3 ms·

I don't know if you all know this, but Palantir offers ai/analytics services that are not just for governments. That's how they started out, but don't be surpri

I don't know if you all know this, but Palantir offers ai/analytics services that are not just for governments. That's how they started out, but don't be surprised seeing random companies using them same as they would elastic, splunk and the like. I won't comment on Palantir themselves, I doubt I could add anything there, but I think there is a glaring pattern to be observed there. Companies really are not people, if people don't want them, they can cease to exist. If the UK for example is really able to say no to Palantir, can they do it countrywide? Fines aside (let's be real, they're just taxes at this point since no company goes bankrupt from fines these days), what company is facing meaningful consequence for harming society? Vote with dollars? Ok...but back to my pessimism earlier, I guess I don't need to vote at the ballot then right? Let's just vote with our wallets instead? If Palantir really is so evil (and I'm not saying that, I don't know enough , although I've probably used their stuff more than most), at minimum, tell me what sort of a vote will lead to their extinction. if they broke the law, tell me who I can vote for to imprison the law breakers. If they didn't break the law because one didn't exist to prohibit their actions to begin with, then who will pass the laws required so I can vote for them? Why are we not talking about whatever practice Palantir is in the habit of doing, and how to criminalize that? Maybe we can't in the US, but this is Europe, I would hope they'd have better luck. This sort of thinking and action-taking doesn't seem to exist here in the US. I don't think we're able to function that way anymore. To friends in Europe and elsewhere: Take heed and be warned. Being able to organize and resist companies and laws, that's something you should fight with all your strength over. But looking at this site, it isn't very convincing. I know of more serious accusations against Palantir that aren't listed there. Enabling mass deportations and gaza, yeah.. that's Microsoft, Google and Cisco as well. Their CEO, yeah.. Elon says a lot worse things about a lot more things, are his satellites banned in the UK? at least is the UK gov banned from using them? He's been caught aiding Russia with his sats a couple of times now. My observation is that a more holistic approach and measures are needed. A glaring lack of consequences over all.

karlitooo 10mo ago
Mostly the x is evil crowd are reasoning based on political affiliation. As is the GoodLaw Project and Jolyon Maugham who have a history of doing so. All media is agitprop now. If the CEO of a company says things that oppose the political chorus of either side, they become subject to witch hunts such as this. Individuals are losing their ability to reason with ideas
- discreteevent 10mo ago
  > Individuals are losing their ability to reason with ideas There isn't a single reason or idea in your previous two paragraphs. Instead it seems to be the worst of cynicism designed to encourage people to give up on reasoning and ideas.
deleted 10mo ago
[deleted]
int_19h 10mo ago
Palantir indeed has a lot of clients, but governments - and in particular, US federal agencies - are still the biggest and most lucrative customers. Nor is Palantir blind to what those customers are using the tech for - indeed, their whole point is "deploying" people to customer's premises so that they can work hands on. So when they do that for the ICE contract, say, they know full well what they are optimizing - proudly so. It's way more close and personal than what most of the big tech firms do (although you did list some exceptions). But no, it's not illegal to provide panopticon-as-a-service to authoritarian governments, unfortunately. Especially not when you ask said governments. As to what you can do to change this, I honestly don't know, and I say this as someone who resigned from NVIDIA recently because of this: https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-palantir-ai-enterprise-data-intelligence https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-palantir-ai-enterp... - but there's no shortage of people willing to work on this stuff. And in US at least I feel big tech enmeshed with the feds have such a strong lobby, neither major party is going to do anything useful about it in terms of passing laws making the business model itself illegal.
- notepad0x90 10mo ago
  I don't think I want anyone quitting their jobs over this. Is democracy working or not? Let's make it illegal then. If people who vote are just not aware of this, then there needs to be a more organized awareness campaign, how can we help with that? I don't think all this "lone hero" b.s. by engineers is useful. I don't need someone martyring their careers.
  - int_19h 10mo ago
    I didn't do it because I expected it to influence the decision makers. I did it because I don't want to be knowingly aiding and abetting the kinds of things ICE does. But to answer your other questions... No, democracy isn't working in US right now. Arguably hasn't for a while, but it's very evident now. Fixing that would likely require amending the constitution; a bar so high that at this point I'm confident that the system is more likely to self-destruct from internal contradictions than to reform. At the same time, there are literally millions of people in this country who did vote for this and do want it. Even if they had an honest majority, it wouldn't make any of it any less evil. Democracies aren't inherently good.
alex1138 10mo ago
Has he helped Russia? I know he did help Ukraine partly with Starlink and I hadn't heard much beyond that
- notepad0x90 10mo ago
  Russian drones/war machines with his satlinks have been found, they would have needed to fly with an uplink from deep within russia from what I understand, meaning his sats were providing service there, and chances are he supplied the terminals.

karlitooo 10mo ago

Mostly the x is evil crowd are reasoning based on political affiliation. As is the GoodLaw Project and Jolyon Maugham who have a history of doing so. All media is agitprop now. If the CEO of a company says things that oppose the political chorus of either side, they become subject to witch hunts such as this. Individuals are losing their ability to reason with ideas

discreteevent 10mo ago
> Individuals are losing their ability to reason with ideas There isn't a single reason or idea in your previous two paragraphs. Instead it seems to be the worst of cynicism designed to encourage people to give up on reasoning and ideas.

deleted 10mo ago

[deleted]

int_19h 10mo ago

Palantir indeed has a lot of clients, but governments - and in particular, US federal agencies - are still the biggest and most lucrative customers. Nor is Palantir blind to what those customers are using the tech for - indeed, their whole point is "deploying" people to customer's premises so that they can work hands on. So when they do that for the ICE contract, say, they know full well what they are optimizing - proudly so. It's way more close and personal than what most of the big tech firms do (although you did list some exceptions). But no, it's not illegal to provide panopticon-as-a-service to authoritarian governments, unfortunately. Especially not when you ask said governments. As to what you can do to change this, I honestly don't know, and I say this as someone who resigned from NVIDIA recently because of this: https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-palantir-ai-enterprise-data-intelligence https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-palantir-ai-enterp... - but there's no shortage of people willing to work on this stuff. And in US at least I feel big tech enmeshed with the feds have such a strong lobby, neither major party is going to do anything useful about it in terms of passing laws making the business model itself illegal.

notepad0x90 10mo ago
I don't think I want anyone quitting their jobs over this. Is democracy working or not? Let's make it illegal then. If people who vote are just not aware of this, then there needs to be a more organized awareness campaign, how can we help with that? I don't think all this "lone hero" b.s. by engineers is useful. I don't need someone martyring their careers.
- int_19h 10mo ago
  I didn't do it because I expected it to influence the decision makers. I did it because I don't want to be knowingly aiding and abetting the kinds of things ICE does. But to answer your other questions... No, democracy isn't working in US right now. Arguably hasn't for a while, but it's very evident now. Fixing that would likely require amending the constitution; a bar so high that at this point I'm confident that the system is more likely to self-destruct from internal contradictions than to reform. At the same time, there are literally millions of people in this country who did vote for this and do want it. Even if they had an honest majority, it wouldn't make any of it any less evil. Democracies aren't inherently good.

alex1138 10mo ago

Has he helped Russia? I know he did help Ukraine partly with Starlink and I hadn't heard much beyond that

notepad0x90 10mo ago
Russian drones/war machines with his satlinks have been found, they would have needed to fly with an uplink from deep within russia from what I understand, meaning his sats were providing service there, and chances are he supplied the terminals.