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The problem is the change with success. Page and Brin where once idealistic hackers and even came up with a catch phrase of "Don't be evil", fast forward and it
by kls 6y ago
The problem is the change with success. Page and Brin where once idealistic hackers and even came up with a catch phrase of "Don't be evil", fast forward and it did not work and the reality is it probably had very little to do with them. Success and size whittle away at idealistic visions. You need to put together a framework before you are successful, on how you are going to enforce that your core values reflect with success and size and it has to have teeth. I am confident you are a good person and you are idealistic. The problem is, that you won't always be steering the ship.
- kirubakaran 6y agoYes, that's a great point. Is a strong privacy policy the solution? I do have one in place. I'm happy to put in stronger commitments. Another thing to highlight here: Histre is a paid product. I'm bootstrapping it. I think that it is the "free" products that go the adtech route. By charging the users, I'm making it clear that it is their money that supports Histre.
- kls 6y agoI would say a legal poison pill, something that builds a framework that the company is dissolved if the core tenants are violated, or that all digital assets are forfeited to a no-profit privacy group.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- panopticon 6y agoI know very little about this kind of stuff, but is there anything that would prevent a controlling party from striking the poison pill provisions from the bylaws? Usually poison pills are to trip up parties without controlling interest, so I'm curious what kind of legal framework would making something like that unchangeable.
- hansvm 6y agoYour target audience might not care, but I don't think that's strong enough. - Companies display a willingness to force agreement to new policies in order to continue using the service, even for paid customers, and often on questionable or void legal footing. - The fact that it's a paid service right now might not be a strong enough signal. Even large device manufacturers (e.g. HTC) have retroactively patched ads into paid-in-full, physical products. What's to say that you won't have to pivot to make Histre succeed? - What happens if you are bought out or otherwise personally leave the product? Even if success doesn't affect how you act on your commitments, what's to keep others from malicious actions? - Adding to the above (re-iterating an ancestor comment), if you're successful enough to need employees you won't have a hand in every decision. How then is privacy still protected? Privacy aside, if Histre goes under what options do customers have for, e.g., exporting their data?
- kirubakaran 6y agoThanks, good points, I'll think about them. Re exporting data: I'm working on that. There will be org-mode export first. Then json.