4 ms·

Collaboration with a bad government is always optional, you can cease to do business. That's definitely tenable. It takes a lot of balls to do so. Imagine goog

by 0x12 15y ago

Collaboration with a bad government is always optional, you can cease to do business. That's definitely tenable. It takes a lot of balls to do so. Imagine google coming right out and saying: 'Our do no evil motto is our guiding light and we have decided that being forced by the government to act in this manner to prevent our technology from being used to spy on American citizens in ways that we can not in good conscience allow is against our principles. Therefore we will cease operating today.'. I'm trying to imagine the effect of such a move, it strikes me that the ensuing fall-out would probably see the government as the losing party and google re-instated in very short order. Sometimes you have to make a stand, if the same thing was a good enough reason for google to cease to do business in China then maybe it should be good enough to cease doing business in the US.

netcan 15y ago
They could have made more of a fuss over it. Get ideas up in the air about shifting pieces of Google overseas, for example. Once the idea that Google might be locating somewhere else for concern about collaborating with the US government, public concern might have been raised. The reality is that governments do have the ability to dictate a lot. But companies are global now and that means some competition exists. It's old news that countries compete on tax laws but competing on rights and freedoms would be nice too. To a certain extent, they do.
- 0x12 15y ago
  Google Iceland has a nice ring to it. Also the economy there could use a boost I believe.
Cushman 15y ago
Why even bother to shut down? Google could probably just go "Haha! Fuck you. Who's your closest supervisor in an elected office?" Next day, "<Official> wants Google to share your personal information with the Federal Government" magically becomes the top hit for that name. Bureaucrats and spooks are happy to play this game because they know it never comes back to them. Nobody who has to answer to voters would dare put their name on it-- we're looking for any damn excuse to not vote for the incumbent this cycle. But I guess standing up for us could mean a hit to shareholder value, and some things just aren't worth sacrificing.
- jbooth 15y ago
  Nobody who has to answer to voters would dare put their name on it? Remember that 99-1 vote for the Patriot Act? The one senator who voted against, Russ Feingold, lost in 2010 to a guy who's campaign slogan revolved heavily around "freedom".
  - CWuestefeld 15y ago
    There are many dimensions of freedom. I'll note that Sen. Feingold's name shares a place in "McCain-Feingold", which is a limitation on free speech (some may argue that it's a warranted limitation, but the fact that it is a limitation on freedom is objectively true)
    - jbooth 15y ago
      Yeah, I know that some people consider limiting campaign contributions to be more damaging to freedom than creating the legal framework for a modern day KGB. I think those people are ignorant. Fascism and communism didn't kill 100 million people because of a 2300 dollar limit on campaign contributions.
      - CWuestefeld 15y ago
        Perhaps they did so because of a total ban on advocacy ads within X days of the election? We wouldn't want people to hear about what a snake their Congressman is, when the election is close enough they might remember. There's a heck of a lot more to McCain-Feingold than just a $2300 limit.
karamazov 15y ago
I very much doubt that Google threatening to pull out of the country would cause any action in Congress. The government has no incentive to act, and all the power to spin the story if there is some sort of public outcry - something to the effect of "Google is unpatriotic and doesn't care about your safety." Most people will buy it. If anything, Microsoft would just step in to fill the vacuum with Bing, and business would continue as usual for everyone but Google.
- 0x12 15y ago
  Gmail.
- Cushman 15y ago
  That's why I'm sayin' they can't just leave, and they can't just threaten. It has to be real civil disobedience. They have to be willing to say: No, we're not going to do that. You'll have to shut us down, which will take years, and cost the economy millions of jobs and trillions of dollars. Oh, and I hope it goes without saying that we won't be complying with any court orders related to this matter. If you're serious about doing this, there will be pictures of men pointing guns at innocent American technicians, right next to the headline "The Feds are Coming for Your Email," and underneath that, Senator, will be your name. Then they'd say something like: "This is America, motherfucker. Land of the free. You can't get away with this shit." ...sigh. At least it'd make a good screenplay.
  - mattmanser 15y ago
    Look at this from the opposite direction. You want a big multi-billion $ business to start dictating your laws? Good luck on that one, that's not going to end badly is it?
    - patternexon 15y ago
      Don't they already ? Every multi-billion $ business has lobbyists that dictate the law.
    - webXL 15y ago

by 0x12 15y ago

netcan 15y ago

They could have made more of a fuss over it. Get ideas up in the air about shifting pieces of Google overseas, for example. Once the idea that Google might be locating somewhere else for concern about collaborating with the US government, public concern might have been raised. The reality is that governments do have the ability to dictate a lot. But companies are global now and that means some competition exists. It's old news that countries compete on tax laws but competing on rights and freedoms would be nice too. To a certain extent, they do.

0x12 15y ago
Google Iceland has a nice ring to it. Also the economy there could use a boost I believe.

Cushman 15y ago

Why even bother to shut down? Google could probably just go "Haha! Fuck you. Who's your closest supervisor in an elected office?" Next day, "<Official> wants Google to share your personal information with the Federal Government" magically becomes the top hit for that name. Bureaucrats and spooks are happy to play this game because they know it never comes back to them. Nobody who has to answer to voters would dare put their name on it-- we're looking for any damn excuse to not vote for the incumbent this cycle. But I guess standing up for us could mean a hit to shareholder value, and some things just aren't worth sacrificing.

jbooth 15y ago
Nobody who has to answer to voters would dare put their name on it? Remember that 99-1 vote for the Patriot Act? The one senator who voted against, Russ Feingold, lost in 2010 to a guy who's campaign slogan revolved heavily around "freedom".
- CWuestefeld 15y ago
  There are many dimensions of freedom. I'll note that Sen. Feingold's name shares a place in "McCain-Feingold", which is a limitation on free speech (some may argue that it's a warranted limitation, but the fact that it is a limitation on freedom is objectively true)
  - jbooth 15y ago
    Yeah, I know that some people consider limiting campaign contributions to be more damaging to freedom than creating the legal framework for a modern day KGB. I think those people are ignorant. Fascism and communism didn't kill 100 million people because of a 2300 dollar limit on campaign contributions.
    - CWuestefeld 15y ago
      Perhaps they did so because of a total ban on advocacy ads within X days of the election? We wouldn't want people to hear about what a snake their Congressman is, when the election is close enough they might remember. There's a heck of a lot more to McCain-Feingold than just a $2300 limit.

karamazov 15y ago

I very much doubt that Google threatening to pull out of the country would cause any action in Congress. The government has no incentive to act, and all the power to spin the story if there is some sort of public outcry - something to the effect of "Google is unpatriotic and doesn't care about your safety." Most people will buy it. If anything, Microsoft would just step in to fill the vacuum with Bing, and business would continue as usual for everyone but Google.

0x12 15y ago
Gmail.
Cushman 15y ago
That's why I'm sayin' they can't just leave, and they can't just threaten. It has to be real civil disobedience. They have to be willing to say: No, we're not going to do that. You'll have to shut us down, which will take years, and cost the economy millions of jobs and trillions of dollars. Oh, and I hope it goes without saying that we won't be complying with any court orders related to this matter. If you're serious about doing this, there will be pictures of men pointing guns at innocent American technicians, right next to the headline "The Feds are Coming for Your Email," and underneath that, Senator, will be your name. Then they'd say something like: "This is America, motherfucker. Land of the free. You can't get away with this shit." ...sigh. At least it'd make a good screenplay.
- mattmanser 15y ago
  Look at this from the opposite direction. You want a big multi-billion $ business to start dictating your laws? Good luck on that one, that's not going to end badly is it?
  - patternexon 15y ago
    Don't they already ? Every multi-billion $ business has lobbyists that dictate the law.
  - webXL 15y ago