this post was submitted on 29 Feb 2024
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The Tech Industry Doesn’t Understand Consent - Dhole Moments (soatok.blog)
submitted 8 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] [email protected] 30 points 8 months ago (7 children)

The tech industry understands consent just fine, the corpos will ignore the idea however if it means less revenue and can't have that because capitalism.

I'm giving the benefit of the doubt to every one of these shitty clickbait article authors about "tech industry" and "software engineering circles" that the authors aren't dense and know random code monkeys aren't evil or too stupid to figure out opt-in is more ethical, they just work for corps that have to make money because capitalism, but they post their stupid garbage anyway because it gets clicks.

Don't post it here.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Why would you discourage interesting, original journalism over such an obtuse nitpick?

They are clearly criticising the same capitalist structures that you are. They single out the tech industry because the article is about the misuse of tech, not because they think rank and file tech workers are deviants.

Frankly it comes off as fragile and dismissive, and if that's what we're doing we could have just stayed on reddit.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (3 children)

While the tone of the comment is dismissive, they have a point.

It's not the engineers that are the problem, or even limited to the tech industry. Dark patterns are top-down business decisions, motivated by money.

It's not that the "tech industry doesn't understand consent," but rather that greedy people do evil things. And software is just a low hanging fruit for that kind of business.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

There are absolutely the problem, that's actually the difference between a programmer and an engineer: the liability.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It's not the engineers that are the problem, or even limited to the tech industry. Dark patterns are top-down business decisions, motivated by money.

Just following orders, right?

Come on, that’s not how morality works.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Are you a moron? Because you sound like one. Are you really equating wageslaves working for Google instead of facilitating the sale of gazillions of far more unethical products at their local Walmart by being an associate customer success checkout wagie or smth to soldiers committing attrocities? Do you not even realize the "you hate prison, yet you participate in it - curious" levels of bullshit that view entails?

Because if you did that you'd be a moron. You are a moron.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Are you seriously suggesting knowledge workers have no responsibility for how their work is used?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

We have limited options in what we can do to get money. I currently have a job where I'm proud of what I do, but it took decades of working for assholes to get there. Even now I'm not comfortable with everything I'm asked to do. I push back when it's unethical, and sometimes that changes things. Sometimes it doesn't and I just have to do as I'm told. What's your life like?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I directly tell my managers that what they are asking for is illegal, and then I refuse to do it. So far, I've yet to be forced to "do as I'm told," and I doubt that this will ever be a problem for me as I don't intend to sign up for the military or any other organization that can actually force people to follow orders.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I don't get asked to do illegal things fortunately.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

But you do sometimes get asked to do "unethical" things, and you're "proud of what [you] do" even though "sometimes … [you] just have to do as [you're] told." Why? It sounds like you've chosen a compromised position "to get money."

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago

Because we're all human beings and we all think slightly differently to each other. If I wanted to only work with people who exactly agreed with me about everything, then I would only be able to work alone.

I'm not talking about things that are red lines for me, just preferences. If it were something that caused me dissonance I'd move on again, I promise you.

I'm lucky enough to have the background and the aptitude to get a new job whenever I want. Most people aren't that lucky.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Nowhere in the article does the author pin blame on individual employees. "Tech industry" obviously refers to corporations, not individual contributors. The title isn't clickbait.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (2 children)

"Tech industry" does not mean that, it could just as well mean "people in the tech industry" which means "people who work in the tech industry". The author uses this because it's the boogeyman du jour with Sam altman and such but his entire essay is dancing around the point that it's capitalism and has nothing to do with tech or is even specific to it. They would've probably had more of an article if they tried to specifically tie it to Nestle than the Tech Industry but it wouldn't get them those precious clicks.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Sure, I agree that "tech industry" can refer to individuals. But in this context, it's referring to corporations. That's the simplest interpretation of the headline, and if you don't arrive at that interpretation, it becomes increasingly apparent in the article.

"Nothing to do with tech" -- I disagree. The author is speaking to a specific issue of consent in how tech companies handle data and build UX. These are tech industry issues. Immoral data handling may also be an issue with Nestle, but the author isn't talking about Nestle. They also aren't purely talking about the general economic system of capitalism, because doing so would dilute their argument.

I don't know the author, but I don't think reducing the article to an effort to get "precious clicks" is fair. They're an established tech blogger, they've worked in security for many years, and as far as I know they make no money directly off of their articles. They even strongly encourage you to use an ad blocker when you enter the site.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago

No, it isn't

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

This also isn't only the tech industry, it's any industry. Pushy door to door salespeople aren't in the tech industry.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The corpos and gaffers ARE the tech industry. We all know that coders don't make decisions like that, and the article does not blame them. I'm all for raising awareness of the problems with "opt-out" and fluid license agreements.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

The article says "software engineering circles" so yes it does mean coders absolutely and primarily.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

random code monkeys aren't evil or too stupid to figure out opt-in is more ethical

Coming in with a hot fucking take, they very much are that evil and/or stupid. They're not at fault for how the software is structured, but judging by the crazes around tech hype (crypto, AI, NFTs) and my personal experience with average code monkeys, they would happily support "unethical" solutions (like opt-out tracking) if asked

[–] [email protected] -4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Ur an idiot. AI is anarchist af.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Yeah I'm gonna need some elaboration on that. How is AI anarchist? What exactly do you mean by anarchism? And how does this relate to my comment about the moral and intellectual (and thus cultural) tendencies in software engineering and the wider tech community?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Okay I'll bite:

How is AI anarchist

Running a local FOSS AI model that allows one to generate images, text, code and even video circumvents the power of the capitalists by giving the proletariat the means to produce themselves much more readily and with far fewer startup capital required, plus being able to train a model on the internet turns it into a trap for corporations who want their intellectual property to stay theirs, as now anyone can violate IP laws readily, similar to what the internet did to copyrighted media (paying for stuff being just a suggestion via the magic of P2P).

what do you mean by anarchism

For a good starter I'd suggest "The Conquest of Bread" and "Mutual Aid: A Factor in Evolution" by Peter Kropotkin.

how does this relate

There is no moral, and there's no such thing as culture. These are spooks in your head. There is no "community" either, that's a spook too.

There are wageslaves (proletariat or 'working class') who want a roof over their heads, their best chance is to slave for corporations who's primary product of exploiting the proletariat labour ends up being technology of some kind, be that a toaster or a marketing tool, most workers have no choice or way to affect that.

Capitalists who own these enterprises are those who make the calls because they own the means of production.

It's that simple. There are no other forces at play here.

You want to change that? Better start practicing communism, e.g. by working on foss AI projects or even foss in general.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I'll bite back >:3

I don't think I know enough about anarchism to really dispute that. Though how much can the proletariat gain compared to the capitalists from AI? FOSS models are limited - I don't think most people have supercomputers required for the training in their basements.

I will however question your denial of community. What definition of that word do you use? We're not in a worker - capitalist relationship all the time. See: us right now, right here. See: me with other students at my university. Class distinctions are irrelevant to that.
Hell, Lemmy as a whole is a tech enthusiast community to an extent, though it being a lesser known specific form of social media introduces forces that make this community different in meaningful ways (e.g. it's not corporate - there are fewer corpowhores here, it requires more effort to get in - people here will be on average more interested in actually contributing something meaningful).
On top of that, you mentioned FOSS models. Who were they built by? Corporations? Or a bunch of loosely associated volunteers who came together to work towards a shared goal? Is this not a community? (Those are actual questions btw, I couldn't be bothered to check)
And with some form of a community comes some form of culture and morality.

As for additional forces even in workplaces, did you know most tech workers are men?

And as an aside, where have I said that it's the tech workers who are responsible for bad, unethical solutions? I'm pretty I explicitly claimed the opposite

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

I try to fight some battles about ads, accessibility and an open web but I’m a failing don Chiosciotte; best I can actively do is test mainly for Firefox and make sure everything works properly there but for more business related decisions (see: ads, consent etc) there is little to nothing I can do

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

"I was just following orders"

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Lol you already commented this with your alt https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/6909435 lmao

Absolute lunatic m8

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It sounds like you understand what's wrong with your opinion and yet can't bring yourself to improve as a person.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago

Nah I already proved you wrong in the comment I linked

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You are out of your mind. Soatok has more credibility in the industry than all the posters here put together.

You might not want to read it. Skip it and move on.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Are you this 'soatok'? I've never heard of you before doesn't look like anyone else has either.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Umm no? Soatok is Soatok.

He’s an expert in the field of the security of cryptographic implementations, along with other lesser interests.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Okay you claim to be expert but you are wrong so maybe we need better?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Wait what? I’m not the expert in the previous sentence.

Listen, you are clearly half assing this, so I’m just gonna block you and move on.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

@LainTrain That would be @[email protected]. The blog itself is also federated at @[email protected]

[tagging @vzq @programming for Mastodon->Lemmy federation]

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

@TerrorBite @LainTrain @[email protected] @vzq @programming Hi.

I'm not able to comment on the entire thread, but I wanted to point something out that LainTrain commented on in another part of the thread.

When I say "tech industry" I absolutely mean the companies. When I say "tech community", I mean the workers.

You can substitute "tech" in those descriptors for something more specific (i.e., "security industry" salesdrones pitch blinky boxes at Black Hat USA while the "security community" shares exploit tricks for drinks at DEF CON -- two very different beasts).

[–] [email protected] 25 points 8 months ago

It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!

Upton Sinclair

[–] [email protected] 18 points 8 months ago

Opt-out is bullshit, it's unethical. Unless people specifically give their consent to their content being used for training data, and are compensated if they wish to be compensated for that privilege, then it's just not morally defensible. Legally defensible? Sure, maybe so. But we don't like to support companies who are merely abiding by the letter of the law, we want them to abide by the spirit of the law and of treating their customers with respect and consideration. This is not that at all. 😕

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

Hey, non-FOSS internet, how is it going?

...

Yeah.