10 ms·

NixOS just dropped Anduril as a NixCon sponsor

51 points by spoon16 3y ago

rvz 3y ago
Right. So why haven't they gotten rid of Google as a sponsor then given that they also hold contracts with multiple governments, militaries and especially one contract with the Pentagon in the US on top of aiding their surveillance programmes?
- danpalmer 3y ago
  (Biased, I work at Google), but I think there's a material difference between what Google does (as I understand it, from public info) – providing infrastructure services on Google Cloud, as all the major cloud providers do, or providing customer support for cloud workloads – and building defence related technology. To my knowledge Google and the other big tech companies aren't building application directly for offence/defence. It seems this company might be. I would never work at a company that designs and builds missiles or fighter jets, but I would work at a cloud provider that provides infrastructure that is used to design missiles or fighter jets, in the same way that I would work at a telecoms company that provides the phone systems to a defence contractor. Being one level removed, and providing "neutral" services, is a substantial difference for me, and I suspect for most people.
  - olix0r 3y ago
    > To my knowledge Google and the other big tech companies aren't building application directly for offence/defence. Actually there was a big uproar about exactly this several years ago https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/07/google-ai-us-department-of-defense-military-drone-project-maven-tensorflow https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/07/google-ai...
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - danpalmer 3y ago
      From reading that article it pretty much aligns with what I was saying. The US DoD used a Google technology that is not defence specific or designed for defence applications, like them running their servers on Google Cloud, or using Microsoft for their email or something. I think that's materially different to designing missiles/etc.
  - skinkestek 3y ago
    For what it is worth I would much rather work for parts of western defense industry than for Google. I'd be overjoyed to help create the tools to drive the invaders out of Ukraine for example, but not so much to try to finally kill the rest of the browser market or to serve shady ads. Yes, while I am not exaggerating I am probably a bit one sided here - I know there are parts of Google that I have nothing against like GCP - but I am serious: Much rather work for the military than Google.
    - danpalmer 3y ago
      Yeah we all have our own moral positions on these things. I wouldn't want to work for a hedge fund, but many people do. A friend of mine turned down a university project from a hedge fund, but went to work at a defence contractor after university. I personally disagree with your characterisation of Google, but again this is all based on opinion.
  - arthurcolle 3y ago
    > To my knowledge Google and the other big tech companies aren't building application directly for offence/defence. Project Maven? Dragonfly?
    - delroth 3y ago
      Both dropped after very significant internal outcry, even though they'd have objectively been very profitable ventures for Google.
    - danpalmer 3y ago
      Project Maven looks exactly like the cloud services thing I was talking about. I'm only going on what I can read in public online news sources though. Dragonfly looks a bit different, I'm not super familiar, but it seems it was shut down anyway?
- naasking 3y ago
  Should they drop power companies and internet service providers too? How many hops away from direct responsibility is enough for moral purity? I think only one hop should do.
peatmoss 3y ago
Is there some specific controversy with Anduril that the community is reacting to, or is NixCon simply avoiding sponsorship from defense firms?
- mepian 3y ago
  Anduril is infamous for its AI sentry towers along the US-Mexico border.
  - tomschlick 3y ago
    People who push back on technology used at the border make little sense to me. Using technology frees up other resources to process migrants more quickly through the abused asylum process. That means they are in detention for less time, they get court cases quicker, and get asylum or removal quicker.
    - cjbprime 3y ago
      Surely you can imagine some consistent viewpoints that a person could have here, such as "it can be a good thing when someone is able to escape a terrible situation in their current country even if they don't meet the rules for being granted asylum"?
      - tomschlick 3y ago
        I can see how people empathize with that but on the flip side I've known plenty of immigrants who went through the process the right way, waited months or years, gone through naturalization process and did the same to get get their families here. They, along with others still in line feel cheated by the people entering illegally / abusing the asylum claim systems. If you're escaping a bad situation in a central or southern American country, and then pass through 4-5 countries to get here, you're not seeking asylum, you're an economic migrant no different from immigrants from India, China, etc all seeking a better life. No other developed country would or should allow people to illegally enter and skip the legal process.
xyzal 3y ago
I wonder where that anti-military sentiment in U.S. tech stems from? At least in former Soviet bloc, we view your military in quite a positive light. Well, for sure in a more positive light than armies of competing 'superpowers'.
- boffinAudio 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - skinkestek 3y ago
    > The illegal invasion and occupation of Syria by an imperial force of allies. Is it the Russians or IS you think are our allies. Or am I missing out on something here?
    - Georgelemental 3y ago
      I assume boffinAudio is referring to how the Obama administration funded, armed, and trained Al-Quaeda: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/how-america-armed-terrorists-in-syria/ https://www.theamericanconservative.com/how-america-armed-te... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_Sycamore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_Sycamore
  - Georgelemental 3y ago
    > In former eastern-bloc countries, such trivialities are easily ignored in the lust for the Western decadence Also because people there remember the horror of Soviet domination. I am ashamed of my country's (US) crimes too, but they don't make the alternatives on offer any better.
    - boffinAudio 3y ago
      The world has a long, long way to go to catch up with the US' vast and heinous war crimes, crimes against humanity, and massive violations of human rights at scale. Anyone who lived through the soviet era can see that the USA has factually become the thing it was resisting, all this time, during the cold war era. War-profiteers such as Anduril are distasteful in that light, because they are producing weapons systems that are even MORE impune to public scrutiny. Stealth capabilities are there to hide from your own people too.
fodkodrasz 3y ago
What is the point? Getting some goodwill of non-paying users (aka. freeloaders), while (maybe) alienating paying users? I get that it is a project that uses lots of volunteer work, but you won't pay your hosting fees and buildfarms from latest rust helloworld-webservice flake contributions from the programmers-socks wearing community. Sidenote: the foundation of current computing is built on DoD money.
- boffinAudio 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - ogogmad 3y ago
    While I think you're being genuine, remember that si vis pacem para bellum: "if you want peace, prepare for war". A blanket antimilitary view is very dangerous. A company should only be ostracised if it's helping carry out war crimes.
    - nailer 3y ago
      We can see this right now with the Ukraine invasion. The 'peace' side is advocating giving Putin whatever he wants.
      - KptMarchewa 3y ago
        Exactly. If NATO countries maintained cold war weapons and ammo stockpiles, the war would already be lost for russia. Instead we got unilateral demilitarization .
        nailer 3y ago
        Ukraine disarmed their nuclear stockpile. Obviously Russia wouldn’t have invaded otherwise.
        3y ago
JacobiX 3y ago
They dropped this company in anticipation of a future version of the CoC and sponsorship rules. Certainly, they have the right to define their rules, but they should revise the rules beforehand.
- FireBeyond 3y ago
  They’re not saying the company did anything wrong. Just deciding not to take their sponsorship money. I don’t think you should need to enact a new rule in order to decide not to accept money.
  - totony 3y ago
    I don't think any non profit should ever refuse money. If they make money from something you disagree with, then taking that money and using it in the scope of your non-profit (which you agree with) is a moral imperative
    - FireBeyond 3y ago
      I don't believe that. Being a non-profit is not inherently a moral stance. Your goal is to further your own efforts. That doesn't automatically require you to attempt to 'disadvantage' others (even if that is voluntary on their part).
debo_ 3y ago
AI sentry towers on the US-Mexico border lends credence to Anduril's name from Lord of the Rings -- "the Flame of the West." This is completely unrelated, but if you like weapons with cool names (or are looking for names for your next defense-industry startup) the Tolkien legendarium has many! Angrist - the dagger that cut a Silmaril from Morgoth's iron crown. Means "Iron Cleaver" in Sindarin Dagmor - "dark-slayer", Beren's short blade Aranruth - The terrible sword of Thingol, King of Doriath. Means "King's Ire" The twin bastard swords "Anglachel" and "Anguirel" -- Forged by Eol the Dark Elf from a meteor, these swords were both sort of malevolent and I think were probably inspired by the Norse Tyrfing. Probably also influenced Stormbringer and Mournblade in those terrible Moorcock books. Celeg Aithorn - A legendary sword from the First Age. Reference to a Valar (God's) blade "lightning", and said to be the blade that will one day cleave the world. Edit: Ack! I forgot my favorite. "Dramborleg" -- the axe that the man Tuor found during the Fall of Gondolin. He slew three balrogs (!) and many orc champions with it. Means "thudder-sharp", because it both smashes and cuts at the same time. ("smote both a heavy dint as of a club and cleft as a sword") ... that's enough. I know the posted tweet is a serious topic and what I have posted is not, but that's where I'm at today.
- nextaccountic 3y ago
  > AI sentry towers on the US-Mexico border lends credence to Anduril's name from Lord of the Rings -- "the Flame of the West." So they hijacked a name from Tolkien's works and the Tolkien estate did nothing about it? They threatened to sue TSR for using "hobbit" in D&D in the 70s [0], which prompted D&D authors to change the name to "halfling" and later on change their lore a bit. [0] https://www.museumofplay.org/blog/cease-and-desist-dont-mess-with-tolkien/ https://www.museumofplay.org/blog/cease-and-desist-dont-mess...
  - debo_ 3y ago
    Same goes with Palantir. No idea how the estate chooses what to go after. "Hobbit" is rather central to the Tolkien brand; Palantir and Anduril are essentially props, so it could be that these were seen as less important instances of name-theivery.
arianvanp 3y ago
Would like to add some needed context (at least I think it's needed): * This started out because NixOS mastodon account posted on chaos.social local timeline which is rather German Mastodon instance with a strict no-military-content-without-content-warnings moderation policy. People got angry for NixOS posting about the sponsor there and started complaining en masse to drop it. I think most people complaining aren't affiliated with NixOS at all but I'm sure there were also attendees of the conference complaining on Mastodon. * NixCon is a (compared to other open source conferences like kubecon) extremely small community conference, organised by volunteers who have been under immense pressure this week to pull off all the organisation whilst also having to handle this drama on Mastodon. * We as a community should definitely discuss during the conference this weekend what we're gonna have as policies for sponsorship going forward. Because as far as I know we haven't had any real formal policies regarding NixCon organisation at all. It has always been kind of community-driven. * This year the role of the NixOS foundation has been made way more clear in the NixOS community. Before it really was just an entity for receiving donations but it did not actively do anything community building. I'm happy that we have an active Foundation board now that isn't just an administrative formality but an actual voice that can make statements. * NixOS foundation is having a board meeting today and will have a more clear statement later from what I understand * I am looking forward to Nixcon this weekend despite this hiccup. And I'm sure we'll figure it out. Edit: Also for context a statement from the founder of Anduril: https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1699590452847272044 https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1699590452847272044
- sremani 3y ago
  thanks for providing some context here.
- madars 3y ago
  >whilst also having to handle this drama on Mastodon What do you mean by "having to"? It is unreasonable to set a standard where every single complaint on social media deserves a reply. Either the sponsor is dropped or it is not -- where is the handling?
- abathur 3y ago
  I guess it may also be meaningful context that the account posting the link on HN indicates that it is affiliated with Anduril.
bowsamic 3y ago
Finding it bizarre and a little frightening that anti-war comments are being flagged in this thread
- boffinAudio 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - bowsamic 3y ago
    You're already getting downvoted. Pretty terrifying. I do wonder if the mods are involved in war profiteering EDIT: you're flagged again. /u/dang is this your doing?
toss1 3y ago
The reality of the world is that if you want a self-determined life and a self determined government, you MUST be better armed and prepared to fight than any bully, abuser, or autocrat. If not, they will soon take your lunch and your government — every time. Claiming you want "peace" without accounting for how you will defeat the bullies, abusers, and autocrats only helps them, not you. It brings war, not peace. Bullies, abusers, and autocrats do not give a fork about scolding and condemnation; if they succeed in taking what they want, regardless of any talk, they WILL take more — failure to stop them is literally seen as permission to do more. So, this is the action of absolute fools and cowards. Specifically, Useful Idiots in the Vladmir Lenin sense. Or worse yet, the actions of active supporters of genocidal autocracies. (And, do not even try to do whataboutism about the failings of the Democratic nations. Even their worst historical failings do not begin to compare vs the active genocide and war crimes being systematically committed today by the autocracies today, Russia in Ukraine, China on Tibet and Uighurs, Myanmar, etc..). This kind of bullshirt move by sniveling cowards and poseur fauxgressives is a move in the direction of literally getting us all killed. edit: Also possible that they are just thoughtlessly responding to some clueless complaints, but the failed to even call out even who made the complaints. Nevertheless, this still literally carries water for Xi and Putin.
hardware2win 3y ago
Do ppl sabotaging those relationships realize that their enemies do not do that?
- thrill 3y ago
  They count on it.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
71a54xd 3y ago
Linux groups like this are an absolute joke at this point - it's beyond a circus of political / virtue signaling that's metastasized to a point that it's basically a net negative to anyone actually trying to contribute or learn... I miss the early 2000's when hacker culture / defcon culture etc could exist on its on merits and wasn't coded by race, gender, politics or orientation...
- colinsane 3y ago
  i'd be curious to hear your experiences trying to contribute or learn about nixos with respect to this. what you're describing here i've never seen on the nixos PR or issue trackers, nor in the Matrix rooms. i don't spend much time on the nixos discourse though: are you having your threads derailed by ideological debate over there?
mlindner 3y ago
How many Chinese companies are donating to NixCon/NixOS? What communication did NixCon/NixOS receive from said companies regarding Anduril?
analognoise 3y ago
I love NixOs even more now.

51 points by spoon16 3y ago

rvz 3y ago

Right. So why haven't they gotten rid of Google as a sponsor then given that they also hold contracts with multiple governments, militaries and especially one contract with the Pentagon in the US on top of aiding their surveillance programmes?

danpalmer 3y ago
(Biased, I work at Google), but I think there's a material difference between what Google does (as I understand it, from public info) – providing infrastructure services on Google Cloud, as all the major cloud providers do, or providing customer support for cloud workloads – and building defence related technology. To my knowledge Google and the other big tech companies aren't building application directly for offence/defence. It seems this company might be. I would never work at a company that designs and builds missiles or fighter jets, but I would work at a cloud provider that provides infrastructure that is used to design missiles or fighter jets, in the same way that I would work at a telecoms company that provides the phone systems to a defence contractor. Being one level removed, and providing "neutral" services, is a substantial difference for me, and I suspect for most people.
- olix0r 3y ago
  > To my knowledge Google and the other big tech companies aren't building application directly for offence/defence. Actually there was a big uproar about exactly this several years ago https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/07/google-ai-us-department-of-defense-military-drone-project-maven-tensorflow https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/07/google-ai...
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - danpalmer 3y ago
    From reading that article it pretty much aligns with what I was saying. The US DoD used a Google technology that is not defence specific or designed for defence applications, like them running their servers on Google Cloud, or using Microsoft for their email or something. I think that's materially different to designing missiles/etc.
- skinkestek 3y ago
  For what it is worth I would much rather work for parts of western defense industry than for Google. I'd be overjoyed to help create the tools to drive the invaders out of Ukraine for example, but not so much to try to finally kill the rest of the browser market or to serve shady ads. Yes, while I am not exaggerating I am probably a bit one sided here - I know there are parts of Google that I have nothing against like GCP - but I am serious: Much rather work for the military than Google.
  - danpalmer 3y ago
    Yeah we all have our own moral positions on these things. I wouldn't want to work for a hedge fund, but many people do. A friend of mine turned down a university project from a hedge fund, but went to work at a defence contractor after university. I personally disagree with your characterisation of Google, but again this is all based on opinion.
- arthurcolle 3y ago
  > To my knowledge Google and the other big tech companies aren't building application directly for offence/defence. Project Maven? Dragonfly?
  - delroth 3y ago
    Both dropped after very significant internal outcry, even though they'd have objectively been very profitable ventures for Google.
  - danpalmer 3y ago
    Project Maven looks exactly like the cloud services thing I was talking about. I'm only going on what I can read in public online news sources though. Dragonfly looks a bit different, I'm not super familiar, but it seems it was shut down anyway?
naasking 3y ago
Should they drop power companies and internet service providers too? How many hops away from direct responsibility is enough for moral purity? I think only one hop should do.

peatmoss 3y ago

Is there some specific controversy with Anduril that the community is reacting to, or is NixCon simply avoiding sponsorship from defense firms?

mepian 3y ago
Anduril is infamous for its AI sentry towers along the US-Mexico border.
- tomschlick 3y ago
  People who push back on technology used at the border make little sense to me. Using technology frees up other resources to process migrants more quickly through the abused asylum process. That means they are in detention for less time, they get court cases quicker, and get asylum or removal quicker.
  - cjbprime 3y ago
    Surely you can imagine some consistent viewpoints that a person could have here, such as "it can be a good thing when someone is able to escape a terrible situation in their current country even if they don't meet the rules for being granted asylum"?
    - tomschlick 3y ago
      I can see how people empathize with that but on the flip side I've known plenty of immigrants who went through the process the right way, waited months or years, gone through naturalization process and did the same to get get their families here. They, along with others still in line feel cheated by the people entering illegally / abusing the asylum claim systems. If you're escaping a bad situation in a central or southern American country, and then pass through 4-5 countries to get here, you're not seeking asylum, you're an economic migrant no different from immigrants from India, China, etc all seeking a better life. No other developed country would or should allow people to illegally enter and skip the legal process.

xyzal 3y ago

I wonder where that anti-military sentiment in U.S. tech stems from? At least in former Soviet bloc, we view your military in quite a positive light. Well, for sure in a more positive light than armies of competing 'superpowers'.

boffinAudio 3y ago
[flagged]
- skinkestek 3y ago
  > The illegal invasion and occupation of Syria by an imperial force of allies. Is it the Russians or IS you think are our allies. Or am I missing out on something here?
  - Georgelemental 3y ago
    I assume boffinAudio is referring to how the Obama administration funded, armed, and trained Al-Quaeda: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/how-america-armed-terrorists-in-syria/ https://www.theamericanconservative.com/how-america-armed-te... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_Sycamore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timber_Sycamore
- Georgelemental 3y ago
  > In former eastern-bloc countries, such trivialities are easily ignored in the lust for the Western decadence Also because people there remember the horror of Soviet domination. I am ashamed of my country's (US) crimes too, but they don't make the alternatives on offer any better.
  - boffinAudio 3y ago
    The world has a long, long way to go to catch up with the US' vast and heinous war crimes, crimes against humanity, and massive violations of human rights at scale. Anyone who lived through the soviet era can see that the USA has factually become the thing it was resisting, all this time, during the cold war era. War-profiteers such as Anduril are distasteful in that light, because they are producing weapons systems that are even MORE impune to public scrutiny. Stealth capabilities are there to hide from your own people too.

fodkodrasz 3y ago

What is the point? Getting some goodwill of non-paying users (aka. freeloaders), while (maybe) alienating paying users? I get that it is a project that uses lots of volunteer work, but you won't pay your hosting fees and buildfarms from latest rust helloworld-webservice flake contributions from the programmers-socks wearing community. Sidenote: the foundation of current computing is built on DoD money.

boffinAudio 3y ago
[flagged]
- ogogmad 3y ago
  While I think you're being genuine, remember that si vis pacem para bellum: "if you want peace, prepare for war". A blanket antimilitary view is very dangerous. A company should only be ostracised if it's helping carry out war crimes.
  - nailer 3y ago
    We can see this right now with the Ukraine invasion. The 'peace' side is advocating giving Putin whatever he wants.
    - KptMarchewa 3y ago
      Exactly. If NATO countries maintained cold war weapons and ammo stockpiles, the war would already be lost for russia. Instead we got unilateral demilitarization .
      - nailer 3y ago
        Ukraine disarmed their nuclear stockpile. Obviously Russia wouldn’t have invaded otherwise.
        3y ago

JacobiX 3y ago

They dropped this company in anticipation of a future version of the CoC and sponsorship rules. Certainly, they have the right to define their rules, but they should revise the rules beforehand.

FireBeyond 3y ago
They’re not saying the company did anything wrong. Just deciding not to take their sponsorship money. I don’t think you should need to enact a new rule in order to decide not to accept money.
- totony 3y ago
  I don't think any non profit should ever refuse money. If they make money from something you disagree with, then taking that money and using it in the scope of your non-profit (which you agree with) is a moral imperative
  - FireBeyond 3y ago
    I don't believe that. Being a non-profit is not inherently a moral stance. Your goal is to further your own efforts. That doesn't automatically require you to attempt to 'disadvantage' others (even if that is voluntary on their part).

debo_ 3y ago

AI sentry towers on the US-Mexico border lends credence to Anduril's name from Lord of the Rings -- "the Flame of the West." This is completely unrelated, but if you like weapons with cool names (or are looking for names for your next defense-industry startup) the Tolkien legendarium has many! Angrist - the dagger that cut a Silmaril from Morgoth's iron crown. Means "Iron Cleaver" in Sindarin Dagmor - "dark-slayer", Beren's short blade Aranruth - The terrible sword of Thingol, King of Doriath. Means "King's Ire" The twin bastard swords "Anglachel" and "Anguirel" -- Forged by Eol the Dark Elf from a meteor, these swords were both sort of malevolent and I think were probably inspired by the Norse Tyrfing. Probably also influenced Stormbringer and Mournblade in those terrible Moorcock books. Celeg Aithorn - A legendary sword from the First Age. Reference to a Valar (God's) blade "lightning", and said to be the blade that will one day cleave the world. Edit: Ack! I forgot my favorite. "Dramborleg" -- the axe that the man Tuor found during the Fall of Gondolin. He slew three balrogs (!) and many orc champions with it. Means "thudder-sharp", because it both smashes and cuts at the same time. ("smote both a heavy dint as of a club and cleft as a sword") ... that's enough. I know the posted tweet is a serious topic and what I have posted is not, but that's where I'm at today.

nextaccountic 3y ago
> AI sentry towers on the US-Mexico border lends credence to Anduril's name from Lord of the Rings -- "the Flame of the West." So they hijacked a name from Tolkien's works and the Tolkien estate did nothing about it? They threatened to sue TSR for using "hobbit" in D&D in the 70s [0], which prompted D&D authors to change the name to "halfling" and later on change their lore a bit. [0] https://www.museumofplay.org/blog/cease-and-desist-dont-mess-with-tolkien/ https://www.museumofplay.org/blog/cease-and-desist-dont-mess...
- debo_ 3y ago
  Same goes with Palantir. No idea how the estate chooses what to go after. "Hobbit" is rather central to the Tolkien brand; Palantir and Anduril are essentially props, so it could be that these were seen as less important instances of name-theivery.

arianvanp 3y ago

Would like to add some needed context (at least I think it's needed): * This started out because NixOS mastodon account posted on chaos.social local timeline which is rather German Mastodon instance with a strict no-military-content-without-content-warnings moderation policy. People got angry for NixOS posting about the sponsor there and started complaining en masse to drop it. I think most people complaining aren't affiliated with NixOS at all but I'm sure there were also attendees of the conference complaining on Mastodon. * NixCon is a (compared to other open source conferences like kubecon) extremely small community conference, organised by volunteers who have been under immense pressure this week to pull off all the organisation whilst also having to handle this drama on Mastodon. * We as a community should definitely discuss during the conference this weekend what we're gonna have as policies for sponsorship going forward. Because as far as I know we haven't had any real formal policies regarding NixCon organisation at all. It has always been kind of community-driven. * This year the role of the NixOS foundation has been made way more clear in the NixOS community. Before it really was just an entity for receiving donations but it did not actively do anything community building. I'm happy that we have an active Foundation board now that isn't just an administrative formality but an actual voice that can make statements. * NixOS foundation is having a board meeting today and will have a more clear statement later from what I understand * I am looking forward to Nixcon this weekend despite this hiccup. And I'm sure we'll figure it out. Edit: Also for context a statement from the founder of Anduril: https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1699590452847272044 https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1699590452847272044

sremani 3y ago
thanks for providing some context here.
madars 3y ago
>whilst also having to handle this drama on Mastodon What do you mean by "having to"? It is unreasonable to set a standard where every single complaint on social media deserves a reply. Either the sponsor is dropped or it is not -- where is the handling?
abathur 3y ago
I guess it may also be meaningful context that the account posting the link on HN indicates that it is affiliated with Anduril.

bowsamic 3y ago

Finding it bizarre and a little frightening that anti-war comments are being flagged in this thread

boffinAudio 3y ago
[flagged]
- bowsamic 3y ago
  You're already getting downvoted. Pretty terrifying. I do wonder if the mods are involved in war profiteering EDIT: you're flagged again. /u/dang is this your doing?

toss1 3y ago

The reality of the world is that if you want a self-determined life and a self determined government, you MUST be better armed and prepared to fight than any bully, abuser, or autocrat. If not, they will soon take your lunch and your government — every time. Claiming you want "peace" without accounting for how you will defeat the bullies, abusers, and autocrats only helps them, not you. It brings war, not peace. Bullies, abusers, and autocrats do not give a fork about scolding and condemnation; if they succeed in taking what they want, regardless of any talk, they WILL take more — failure to stop them is literally seen as permission to do more. So, this is the action of absolute fools and cowards. Specifically, Useful Idiots in the Vladmir Lenin sense. Or worse yet, the actions of active supporters of genocidal autocracies. (And, do not even try to do whataboutism about the failings of the Democratic nations. Even their worst historical failings do not begin to compare vs the active genocide and war crimes being systematically committed today by the autocracies today, Russia in Ukraine, China on Tibet and Uighurs, Myanmar, etc..). This kind of bullshirt move by sniveling cowards and poseur fauxgressives is a move in the direction of literally getting us all killed. edit: Also possible that they are just thoughtlessly responding to some clueless complaints, but the failed to even call out even who made the complaints. Nevertheless, this still literally carries water for Xi and Putin.

hardware2win 3y ago

Do ppl sabotaging those relationships realize that their enemies do not do that?

thrill 3y ago
They count on it.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

71a54xd 3y ago

Linux groups like this are an absolute joke at this point - it's beyond a circus of political / virtue signaling that's metastasized to a point that it's basically a net negative to anyone actually trying to contribute or learn... I miss the early 2000's when hacker culture / defcon culture etc could exist on its on merits and wasn't coded by race, gender, politics or orientation...

colinsane 3y ago
i'd be curious to hear your experiences trying to contribute or learn about nixos with respect to this. what you're describing here i've never seen on the nixos PR or issue trackers, nor in the Matrix rooms. i don't spend much time on the nixos discourse though: are you having your threads derailed by ideological debate over there?

mlindner 3y ago

How many Chinese companies are donating to NixCon/NixOS? What communication did NixCon/NixOS receive from said companies regarding Anduril?

analognoise 3y ago

I love NixOs even more now.