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Comment by hn_throwaway_99 | Hacker News Reader

I'll explain why I downvoted - because I get a little bit sick of these slippery slope arguments that every time Google has to follow a law that, while controversial, is not exactly the last breath of a despotic régime, that people love to decry Google as "being evil".

The fact is, there are gray areas. When it comes to government regulations, tech companies essentially have 2 options: comply or leave the country in question (note Google has already tried to lobby against the law in question). While "leave" sometimes is the only moral option, I totally disagree that this law warrants Google leaving Australia.

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Consider then if Google had decided to leave it would have had a huge negative backlash on the law, given the usefulness of Google.

Instead Australia can now get what it wants and the backlash is minimal at best. Meanwhile they can go on to celebrate their dystopian law as working because of the endorsement Google gave them by capitulating.

Short term yeah it'd suck for Australia to lose Google but then the law gets changed back, Google comes back, and everyone wins. Well except for the Australian government.

I find this reaction, well, odd. It is basically arguing that we want giant multinational corporations to have more power than democratically elected governments.

I see diatribes all the time on HN bashing companies like AirBnB and Uber for "blatantly ignoring the law" to get what they want, and here are a bunch of people wishing for Google to blatantly ignore the law to get what they want.

You have a point. However I don't believe anyone here's advocating that Google ignore or break laws. But rather, to (as done with China) voluntarily withdraw certain services in response to arguably-unacceptable duress.

[note: that is not my position here - I'm merely clarifying part of the discussion]

I must add, being relatively familiar with Australia's tech sector and it's people, that there is not a great deal of respect in the sector for the tech choices made by Australia's incumbent government of recent years. Whether or not that sentiment is ethically trumped by the fact of that government's democratic election by the general populace, is up to the reader...

Then we agree, at least in principle.

I don't know the details of this legislation but I have viewed Australia as a beta test for new tech legislation and worry this sort of authorization barrier could become more common place in Western countries.

> I totally disagree that this law warrants Google leaving Australia

I think most people have this opinion, but I wonder if they would have the same opinion if the country in question is a non-Anglo non-West but democratic country like India or Brazil

For the record, i think Google should leave

> I wonder if they would have the same opinion if the country in question is a non-Anglo non-West but democratic country like India or Brazil

I for one would have the same opinion. India and Brazil may have lots of corruption but they are still functioning democracies.

If it were Russia or China I would have a different opinion.

i think regimes in china and russia feed on this type of hypocricy quite succesfully

I disagree, but appreciate the explanation rather than vote and run.

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