Can't really blame GitHub here... US laws are badly written.
Personally, I'd rather a world where companies obey the law than one where they pick and choose what laws they would like to obey.
EDIT: concerning hypothetical worlds, I pretty much not want to live in a world were companies blindly follow the law regardless of how harmful it is. We have tried these worlds in the past and they were not pretty.
Personally, I think a distinction is necessary. Companies IMO should absolutely obey the laws regardless of if they like them or not. It's entirely unfair to blame them for obeying the law.
They (as well as individual people) are free to oppose those laws in an attempt to change them, however until they are changed, they should follow the laws or cease trading in the country who's laws they disagree with. It's entirely fair to blame them for not fighting stupid/wrong/harmful laws.
Allowing companies to choose which laws they are going to obey is never going to end well.
We are quite privileged to just assume that following the law as written (AND interpreted by the judiciary) will mostly work out alright and doesn't cause us moral dilemma. And companies consist of people, too. Is it then all of a sudden morally acceptable to build spying software so your country's leadership can prey on it's political enemies? Or assist in persecuting discriminated groups?
You don't have to cite long abolished laws or an industrialized killing machine for pointing that out ;-) though the post is really begging for it.
Should US companies be free to ignore laws related to sanctions because the UAE has made being gay illegal or because political opposition in China could land you in jail? Where do you draw the line? Specifically - for a US company as is being discussed.
Yet you continue with your strawmans. Nobody said that. The crucial word in your sentence is "all", with which nobody has agreed here. Of course nobody is above law. But sometimes, in exceptional circumstances, a particular law turns out to be immoral. In that case, and only in that case, it is wrong to follow that particular law, and it is right to do the illegal alternative.
If a company is found to have followed an immoral law and performed harmful (but lawful) acts, it is right that society punish that company later (e.g., when the law situation is solved). More so in this case, when the company is overzealous in its application of that immoral law.
No, it was rhetorical question. Reading and making an effort to respond to the entirety of the comment would have made that obvious when I specially ask "Where do you draw the line?".
GitHub could have warned the company before blocking and/or blocked access only from Iran. It did neither.
You're right that companies don't always obey the law. However, what has that got to do with "Personally, I'd rather a world where companies obey the law"?
My point is that companies SHOULD obey the laws, not that they always do - and that - allowing and encouraging companies to pick and choose the laws they are going to obey is wrong, and will simply not end well.
> GitHub could have warned the company before blocking and/or blocked access only from Iran. It did neither.
I'm not familiar enough with the specifics of the US laws regarding Iran to know if this is a lawful course of action to take upon a customer attempting to use your products/services from Iran.
Maybe they could have? Maybe they can't? I've no idea & I've made no attempt to address anything other than the "It's alright to blame people for lawfully following harmful laws" comment.
Disobey the law, make a public statement about it, and deal with the consequences. This is not a new problem, it was treated by Kant a few centuries ago.
Although I agree the export embargo is fucking stupid, especially when it comes to online technology, I really want to see less criminal behavior from companies, not more.
The law is not stupid, it's criminal. By following it, companies are precisely engaging in criminal behavior.
The law itself is not illegal, as the lawmakers have created and enacted that law. It's the opposite, the law is declaring what's illegal.
So, if GitHub doesn't ban users from Iran, they are breaking the law in the US.
Hope this clears up any misunderstanding on how things work.
GitHub could comply with the law without completely banning users who access their service from Iran, e.g. by making their website unavailable for Iranian IPs or by making paid features unavailable.
But, if the CEO of GitHub (Nat Friedman) claims that they "do no more than what is required by the law" and end up banning a user, my understanding is that the lawyers are GitHub and Microsoft have made the judgement that banning users are a must, simply restricting them temporary is not enough.
Again, I think export embargoes are shit and don't necessarily agree with the calls that GitHub/Microsoft did, but trying to understand the side they are coming from here.
It may be countered that the law isn't actually unjust (nor immoral), but a more convincing point is that it opens the door for companies to do whatever they like. I don't think that holds up - morality is supposed to supercede law.
It could be argued that anyone can disobey any law because anyone can find something moral or immoral - but that doesn't stand up; most people (and certainly society in general) admit some degree of objectivity in morality to the point where almost all moral questions either already have an answer, or the answer is currently being discussed (and that discussion is a process to find the right answer). People tend to say morality is "subjective" (whatever that means) or "relative", but act as though it is objective - with all the blame, shame, guilt, and assigning of responsibility. Even if it is "relative", it is relative to this society, in which GitHub operates.
Some people are interpreting this discussion on morality and law as being a matter of what a company or person does or doesn't "like" - morality is (by most accounts) a different ballgame, and should not (epistemologically speaking) be conflated with mere preference. Disobeying a just law (and doing something unjust in the process) is just as morally blameworthy as obeying an unjust law (and doing something unjust in the process). It's not a carte blanche for companies to do as they please.
I'm not commenting on this specific case; I'm silent on my moral reasoning of it, but I wanted to try and explain what I think GP was getting at.
It also does not require to do so without warning or clarification.
It's also alright to blame people for interpreting laws too widely and too abusively. The legal and security departments are much at fault for this where they'll prefer to abuse people than to take up any kind of risk.
Essentially you're saying that Nat Friedman should risk 20 years in prison, and a million dollar fine per user in order to let Iranian developers use Github.
As much as I hate the idea of software not being freely available to everyone, I would not be willing to take that risk. I doubt many HN readers would.
I'll pick the legal way unless the profits I can make somehow outweigh the sanctions (legislators can make mistakes too) and there are no penal repercussions.
The first one is a violent crime against individuals, the second one is basically a tax.
I'm against both but they carry a different weight.
“One has not only a legal, but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
Microsoft is no stranger to breaking laws and certainly has the resources to fight this one, or at least to argue that it shouldn't apply in this case.
I consider immoral the USA's warmongering and spying on its own citizens.
Still, if I don't pay my taxes or if I try to stop the army from going to bomb some poor people in the middle east, I'll be put in jail.
If I have a way to sabotage the government which won't ruin my life, I'll do it, but I'll pass on the rest.
We're lucky enough not to live in a country that require us to kill people in concentration camps, because we would surely do that.
At least, I would do it if I didn't have another choice (but I would also try to desert).
Another thing it also doesn't care about is the U.S.A. laws that prohibit those under 13 from effectively contributing.
The real issue is that many projects, many of which making sanctimonious statements about inclusivity they clearly caren't a bit about continue to operate through GitHub and other companies under U.S.A. control and remain reliant upon them for contribution.
The last time I assessed the matter, publishing on crates.io seemed to require a GitHub account, though I'm not sure whether this issue has now been fixed; I've certainly seen Rust preach and pat itself on the back how much it cares about not excluding anyone, but apparently Iran isn't so included.
Is it an X-ray machine? Does it use crypto? Is it more than 231 dpi? Well you can't export it to Middleeastistan.
https://www.bis.doc.gov/index.php/licensing/commerce-control...