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Official Response: Request to Freeze Canadian Edge Users’ Accounts
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- SSilver2k2 5y agoOof. Not a good look for edge. I'll be the first to admit I think this protest is about a bunch of idiots with a victim complex. They should just get the vaccine like 90% of the rest of their profession have done. It's safe and is what anyone should do to help their fellow humans. The Emergencies Act is law. If Edge wants to do business in Canada they have to follow it. I don't see this ending well for them. Maybe I'm an old curmudgeon, but I also don't want to see ANY financial company using memes in an official press release.
- djbebs 5y agoIt's not a good look for the Canadian government.
- shamiln 5y agoDo explain
- liaukovv 5y agoEmergency is the favourite tool of tyrants
- vba616 5y agoAccording to Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_national_emergencies_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_national_emergencies_i... ...in the US, there are ~40 (after counting the green squares twice it seems there are now 41) ongoing "national emergencies" declared since the passage of the "National Emergencies Act" in 1976. The oldest one seems to be from 1979 and involve sanctions on Iran from the hostage crisis. Biden has declared five emergencies; Trump declared nine (that haven't ended), Obama also declared nine (again ignoring ones that ended), GWB declared eleven, net, Clinton declared six, net, and surprisingly all emergencies between 1979 and 1994, roughly did come to an end. Regardless of what one thinks of it, it's curious that for a couple of decades, the norm was for emergencies in the US to end and now it's not.
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoAsset seizure is a big step, I agree. They should just cut off their mobile data. Going without Joe Rogan podcasts and Jordan Peterson tweets will eventually hit hard.
- smnrchrds 5y agoAs far as I know, the law does not demand asset seizure, but freezing. And the frozen accounts will be unfrozen when the emergency order expires or is lifted. The goal is to prevent the use of assets right now to finance blockades, not to deprive people of their property forever.
- totony 5y agoPeople that argue this seem unaware of how dreadful freezing assets can be. 30 days without funds means you can't pay any debt, can't pay for food, can't use transportation, etc. I don't believe "The goal is to prevent use of assets right now to finance blockades," it's clearly an intimidation tactic against "undesirables."
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoI do think that is the goal. These are protestors with heavy, portable living quarters, after all; if you can't move them, you've got to cut off the money they use to live. If governments don't come down hard on using heavy vehicles for blockades, and don't do what they can to stop that being a financially supportable method of protest, it will be repeated everywhere, like the Gilets Jaunes model of protest. But ultimately I think it would be better to make life miserable for them by degrees, rather than attacking their personal finances. So the Spotify/Peterson idea was a sarcastic joke (which humourless people have downvoted), but why _not_ make it difficult for them to protest by making it hard for them to buy stuff, or by making it difficult for them to return to their cabs when they leave them? Why not make the protests less liveable? The thing about non-vehicular protest is that it eventually fizzles out; people make their point, they endure some notable hardship, it makes the press, they make their point and they move on. Generally this is how protest brings about small changes. But it's inherent in the process that it's difficult, extreme and inappropriate to permanently disrupt. There is a balance, and protests are designed to attract law enforcement; civil disobedience, arrest and being very publicly removed by the police is ultimately part of the modern mechanism of protest. Road-blocking with a truck in which it is presumably quite routine to be able to exist in a little more comfort for a few days at a time is another matter, and if the response does not reflect that, it'll go on forever. It's a clever idea, but just because it has clever and innovative advantages over e.g. chaining yourself to a fence doesn't mean that it should be granted a pass. Either the protesters and the police come to some point of collusion about what their very public arrest and removal will look like, or something ultimately has to be done to stop them disrupting forever.
- unfocussed_mike 5y ago> Oof. Not a good look for edge. Predictable one though.
- nafix 5y agoAs a mid-30s sw engineer, I’d say it’s a good look. I hate professional facades and meme’ing is how people communicate now. I’d also say the first part of your your last statement is probably correct, in that you might be an old curmudgeon ;)
- basisword 5y agoNot OP but dropping a professional facade is often the first step on the road to actually becoming unprofessional. Not something you want from a company dealing in finance.
- whatshisface 5y agoIt's cryptocurrency.
- endisneigh 5y agoI’m sure you’ll begin to appreciate professionalism when your employer starts trying to pay you in memes
- unfocussed_mike 5y agoOr crypto.
- frebord 5y ago[flagged]
- zarathustreal 5y agoA bunch of idiots with a victim complex? That’s a rather jaded viewpoint.. how did we get to a place where being skeptical of habitual liars is seen as idiotic? Where fear is seen as a victim complex?
- superfunny 5y agoKudos to Edge. This is a ridiculous request.
- basisword 5y agoIf it’s the law it’s not a request is it? More of a command or face the consequences.
- whythre 5y agoBad laws should be disobeyed. That is the point of civil disobedience in the first place.
- quotemstr 5y agoAre there not situations in which we're obligated not to follow the law? Every tyranny in history has been legal.
- tastyfreeze 5y agoYes. Any law that breaks the highest law of the land is invalid and should be disobeyed. However, as long as there is a tyrannical government willing to enforce invalid laws there are still consequences for breaking them.
- bufferoverflow 5y agoSlavery was legal at some point.
- irthomasthomas 5y ago
- polski-g 5y agoEdge is not a Canadian corporation. They are not Canadian citizens. If Canada wants them to do something, they should get a US Court order.
- basisword 5y agoWhat a childish response and a great way to invite future regulation. I’m not an Edge customer but if I was I wouldn’t be anymore. Why would I entrust my money with a company that ignores the law and responds in memes?
- oh_sigh 5y agoIs it against the law for a US company to say "No" to a "request" by the Canadian government? Does edge even have a presence in Canada or need to follow Canadian laws(if the request is actually a demand)?
- cldellow 5y agoTo me, it's not even clear from that article that Edge received a request from the Canadian government. This reads more as good PR / linkbait to get eyeballs.
- berberous 5y agoThey are not ignoring the law: “And most importantly, we can’t even if we wanted to.” Sounds like they are a non-custodial wallet or similar. While they may truly believe the law is amoral and are in part happy to make that statement, this is primarily a marketing stunt for the pro-privacy and unseizable aspects of self-custodied crypto wallets.
- djbusby 5y agoThey should have opened with the facts. Then put the meme. Plus, that wasn't even the best "no" meme to choose.
- berberous 5y agoI’ve never heard of them and everyone in this thread now has. I think they succeeded with the marketing stunt. If they led with the facts it wouldn’t have been as viral as it leverages people’s extreme interest in this political issue.
- margalabargala 5y agoWhen this protest started, people were complaining that the government was approaching the protest with relative tolerance compared to things like pipeline protests. Well, now protestors are being arrested and their accounts being frozen. They're no longer being treated nicely compared to environmental protestors. While I don't agree with their stance, I do think that "we should not have a vaccine mandate" is a valid political opinion, and I support people being able to protest in support of their opinion. Yes, it's legal to freeze the funds. The list of net-negative-for-society things perpetrated that have been legal in the jurisdictions in which they occurred is long. I would rather these protestors, environmental/pipeline protestors, and generally all other protestors be treated gently rather than quashing protest. Canada's laws protecting protestors are much more limited than those in the USA. If the Canadians have decided that this is how they would like their country to operate, that is their right, but I would hope that this sort of thing never happens in the US regardless of the cause.
- kennywinker 5y ago> now protestors are being arrested Environmental protesters are FREQUENTLY arrested, so if you’re upset about these arrests at least have the decency to also be upset about these ones last year: https://thenarwhal.ca/rcmp-arrests-wetsuweten-media-photos/ https://thenarwhal.ca/rcmp-arrests-wetsuweten-media-photos/
- csee 5y agoI am not upset about the arrest of any protester if their protest escalates into significant economic damage or other types of harm. That's when it graduates from protest to terrorism. But they should be swiftly tried with a specific crime in a court of law. That's due process and liberal democracy working as it should. Freezing assets without due process is a new thing which should be resisted as it's tyrannical and unchecked. Not good.
- kennywinker 5y ago> if their protest escalates into significant economic damage or other types of harm. That's when it graduates from protest to terrorism. First of all, look up the definition of terrorism. It’s not “thing you think is bad”. Pretty integral to terrorism is violence. No violence or threat of violence, no terrorism. Second, all protest causes economic harm - successful protest causes significant economic harm. Your line of thinking would have you condemn friggin’ Gandhi, a globally renowned and much celebrated peaceful revolutionary. His entire non-violent protest movement relied heavily on inflicting economic damage. E.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_March https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt_March
- kache_ 5y agoMove your coins to your own wallet. Use Monero. Exchanges should be simply used as fiat onramps and offramps. It's only a matter of time
- Waterluvian 5y agoNot sure what Edge is but clearly it’s a deeply unserious organization that uses memes to respond to serious (and absolutely worthy of debate) requests.
- bpodgursky 5y agoThe Canadian government is a deeply unserious organization that abuses emergency powers to lock people out of the financial system. > and absolutely worthy of debate No, it's worthy of ridicule, which is the right move here.
- jazzyjackson 5y agosmall-time crypto- exchange getting some free press for itself
- peter_retief 5y agoSo they want to get good press, good luck to them, I now know who they are.
- Turing_Machine 5y agoRight. I'd also never heard of them before. Now I have.
- peter_retief 5y agoActually a little funny.
- TMWNN 5y agoWhy did you post the same comment as by user kajal7052?
- Waterluvian 5y agoI didn’t read the comments.
- stefan_ 5y agoWhen nobody has even requested anything of you but you find it's a great opportunity to make your mark among the various bag holders. (If only these people would actually use the decentralized tools they can't stop talking about, they wouldn't need some exchange posting memes to reassure them)
- hirundo 5y agoAs a boomer I had to do a visual search to translate the meme. Apparently it is a magic conch shell on SpongeBob and my cultural literacy is deteriorating.
- kennywinker 5y agoI’m very very anti “freedom convoy” but even I thinks seizing assets and freezing accounts is a bridge too far
- Beltalowda 5y agoWhat is the given rationale behind it? I didn't really follow the news on this very closely as it's very far removed from my part of the world, but can't they just walk up to the protestors and say "knock it off mate, or we'll arrest ya"?
- kennywinker 5y agoNo a clue, honestly. They didn’t need to seize assets or declare an emergency to send in armed forces to remove pipeline protesters last year, so it’s confusing why they’ve been treating this with such theatrics.
- chickenimprint 5y agoThey are able to freeze assets suspected of being used to fund criminal activity. This only applies to the corporate accounts of the owners of the trucks and the millions of dollars raised by mostly US-based anti-vaxxers. If Antifa activists were to recieve 6 figures from mostly Chinese communists with the express intent to use those funds to cause economic damage, some of the commentators here might react differently. Of course there have been ample warnings, including the handing out of leaflets detailing the unlawful offenses. Many people were ticketed and arrested at border crossing protests, including 11 members of a splinter group, in posession of 13 long guns, ammunition, body armor and hand guns. The Ambassodor Bridge, accounting for ~30% of the cross-border land trade has since been cleared. The damage is estimated at above $500M. Damages at border crossings in Alberta and Manitoba have been estimated at 48 and $73M respectively.
- kennywinker 5y agoI don’t actually care which country wants to fund anti-facism. If you’re not anti-fascism, you’re the problem. And before anyone hit’s the “i’m not anti-anti-fascist, i’m anti-antifa” there IS no antifa. You can’t join antifa, you can’t donate to antifa, they don’t give out member cards. It’s just a name people who are anti-fascism apply to themselves.
- BossingAround 5y agoResponse itself? Good. But responding with a meme? An institution that presumably holds my money? Oof.
- tylersmith 5y agoThey don't hold money, that's the entire point of their response.
- kajal7052 5y ago
- stevens37 5y agoI've never heard about them but like this.
- aaomidi 5y agoAm I the only one who thinks responding with a meme is actually perfect? Stupid requests get stupid answers.
- ohCh6zos 5y agoI'm very anti-crypto, but if governments are going all tyrannical they do have a point about seizure resistance.
- DethNinja 5y agoThis is nowhere near edgy enough as the nunchuk's response: https://twitter.com/nunchuk_io/status/1494885897577271299 https://twitter.com/nunchuk_io/status/1494885897577271299
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tpoacher 5y agoSerious question: how does content get flagged in HN? I'm assuming it's a case of "if enough users flag a topic", but is there a moderator involved at all? Can a topic get 'unflagged' once flagged? Could this system be abused by planted shills who coordinate 'flagging' when something is posted that is detrimental to a company? I read the post, I see people's point here that responding with a meme is perhaps not appropriate for some audiences on a serious matter, but I personally didn't find it in bad taste, and would never consider this as grounds for 'flagging'. Especially since 'flagging' in this particular case effectively means "censorship" / "shadowbanning" (in that it causes the topic to be removed from the list of topics, but does not kill the link itself). Reminds me of that quote: "The best way to keep people obedient is to severely limit the scope of conversation, but allow very vivid conversation within that scope" Seems like the few people who spotted this topic before it was removed from the list are allowed to discuss this topic as passionately as they like, while the moderator sleeps quietly at night knowing nobody will ever discover this passionate conversation. What a weird world we live in.
- grzm 5y agoSee the FAQ (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html), in particular: > How are stories ranked? > The basic algorithm divides points by a power of the time since a story was submitted. Comments in threads are ranked the same way. > Other factors affecting rank include user flags, anti-abuse software, software which demotes overheated discussions, account or site weighting, and moderator action." and > What does [flagged] mean? > Users flagged the post as breaking the guidelines or otherwise not belonging on HN. > Moderators sometimes also add [flagged] (though not usually on submissions), and sometimes turn flags off when they are unfair. You might also find the guidelines helpful in answering your questions. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- tpoacher 5y agoThanks gzrm! So effectively a single normal user can flag a submission. Interesting.
- yashg 5y agoThis childish response reminds me of Piratebay mocking legal notices and posting them on their website in the early days. Regardless of the legitimacy of the government's demand, such a response makes me feel it's being run by amateurs who don't realize the seriousness, power and reach of a sovereign government.
- mdoms 5y agoI tried to share this link with a group chat on Facebook Messenger and it was blocked.