandoned my account. ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23105253 ) I've been currently using Zoom during the pandemic because as a product it's still the best (and I signed up for a discounted year of pro), but I won't give them any money again.

As much as I don't like consolidation of tech, I've had really good experiences with Google Meet. No scummy practices like forcing users to pretend that the app installer doesn't download just to connect from the browser either. What are Zoom's advantages?

Zoom is SO much more seamless than Meet. Its desktop clients exist, are usable, and don't force you to keep trying Chrome whenever something breaks. (I swear Google never tests their prodcuts on FF/Safari...)

Meet also has a very fixed layout. Its mic control bar on the bottom cuts off the names on the bottom row of participants. The UI on "waiting to connect" page is hilarious; it has a line of vertical dots for changing settings, and a line of horizontal dots for monitoring audio. There's a small concept in design called discoverability -- doesn't exist for Google, lol.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#357

Post by peterkos »

mindfulhack wrote: post #345
gonehome wrote: post #7

This kind of thing is the exact reason why I was disturbed by the Keybase.io sale to Zoom and abandoned my account. ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23105253 ) I've been currently using Zoom during the pandemic because as a product it's still the best (and I signed up for a discounted year of pro), but I won't give them any money again.

Thank you for the idea, just deleted my keybase.io account.

And riiight when I create one lol -- argh, nothing in this world is good!

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#358

Post by kragen »

jedberg wrote: post #94
strogonoff wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Security and ease of use are always a tradeoff. Security and ease of use are not by default mutually exclusive. Depending on circumstances satisfying both may be a challenge, but it’s not a blanket impossibility and we could probably hold certain companies up to a standard that corresponds to their multi-billion valuations. A virtual “slider” on which you can only dial up security by hurting usability is only a use…

> It’s worth keeping in mind that even though security and ease of use tend to inversely correlate with each other, they are not by default mutually exclusive. I actually disagree with you. I think security and ease of use are mutually exclusive. I can't think of a single counterexample where security did not have an effect on usability. Now to be clear, I absolutely believe we should have a lot more security than we…

[flagged]

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#359

Post by crazygringo »

loceng wrote: post #333
crazygringo wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it seems like this was ultimately a bit of a nothingburger. As much as we may not like it (and I certainly personally don't), China has the authority to censor the internet within its borders. Zoom literally has no choice but to follow China's law within China's borders, if it is to provide its product there at all. Zoom accidentally deactivated a US-based account, and fixed it when they found out. At worst, in…

I assume you're getting downvoted because you don't seem to take issue with censorship of free speech ultimately being a problem, and why people take stand against tyrants?

I've got no idea. I literally said I don't personally like it, so obviously I do take issue.

But there's no scandal with Zoom in this particular case. And this certainly isn't anything new about China.

Why people are downvoting something so factual is beyond me. You'll have to ask them.

Re: Zoom closes account of U.S.-based Chinese activist after Tiananmen event

#360

Post by a1369209993 »

newbie578 wrote: post #208
dang wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you please stop posting fulminating rhetoric to HN? No doubt your strong feelings are justified but the discussion this leads to is tedious, predictable, and nasty. The idea here is to have thoughtful comments and curious conversation. "FUCK ONE THING and FUCK OTHER THING" is...not that. Also, can you please not use allcaps for emphasis? maybe it would be a good moment to review the site guidelines: https://new…

Please do tell what should a curious conversation be about a U.S-based company which does a foreign country's bidding (China), and blatantly censors people and won't even let mothers of students who were killed in Tiananmen Square speak in a private online meeting.. This should be nothing short of condemnation and public shaming. As you said, unfortunately I may have come across as a little strong and nasty, but thes…

I don't know about you, but I'm curious about how best to go about destroying Zoom (the company) and eliminating all use of Zoom (the software tool) even among people who don't recognize the threat posed by corporate censorship.

Maybe you could start a conversation about that?

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