4 ms·

> And it's not just about anti-trust; you also never want to talk in any kind of discoverable medium how an engineering short-cut in the development of your pro

> And it's not just about anti-trust; you also never want to talk in any kind of discoverable medium how an engineering short-cut in the development of your product (say, like a 737) is going to cause people to get killed. You don't see the fucking problem with this policy? Ultimately, I guess the solution here is that this "training" ought to be considered as damning as the kind of speech that it tries to forbid. This is like trying to get out of a drunk driving ticket by smoking weed and wearing a blindfold.

jeffbee 6y ago
No, it's not like that at all. What you don't want is a bunch of nerds with no idea what they are talking about writing an email that says "I don't think this follows standard safety practices" because then that will be admitted into court even if the author has no knowledge whatsoever about industry standard practices. The training is more about getting nerds to shut the hell up, and less about some great conspiracy against humanity.
- iguy 6y ago
  I get that damping down language on "dominating the market" isn't going to hurt anyone. But on engineering matters, it does seem problematic to put legal before technical. Instead of people using the medium they would otherwise use to communicate something they are concerned about, they are supposed to stop, think about the company's image, and instead remember to bring it up in person tomorrow? Don't dare email a guy you know on the other production line to see if he's noticed the same pattern? This does seem like a nudge toward sweeping problems under the rug.
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    I don't believe that delay is part of the training. As I recall, the training advises people with such concerns to raise the matter with their product counsel immediately. ETA by the way, the training does not discourage people from making statements of fact in discoverable docs, it discourages people from drawing conclusions of law. If you emailed Bob down on the production line to mention that you had 42 failed gFrobs on Tuesday, and asked Bob how many he had, that's not discouraged. If you were to instead mail Bob and said "Those Panamanian safety regulators are gonna be pissed, LOL!" that is discouraged.
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    "Hey Cheryl, let's meet tomorrow and confirm we've considered all possible concerns on the privacy constraints around data storage for X" is preferable to putting in an email "Cheryl, we need to meet tomorrow. If we launch X as is, there's a huge privacy hole and we're going to get sued." In essence, that's all the training says regarding this topic.
    - iguy 6y ago
      It still seems that every time you push people from vividly describing what the problem is, as they see it, to cloaking it in something bureaucratic like "considered all possible concerns", you get lower bandwidth. And, both your setups imagine the main course being a verbal meeting tomorrow, no notes, only memories. Sometimes this is a great way to hash out problems. Sometimes it's not. Maybe the underling is scared that his words will be twisted by Cheryl on the way to big boss Bob, and would prefer to write it down to cover his ass... and if he can't, maybe he convinces himself it's not a big deal, and doesn't tell Cheryl at all.
      - shadowgovt 6y ago
        If the underling has a reason to be scared, they should commit it to writing. But that's a different scenario than the one the training is talking about. The training is talking about how to avoid accidentally shooting oneself in the foot by misunderstanding what can happen in legal discovery.
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
  - Arainach 6y ago
    Give them a call. Walk over to their desk. There's no need to wait, but there's also no need to present things out of context. There are two kinds of companies: Companies that advise their employees to watch their language on all discoverable mediums, and those that have never been sued before. Most large companies are in the latter group. In tech, it's much more obvious - unless you're working on hardware, the odds of your code directly posing a threat to life is rather low. The odds that some passionate employees may start a discussion on a large email group discussing ongoing legal action against your company that's been in the news, and that they will say something misinformed that will get quoted out of context, is incredibly high. Never say anything in an email that you wouldn't want presented out of context in a courtroom. And unless you want all of your emails to be legally mandated to be retained for a few years, I'd avoid talking about anything relevant to ongoing or potential lawsuits over discoverable mediums.
    - iguy 6y ago
      > watch their language on all discoverable mediums, and those that have never been sued Yes I see how this has come about. I'm trying to say that it's not a very healthy place for our society to have ended up. And I'm explicitly not talking about discussing ongoing legal action, or speculating about politics. I'm talking about technical matters, and communication bandwidth between people close to the coalface who may notice some pattern, and people higher up from whom this might be hidden, if the incentives are wrong. Sometimes talking to people in person is the best from all perspectives, sure. But illiterate societies never built jet airliners.
- Nullabillity 6y ago
  Or.. you could document what safety practices you do follow, and refer to those when people get curious. Or take their concerns seriously if it's not covered already. You do care, right?
- whimsicalism 6y ago
  > The training is more about getting nerds to shut the hell up, and less about some great conspiracy against humanity. So uh, don't talk about potential engineering problems that might kill you, and after the first response pushing back, you characterize the people highlighting these issues as a "bunch of nerds." Honestly, no clue why people could possibly have a problem with corporate America, seems pretty healthy and non-toxic to me.
  - jeffbee 6y ago
    Are you here to question whether this industry as a whole lacks social skills, or do you have some other, as-yet-unmentioned objection?
    - michaelt 6y ago
      Some people reading your post [1] believe you're saying either that aircraft designers are less qualified than lawyers to determine whether an aircraft is airworthy - or that aircraft designers should prioritise protecting their employer's money over protecting their passengers' lives. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24782526 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24782526
tytso 6y ago
There are ways to raise issues related to product safety that don't potentially leave you in the very uncomfortable position of being a witness in a court proceeding. (Trust me, this is not going to be a pleasant experience, so if you don't care about your fiduciary duty to your employer, you might want to learn how to raise these issues so you can meet your engineering ethical demands and at the same time, not risk landing you and your company in a super-uncomfortable position, whether it's in a lawsuit, or at a congressional hearing. "No Senator, that's not exactly what I meant....")
- Nullabillity 6y ago
  > so if you don't care about your fiduciary duty to your employer Your duties are to: 1. Society at large 2. Your users 3. Yourself 4. Your company In that order. > you might want to learn how to raise these issues so you can meet your engineering ethical demands and at the same time, not risk landing you and your company in a super-uncomfortable position, whether it's in a lawsuit, or at a congressional hearing. Or the company could, y'know, keep its shit together and steer clear of stuff that people raise congressional hearings about, rather than just trying to sweep it under the rug.
  - cycloptic 6y ago
    >the company could keep its shit together and steer clear of stuff that people raise congressional hearings about I'm sorry but is this not exactly what is being said? To steer clear of instructing other employees to perform anti-competitive behavior? I think you may be misinterpreting the parent post.
    - Nullabillity 6y ago
      No, the discussion is about acknowledging that behaviour is anti-competitive.
      - cycloptic 6y ago
        I don't see how. Acknowledging what behavior is anti-competitive is generally done by a court, not by us random posters on HN. (If you're a federal prosecutor with some authoritative insight here then please disclose :)

jeffbee 6y ago

No, it's not like that at all. What you don't want is a bunch of nerds with no idea what they are talking about writing an email that says "I don't think this follows standard safety practices" because then that will be admitted into court even if the author has no knowledge whatsoever about industry standard practices. The training is more about getting nerds to shut the hell up, and less about some great conspiracy against humanity.

iguy 6y ago
I get that damping down language on "dominating the market" isn't going to hurt anyone. But on engineering matters, it does seem problematic to put legal before technical. Instead of people using the medium they would otherwise use to communicate something they are concerned about, they are supposed to stop, think about the company's image, and instead remember to bring it up in person tomorrow? Don't dare email a guy you know on the other production line to see if he's noticed the same pattern? This does seem like a nudge toward sweeping problems under the rug.
- jeffbee 6y ago
  I don't believe that delay is part of the training. As I recall, the training advises people with such concerns to raise the matter with their product counsel immediately. ETA by the way, the training does not discourage people from making statements of fact in discoverable docs, it discourages people from drawing conclusions of law. If you emailed Bob down on the production line to mention that you had 42 failed gFrobs on Tuesday, and asked Bob how many he had, that's not discouraged. If you were to instead mail Bob and said "Those Panamanian safety regulators are gonna be pissed, LOL!" that is discouraged.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  "Hey Cheryl, let's meet tomorrow and confirm we've considered all possible concerns on the privacy constraints around data storage for X" is preferable to putting in an email "Cheryl, we need to meet tomorrow. If we launch X as is, there's a huge privacy hole and we're going to get sued." In essence, that's all the training says regarding this topic.
  - iguy 6y ago
    It still seems that every time you push people from vividly describing what the problem is, as they see it, to cloaking it in something bureaucratic like "considered all possible concerns", you get lower bandwidth. And, both your setups imagine the main course being a verbal meeting tomorrow, no notes, only memories. Sometimes this is a great way to hash out problems. Sometimes it's not. Maybe the underling is scared that his words will be twisted by Cheryl on the way to big boss Bob, and would prefer to write it down to cover his ass... and if he can't, maybe he convinces himself it's not a big deal, and doesn't tell Cheryl at all.
    - shadowgovt 6y ago
      If the underling has a reason to be scared, they should commit it to writing. But that's a different scenario than the one the training is talking about. The training is talking about how to avoid accidentally shooting oneself in the foot by misunderstanding what can happen in legal discovery.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
- Arainach 6y ago
  Give them a call. Walk over to their desk. There's no need to wait, but there's also no need to present things out of context. There are two kinds of companies: Companies that advise their employees to watch their language on all discoverable mediums, and those that have never been sued before. Most large companies are in the latter group. In tech, it's much more obvious - unless you're working on hardware, the odds of your code directly posing a threat to life is rather low. The odds that some passionate employees may start a discussion on a large email group discussing ongoing legal action against your company that's been in the news, and that they will say something misinformed that will get quoted out of context, is incredibly high. Never say anything in an email that you wouldn't want presented out of context in a courtroom. And unless you want all of your emails to be legally mandated to be retained for a few years, I'd avoid talking about anything relevant to ongoing or potential lawsuits over discoverable mediums.
  - iguy 6y ago
    > watch their language on all discoverable mediums, and those that have never been sued Yes I see how this has come about. I'm trying to say that it's not a very healthy place for our society to have ended up. And I'm explicitly not talking about discussing ongoing legal action, or speculating about politics. I'm talking about technical matters, and communication bandwidth between people close to the coalface who may notice some pattern, and people higher up from whom this might be hidden, if the incentives are wrong. Sometimes talking to people in person is the best from all perspectives, sure. But illiterate societies never built jet airliners.
Nullabillity 6y ago
Or.. you could document what safety practices you do follow, and refer to those when people get curious. Or take their concerns seriously if it's not covered already. You do care, right?
whimsicalism 6y ago
> The training is more about getting nerds to shut the hell up, and less about some great conspiracy against humanity. So uh, don't talk about potential engineering problems that might kill you, and after the first response pushing back, you characterize the people highlighting these issues as a "bunch of nerds." Honestly, no clue why people could possibly have a problem with corporate America, seems pretty healthy and non-toxic to me.
- jeffbee 6y ago
  Are you here to question whether this industry as a whole lacks social skills, or do you have some other, as-yet-unmentioned objection?
  - michaelt 6y ago
    Some people reading your post [1] believe you're saying either that aircraft designers are less qualified than lawyers to determine whether an aircraft is airworthy - or that aircraft designers should prioritise protecting their employer's money over protecting their passengers' lives. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24782526 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24782526

tytso 6y ago

There are ways to raise issues related to product safety that don't potentially leave you in the very uncomfortable position of being a witness in a court proceeding. (Trust me, this is not going to be a pleasant experience, so if you don't care about your fiduciary duty to your employer, you might want to learn how to raise these issues so you can meet your engineering ethical demands and at the same time, not risk landing you and your company in a super-uncomfortable position, whether it's in a lawsuit, or at a congressional hearing. "No Senator, that's not exactly what I meant....")

Nullabillity 6y ago
> so if you don't care about your fiduciary duty to your employer Your duties are to: 1. Society at large 2. Your users 3. Yourself 4. Your company In that order. > you might want to learn how to raise these issues so you can meet your engineering ethical demands and at the same time, not risk landing you and your company in a super-uncomfortable position, whether it's in a lawsuit, or at a congressional hearing. Or the company could, y'know, keep its shit together and steer clear of stuff that people raise congressional hearings about, rather than just trying to sweep it under the rug.
- cycloptic 6y ago
  >the company could keep its shit together and steer clear of stuff that people raise congressional hearings about I'm sorry but is this not exactly what is being said? To steer clear of instructing other employees to perform anti-competitive behavior? I think you may be misinterpreting the parent post.
  - Nullabillity 6y ago
    No, the discussion is about acknowledging that behaviour is anti-competitive.
    - cycloptic 6y ago
      I don't see how. Acknowledging what behavior is anti-competitive is generally done by a court, not by us random posters on HN. (If you're a federal prosecutor with some authoritative insight here then please disclose :)