5 ms·

Care to explain what's unreasonable with that?

by gdee 18y ago

tlrobinson 18y ago
I like to base my technology related decisions mostly on the technology, not politics. You could say that it was about technology, since he's talking about GreaseMonkey (though the same thing could probably be accomplished with user stylesheets, which I'm sure Chrome does/will support), but really he just wanted to inject his opinion about something pretty irrelevant and couldn't figure out a better way. Plus replacing the Google logo like that is a petty thing to do in the first place.
- mechanical_fish 18y ago
  I like to base my technology related decisions mostly on the technology, not politics. Well, that's your use case. Cory Doctorow has his own use case -- one which Firefox addresses much better than Chrome, at least for the moment.
bmj 18y ago
I'm not sure I'd label it "unreasonable," but if you feel so strongly about Google's business practices, shouldn't you boycott their services completely? By using their services, aren't you tacitly assenting to their business practices?
- EliAndrewC 18y ago
  Since he blocks Google's ads, they're not profiting from his usage of their services. So he could argue that he's not really supporting him if he's merely a drain on their resources.
- mechanical_fish 18y ago
  By using their services, aren't you tacitly assenting to their business practices? Certainly not! I do business with plenty of people that I disagree with. So do you, no doubt. This is a classic (i.e. "really old") line of argument against political activists. To testify to that, I give you MIT's most (in?)famous political activist, Noam Chomsky: As to how I tolerate MIT, that raises another question. There are people who argue, and I have never understood the logic of this, that a radical ought to distance himself from oppressive institutions. The logic of that argument is that Karl Marx shouldn't have studied in the British Museum which, if anything, was the symbol of the most vicious imperialism in the world... But I think Karl Marx was quite right in studying in the British Museum. He was right in using the resources and in fact the liberal values of the civilization that he was trying to overcome, against it. Remember, the goal of an activist is not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The goal is to convince the baby to join the activist's side. Which you accomplish by living inside the baby's culture, appealing to its better nature, and using all the tools at your disposal, including the baby's tools. It's not as if the whole idea of Google is fundamentally evil. It's a few specific aspects of Google's business practices that Cory dislikes -- aspects which, he might well argue, could easily be reformed without significantly affecting Google's prosperity.
  - bmj 18y ago
    Point taken. But at what point do you throw the baby out with the bathwater?
    - helveticaman 18y ago
      When the baby is Chuckie.
  - david 18y ago
    Maybe I don't understand the whole Google+China issue, but if you can do business with people you disagree with, can't Google do business with China?
    - mechanical_fish 18y ago
      Whether or not a particular aspect of Google's business with "China" [1] is ethical -- and whether or not "the business" can be readily separated into "ethical" and "unethical" pieces that can be independently pursued (or not pursued) while maintaining Google's own ethical standards -- is, not surprisingly, a question of ethics and politics. One which I don't think is best carried on here at Hacker News. [1] "China" is a word for a very big place. Does it refer to the government, or the people? Is there a difference? This footnote is too small to contain the volumes of debate which might ensue from this question.
    - olavk 18y ago
      I think his issue is not with doing business with China, but rather with the censorship Google has implemented in the Chinese version of the search. One thing is to do business with an entity you disagree with, another thing is to act unethetical (or "evil") yourself in order to do business.
      - orib 18y ago
        What's the difference between financially supporting someone who would do evil, and doing it yourself? Is hiring a hitman wrong? Is shopping at a known hitman's store, knowing that the profits he makes will be invested into killing wrong? It's an extreme example, but if you feel that something a company is doing is wrong, financially supporting them is also wrong. If you say "I'm supporting an entity that does wrong, but the benefit it brings me is greater than the guilt I feel from using them" is one thing. saying "I support them financially, but I disagree with them, therefore I'm not supporting immoral behavior, and am still moral" is just stupid and hypocritical.

Care to explain what's unreasonable with that?

by gdee 18y ago

Care to explain what's unreasonable with that?

I like to base my technology related decisions mostly on the technology, not politics. You could say that it was about technology, since he's talking about GreaseMonkey (though the same thing could probably be accomplished with user stylesheets, which I'm sure Chrome does/will support), but really he just wanted to inject his opinion about something pretty irrelevant and couldn't figure out a better way. Plus replacing the Google logo like that is a petty thing to do in the first place.

mechanical_fish 18y ago
I like to base my technology related decisions mostly on the technology, not politics. Well, that's your use case. Cory Doctorow has his own use case -- one which Firefox addresses much better than Chrome, at least for the moment.

bmj 18y ago

I'm not sure I'd label it "unreasonable," but if you feel so strongly about Google's business practices, shouldn't you boycott their services completely? By using their services, aren't you tacitly assenting to their business practices?

EliAndrewC 18y ago
Since he blocks Google's ads, they're not profiting from his usage of their services. So he could argue that he's not really supporting him if he's merely a drain on their resources.
mechanical_fish 18y ago
By using their services, aren't you tacitly assenting to their business practices? Certainly not! I do business with plenty of people that I disagree with. So do you, no doubt. This is a classic (i.e. "really old") line of argument against political activists. To testify to that, I give you MIT's most (in?)famous political activist, Noam Chomsky: As to how I tolerate MIT, that raises another question. There are people who argue, and I have never understood the logic of this, that a radical ought to distance himself from oppressive institutions. The logic of that argument is that Karl Marx shouldn't have studied in the British Museum which, if anything, was the symbol of the most vicious imperialism in the world... But I think Karl Marx was quite right in studying in the British Museum. He was right in using the resources and in fact the liberal values of the civilization that he was trying to overcome, against it. Remember, the goal of an activist is not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The goal is to convince the baby to join the activist's side. Which you accomplish by living inside the baby's culture, appealing to its better nature, and using all the tools at your disposal, including the baby's tools. It's not as if the whole idea of Google is fundamentally evil. It's a few specific aspects of Google's business practices that Cory dislikes -- aspects which, he might well argue, could easily be reformed without significantly affecting Google's prosperity.
- bmj 18y ago
  Point taken. But at what point do you throw the baby out with the bathwater?
  - helveticaman 18y ago
    When the baby is Chuckie.
- david 18y ago
  Maybe I don't understand the whole Google+China issue, but if you can do business with people you disagree with, can't Google do business with China?
  - mechanical_fish 18y ago
    Whether or not a particular aspect of Google's business with "China" [1] is ethical -- and whether or not "the business" can be readily separated into "ethical" and "unethical" pieces that can be independently pursued (or not pursued) while maintaining Google's own ethical standards -- is, not surprisingly, a question of ethics and politics. One which I don't think is best carried on here at Hacker News. [1] "China" is a word for a very big place. Does it refer to the government, or the people? Is there a difference? This footnote is too small to contain the volumes of debate which might ensue from this question.
  - olavk 18y ago
    I think his issue is not with doing business with China, but rather with the censorship Google has implemented in the Chinese version of the search. One thing is to do business with an entity you disagree with, another thing is to act unethetical (or "evil") yourself in order to do business.
    - orib 18y ago
      What's the difference between financially supporting someone who would do evil, and doing it yourself? Is hiring a hitman wrong? Is shopping at a known hitman's store, knowing that the profits he makes will be invested into killing wrong? It's an extreme example, but if you feel that something a company is doing is wrong, financially supporting them is also wrong. If you say "I'm supporting an entity that does wrong, but the benefit it brings me is greater than the guilt I feel from using them" is one thing. saying "I support them financially, but I disagree with them, therefore I'm not supporting immoral behavior, and am still moral" is just stupid and hypocritical.