https://soatok.blog/2024/02/27/the-tech-industry-doesnt-understand-consent/
Thanks to Samantha Cole at 404 Media, we are now aware that Automattic plans to sell user data from Tumblr and WordPress.com (which is the host for my blog) for “AI” products. In respon…
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.
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.
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.
Okay, but what is the utility in taking the title so literally and ignoring the real content? It's a vague and mildly provocative title that is quickly clarified.
The article doesn't argue that the tech industry is uniquely evil. It is just spreading awareness about a specific phenomenon that is currently happening in the tech industry. That is what good journalism is. People can't organise a response to something they don't even know about.
Besides, the tech industry does have its own culture and that culture is full of problems. Capitalism is very top-down, but it's our shared culture that allowed tech solutionist billionaires to be embraced as heroes for so long. The least we can do is dispel the bad ideas they hide behind so people stop waiting for tech to save them.
And sorry if my tone seems rude. It's not intentional, it's just a frustrating subject to think about.
Software engineering has no culture - shared or otherwise. It's just a job, you clock in, you clock out, it's the same prison as anything else but with the comfort of WFH. The only maybe cultural aspect is that people refuse to unionize, but that's a different issue and a result of material pressures (far too much demand for jobs gives uneven bargaining power).
Bezos, musk, gates et al were never seen as heroes by those who don't idolize capitalists and corpos to begin with, and are still seen that way by the rest.
The future is indeed tech solutions and always has been, not an-prim nonsense and tech will indeed save us (and already has from every problem tackled thus far in humanity's history, every disease etc.), but those tech solutions have to be aligned with humanity's interests, and to do that you need to remove the exploitation incentive and the way you do that is by changing economic systems to communism or anarchism.
Idk I don't find it very frustrating, it's very clean cut in my opinion.
Software engineering has no culture - shared or otherwise.
This is absurd. Everything about software engineering is culture. It's built around shared cultural artifacts and texts. The idea of tech and a tech industry is a purely cultural delineation.
Bezos, musk, gates et al were never seen as heroes by those who don’t idolize capitalists and corpos to begin with, and are still seen that way by the rest.
Self-congratulating and utterly defeatist at the same time. Sorry but if you ever want a union it's pretty important that your colleagues don't think some CEO is the messiah. If you really haven't noticed a shift in the perception of tech billionaires in the last 10 years I don't know what to tell you.
The future is indeed tech solutions and always has been, not an-prim nonsense and tech will indeed save us
So you're a historical materialist who thinks we need a communist and/or anarchist revolution to save us, but who also thinks that we can sit around doing nothing until someone invents one in their garage? What on earth are you talking about?
the way you do that is by changing economic systems to communism or anarchism.
Okay but HOW? You seem to think an article that documents the exploitative behaviour of capitalists is somehow actively obstructing this revolution.
There are absolutely the problem, that's actually the difference between a programmer and an engineer: the liability.
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.
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.
Are you seriously suggesting knowledge workers have no responsibility for how their work is used?
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?
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.
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.
"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.
This also isn't only the tech industry, it's any industry. Pushy door to door salespeople aren't in the tech industry.
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.
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.
The article says "software engineering circles" so yes it does mean coders absolutely and primarily.
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
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?
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.
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
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
Lol you already commented this with your alt https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/6909435 lmao
Absolute lunatic m8
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.
Are you this 'soatok'? I've never heard of you before doesn't look like anyone else has either.
Umm no? Soatok is Soatok.
He’s an expert in the field of the security of cryptographic implementations, along with other lesser interests.
@LainTrain That would be @soatok@furry.engineer. The blog itself is also federated at @soatok@soatok.blog
[tagging @vzq @programming for Mastodon->Lemmy federation]
@TerrorBite @LainTrain @soatok@soatok.blog @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).
It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!
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. 😕