4 ms·

I don't have a horse in this race (anymore), but in the abstract I would love if government aligned incentives so that it was more painful for companies to toss

I don't have a horse in this race (anymore), but in the abstract I would love if government aligned incentives so that it was more painful for companies to toss records that should have been retained than to retain records that are damaging to them in hindsight, which they were legally allowed at some point to toss. For precisely the reason you indicated.

ROTMetro 4y ago
Then companies will just get rid of chat tools because informal discussions can be turned to fit any narrative. 'wow, Bob picked the worst possible way to solve xyz' negligence, knowingly having incompetent developers. You yourself said Bob's solutions were the worst possible. 'looking back, we should have implemented XYZ differently but we are stuck with that implementation now' can be about something harmless but blown so out of proportion in court.
- ROTMetro 4y ago
  This site is crazy. I get downvoted for posting insurance company training regarding chat and get downvoted. I guess you all just run a company without worrying about having insurance? Are you people who downvoted in IT and the liaison with the insurance company?
- wpietri 4y ago
  Companies can't get rid of chat tools anymore than previous bureaucracies could stop using paper. Operating at current scale requires digital communication. If they tried to cut that off, they'd discover that things stopped working. Twitter gave us an example of that just this week: https://www.platformer.news/p/new-cracks-emerge-in-elon-musks-twitter https://www.platformer.news/p/new-cracks-emerge-in-elon-musk...
  - bluGill 4y ago
    True, but saving paper was a lot more work. Most paper memos got read and put into the trash as you didn't have space to save it. Even if there wasn't a review everything saved policy you still did just because it was sitting in your office until you got rid of it. Of course when something did have to be saved you gave it to your secretary to file and wouldn't review it latter to see if it should go, but if it stayed in your office it didn't last much longer than you needed it.
  - andromeduck 4y ago
    People can just voice/video call and write memos.
    - wpietri 4y ago
      Can they? I mean, I grant the theoretical possibility. In the same way that they could in theory only meet in person. But I just provided you with a counterexample of that not actually happening. The reason people use things like Slack is because they're way more efficient than setting up meetings to discuss things. So I think in the long term, a company like Google ruling out chat would be significantly handicapped vs their competitors in terms of information flow, response time, and ability to iterate.
    - dragonwriter 4y ago
      Paper records like memos are subject to evidence preservation rules as well.
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  > can be about something harmless but blown so out of proportion in court. That's the entire point of a court, to find correct context and proportion. Judges are not idiots and they don't like being mislead. If you blow things out of proportion, and your opponents can put up a counterargument, it will cost you.
jeremyjh 4y ago
Just let the plaintiff or prosecuter decide what evidence they would have liked to find and instruct the jury to assume it was found. This would never happen again anywhere.
- jefftk 4y ago
  The issue here is that companies are not generally required to retain a records indefinitely, and if something was deleted as part of a standard retention policy (instead of specifically because of its contents) the normal "assume the worst" policy doesn't apply. Which is, I think, why lawyers are excited about a default of having a short retention period. On the other hand, litigation generally comes with needing to put your deletion policy on hold, and it sounds like that didn't happen here?
- gameman144 4y ago
  This seems like some insane government overreach, though. Like, make the penalties for destroying evidence super steep and criminally liable sure, but it seems pretty wild that you could be convicted of a crime without evidence. In that case, the government has an incentive to destroy evidence and its paper trail.
  - shadowgovt 4y ago
    How would the government go about destroying evidence in a defendant's possession? (If you mean "Has the government failed to meet its burden of disclosure regarding evidence in its possession:" yes, it occasionally happens. The significant incentive against it is that it's immediate grounds for a mistrial and incredibly embarrassing to a prosecutor's office that has it happen on their watch).
  - hugh-avherald 4y ago
    I don't want to alarm you but (a) it's definitely possible to be convicted of a crime without evidence and (b) the only things stopping "the government" fabricating evidence are the government officials themselves.
- dragonwriter 4y ago

ROTMetro 4y ago

Then companies will just get rid of chat tools because informal discussions can be turned to fit any narrative. 'wow, Bob picked the worst possible way to solve xyz' negligence, knowingly having incompetent developers. You yourself said Bob's solutions were the worst possible. 'looking back, we should have implemented XYZ differently but we are stuck with that implementation now' can be about something harmless but blown so out of proportion in court.

ROTMetro 4y ago
This site is crazy. I get downvoted for posting insurance company training regarding chat and get downvoted. I guess you all just run a company without worrying about having insurance? Are you people who downvoted in IT and the liaison with the insurance company?
wpietri 4y ago
Companies can't get rid of chat tools anymore than previous bureaucracies could stop using paper. Operating at current scale requires digital communication. If they tried to cut that off, they'd discover that things stopped working. Twitter gave us an example of that just this week: https://www.platformer.news/p/new-cracks-emerge-in-elon-musks-twitter https://www.platformer.news/p/new-cracks-emerge-in-elon-musk...
- bluGill 4y ago
  True, but saving paper was a lot more work. Most paper memos got read and put into the trash as you didn't have space to save it. Even if there wasn't a review everything saved policy you still did just because it was sitting in your office until you got rid of it. Of course when something did have to be saved you gave it to your secretary to file and wouldn't review it latter to see if it should go, but if it stayed in your office it didn't last much longer than you needed it.
- andromeduck 4y ago
  People can just voice/video call and write memos.
  - wpietri 4y ago
    Can they? I mean, I grant the theoretical possibility. In the same way that they could in theory only meet in person. But I just provided you with a counterexample of that not actually happening. The reason people use things like Slack is because they're way more efficient than setting up meetings to discuss things. So I think in the long term, a company like Google ruling out chat would be significantly handicapped vs their competitors in terms of information flow, response time, and ability to iterate.
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    Paper records like memos are subject to evidence preservation rules as well.
ClumsyPilot 4y ago
> can be about something harmless but blown so out of proportion in court. That's the entire point of a court, to find correct context and proportion. Judges are not idiots and they don't like being mislead. If you blow things out of proportion, and your opponents can put up a counterargument, it will cost you.

jeremyjh 4y ago

Just let the plaintiff or prosecuter decide what evidence they would have liked to find and instruct the jury to assume it was found. This would never happen again anywhere.

jefftk 4y ago
The issue here is that companies are not generally required to retain a records indefinitely, and if something was deleted as part of a standard retention policy (instead of specifically because of its contents) the normal "assume the worst" policy doesn't apply. Which is, I think, why lawyers are excited about a default of having a short retention period. On the other hand, litigation generally comes with needing to put your deletion policy on hold, and it sounds like that didn't happen here?
gameman144 4y ago
This seems like some insane government overreach, though. Like, make the penalties for destroying evidence super steep and criminally liable sure, but it seems pretty wild that you could be convicted of a crime without evidence. In that case, the government has an incentive to destroy evidence and its paper trail.
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  How would the government go about destroying evidence in a defendant's possession? (If you mean "Has the government failed to meet its burden of disclosure regarding evidence in its possession:" yes, it occasionally happens. The significant incentive against it is that it's immediate grounds for a mistrial and incredibly embarrassing to a prosecutor's office that has it happen on their watch).
- hugh-avherald 4y ago
  I don't want to alarm you but (a) it's definitely possible to be convicted of a crime without evidence and (b) the only things stopping "the government" fabricating evidence are the government officials themselves.
dragonwriter 4y ago