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Comment by skrebbel | Hacker News Reader

What would you do?

Remember, there’s really only two options: run a service in a country and abide by the law and norms of that country, or don’t run a service in that country (ie IP geoblock the entire place).

I mean, sure, you can run a service that abides by the law but not the norms (eg Onlyfans is available in the US despite the US being a country founded by prudes), but it’s hard and you need your full focus to get it just right. And, worse yet, in China the border between law and norms is notoriously blurred.

I’m for freedom of speech and against Chairman Xi, but I can’t really fault the Midjourney team for choosing to operate in China regardless. It’s a hard choice and there are no right answers.

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I could have a set of values I believe in and not run my service in countries that violate my values. Seems pretty simple.

Not simple if you want to make money from a huge percentage of people in China.

Also, it seems like the principle of giving into bullies isn’t just an immediate decision but a precedent for future decisions where the rule is to capitulate to authoritarian regime demands.

>"the rule is to capitulate to authoritarian regime demands"

Western countries impose a crapload not so freedom loving laws / rulse / behavior / etc as well. Do you propose shutting down business in the West as well? Or you have a rule that says kill no more people than X or do not kill people in country Y and you're ethical?

Certainly if a western country demanded I kill people with my product, I would refuse.

I don’t propose limiting use in China because they are jerks. I just propose not accepting their bullying demands to change my product.

If you want to operate in that country and accept all of the downsides there's nothing preventing you from offering China an inferior version of your product, as many companies already do. That they're going to force feed the rest of the world this authoritarian, fascist, shit is downright deplorable and worthy of condemnation.

> drunk driving may kill a lot of people, but it also helps a lot of people get to work on time, so, it;s impossible to say if its bad or not,

https://twitter.com/dril/status/464802196060917762

The difference is that drunk driving objectively kills over ten thousand people every year. Meanwhile, the negative effects of 10 person company refusing to generate low-effort satire is less clear.

Bending the knee to a brutal ethnic cleansing regime is never a positive, regardless of the size of the entity capitulating.

At the end of the day, it's his company, so he can choose what services to supply. Freedom of speech means that he is allowed to have is own worldview that you disagree with, and you're free to use any other AI tools to make as much satire as you wish. If you're worried about China, worry about our incompetent Congress who is more interested in collecting sound bites than actually learn enough about technology to write meaningful regulation that protects us from China's influence on corporations.

Yes. No one doubts who's company it is. That does not make their actions free from criticism.

They're free to do what they want, others are free to say what they want to say (well, except when using Midjourney), the company can listen or not, and people can use Midjourney or not.

Saying "if you don't like it, shut up and find something else" doesn't seem particularly productive.

There is a third and a fourth option.

3. Split the platform/user-base. Allow freedom of expression in western countries and censor it in China.

4. Censor prompts and images only in China, which still allows sharing non-political artwork between Chinese and western user.

All other platforms operating in China (of Chinese or western origin) have to do the same.

i mean no there's obviously a 3rd option. run the service anyway and don't geoblock. like the banning country might block your service but that's on them.

if i'm running something not illegal and some other country bans it i see no moral case for me doing work to enforce some foreign government's laws for them. i'm not magically "operating" in every country around the world just because someone from there pings my server.

China's legal system doesn't run on rule of law, it runs on threat of rule by law. In this case, it means anyone who wants to function in china must predict what the government will dislike, since there is no actual Chinese law against making fun of Xi Jinping (but they will shut you down anyways if you allow it).

Sure, if they want to operate in China they are taking the best course of action, but it will hardly be enough since it is an user produced content system.

The right answer is not to operate your business in totalitarian states no matter how much you want to be rich.

Just to clarify, puritans were involved in the founding of the USA, but much of the country was not based on prudish norms

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