521–530 of 546 posts
Fun fact: I emailed Tim Cook in August after reading this story in the NYT, asking him to publicly oppose a weak federal privacy bill in the US [1]. I thought they might do it when Bud Tribble, Apple's privacy czar, testified in Congress at the hearing about privacy [2]. He was mostly non-committal until about the time when someone asked if California's law should be preempted, and he answered 'yes' but only if the l…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is that hypocritical? Apple does not require that you upload personal data to their cloud, and Apple has no say in Chinese law. Additionally, Apple's participation in the market (or lack thereof) would have no impact on Chinese data privacy laws, but participation has positive global effects through economies of scale and R&D revenue. A real hypocrite would actually have to enable oppressive behavior... selling d…
> Why is that hypocritical? Apple does not require that you upload personal data to their cloud, and Apple has no say in Chinese law. They have a say in whether they are complicit. That they choose to operate in that anti-privacy market while demeaning others choosing to operate in their anti-privacy market is hypocritical. Could be considered worse if you factor in the consequences of that data. > A real hypocrite w…
However, a hypocrite's stated beliefs directly contradicts their autonomous actions, often with intent to deceive. China's state coercion voids any claims of hypocrisy.
Furthermore, from a privacy perspective I'd argue it is more ethical for Apple to participate than withdraw. Apple does try to provide as much privacy as possible within Chinese law, following the letter of the law and no more. Withdrawing forces people to use their competitors, which happily go beyond the law to appease state authorities.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I would phrase it differently. I am grateful for Apple, but we should not be—asking companies to have morals is like asking rain to fall upwards. Regulation is the appropriate method for dictating companies to behave in a certain way.
The market is an appropriate method for dictating companies to behave in a certain way. The market could speak tomorrow and Facebook could be finished. That users are apathetic isn’t a failure of the market.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>We're going to need platforms that support group encryption and better security for apps. Definitely. Though I also feel we need to give a shock to public awareness of just how evil people can be with this data. My perception is that people are trending towards "vaguely uncomfortable" with the news of foreign interference with targeted ads, election hacking, and so on, but we've a ways to go yet before most will giv…
Maybe some vigilante can create a website where you can type in anyone's name and it connects to these apis, server-side in a sovereign territory, then spits out redacted info about every facet of that person's life so you know it's legitimate and then get a few big news orgs to pick up the story about tech companies abusing data or something....
I do think there's potential in something along these lines, but I agree with child post that it would need to be done carefully so as not to cause collateral damage. The other question in my mind is how to market it such that people get their friends using it and thus spread the word rather than panicking and reporting it.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Personally, I think the MagSafe connector was bloody brilliant and I'm not giving up my mid-2015 MBP until it absolutely won't function any more, because of that feature (it's saved my MBP several times when I was a bit clumsy or forgetful). Another reason: the multiplicity of ports and bunches of things that all use USB-A.
I believe there's a product, or at least a Kickstarter, to add a MagSafe-style dongle to a USB-C port.
1. There is no equivalent for Facebook and apple cannot build a one with privacy 2. There is none from Google-Search and apple has not built one 3. About WhatsApp? (iMessages - yes only within walled garden!) 4. Google groups-? 5. Browser? Safari? 6. Calendar -> Even creating a icloud account needs iDevice 7. Cant create more than 2 Apple account from same iphone!
I don't get Tim Cook and especially the PR style love of him and apple here. 1. Tim Cook accepts billions to make google the default search on apple products. 2. Tim Cook works with/colludes with the chinese government to sell apple products ( god knows what info they are sharing with the chinese government ) 3. Tim Cook loves exploiting near-slave chinese labor ( some who commit suicide ). https://www.bbc.com/news/b…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
By other companies I mean companies like Cambridge Analytica. There are tons of other shady companies out there doing nefarious things with your data. We're going to need platforms that support group encryption and better security for apps.
As a person living in the current world, I want to thank you for both standing up against these kind of requests, and for leaving money on the table, which other companies like Cambridge Analitica easily grabbed. I don't know if there's any way for people/companies like you to defend against unscrupulous companies. I can only say thank you.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
And people wonder why I've argued that, at some point, IT needs to be a certified and regulated profession like lawyers, doctors, engineers, nurses, pilots, accountants, electricians, plumbers, teachers, etc. If the future is going to be built using software and data, it's probably going to be essential that the general public have some agency -- public or private -- to safeguard the public interest. It takes years o…
And people wonder why I've argued that, at some point, IT needs to be a certified and regulated profession like lawyers, doctors, engineers, nurses, pilots, accountants, electricians, plumbers, teachers, etc. Awesome idea. The same governments who are sending RFPs to burtonator's company will then have the ability to decide who is even allowed to work in the industry.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why not? The decision first comes from management, but engineers are the ones who implement it. I think things would change pretty quick if engineers responded to such requests with "I can't do that, because my professional association would remove me from their membership, which would revoke my license to write software in this country at all". That's how (AIUI) law, medicine, (real) engineering, etc., work today.
“I can’t prescribe you this drug because it’s more expensive than the generic one ... despite their sponsoring me and my family to their annual conference in the Bahamas.” “I can’t recommend this additional procedure for you despite it making me $8500 in a day.” Regulation doesn’t seem to influence for profit medicine much.
The whole conversation is logged or perhaps converted speech2text as they discuss, and both patient and doctor sign each statement they make. Then both doctor and patient have a copy of their interaction.
Any poor advice is now provable to a third party (say court).