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September 12, 2020

When Companies Do Evil -- What Should Engineers Do?

I'm writing this to all the engineers. The SysAdmins, Developers, Testers, and DevOps folk out there. The people that keep the servers running and the companies in business.

All of us that have been in this line of work, for more than a few years, have had at least one example (if not several dozen) where we have disagreed with something our company was doing.

Maybe we disagreed with the way our software was licensed. Or the marketing was, in our opinion, a bit deceptive. Perhaps we took issue with the way the personal data, collected by the services we built, was being used.

All legitimate concerns.

And, depending on a variety of factors, these are concerns we may have spoken out about.

Lots of possibilities. Maybe we opted to stay quiet to keep the paychecks coming. Maybe we tried to effect change internally... but simply gave up after that change proved too challenging. Every case is different. And no two engineers are going to be in the same set of circumstances.

But what if... the company we work for does something much, much worse?

I'm talking... real bad. So bad, that it can't be ignored. So utterly horrendous, that it will be talked about for years (if not decades, or more) to come.

A lot of engineers are finding themselves in exactly that position right now. And I feel for them.

Apple, for example, appears to be benefiting from slave labor -- a large group placed into camps, and forced to labor, by the Chinese government. (1)

This is, without question, a bad thing. I don't know of a single engineer that likes the idea of slave labor. And I know a lot of engineers.

Another recent example would be Netflix. (2) The streaming company is currently promoting and distributing a film ("Cuties" ) that, clearly and overwhelmingly, meets the legal definition of "Child Pornography". (3)

Not one single good person on planet Earth thinks child pornography is a good thing. Not one. Which means that not only did Netflix commit a crime (possibly a great many), but they have done something that nearly every human being finds utterly disgusting. Firmly within the very definition of "evil".

"Slave Labor" and "Child Pornography". Not little concerns. Possibly some of the worst things any person or company could do.

And we, as engineers, make a great deal of these things possible. We design, build, and maintain the technical infrastructure required for any of this to happen.

The software. The servers. All of it. It's us that makes it happen.

But that begs the question: What should a good engineer do in such situations?

I suppose there are really 4 primary options:

1. Ignore

The easiest reaction would simply be to ignore these bad things. To pretend them away.

To put those thoughts into a lock box, deep inside our soul. To block and filter any news stories or people talking about the topic.

To, in effect, put our fingers in our ears and sing "LA LA LA" as loudly as possible.

2. Rationalize

Or, we can rationalize these things.

"I didn't directly have anything to do with the slave labor. That was a different department. That's hardware. I work on the Operating System team."

... or ...

"I didn't make the child porn. That was someone else. I just write the python scripts that publish the files to the production servers."

... or ...

"These things are terrible. But I need the paycheck."

All of these rationalizations -- and the nearly limitless others -- have a bit of truth to them. That's what makes them good rationalizations.

But, at the end of the day, that means we still work at a company doing truly evil things. We justified it to ourselves (and others). And we got paid for it.

This approach to dealing with these evils... I tell ya. It makes my stomach hurt. No sir. Don't like it.

3. Stay and fight

In the two examples (Slave Labor and Child Porn), we all agree: these things are evil.

Evil must be stopped, right?

So, perhaps, we stay. We stay working at the company (and drawing a paycheck). But we fight to change things.

We push for the people making these evil decisions to be fired.

We push for changes to procedures and policies that would make those sorts of evils not happen in the future.

We push for the company to (at least attempt to) fix what they had done. However difficult that task may be.

This approach takes some serious guts. You're putting your livelihood on the line. You're talking, every day, with people at a company that you are fighting to change in a not-insignificant way. For most engineers... This is a darn stressful approach.

4. Leave

Or you can simply leave the company.

Maybe you speak out afterwards. Maybe you don't.

Maybe you become a whistle-blower and work to end those evils. Maybe... you don't.

Either way, you stop earning a paycheck that comes, at least in some part, from something truly evil.

...

Four distinctly different approaches -- and I'm sure there are plenty of others and variations. But, for me, I think it all boils down to this:

20 years from now, when I'm telling the story of that period of time. That time Netflix, Apple, or whatever company I was working at did something truly terrible -- just pure evil... the kind of evil that will be talked about for decades to come -- what did I do? What action did I take?

What will I say?

In that story, am I the hero? The good guy? When I tell the story, do I puff up my chest with a little pride? Does it make me feel good about my impact on that company... and the world?

Or am I the engineer that kept the machinery of evil chugging along?

The old saying "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing" comes to mind.

Right now seems like a pretty good time to think about such things.

1 - https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-forced-uighur-labor-iphone-factory-2020-3

2- https://www.foxnews.com/politics/ted-cruz-calls-for-doj-investigation-into-netflix-promotion-of-cuties

3- https://www.justice.gov/criminal-ceos/child-pornography#:~:text=Federal%20law%20defines%20child%20pornography,less%20than%2018%20years%20old).&text=Federal%20law%20prohibits%20the%20production,any%20image%20of%20child%20pornography.

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Looking for the Podcast RSS feed or other links? Check here:
https://lunduke.locals.com/post/4619051/lunduke-journal-link-central-tm

Give the gift of The Lunduke Journal:
https://lunduke.locals.com/post/4898317/give-the-gift-of-the-lunduke-journal

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openSUSE says "No Lunduke allowed!"

Those in power with openSUSE make it clear they will not allow me anywhere near anything related to the openSUSE project. Ever. For any reason.

Well, that settles that, then! Guess I won't be contributing to openSUSE! 🤣

Looking for the Podcast RSS feed or other links?
https://lunduke.locals.com/post/4619051/lunduke-journal-link-central-tm

Give the gift of The Lunduke Journal:
https://lunduke.locals.com/post/4898317/give-the-gift-of-the-lunduke-journal

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"Andreas Kling creator of Serenity OS & Ladybird Web Browser" - Lunduke’s Big Tech Show - September 13th, 2023 - Ep 044

This episode is free for all to enjoy and share.

Be sure to subscribe here at Lunduke.Locals.com to get all shows & articles (including interviews with other amazing nerds).

"Andreas Kling creator of Serenity OS & Ladybird Web Browser" - Lunduke’s Big Tech Show - September 13th, 2023 - Ep 044

I thought the headline was clickbait, but in a way, it's kinda true. Quite cool. I would love to chat to the person responsible for telling the big corp bosses how lava lamps would help secure the net. 😁
https://grantpiperwriting.medium.com/how-a-wall-of-lava-lamps-is-protecting-the-internet-c7b773b251ee

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I found an interesting project: a Z80 single board computer.
https://github.com/tec1group/TEC-1G
It's a computer that anyone can build from parts, it has a hexadecimal keyboard for coding and a small display. Also it can write stuff to some kind of port and it can import (precompiled) programs from another computer.
One great thing about it is that it's in active development with an active community. I hope you also find it extremely interesting.

The Lunduke Journal Week-in-Review: March 24th, 2024
Hard-hitting news, nerdy goofines, & a dash of controversy. You know. A normal week.

It’s been a heck of a fun week at The Lunduke Journal. Just shy of a dozen new shows — across a wide range of topics.

Just to make sure you don’t miss out on any of the good times, here are all of the shows (and a few other odds and ends) from the last week alone — across all three sites in The Lunduke Journal Universe.

Lunduke.Locals.com

NerdyEntertainment.Locals.com

ConservativeNerds.Locals.com

Warning: Content in this portion of The Lunduke Journal can get very political. If you want to avoid politics, stick to the two areas above.

Hot diggity, that’s a lot of nerdy shows! A combination of “You’ll only hear about this on The Lunduke Journal” hard-hitting news topics… and more than a little happy, goofy nerdiness.

Exactly the way it should be.

-Lunduke

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The Lunduke Journal has been banned from YouTube

YouTube has a long history of making things difficult for The Lunduke Journal.

In the early days, The Lunduke Journal published all shows exclusively to YouTube (yeah, I know... a mistake).  And, for over a year of that time, YouTube demonetized every single video with the word "Linux" in the title.

Seriously.  They really did that.

If a video said "Linux is nifty" it was instantly demonetized.  As you can imagine, for someone who talks about Linux a great deal, this made earning a living from those videos incredibly difficult.

Now, in 2024, YouTube has kicked things up a notch.

The Lunduke Journal is no longer allowed to upload any videos to YouTube.  Not even allowed to post comments or text posts.  No communication with the YouTube subscribers, whatsoever, is allowed.

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Luckily, this has very little impact on The Lunduke Journal.

The good news is that this was always inevitable... and I planned for it.

Any "YouTuber" who speaks their mind will eventually get banned or heavily censored on YouTube.  It's simply going to happen.  We all know that.

For that reason, over the last few years, I have encouraged people (rather strongly) to migrate their viewing (and reading) habbits to non-YouTube (and non-Google) platforms.  And that has been successful.

As such, in 2024, YouTube is not the primary way most people get my shows.  There may be roughly 60,000-some-odd subscribers on The Lunduke Journal's YouTube channel... but those viewers represent a small portion of the overall audience.

Losing 60,000 subscribers is a bummer.  But The Lunduke Journal will survive.

To those who have clung to YouTube: It's time to subscribe elsewhere.

There are lots of amazing ways to get videos from The Lunduke Journal.  Here they are... in order from "most recommended" to "still good, but not as awesome":

  1. Lunduke.Locals.com <-- Recommended
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  3. X.com/LundukeJournal

If you subscribe at one place: Lunduke.Locals.com is it.  That will ensure you see everything -- including the exclusive stuff.  But free videos (including free live streams) are also available on Rumble and X going forward.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go fight the urge to begin writing a "YouTube Sucks" show...

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Book & Movie Club, Discord Server Invite, Content page, and other odds & ends

Just a few quick updates and reminders for everyone (to make sure nobody misses out on anything around The Lunduke Journal Universe).

  • We've got a Movie Club and Book Club going over on NerdyEntertainment.Locals.com.  Here's the current schedule:
  • The Lunduke Journal has a priviate, invite-only Discord server.  Only for subscribers (keeps the trolls out).  You can find the invite link at the bottom of Lunduke.com.
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  • A quick reminder to check out the Content page (or Content Tab on the Locals iOS/Android App).  All videos and articles are there.  Searchable and sortable.  It exists on each Locals site and it's really handy to make sure you don't miss any of the big stuff.
  • There's now a small (permanent) discount when picking up a Lifetime Subscription with Bitcoin.  Since there's less total processing fees with Bitcoin, I'm just passing the difference on to you.  No biggy.  But if you use Bitcoin already, and you are looking at a Lifetime Sub... worth going that way to save a few bucks.  Of course picking a subscription up straight through Locals is pretty sweet too.  😉
  • Have any issues?  Have a Triple Pass but missing access somewhere?  Email bryan at lunduke.com.  I can usually sort out any issues pretty doggone quickly.  😎

That's it for now.  Just a few odds & ends to make sure nobody misses out on some of the fun stuff.

-Lunduke

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