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Guys, we all know that Bezos is a micromanaging maniac. Because of this, he must have known (and approved) the stance that the Washington Post was taking on Sno

by oneloop 10y ago

Guys, we all know that Bezos is a micromanaging maniac. Because of this, he must have known (and approved) the stance that the Washington Post was taking on Snowden, right? What do you think? I must say that I'm disappointed with Bezos... (Separate point, I've recently been discovering that The Intercept is an outstanding paper. They have some real investigative journalism)

Jerry2 10y ago
Snowden's revelations cost Amazon billions of dollars in AWS fees. In fact, it cost tens of billions of dollars to Silicon Valley companies over the past 3 years. This is why all these SV companies hate him so much.
- yolesaber 10y ago
  Source on these claims? I don't doubt it, but i'd be interested in seeing the data
  - Jerry2 10y ago
    Do some googling on your own but here's one estimate: >“It’s clear to every single tech company that this is affecting their bottom line,” said Daniel Castro, a senior analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, who predicted that the United States cloud computing industry could lose $35 billion by 2016. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/22/business/fallout-from-snowden-hurting-bottom-line-of-tech-companies.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/22/business/fallout-from-snow...
  - spydum 10y ago
    I can say with first hand knowledge, yes, US businesses have lost out on international contracts immediately following the leaks. There are plenty of industries (legal ones), in which the realization of government monitoring caused them to change course and keep business local (or at least, significantly shift the amount of information they would trust to a US-hosted business). Doesn't matter if it's irrational or not, real money was lost to US businesses, and I'm sure Amazon would have been party to that (whether they could even distinguish it in their monsterous growth or not, who knows).
    - fixermark 10y ago
      It seems oddly short-sighted for SV companies to place blame on the messenger and not, say, the espionage system that created an ecosystem where it's perfectly sensible for people to ask whether their data is actually secure when stored on the servers of companies headquartered in a nation that spies on its own people. The US could easily have ruled the world in terms of technological sophistication in the cloud services space if the government had been able to keep its sticky fingers off of data that it didn't own. The fact that it couldn't is really the government's fault, not the man that exposed it. A secret this big doesn't stay secret.
      - x1798DE 10y ago
        > It seems oddly short-sighted for SV companies to place blame on the messenger and not, say, the espionage system that created an ecosystem where it's perfectly sensible for people to ask whether their data is actually secure when stored on the servers of companies headquartered in a nation that spies on its own people. I don't think it's about blame, it's just that you can't trust US companies with your data anymore.
  - virtuabhi 10y ago
    Try "chinese not buying cisco equipment". On mobile, not enough time to search for articles myself.
    - ericd 10y ago
      Actually, I believe this helped Cisco on the balance, as it delayed many companies on their march to cloud. China's been favoring Huawei equipment for a long time.
- zellyn 10y ago
  I worked at Google (YouTube) during the Snowden revelations. I never got the impression that Google "hated" him. In fact, that statement doesn't even make sense: Google is tens of thousands of individuals. Of course, some considered what he'd done heroic, and some treasonous. My completely subjective impression was that he was generally favourably regarded.
- oneloop 10y ago
  If Bezos stance is based on billions of dollars that Amazon lost in AWS fees then I'm even MORE disappointed. And in any case, if it's true that AWS lost billions, that's the US government's fault, not Snowden.
wilg 10y ago
Isn't the last thing you want having the billionaire editor of a newspaper influencing its editorial board?

by oneloop 10y ago

Jerry2 10y ago

Snowden's revelations cost Amazon billions of dollars in AWS fees. In fact, it cost tens of billions of dollars to Silicon Valley companies over the past 3 years. This is why all these SV companies hate him so much.

yolesaber 10y ago
Source on these claims? I don't doubt it, but i'd be interested in seeing the data
- Jerry2 10y ago
  Do some googling on your own but here's one estimate: >“It’s clear to every single tech company that this is affecting their bottom line,” said Daniel Castro, a senior analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, who predicted that the United States cloud computing industry could lose $35 billion by 2016. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/22/business/fallout-from-snowden-hurting-bottom-line-of-tech-companies.html http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/22/business/fallout-from-snow...
- spydum 10y ago
  I can say with first hand knowledge, yes, US businesses have lost out on international contracts immediately following the leaks. There are plenty of industries (legal ones), in which the realization of government monitoring caused them to change course and keep business local (or at least, significantly shift the amount of information they would trust to a US-hosted business). Doesn't matter if it's irrational or not, real money was lost to US businesses, and I'm sure Amazon would have been party to that (whether they could even distinguish it in their monsterous growth or not, who knows).
  - fixermark 10y ago
    It seems oddly short-sighted for SV companies to place blame on the messenger and not, say, the espionage system that created an ecosystem where it's perfectly sensible for people to ask whether their data is actually secure when stored on the servers of companies headquartered in a nation that spies on its own people. The US could easily have ruled the world in terms of technological sophistication in the cloud services space if the government had been able to keep its sticky fingers off of data that it didn't own. The fact that it couldn't is really the government's fault, not the man that exposed it. A secret this big doesn't stay secret.
    - x1798DE 10y ago
      > It seems oddly short-sighted for SV companies to place blame on the messenger and not, say, the espionage system that created an ecosystem where it's perfectly sensible for people to ask whether their data is actually secure when stored on the servers of companies headquartered in a nation that spies on its own people. I don't think it's about blame, it's just that you can't trust US companies with your data anymore.
- virtuabhi 10y ago
  Try "chinese not buying cisco equipment". On mobile, not enough time to search for articles myself.
  - ericd 10y ago
    Actually, I believe this helped Cisco on the balance, as it delayed many companies on their march to cloud. China's been favoring Huawei equipment for a long time.
zellyn 10y ago
I worked at Google (YouTube) during the Snowden revelations. I never got the impression that Google "hated" him. In fact, that statement doesn't even make sense: Google is tens of thousands of individuals. Of course, some considered what he'd done heroic, and some treasonous. My completely subjective impression was that he was generally favourably regarded.
oneloop 10y ago
If Bezos stance is based on billions of dollars that Amazon lost in AWS fees then I'm even MORE disappointed. And in any case, if it's true that AWS lost billions, that's the US government's fault, not Snowden.

wilg 10y ago

Isn't the last thing you want having the billionaire editor of a newspaper influencing its editorial board?