11 ms·
Probably related to this: https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/v869-about-taiwan/ https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/v869-about-taiwan/
by simlevesque 8mo ago
Probably related to this: https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/v869-about-taiwan/ https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/v869-about-taiwan/
- icelancer 8mo agoYeah, Notepad++ is known for political messaging in their updates. Taiwan, Ukraine, etc.
- lobito25 8mo agoProbably the real motive.
- chvid 8mo ago“ The incident began from June 2025. Multiple independaent security researchers have assessed that the threat acotor is likely a Chinese state-sponsored group, which would explain the highly selective targeting obseved during the campaign.” How do they know it was a Chinese group or even a state sponsored one?
- cwnyth 8mo agoThey said "likely", so they don't "know." Yours is the wrong question.
- skeledrew 8mo agoThe "likely" does give the impression that they have a pretty good idea.
- cwnyth 8mo agoI didn't say that to be pedantic, but to avoid that particular type of asker who isn't actually asking a genuine question here. After listing all the ways that Notepad++ (as an example here) suspects who they suspect, the asker then comes back with "Yeah, but how do you know?", as if that's some sort of gotcha. It's disingenuous. Even if the person I replied to isn't attempting this, I find it good to call out and get people to ask a better question: what's the evidence and why does that evidence point to this conclusion?
- uhx 8mo agoBy analyzing payloads / C2 address, etc...
- somenameforme 8mo agoYeah because a state level actor would be completely incapable of false attribution.
- lukan 8mo agoWith enough effort, anything can be obfuscated. But effort costs money and also state level actors have limited funds and time and want to go home to their families ar some point and if the purpose was to get a message across (don't mess with china, otherwise face the consequences) there is no need to really hide the origin.
- tbrownaw 8mo agoPerhaps it's "...because that would explain..."?
- rightbyte 8mo agoWhen you want to spread jingoist paranoia you can just make stuff up and claim any critique is from said actors.
- hulitu 8mo ago> Chinese group our enemy. It must be Chinese, North Korean or Russian. > state sponsored one "our software/our provider is so good that only a state actor can compromise us" (see Microsoft's AD keys hack for details)
- LoganDark 8mo agoI can't help but feel there must some better venue for such messaging. When I see politics in software updates or documentation, nothing happens because I'm not looking to use the software for political activism. Maybe I tell my adblocker to remove the messaging, and carry on with my task. I can engage with politics in a social context, when political messaging isn't interrupting something else I'm doing; that's a better place for activism, IMHO. I almost always see activists using the argument that if I don't like the messaging then I'm part of the problem. Somehow I doubt that, given I don't mind messaging at all, where it's appropriate.
- icelancer 8mo agoI generally agree with you. But I put up with it since Notepad++ is good software. It is what it is.
- deleted 8mo ago[deleted]
- ryandrake 8mo agoSimilar comments also come up in the [now regular] "I don't want to see political articles on HN" threads, and I think the response is similar: Asking for "no politics" is itself a strong political view: One in support/service of whatever the current status quo is. Trying to set oneself apart from (or above) politics is itself political. If you're lucky enough to be one of the fortunate people on earth who are not under attack by political forces or who benefit from status quo politics, I'd encourage you to simply reflect on that good luck and try to ignore the "politics" that others are deeply affected by and care about.
- LoganDark 8mo agoI don't care for the current status quo at all. The current administration has wrecked this country and completely compromised its position in the global economy potentially forever. But there is a time and a place for those arguments and activism, as well as the same for other parts of the world suffering from similar or worse issues. Like, I wouldn't be receptive to hearing about Ukraine every time I go to the grocery store. When I want to hear about it I go to the YouTube channels documenting it! They're very interesting, but I need to be in a space to receive it. Similarly there are places where I'm not specifically looking for it but where I'd be receptive because it's not immediately irrelevant to something I'm doing. Otherwise it is just noise. This is absolutely no statement about the status quo, but just how my brain works. It's also not a statement against activism in general, just about my personal opinion of it in certain places.
- tjpnz 8mo agoI wouldn't brush off Taiwan or Ukraine as "political". In both cases it's about survival, and in one it's a literal fight.
- MengerSponge 8mo agoBro, it's political. Political isn't synonymous with "bad" or with "propaganda". Wars are waged on many fronts, and securing economic and hardware support takes messaging.
- airstrike 8mo agoIn fact, Carl von Clausewitz is known for saying "War is politics by other means" (among many other great quotes)
- direwolf20 8mo agoI'd say politics is war by other means. First we killed each other for resources. Then we decided killing sucked, and if your tribe doesn't kill my tribe, my tribe won't kill your tribe, but now we have to decide how many resources we each get. It's hard work to keep things like this and avoid reverting back to the default state.
- user205738 8mo ago[flagged]
- avazhi 8mo agoThat’s political, lol.
- deleted 8mo ago[deleted]
- ValveFan6969 8mo ago[flagged]
- pandemic_region 8mo agoYou'll enjoy the ads more?
- orsorna 8mo agoAnd this https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/v781-free-uyghur-edition/ https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/v781-free-uyghur-edition/ I distinctly remember their GH page being flooded with issues written in Chinese.
- maxkfranz 8mo agoEveryone is entitled to their opinions. My opinion is that open source documentation is like polite dinner conversation: It’s not the proper place to discuss politics. If an author wishes to use their open source project as a platform to discuss politics, that’s the author’s prerogative. But then, as perhaps in this instance, it could be to the detriment of the project itself.
- davorak 8mo ago> My opinion is that open source documentation is like polite dinner conversation: It’s not the proper place to discuss politics. I know this is a common turn of phrase, but I can not help thinking that if the political conversation is impolite it is because some in the conversation is being impolite not due to the topic itself.
- cespare 8mo agoSkirt too short, in other words? I'm going to place the blame on the party committing the crimes, not the person exercising free expression.
- jajuuka 8mo agoThis is a zero sum take. There are no winners, only the people you deem using free expression correctly. Would a developer who names releases like "Ukrainians are nazi's" or "Taiwan is China" be met with this same sympathy? Or would you brush them off as a mouthpiece for those governments? I'm thinking it's the latter. Free expression is rarely anything other than socially acceptable expression.
- mckn1ght 8mo agoIMO the ethical response should be positive disengagement with entities with which you disagree, instead of negative engagement. See something in the release notes of an app you don’t like? Go use a different app, give your money to a different entity. Don’t spend your time and resources messing with the producer or user of the thing you don’t like. This of course runs the risk of maximal polarization once everyone has filtered themselves into their neat and tidy little bubbles. What happens then, everybody leaves each other alone? Or do the echo chambers slide into further radicalized detachment from each other?
- shevy-java 8mo agoAh, so this has to do with mainland China going after those who think the Taiwanese do not belong to mainland China. Well, I see them as independent folks. Mainland China needs to stop thinking it can occupy land willy-nilly; unfortunately with USA, Russia and China thinking they can bully other countries that lack nukes, I think these smaller countries absolutely need nukes for defensive purpose. It is also annoying that all these three countries think they can bully other countries too. That is basically them saying they can kill other people in other countries at all times no matter the real "reason" (just make up a fake reason, such as Russia with regard to Ukraine) - annoying to no ends. Having said that, and I just pointed out I disagree with mainland China bullying the Taiwanese, I think it would actually be better to have software itself be completely apolitical. I never understood why people felt a need to tie political goals into software. That is a valid statement even if I happen to agree with the political goals here.
- deleted 8mo ago[deleted]
- Wilder7977 8mo agoIn 2026 hoping that software could be (more) apolitical is a very brave stance. I look at the software world and I can see core political statements in almost every popular software. From privacy invasion, supporting shady industries (e.g., marketing) even at the expense of people (a reverse-welfare, in a sense), environmental destruction (e.g., complete lack of care for resource usage) and many more. If anything, we need much more politics in software, ideally exercised by those who write that software instead of "apolitical" software writers who end up executing the political software of those who pay them. If you meant to scope your statement only to FOSS, then this still applies (in fact, FOSS is inherently political), plus I suppose some people who invest their time to write software want to also use the same effort for political activism and there is nothing wrong with that. This can be expressing their political views via that software (e.g., vim and the support to children in Uganda) or can be using a license that only allows co-ops to run their software, or many other ways. The idea that software even could be apolitical stems from the idea that technology can be neutral, which again, in 2026 is really a tough idea to support.
- jojobas 8mo agoMy understanding is they targeted particular users of Notepad++, not the author.