
The Phony Patriots of Silicon Valley - Bhilai
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/12/technology/the-phony-patriots-of-silicon-valley.html
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mlb_hn
I think the author might be confusing nationalism and patriotism? I'm not sure
what's unpatriotic about working with other countries while recognizing that
those countries have their own interests.

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nostromo
This article had me cringing.

Peter Theil was right to criticize Google cozying up to China. But rather than
respond to that point, this guy calls him a hypocrite for backing a
seasteading company and gaining dual citizenship in another country. Why argue
with his original point when you can just throw ad hominem attacks around?

Plus all of the dog whistles in this article are below the NY Times. Implying
that Zuckerberg speaks Mandarin and therefore can't be trusted on China is
beyond ridiculous. Or that Google is "rallying around the flag" just because
they met with Trump once (I mean, he's the president... ignoring him isn't
exactly an option.)

~~~
rconti
I'm sorry, I fail to see how critiquing his attempts to move his billions
offshore and gain citizenship abroad is an "ad hominem attack" rather than
"legitimate criticism of his alleged patriotism"

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ETHisso2017
Can we just all agree most big tech companies are systems of power, and they
will gravitate to other systems of power (the US, China) based on whatever
best advances their own interests at a particular moment in time?

~~~
logicallee
if I have the ideas, I'm the one with the power. I remember when Google first
had notions of "don't be evil", and I thought that was good enough. It's in
their original shareholder documents.

Apparently that isn't good enough. But what's to keep someone like me from
looking at the fact that Google's original structure wasn't good enough, so
that essentially there is a diff where they take out "don't be evil" from
their corporate charter, and deciding: okay, we need something more formal, so
that a company can't just diff "don't be evil" out of its documents.

What's to stop someone from starting a company and giving it a constitution
not to be evil, defining evil, giving it 9 justices as a balance of power, and
so on?

Corporate documents have a ton of weight.

For reference, here is the exact moment Google diff'd "don't be evil" out of
one of its own documents:

[https://gizmodo.com/google-removes-nearly-all-mentions-of-
do...](https://gizmodo.com/google-removes-nearly-all-mentions-of-dont-be-evil-
from-1826153393)

I'll now quote this write-up extensively.

>"Google Removes 'Don't Be Evil' Clause From Its Code of Conduct"

>“Don’t be evil” has been part of the company’s corporate code of conduct
since 2000. When Google was reorganized under a new parent company, Alphabet,
in 2015, Alphabet assumed a slightly adjusted version of the motto, “do the
right thing.” However, Google retained its original “don’t be evil” language
until the past several weeks. The phrase has been deeply incorporated into
Google’s company culture—so much so that a version of the phrase has served as
the wifi password on the shuttles that Google uses to ferry its employees to
its Mountain View headquarters, sources told Gizmodo.

>Here’s the relevant section of the old code of conduct, as archived by the
Wayback Machine on April 21, 2018:

>> “Don’t be evil.” Googlers generally apply those words to how we serve our
users. But “Don’t be evil” is much more than that. Yes, it’s about providing
our users unbiased access to information, focusing on their needs and giving
them the best products and services that we can. But it’s also about doing the
right thing more generally – following the law, acting honorably, and treating
co-workers with courtesy and respect.

>> The Google Code of Conduct is one of the ways we put “Don’t be evil” into
practice. It’s built around the recognition that everything we do in
connection with our work at Google will be, and should be, measured against
the highest possible standards of ethical business conduct. We set the bar
that high for practical as well as aspirational reasons: Our commitment to the
highest standards helps us hire great people, build great products, and
attract loyal users. Trust and mutual respect among employees and users are
the foundation of our success, and they are something we need to earn every
day.

>> So please do read the Code, and follow both its spirit and letter, always
bearing in mind that each of us has a personal responsibility to incorporate,
and to encourage other Googlers to incorporate, the principles of the Code
into our work. And if you have a question or ever think that one of your
fellow Googlers or the company as a whole may be falling short of our
commitment, don’t be silent. We want – and need – to hear from you.

>And here’s the updated version, first archived by the Wayback Machine on May
4, 2018:

>> The Google Code of Conduct is one of the ways we put Google’s values into
practice. It’s built around the recognition that everything we do in
connection with our work at Google will be, and should be, measured against
the highest possible standards of ethical business conduct. We set the bar
that high for practical as well as aspirational reasons: Our commitment to the
highest standards helps us hire great people, build great products, and
attract loyal users. Respect for our users, for the opportunity, and for each
other are foundational to our success, and are something we need to support
every day.

>> So please do read the Code and Google’s values, and follow both in spirit
and letter, always bearing in mind that each of us has a personal
responsibility to incorporate, and to encourage other Googlers to incorporate,
the principles of the Code and values into our work. And if you have a
question or ever think that one of your fellow Googlers or the company as a
whole may be falling short of our commitment, don’t be silent. We want – and
need – to hear from you.

>Despite this significant change, Google’s code of conduct says it has not
been updated since April 5, 2018.

\----------

TO me the words removed from the first version are very powerful:

>“Don’t be evil.” Googlers generally apply those words to how we serve our
users. But “Don’t be evil” is much more than that. Yes, it’s about providing
our users unbiased access to information, focusing on their needs and giving
them the best products and services that we can. But it’s also about doing the
right thing more generally – following the law, acting honorably, and treating
co-workers with courtesy and respect.

That reminds me of the Google I knew in 2000. The diff removes that language.
It is literally saying "don't be evil is over."

It is like a diff that goes from "We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with
certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit
of happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among
men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed" to "We
recognize that many people feel, wrongly or rightly, as though they have
rights, such as 'liberty' or to do as they please. It is important to
recognize that some people will feel that governments only have 'just powers'
when they are serving the will of the people." You know, almost passive
aggressive disdain.

But if I put language like the first version into my corporate charter, what's
to keep the next CEO from just removing it, and saying, "nah, thanks for the
goodwill you built up for me, we're going remove that now. I'll be out in 5
years anyway. Time to make a lot of money."

For example the removed language explicitly says "providing our users unbiased
access to information, focusing on their needs and giving them the best
products and services that we can". But if a government wants to censor
information? Or it is possible to make more money by removing this?

Then you can just remove this language and call it a day. So structurally,
what ways do I have of keeping this from happening to a company that I found?

I feel like an independent ethical judiciary would be a good step. Companies
are insanely powerful, they can do whatever they are set up to do
structurally. What's the correct structure here?

~~~
andrekandre
> I feel like an independent ethical judiciary would be a good step. Companies
> are insanely powerful, they can do whatever they are set up to do
> structurally. What's the correct structure here?

there are companies that are owned by their actual stakeholders, i.e the
customers[1] and/or the employees[2], in that circumstance changing the
corporate charter would require the actual people affected by it to have to
vote on the change and approve by some amount of majority depending on how the
bylaws are setup

my guess is, if it was up to google employees themselves, don’t be evil” would
not have been removed, and might have even been expanded upon

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumers%27_co-
operative](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consumers%27_co-operative)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_cooperative](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_cooperative)

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jrochkind1
This opinion column, written with an argument "These hypocritical tech company
execs" is missing the actual story: In the United States right now, companies
feel that making statements in line with government propaganda and actions
that symbolically support it, is what will make the difference between being
regulated or not, in business success. The regulators will decide what and how
to regulate based on how much a company is liked by the President.

From drain the swap to a political commissar in every swamp. (These are the
people that don't like socialism? This is the worst part about socialism! This
is the worst kind of 'political correctness', government-enforced) Support our
political program, we'll leave your business alone. It's practically a
protection racket.

(of COURSE they're all hypocrites, in business and government both, it's just
not news, and not nearly as alarming as the part that is news).

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shadowmore
Full-blown globalists until they want something, whether less regulation or
$8/hr foreign slave labor.

Late stage capitalism clearly isn't compatible with actual patriotism. Most
patently patriotic business (and government) decisions would nowadays be
called "isolationist" or whatnot. We're a long way from the Mad Men era.

