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Comment by cyphar | Hacker News Reader

It's strange to me that technology workers are seemingly unwilling to unionise and hold general strikes to protest these kinds of policies -- if we aren't willing to take real collective action, we aren't ever going to have our voices heard. When Australia passed an even more ludicrous anti-encryption bill a year ago, the only real response by the technology community was a handful of blog posts (after it was too late to do anything about the legislation[+]) and grand-standing on twitter.

Why are we so shocked when politicians don't listen to us? We act like petulant children -- small bursts of outrage, but with no consequences for the people in power.

[+]: Most posts were published either a day or two before it passed through the House of Reps, and some were posted during the day of the Senate discussion and passage. I did submit comments during the comment period, but we all know that had zero effect on their decisions.

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Unions exist primarily to engage with employers, not government. Governments are very weary to permit any union to become politically important for historic reasons. And any wise union thinks twice before getting involved in politics.

So you'd need workers to unionize (which they have NOT done to deal with their employers). AND for that union to pick the federal government as it's first opponent (and not it's members' employers!?). AND to get that all done before this bill becomes law (and in a time of epidemic). AND then for them to win an uphill battle with the most powerful political entity on earth despite the fact that ~80% of voters don't know what you're campaigning about and if they did wouldn't care.

I think the real question here is why tech companies (or rather their CEOs, founders etc) are not making a fuss. I was disappointed by the revelations from Snowden about how Google, FB, Apple, ISPs and everyone else turned over everything without asking any questions before it was even legal after sept. 11th. But I gave them the benefit of the doubt: they were afraid, they wanted to be patriotic, it's hard to say no when someone asks nicely etc. Then they were all "outraged" by the revelations. If they were really outraged, they'd be buying senators, hiring PR firms and making public statements decrying this.

The cynical answer to that is that these companies have made a calculated decision not to pick a fight most users don't (yet) care about.

I'd also be careful calling us petulant. Politicians ignore us because 90% of people are not informed and choose not to think about history when these issues come up. But the audience here are mostly members of the other 10%. Since we're overwhelmingly outnumbers, out voted and ignored, what can we do but be outraged, share some articles about self-service-encryption and then move on?

Sorry, I've been quite confrontational in this comment. I also think there will be a lot more "outrage" than action on this. But when the possible action is very limited... Unionization would likely be positive too, I just think it would be a small part of a large and complex solution.

> Unions exist primarily to engage with employers, not government.

Labor parties in countries like the UK and Australia specifically exist to act as union-supported (and funded) parties. Unions do exist to help deal with members' employers, but they also exist to allow for collective political action.

An obvious example worldwide is teachers' unions (though you could argue because their employer is the state government, the union is fighting against their employer). Another example would be the strikes in the UK during Thatcher's time in office. Not to mention that basically all workers' rights legislation in most countries came out of battles between unions and governments, hence why they are so "weary" to "permit" unions to take political action -- because collective action works.

> So you'd need workers to unionize (which they have NOT done to deal with their employers) [...]

There's a saying about the second best time to plant a tree being today, and that applies here. This battle is most likely already lost, but actively choosing to not learn a lesson from it (unionise and mobilise for the next time this happens) is simply foolish. Ideally the technology industry would've unionised 30 years ago, but you'll never have any strength if the immediate response to someone saying "we should unionise" is "even if we unionised right now we couldn't solve $current_problem". Even if that is true, maybe having that infrastructure in place will allow you to solve tomorrow's problem?

> I think the real question here is why tech companies (or rather their CEOs, founders etc) are not making a fuss.

I hope by "fuss" you mean "shutting down operations until demands are met". Plenty of CEOs blogged about how insane the aforementioned anti-encryption legislation is (as they have in most of these cases). Looks like that doesn't work, maybe we should stop trying the same tactic?

> Politicians ignore us because 90% of people are not informed and choose not to think about history when these issues come up.

If (hypothetically) Google shut down for a week over this or any other bill, it would not be passed. They ignore us because all of our complaining is petulance -- it's not a substitute for action. That's the entire historic purpose of general strikes.

The last Labour (UK) government launched the Iraq war, started privatising the NHS, brought in student fees and cut benefits for working people. They supported measures far more draconian than this, including detaining people without charge for 28 days.

The party was founded to empower workers and unions. But that was in 1900. Things have changed a lot on the last 120 years.

>If (hypothetically) Google shut down for a week over this or any other bill, it would not be passed.

Assuming that's true, its irrelevant. No one here can turn off Google (or Facebook or whatever else) for a week. So no one here is being petulant are they? A few very rich and powerful people might be able to. I'm happy to agree they should do more. But 99.999% of people can do nothing but complain.

Edit: FYI, I agree they should get on and unionize. But that will be a multi-year (maybe multi decade) process...

The most recent U.K. Labour government also reintroduced national minimum wage, raised the zero-tax threshold, and passed the Human Rights Act and the Freedom of Information Act.

I don’t like everything they did, but they did do various things which supported worker rights.

> The last Labour (UK) government [...]

I disagree fundamentally with many of the things the last UK Labour government did.

However at the same time, the last Australian Labor government combated the GFC with a stimulus package that allowed us to be the only country that survived the recession effectively unscathed. They developed the NBN which (before the Liberals got their hands on it) was affordable and actually stood a chance to revolutionise Australia's economy. The Labor government before that was responsible for the largest structural change to Australia's economy through floating the dollar.

My point is that just because one Labour government did many reprehensible things doesn't discount the very concept. And even in the UK (where Labour has struggled to get elected for decades), Labour governments have done more than a handful of worthwhile things in the past 120 years.

> No one here can turn off Google (or Facebook or whatever else) for a week. So no one here is being petulant are they?

Right, and I was going to say this in my original comment. But then I thought "if all the engineers who worked for Google striked, would Google function for a week?" and wasn't sure of the answer. This is ultimately the downside of working on self-regulating machines -- strikes become less effective because the machinery stops for no-one. But I still think general strikes by technology workers would be effective.

> I think the real question here is why tech companies (or rather their CEOs, founders etc) are not making a fuss.

A heavy compliance burden is a moat for incumbents. This is true in most industries - businesses only squeal about regulations if it's going to severely hurt their bottom line, if it's just an annoyance than they'll publicly claim they don't like it but also point out that it stops cowboys and amateurs (i.e. new competitors) from potentially hurting consumers.

I think stripping this encryption would make competition MORE easy, since now offering encryption is a niche google etc won't compete for (Telegram got started here) and since now you don't have to spend time and energy adding security like before. But who knows.

It's also worth considering more conspiratorial (tin foil hat time, sorry) answers:

* Don't make a fuss and we will keep your Chinese competitor companies out of western markets for another decade.

* Don't make a fuss or we will come down hard on you with taxes and audits, both at the corporate level and for you as individuals. We might even move our lucrative federal contracts elsewhere or brand you "insecure" (yes, they are that hypocritical) and ban your products.

* Don't make a fuss, you gave us access to all that data and it includes you and your families. We will start by outing peoples sexuality and affairs and move on to arresting them for trumped up minor offenses we would never have known about without your help. And they'll blame you for their ruined lives.

Unions must be political because workers rights, healthcare, and pay are already political issues and business is already political. Anything which is a major fight with other powers is political, and if your issues are on the table for the nation to fight over, then it's political.

> Since we're overwhelmingly outnumbers, out voted and ignored, what can we do but be outraged, share some articles about self-service-encryption and then move on?

“Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor.” ― Robert A. Heinlein, Starship Troopers

If asking nicely isn't getting you anywhere then the only alternative to achieve your goal is to use some kind of force. Economic, social or direct physical force.

I'd think that in this particular case, black-hat hacking would also be in play--to include those untrustworthy black-box voting machines.

To that trope of "four boxes" (soap box, ballot box, jury box, ammunition box) we might add "burner box", for the computer that was purchased with cash and kept off all of one's usual networks.

It's one of the quirks of the modal ethics of the computer person that we'd rather get someone fired, ruin their credit, reassign 20000 orphaned traffic/parking tickets to their name, or send a SWAT team to their home address, than to dirty our own hands with actual blood. You have to account for that in any organized resistance strategy. Nobody around here is going to be beating up scabs.

I think you've hit the nail on the head, to be perfectly honest. Beyond that, the fight is a moving target. A union that forms for this issue would not be the same union as for the next issue, nor would its members uniformly be for or against the next thing in lockstep. This is how political parties splinter, expecting the same members to be mad about whatever the next issue as they were the last, however tenuously related they are.

And beyond the fight itself being so ephemeral, there's no real way to know when it's been won or not. I believe that the FCC's tight-fisted control over what's allowed on what is allowed on network television is gone, and has been for some time. The Supreme Court has shown that they actually value the first amendment pretty strongly in recent years, even when its exercise may have bad side effects, and I think that if the FCC were to try and level fines against a new broadcaster for using the word 'ass' on television or something, it could be fought and the law overturned. But existing broadcasters are relatively complicit in that. The bigger networks don't want their family friendly-mass market television to have to compete with FX, HBO, or whatever other edgier networks are out there on the same spectrum, so they don't make a fuss because the barrier to entry that those broadcasting standards impose is worth paying the occasional small fine for accidental violations.

This is undoubtedly true in some tech arenas as well, and that tech companies - despite their lofty ideals, are finding it hard to find the energy to muster full-throated rebukes of policies that they may dislike ideologically, but maybe derive some small benefit from that their upstart competitors may not.

> "Governments are very weary to permit any union to become politically important for historic reasons. And any wise union thinks twice before getting involved in politics."

An interesting notion, but not at all reflective of the way unions relate to politics in the US or Europe at least.

> Unions exist primarily to engage with employers, not government. Governments are very weary to permit any union to become politically important for historic reasons. And any wise union thinks twice before getting involved in politics.

Wise unions may not, but U.S. unions constantly do. Some governments may not permit politically-active unions, but the U.S. government does, and unions are consistently large contributors (cf. https://www.opensecrets.org/overview/toporgs.php?view=hm&cyc...).

> Unions exist primarily to engage with employers, not government.

Simply not true. Unions engaged in both historically. Workers rights is a political cause after all. Historically, unions primarily engaged the government to gain rights for the workers. Every union is/was a political organization first.

Just because unions did that historically, doesn't mean they can do it today. When was the last time a Union engaged the federal government for something not related to workers rights (like this) and succeeded? My guess is before Reagan. Before I was born, and I am old now.

Don't get me wrong, it would be nice if they could and did. Increased union power would be a boon to workers. But wanting something doesn't make it happen.

I am also happy to agree that unions used to be much more politically powerful. Though even then, they concentrated workers rights, not say freedom of speech issues. Since at least the 70s, Unions have been crippled by changing economic structures and politicians who don't like the competition. In the 1960s, 30% of workers were in a union. Today it's 13% mostly federal or state employees. Unions in private industry barely exist anymore. Simultaneously, the percentage of votes who are workers (and so might be in a union) has fallen. That double-whammy means they can barely keep their members from unemployment. Expecting them to safeguard to constitution and take on the federal government is (sorry) silly.

> Just because unions did that historically, doesn't mean they can do it today.

You said Governments, not USA specifically. Unions are very politically active all over Europe, a large number of top politicians have been or were union leaders. So to me USA seems to be the odd one out on this rather than the rule.

The UAW notoriously was a huge force in getting Daimler-Chrysler bailed out.

The major unions in the US have some of the biggest lobbying arms there are.

Your example was working with the federal government not opposing it.

Your answer was purely about saving their members jobs, not them going off an engaging politically.

Your union had the support of CEOs and Owners.

I have to ask: do you really, honestly, believe that unions are politically powerful at the federal level and interested in subjects that don't directly affect their members? Really? Despite the dwindling memberships, widespread At Will employment being passed, record gaps between worker and CEO pay? Really?

I think it’s undeniable that union power has decreased over the last 50 years.

But it’s also just untrue that they aren’t political entities. In many ways that’s what they primarily are.

> It's strange to me that technology workers are seemingly unwilling to unionise

A better model may be a guild like actors have (SAG).

Certain 'base-level' protections are agreed to with regards to health and safety, working hours, perhaps minimum salary guidelines, healthcare, retirement plans/pensions (?), etc. However things like salary can be independently determined. Paying dues would also give access to employment lawyers and dispute resolution mechanisms.

Just as (e.g.) SAG makes sure everyone on set is safe (both Tom Cruise and Jane Smith who plays Waitress #2), but people can be paid according to their (perceived?) importance to the project.

The SAG is a labor union. “Guild” is just part of the name.

Many people instantly bristle at the word "union". It's worth distinguishing between the gatekeeping and seniority effects of a "union" as understood in the currently-not-pro-union mind and the potential benefits of a collective voice using more descriptive nomenclature.

Most unions don't have "union" in their name, I don't think it's an issue of nomenclature. People know which organizations can be colloquially referred to as a labor union.

That said people just have problems understanding how unions work. It's a collective voice. How that voice is used is up to the union members. If you want that to include gate keeping and seniority protections that's up to the members. If you want it to be a political lobby, same thing.

>It's a collective voice. How that voice is used is up to the union members.

I've never been in (or had the opportunity to be in) a union, but it seems like you could apply this exact same argument to the US congress. Congress is a collective voice. How that voice is used is up to the voters. Of course, it's far from that simple in the real world.

Do you have some organizational mechanisms in mind to prevent such an institution from eventually evolving gatekeeping and seniority (or to dislodge it from power if it does)?

So re-brand it. How about ‘collective’? Bernie Sanders literally lost the election because he couldn’t rebrand socialism and instead called it socialism.

I also don’t thing developers need a traditional labor union. We probably need baseline guidelines where non-compliant companies would be seen as ‘very lame, avoid’. Similar to a coding standard.

How would you keep the baseline protections reasonable enough so every startup and tech department would be proud to support it?

I see a lot of ‘Made in NY’ startups, even open source stuff use that brand, it feels like developer community is ripe for something like this.

> How would you keep the baseline protections reasonable enough so every startup and tech department would be proud to support it?

It would take a few years of back and forth of negotiation. Of course not all organizations would have employees may necessarily be part of it.

Holywood is a 'closed shop' where you basically need to be in the union / guild, but that is not true in every industry.

I'm in Ontario, Canada where a lot of car OEMs have plants: the Detroit Three plants are all unionized AFAICT. However the Cambridge Toyota plant is not: the CAW has been asking the employees for a while, but they always said 'no'. Seems that Toyota has a different mindset towards their employees.

Similarly Air Canada has been unionized with pilots for a while, but WestJet (~Southwest) only recently unionized: turns out the pilots there were tired of crap.

So it may not be an all/nothing situation.

> the only real response by the technology community was a handful of blog posts

Something that is rarely talked about anymore but true is that the original 'internet culture' from the early 90s is basically dead.

The ethos of that age was an active distrust of government and centralized authority. Further, there was a lack of trust in politics in general. That's basically gone now.

The new technologist are not just unprincipled, they are deeply political and will support whatever initiative their tribe is pursuing. Even more cynical, is how can they even be against 'spying' and 'privacy violations'? 90% of the jobs available involve doing just that.

There is no way to have a world both against the EARN IT act and yet work for FB, Google, etc - they are basically all part of the same spyware industry.

>There is no way to have a world both against the EARN IT act and yet work for FB, Google, etc - they are basically all part of the same spyware industry.

Exactly correct. I said elsewhere in this thread that I gave them (plus ISPs etc) the benefit of the doubt when it came to Snowden and their compliance with government requests because I could understand they were scared by sept 11th, they wanted to be patriotic, maybe they didn't fully understand the risk or the future they were building etc. If they let EARN pass and comply with it, we all need to opt out.

My worry is how to get enough people to do the same. Being in the 1-10% of people not using these services is difficult (I have too many friends stuck using Whatsapp and Facebook messenger), it's uneconomic (who's buying a non-apple, non-android phone?) and it just makes it too easy for government to surveil you as your own special group.

That age died when the general public started coming online. That was the time when people self hosted their own email and web servers. Nobody has time for that anymore.

Sadly, centralization is simpler. And privacy was an illusion anyway.

It's hard to keep that mindset when you end up getting a lion's share of the world's wealth and power from your technology. How can you distrust yourself and your people, then?

I'd think (if I didn't know any better) that being well-off would result in people having more time and energy to consider things like ethics or politics. I think this is how it's supposed to work, historically. Evidently, it stopped working, both in the general populace and in people involved with tech.

It's not very surprising, though. The technology is mostly built by one-step-above (or outright-) autistic nerds, and marketed and sold by hyperactive pie-in-the-sky megalomaniacs. The nerds don't care that much about anything in particular (other than tabs vs. spaces), and the business types have flexible ethics. Both groups would be dangerous - for different reasons - if taken separately but taken together make for the most ethics-free industry ever.

The complete inability of both nerds and founders to act as a (larger) group might be the only reason why the industry is not under regulations stricter than surgeons and soldiers are. If it were possible for this industry to actually wield the power it has, the governments would be much more pressed for securing what became a vital infrastructure. My guess is that they know for a fact that shutting down Google for a week is not going to happen, ever - and that they are content with the kinds of people that self-select into IT.

>There is no way to have a world both against the EARN IT act and yet work for FB, Google, etc - they are basically all part of the same spyware industry.

Very well put

It seems to me that emigration is the only socially-acceptable tax revolt. I'm a South African with a BEng. degree in Electronic Engineering & Comp Sci who has been looking to emigrate.

After Australia passed the anti-encryption bill, I crossed it off the list of places I would ever start a company in. Previously it was quite high on my list, but now I feel like I would be funding a corrupt state if I paid taxes there. That is also why I intend to flee ZA.

(Any software companies in the Netherlands need someone a senior Clojure engineer, let me know!)

> It's strange to me that technology workers are seemingly unwilling to unionise and hold general strikes to protest these kinds of policies

How would that impact hobbyist software? Am I going to be run out of my job for being a "scab" if I keep developing my hobbyist projects during a strike? (Historically, "scabs" got killed, of course.) How about if it's a strike I don't agree with? Even if there's some kind of voting process on whether to strike or not, which is itself fraught and open to abuses, nothing guarantees that majority rule will be just, and nothing guarantees that anything else will result in enough legitimacy to lead to collective action. (As in: "I didn't vote to strike, so I'm not going to.")

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