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I think as ethical, intelligent and conscious individuals, we folks in the developer and hacker community want people to make decisions on the basis of principl

I think as ethical, intelligent and conscious individuals, we folks in the developer and hacker community want people to make decisions on the basis of principles, when the reality is that people generally make decisions on the basis of convenience. In fact, people are often willing to sacrifice their principles (to a certain extent) in the name of convenience. If we want people to use principled technology, then we need to be able to honestly advertise products as "it's just as good as X, and also doesn't violate [your privacy|human rights|the environment|etc.]" If we have to say, "It's not quite as good, but..." then we're dead in the water. (Side note: I switched to Firefox out of principle and I'm hopeful it will hold the line on market share, since it really is just as good as Chrome.) The issue is that we're dealing with corporations who aren't just rich and powerful, they are also innovative, agile, and laser-focused on providing consumer value. Slack is doing an amazing job at serving their users! You wrote, "we have to find ways to make better apps built on top of open protocols." It's a really interesting dilemma and I suspect it's one that isn't solved by better technology, better design, etc., but rather by addressing the base economics of the situation. We need a scenario where principled, open-source, ethical technology is generating the kind of investment we're seeing in Silicon Valley unicorns so they can innovate the same way.

zanny 8y ago
Violating principles and respect for others is a vector for profit, which is why it always feels like a losing race. Its people in their spare time fighting against substantial revenue streams accrued from the violation of the freedoms and principles we want to uphold.
nemothekid 8y ago
If we want people to use principled technology, it has to be usable, full stop. As a developer, being able to say "I'm willing to sacrifice convenience, in the name of principle", is a privileged position - you know how to navigate software when it gets difficult - other people don't. What I find a lot of people miss when comparing Slack to IRC, is that not everyone using Slack is a developer. The world doesn't consist solely of developers - and if your company is 30% of engineers, and the other 70% doesn't have the reserve to wrestle with XML, then your company is using Slack. Otherwise, you are simply choosing to sell out your friends and family in the name of "principle" as well. Personally, I'm tired of the comparisons to IRC and XMPP. Both are garbage - time and time again its been show how difficult it is to create greate software on these protocols. Contrary to your final statement, there have been better open source applications - gitter and riot come to mind.
- u801e 8y ago
  > What I find a lot of people miss when comparing Slack to IRC, is that not everyone using Slack is a developer. I know plenty of non-technical people who chatted on IRC who were not developers. They just used the mIRC client on windows to do that. They also managed to configure their email and news clients to send and read email and browse usenet. I simply don't understand where the idea of needing a technical background came from for using something like IRC.
  - ry-n 8y ago
    > I know plenty of non-technical people who chatted on IRC who were not developers > I simply don't understand where the idea of needing a technical background came from for using something like IRC. You don't have to be a developer but you do need a level of technical background higher than that of the average computer user. There are plenty of tech-savvy, non-developers who can get up and running with things like IRC. There are plenty more non-technical users who can't. Or at least wouldn't given the learning curve time commitment. I'm the only person in my family who would be able to sign on to IRC in under an hour whereas they'd all be able to have slack up and running in a matter of minutes.
    - u801e 8y ago
      > You don't have to be a developer but you do need a level of technical background higher than that of the average computer user. Unless the technical skill of the average computer user has decreased substantially in the last 10 to 15 years, that shouldn't really be the case.
      - sotojuan 8y ago
        It has. Everyone uses computers now for less technical tasks, and some pretty much only use their phone or tablet.
        gsich 8y ago
        Time to learn something then.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
dkarl 8y ago
To have competitive apps built on top of open protocols, you need a big investment of time and money, so we need users to ask for it, or at least to reward companies when they invest money in it. For that, we need users to understand what they're asking for. An example of how it might be possible to push this in the right direction is LEED. It didn't matter what the individual environmental ethics of people manufacturing electronics and designing houses was. Environmentally efficient building practices cost more, and there was no way for all the companies involved to form an opaque conspiratorial cabal to secretly impose the cost on consumers who would rather not pay it. Instead, they created LEED and used marketing to teach end consumers that LEED stood for more environmentally responsible practices. Right now computer privacy and security are huge in the headlines, and a large number of people in the public and in industry want to do the right thing. But consumers don't know how to make the right choices, and companies aren't going to spend extra on the right thing if users are just as likely to choose something horrible. What companies need in order to invest extra capital in privacy and security is a plausible story of how to get users to choose the right thing and pay a bit more for it, if the industry builds it. They need a LEED standard for privacy and security. Then they can promote it and use it as a way to justify their investment in better, more ethical software. Corporations, schools, nonprofits, and other organizations can be pressured to make public commitments to use, or at least prefer, software that meets the standard. This won't drive horrible software out of the market, but it will create a sub-market where good software can survive. Obviously laws and regulation are the bedrock, but in areas where consumers have a choice, we need to make it easy for them to make the right choice if they want to.
- gregknicholson 8y ago
  I think the [Franklin Street Statement](https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Franklin_Street_Statement_on_Freedom_and_Network_Services#Text https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Franklin_Street_Statement_on_...) is a good start.

zanny 8y ago

Violating principles and respect for others is a vector for profit, which is why it always feels like a losing race. Its people in their spare time fighting against substantial revenue streams accrued from the violation of the freedoms and principles we want to uphold.

nemothekid 8y ago

If we want people to use principled technology, it has to be usable, full stop. As a developer, being able to say "I'm willing to sacrifice convenience, in the name of principle", is a privileged position - you know how to navigate software when it gets difficult - other people don't. What I find a lot of people miss when comparing Slack to IRC, is that not everyone using Slack is a developer. The world doesn't consist solely of developers - and if your company is 30% of engineers, and the other 70% doesn't have the reserve to wrestle with XML, then your company is using Slack. Otherwise, you are simply choosing to sell out your friends and family in the name of "principle" as well. Personally, I'm tired of the comparisons to IRC and XMPP. Both are garbage - time and time again its been show how difficult it is to create greate software on these protocols. Contrary to your final statement, there have been better open source applications - gitter and riot come to mind.

u801e 8y ago
> What I find a lot of people miss when comparing Slack to IRC, is that not everyone using Slack is a developer. I know plenty of non-technical people who chatted on IRC who were not developers. They just used the mIRC client on windows to do that. They also managed to configure their email and news clients to send and read email and browse usenet. I simply don't understand where the idea of needing a technical background came from for using something like IRC.
- ry-n 8y ago
  > I know plenty of non-technical people who chatted on IRC who were not developers > I simply don't understand where the idea of needing a technical background came from for using something like IRC. You don't have to be a developer but you do need a level of technical background higher than that of the average computer user. There are plenty of tech-savvy, non-developers who can get up and running with things like IRC. There are plenty more non-technical users who can't. Or at least wouldn't given the learning curve time commitment. I'm the only person in my family who would be able to sign on to IRC in under an hour whereas they'd all be able to have slack up and running in a matter of minutes.
  - u801e 8y ago
    > You don't have to be a developer but you do need a level of technical background higher than that of the average computer user. Unless the technical skill of the average computer user has decreased substantially in the last 10 to 15 years, that shouldn't really be the case.
    - sotojuan 8y ago
      It has. Everyone uses computers now for less technical tasks, and some pretty much only use their phone or tablet.
      - gsich 8y ago
        Time to learn something then.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

dkarl 8y ago

To have competitive apps built on top of open protocols, you need a big investment of time and money, so we need users to ask for it, or at least to reward companies when they invest money in it. For that, we need users to understand what they're asking for. An example of how it might be possible to push this in the right direction is LEED. It didn't matter what the individual environmental ethics of people manufacturing electronics and designing houses was. Environmentally efficient building practices cost more, and there was no way for all the companies involved to form an opaque conspiratorial cabal to secretly impose the cost on consumers who would rather not pay it. Instead, they created LEED and used marketing to teach end consumers that LEED stood for more environmentally responsible practices. Right now computer privacy and security are huge in the headlines, and a large number of people in the public and in industry want to do the right thing. But consumers don't know how to make the right choices, and companies aren't going to spend extra on the right thing if users are just as likely to choose something horrible. What companies need in order to invest extra capital in privacy and security is a plausible story of how to get users to choose the right thing and pay a bit more for it, if the industry builds it. They need a LEED standard for privacy and security. Then they can promote it and use it as a way to justify their investment in better, more ethical software. Corporations, schools, nonprofits, and other organizations can be pressured to make public commitments to use, or at least prefer, software that meets the standard. This won't drive horrible software out of the market, but it will create a sub-market where good software can survive. Obviously laws and regulation are the bedrock, but in areas where consumers have a choice, we need to make it easy for them to make the right choice if they want to.

gregknicholson 8y ago
I think the [Franklin Street Statement](https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Franklin_Street_Statement_on_Freedom_and_Network_Services#Text https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Franklin_Street_Statement_on_...) is a good start.