6 ms·

You underestimate the degree to which high-level executive success is dependent on responding to the boss that tells you to jump with "how high."

bobthepanda 4y ago
also, people really let down their guard texting and emailing despite pleading and trainings from legal. the other thread about people using ChatGPT with their company's confidential data has some people with their behind hanging out defending it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35330438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35330438
- jacquesm 4y ago
  They shouldn't be cautioned not to let down their guard while texting and emailing but regarding doing illegal stuff.
  - holmesworcester 4y ago
    There's this important context missing from this thread though, which is that the people involved in this are not (AFAIK) US citizens, do not live in the US, do not travel to the US (especially not now), have never voted in the US, and are not allowed to vote in the US. So in moral terms or in terms of the political theory that underpins democracy, there's no obligation at all for them to follow US law. Yes, US law might say there is, and might make compelling moral arguments. And yes maybe these laws are in the interest of US voters, or a majority of people in the world. But there's no structurally legitimate democratic mechanism currently in place to make any decision about that. (The UN is not this.) Democracy is what gives laws moral legitimacy, and democracy ends at the border. So at no point have CZ, Lim, or others here (AFAIK) taken on any commitment to follow US law. Morally, they are completely morally free to think US law is wrong and ignore it, just as I'm completely free to think a law in another country (China or Iran) or another US state (say, Mississippi, or Utah) is wrong and ignore it. It seems that they're scared of US law, which is rational, and maybe it would be more rational of them to be more scared, but that's another question. That's not morality, it's just power and violence. Hamas is a great example. Right now the Western world is cheering and arming a country as it fights off a brutal occupying force with a shady territorial claim. That country published crypto addresses so that everyone in the world could help them buy drones and rocket launchers so they could maim and kill the occupiers and drive them out. I donated and I would encourage you to donate too. I spent most of 2022 watching videos on Reddit, Twitter, and Youtube of young occupiers getting killed and maimed by the drones and rocket launchers I helped buy, as an American taxpayer and as a donor. And I think this was the right thing to do, and I'm proud of it. But I'd certainly understand if someone was a bit ambivalent about this whole thing, thought it was kind of f'ed up, and didn't want to be involved. Is it so hard to believe that some people in the world feel that Hamas is similarly worthy of support? I don't, but certainly a ton of Palestinians do; they sometimes vote Hamas into a parliamentary majority, and Hamas does very well in polls it seems. And if so, then is it so hard to believe that some people in the world are ambivalent about Hamas and talk about it flippantly in internal Slacks, even when they're afraid of US regulators? Generally pluralism in the world is served by a diversity of opinions and legal systems. In some cases, like the Ukraine invasion, it will definitely be right to project power outside our borders and legal system. But the default should be to allow for the possibility that we're wrong and avoid imposing the conclusions of our own democratic process on those who did not participate in it. Maybe US law is wrong about financial freedom and someday we'll look back on this period of zero financial privacy as backward and embarrassingly arbitrary.
    - oivey 4y ago
      They chose to illegally run a business in the US. Brazenly. Any moralizing about people unconnected to the US being subject to US laws is irrelevant.
      - bolanyo 4y ago
        how was their business 'in the US'?
        boeingUH60 4y ago
        You move money for Americans, then you're subject to U.S. compliance and anti-money laundering laws. It is that simple.
        msm_ 4y ago
        I'm a citizen of a small European country. I use quite a few American services. Does this mean they are subject to my country's law? Binance used IP-based locking mechanism (easy to avoid with a VPN). Similarly, I saw US-based websites that blocked access to European customers because of GDPR, and I've circumvented their geolocks using a VPN. Does it mean that I can sue them for not following GDPR now? I'm not trying to argue for Binance here, and I think that US compliance and anti-money laundering laws are reasonable. But I wonder if your position is that "everyone should just follow US law", or is it more nuanced.
        boeingUH60 4y ago
        > I'm a citizen of a small European country. I use quite a few American services. Does this mean they are subject to my country's law? Yes, it does, and most especially if it involves moving funds. If your country decides that the platform broke their laws, they could sue just like the CFTC or even request an arrest and extradition of the alleged perpetrators. But, in reality, European countries don't often pursue such cases as aggressively as the US. The U.S. government has a well-oiled law enforcement and military machine that it uses to pursue its targets across the globe (sometimes with bullying involved). I'm reminded of a case where a woman was extradited from the Netherlands to the U.S. and sentenced to 3 years for sending a relatively paltry $300 to the terrorist group Al-Shabab. https://apnews.com/article/africa-netherlands-somalia-al-shabab-28726c5a5a84f93ac9482f8f5c34e300 https://apnews.com/article/africa-netherlands-somalia-al-sha...

bobthepanda 4y ago

also, people really let down their guard texting and emailing despite pleading and trainings from legal. the other thread about people using ChatGPT with their company's confidential data has some people with their behind hanging out defending it. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35330438 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35330438

jacquesm 4y ago
They shouldn't be cautioned not to let down their guard while texting and emailing but regarding doing illegal stuff.
- holmesworcester 4y ago
  There's this important context missing from this thread though, which is that the people involved in this are not (AFAIK) US citizens, do not live in the US, do not travel to the US (especially not now), have never voted in the US, and are not allowed to vote in the US. So in moral terms or in terms of the political theory that underpins democracy, there's no obligation at all for them to follow US law. Yes, US law might say there is, and might make compelling moral arguments. And yes maybe these laws are in the interest of US voters, or a majority of people in the world. But there's no structurally legitimate democratic mechanism currently in place to make any decision about that. (The UN is not this.) Democracy is what gives laws moral legitimacy, and democracy ends at the border. So at no point have CZ, Lim, or others here (AFAIK) taken on any commitment to follow US law. Morally, they are completely morally free to think US law is wrong and ignore it, just as I'm completely free to think a law in another country (China or Iran) or another US state (say, Mississippi, or Utah) is wrong and ignore it. It seems that they're scared of US law, which is rational, and maybe it would be more rational of them to be more scared, but that's another question. That's not morality, it's just power and violence. Hamas is a great example. Right now the Western world is cheering and arming a country as it fights off a brutal occupying force with a shady territorial claim. That country published crypto addresses so that everyone in the world could help them buy drones and rocket launchers so they could maim and kill the occupiers and drive them out. I donated and I would encourage you to donate too. I spent most of 2022 watching videos on Reddit, Twitter, and Youtube of young occupiers getting killed and maimed by the drones and rocket launchers I helped buy, as an American taxpayer and as a donor. And I think this was the right thing to do, and I'm proud of it. But I'd certainly understand if someone was a bit ambivalent about this whole thing, thought it was kind of f'ed up, and didn't want to be involved. Is it so hard to believe that some people in the world feel that Hamas is similarly worthy of support? I don't, but certainly a ton of Palestinians do; they sometimes vote Hamas into a parliamentary majority, and Hamas does very well in polls it seems. And if so, then is it so hard to believe that some people in the world are ambivalent about Hamas and talk about it flippantly in internal Slacks, even when they're afraid of US regulators? Generally pluralism in the world is served by a diversity of opinions and legal systems. In some cases, like the Ukraine invasion, it will definitely be right to project power outside our borders and legal system. But the default should be to allow for the possibility that we're wrong and avoid imposing the conclusions of our own democratic process on those who did not participate in it. Maybe US law is wrong about financial freedom and someday we'll look back on this period of zero financial privacy as backward and embarrassingly arbitrary.
  - oivey 4y ago
    They chose to illegally run a business in the US. Brazenly. Any moralizing about people unconnected to the US being subject to US laws is irrelevant.
    - bolanyo 4y ago
      how was their business 'in the US'?
      - boeingUH60 4y ago
        You move money for Americans, then you're subject to U.S. compliance and anti-money laundering laws. It is that simple.
        msm_ 4y ago
        I'm a citizen of a small European country. I use quite a few American services. Does this mean they are subject to my country's law? Binance used IP-based locking mechanism (easy to avoid with a VPN). Similarly, I saw US-based websites that blocked access to European customers because of GDPR, and I've circumvented their geolocks using a VPN. Does it mean that I can sue them for not following GDPR now? I'm not trying to argue for Binance here, and I think that US compliance and anti-money laundering laws are reasonable. But I wonder if your position is that "everyone should just follow US law", or is it more nuanced.
        boeingUH60 4y ago
        > I'm a citizen of a small European country. I use quite a few American services. Does this mean they are subject to my country's law? Yes, it does, and most especially if it involves moving funds. If your country decides that the platform broke their laws, they could sue just like the CFTC or even request an arrest and extradition of the alleged perpetrators. But, in reality, European countries don't often pursue such cases as aggressively as the US. The U.S. government has a well-oiled law enforcement and military machine that it uses to pursue its targets across the globe (sometimes with bullying involved). I'm reminded of a case where a woman was extradited from the Netherlands to the U.S. and sentenced to 3 years for sending a relatively paltry $300 to the terrorist group Al-Shabab. https://apnews.com/article/africa-netherlands-somalia-al-shabab-28726c5a5a84f93ac9482f8f5c34e300 https://apnews.com/article/africa-netherlands-somalia-al-sha...