To the white male 20-something year old programmer earning $140k $25k in bonus stocks that have performed well free food other benefits outperforming any other business who writes code to compress data between containerized applications: wake up, you’re a cog and your work is a cog. You work for a multi-national, multi-billion dollar company. There will be some projects your company will do that you don’t 100% agree with. That’s how your $1 MM Bay Area condo mortgage is paid.
7
So I took the challenge and Goggled top ten American investors and guess what? The first link was of ten white men including the ones mentioned in this comment. The next several are pretty much the same with one about African Americans being left out. Chris’s comment was a blatantly false attempt at racially slanted trolling and a false flag attack devoid of merit.
3
As an expat in China I think Google coming here is fantastic. Many foreigners (and there are a lot here) will be happy to learn that they can access Maps, Gmail, Playstore etc. without the need of a costly and slow VPN. Really, the virtue signalling of Google's employees here disappoints me, and is hypocritical given the current censorship/filtering taking place.
Let the expats and Chinese use Google, dammit!
2
Sigh. Time to ditch Google.
Those employees should leave if they are upset about the end-use of their work.
4
Thank god for so many people of conscience. I had perhaps too much faith in Sergei Brin?
4
Google employees protesting censorship? That's strange, I don't recall an outcry when James Damore was fired for questioning Google's diversity hiring programs, in a memo that, on its face, was in line with Google's "encouraging internal debate". Ironically, Google's diversity hiring efforts are still as fruitless as when the memo was released, which seems to confirm the theories he was fired for sharing.
And what is censorship, other than manipulation of the information shared with the public? In that context, why is it OK to manipulate search results such as those for "top American inventors" on the American Google search engine? Try it, and you'll wonder if somehow "random inventors in no particular order" or, even more likely, "diversity inventors " wasn't typed instead. What's striking is that despite a few white superstars (Bell, Edison, Tesla, Eastman, Morse, Einstein, Ford), it mostly reads like a Black History month subject, with very random Black inventors having invented nothing of national or international significance representing the lion's share of "top inventors", with a few White household names mixed in for good measure. If a bunch of white guys showed up in a search for "top NBA players", there would be cries of racism; but when results are manipulated in favor of Diversity, that's just Google's alternate reality, where objectivity yields to diversity and inclusiveness.
In this situation, why would Google care if China pushed its own agenda?
3
As a Chinese citizen living in the US, I ask myself this simple question: will Google's re-entering China allow ordinary Chinese to access more information or less, even with its censored search engine?
The answer is quite obvious to me, so I applaud for Google's decision.
10
The real issue is the Chinese government has total control over information and is filling it with lies to suit their purpose. But don’t think it is what a strong government does. Instead the government is insecure and scared of any dissent because it knows its hold on power is weak.
The irony for the multinational companies who have handed over intellectual property to government-owned/controlled companies, acquiesced to restrictive regulations, etc is that China was in a weak bargaining position 10-20 years ago. If the multinationals formed a corporate version of NATO and refused to outbid each other in giving China sweetheart deals, China wouldn’t have the power it has now. Airbus and Boeing is a prime example.
What Google and their like should now do is to spin off a unit to operate in evil empires. The mother company can act like they have nothing to do with these regimes. Employees and investors can restore their faith in the mother companies.
1
Could you imagine a US corporation, circa 1942, assisting a foreign authoritarian govt spy on its citizens. And even better, using state of the art technology (!!!) that can be best produced or only produced here in the US, whilst likely being compelled by the foreign govt to share insight into the tech's development with them. Back then, before lobying had been perfected and when US corporations and our body politic were sequestered, such a thing would not happen.
The US has been and continues to be sold out by the joint pimps of Globalization and corporate lobbying. The standards of for we comport ourselves economically and politically have rotted from the inside out.
In Beijing, there's probably some private mirth about a quip someone once was alleged to have made about Capitalists and rope.
2
In Communist China, Google searches you!
3
What is their motto: "Don't Do Evil" or "Do No Evil"?
Either way, is kowtowing to dictators and dictatorship an evil deed? Or is it not when it is to make money?
1
Dear Google Employees,
How do you think the US Military developed and built the first nuclear weapons? They did it in secrecy, and they used small groups that were unaware of the goal, developing a weapon of mass destruction. A weapon designed to kill every man, woman and child in the target area. A weapon to terrorize the civilian population. A weapon with no strategic military value. And they succeeded!
@Donald Matson
As a result they have probably saved countless millions. Without the nuclear threat Stalin would have probably moved west. The Japanese would have fought rather than surrender costing 100's of thousands of lives.
1
Well - The Google team has made their billions. For several years now I have been asking Google to shed its profit motive and transition itself into a [public utility], probably along the Wikipedia model, (then go and invent something else), so far to the most deaf of ears. Like Facebook, to make a living by surveilling other people is a really creepy way to earn a living. *Who knows what corners you're going to be willing to cut, when, real, moral questions, (long ago)?, became faint, faint, background noise, (dying embers)?
Once again, Everyday Americans are vastly more concerned about decency than industry, enterprise, and Everyone-Congressional and Presidential and Executive. Garden-variety workers -- real Americans, who work vs. invest, scam, or collude -- will prevail. 'Hey, Giants of commerce, try to run the country or capitalism without us!' Why will democracy and the nation prevail? Because WE ARE the country, and We the People have principles; those who own the capital part of capitalism, and those who legislate how it is to be decently run, are only running, while we pause and fret that Commerce and Government are out of control. We the People are not!
Bravissimo, Google Folks! This white-haired, fossilizing Ancient American salutes you!
3
The people of China should have control over their own media environment.
Why should they automatically bow to foreign capitalists and their demands?
Would Americans acquiesce to a Chinese corporation dominating our Net, the way Europeans have been forced by the US to accept Google? Of course not.
The arrogant, imperialist mind set of both the article and the comments shows the truly totalitarian efficiency with which Western media have brainwashed the US population into assuming their own superiority over all other cultures. Amidst the techno babble, you have forgotten two words:
national sovereignty.
2
Wow, you are either incredibly naive about who controls China or you work for the CCP.
4
Google routinely slants search results away from stories that criticize the US gov't. For example "911 conspiracy" initially returned many sites providing credible evidence the official story and 911 commission findings are flawed. Now we get "9/11 conspiracy theories - Wikipedia", "9/11 Conspiracy Theories - Debunking the Myths", and more painting the credible evidence as in-credible and the once rich list of sites questioning our governments official stories is gone. I find similar results on other topics our gov't or major corporations would prefer we didn't look at like "geoengineering", "vaccine safety", or "jfk assassination".
3
I’m split on this.
On one hand it’s refreshing to see an active workforce who feels empowered to stand up for what they believe in and feel they have ownership of the company they work for.
On the other, the employees are not the owners (besides to the extent of their own stock shares), the shareholders are. Employees are employees. They are not management and they are not the majority owners. If you’ve met many Google employees you’d see many of them have a sense of naive, childish entitlement. This behavior and attitude is only nurtured by Google by doing their cooking, laundry, etc. for them. Could you imagine staff saying this to Steve Jobs? Sundar Pichai needs to get his staff in line. A company is a company, not a democracy.
1
@Manish Yes Companies are like little feifdoms. Are you actually saying that you think a dictatorship at this level is a good thing?
1
Interesting that the employees seem to be silent on the ethical issue of the control, ownership, and transparency of personal data collected by Google through search and other technologies it creates. Google has been quite vocal and active in fighting any attempts by anyone who attempts to give users more say over what happens to their personal data (see, for example, the recent NYT article: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/14/magazine/facebook-google-privacy-data....
To me, the ethics of privacy and users' rights seem as important as censorship.
5
Oh come on, all of us who use Chinese products, including the smart phones and laptops on which we are writing these comments, are complicit. Want to put some pressure on the Chinese government to open up? Let's none of us replace our technology for a couple of years. It will work perfectly well.
6
Consumers have become completely amoral. We don't have to buy from China. We could buy from S Korea or Taiwan or Japan. Americans no longer care a fig about freedom and democracy. Our government doesn't want us to.
1
Poor Google (Alpha Bet). Everyone, since companies are people too, has faults and virtues. "Don't do evil" is catchy but no fast-track to profits and other dominant behaviors (see Catholic Church). Anyway, have the concerned employees worried about moral and ethical consequences of their company's bootprint on Mountain View and elsewhere in the Bay area? I don't know but do know people can be evil for a while, then good and vice-versa. Is there an available better model to trade up to?
2
The Code Yellow from the Googlers is essential as our focal point point as Americans. Thank you brave journalists and thank you brave NYTimes. The coders are screaming at the top of their lungs that something is very, very suspect. That the code required 1. will adversely effect human rights accepted worldwide and 2. Will leave the borders, both internet wide and reality wide, and 3. A.I. are involved. Why the Googlers have to call for an Ethicist as Ombudsman when they should already exist as a ratio to programmers is beyond me. Hello, Human Resources! We have have been discussing this issue for decades. And, now, how ‘bout those market options...
5
How about if Google gives US the best results first instead of the paid ads and other useless sites when we search!
4
It’s ironical that the same employees don’t protest about NSA hoovering up the details of each gmail account and emails. But they are worried that building a search engine meant to obey the laws of a specific country as wrong.
4
@KnownNonVictim,
First, if NSA is hoovering up information that is either in accordance with a court order or it is entirely unknown not just to Google employees, but to Google itself. And all of this is subject to exposure and legal remedy.
Second, comparing an action of the US government such as I just described with pervasive, widespread, and inescapable mind control by China's power elites ("obey the laws of a specific country"?!?!) is entirely irrational, in a very unironic way.
Unless you are equating human rights in the US with China, which would indeed be ironic....
8
Wrong. Google (along with other tech companies) is well aware that U.S. intelligence services are gathering our personal information, and has been aware of this for years. Don't do evil, indeed.
1
This story isn't really about Google; it's about the profound ethical corruption of China's political elites. Google's complicity in this is *highly* unfortunate, but it is simple greed that can be comprehended in terms of ordinary human weakness. The thought control imposed by China's power elites is inhuman.
10
I can't help but wonder about the legal implications of something like this. In principle, Google's tailoring their search engine for China in such a way that can actually adversely impact US foreign policy objectives, it seems that Google may be violating the Logan Act established in 1799.
=====
§ 953. Private correspondence with foreign governments.
Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply himself, or his agent, to any foreign government, or the agents thereof, for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects.
1 Stat. 613, January 30, 1799, codified at 18 U.S.C. § 953 (2004).
5
One of Satan's arguments is to say: "Give up. It's hopeless." But, servants of Goodness will not go down that road.
Praise to Google people for the decency they aspire to. With increasing power comes increasing responsibility for the righteous. Not righteous? Then you're a Republican.
7
Google abandoned the creed "Do no evil" long before Alphabet did away with the slogan...
5
I find it to be somewhat peculiar that a company such as Alphabet (Google), who has availed it self of the personal and business freedoms of the United States to grow it’s enterprise, would so readily hamstring it’s marquee offering – the search engine – on the influence of an authoritarian state.
4
@Andre
Big business as the champion of human rights? What a delusion.
The only human right the capitalist cares about is his property rights.
The only freedom the capitalist cares about is his freedom to exploit the labor of the workers.
Anything is else pure baking soda.
Technology is blurring everything and every perspective. We humans have traditionally relied on our national boundaries defined by distance and physical limitations to influence and guide us terms of our ethics, our politics, our global relationships, our individual rights and the role of both governments, private organizations, employees and people in general.
This situation with Google and China brings all of these issues into play on a collision course that will likely redefine everything.
Stay tuned for change in our lives, change as big as anything seen in the past.
4
This article is interesting, given the widely held belief (in the software industry) that the Google search engine software is individually configured for each country. That is to say, Google distributes its search engine software as a standard package, and its local subsidiary sets up the software 'switches' and other configuration data. This is done within the country it serves to avoid the political problems inherit with configuring it from another country, say...the Google headquarters in California.
A caveat to this is, in the absence of a local Google subsidiary, the country has accepted the whatever configuration is made by the Google headquarters.
I'm wondering if the real thrust of this article is that Google China (its subsidiary in China) is demanding changes to the standard software package?
2
Under the Alphabet umbrella, Google pacifies the public by providing YouTube; the umbrella also includes Android and DoubleClick, etc., other profitable companies that want to succeed in China, censored or not. Meanwhile Twitter as a co. offers tweets to its global public while providing an official platform, free of charge, to Trump and his followers, including violent hate-tweeters like A. Jones. What all these social media pursue is higher profits, not technical or educational goals.
What type of simple folk work for Google? Capitalist companies exist for one pupose: make as much money as possible. Morality and ethics have no interest to capitalists.
4
So Google won't work with the DOD but will work with China. What hypocrisy.
10
Forget hypocrisy. What about irony ? The same people didn’t protest about NSA vacuuming the details.
1
Somehow greed wins out in the end, and therein lies the problem.
5
The older I get the more I am coming to believe that ethics and morality do not play much of a role in corporate agendas. We have ceded any sense of decency to the pursuit of money and power.
Do trillion dollar enterprises not have a duty to promote the common good of the masses of individuals who have granted them power?
13
A corporation has but one agenda. Profit. Depressing but true. We unfortunately need to look elsewhere for our moral leadership. Just because google is modern and in silicon valley does not mean it wants to do anything else but make money.
4
Who is harmed if Google does not enter the Chinese market? I would argue it harms regular Chinese citizens who would deprived of Google's services. Google is harmed by not entering a huge market. Given the choice between a censored browser and no browser I would go with a censored browser.
2
@jaco And undoubtedly, you are one that is OK with ceding our individual rights and personal freedoms for our "protection" - as was done in the wake of 9/11.
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Benjamin Franklin
4
@WB
Huh? Where did that come from? We are talking the worker's paradise of China not the US.
It would be nice if Google provided effective search tools to help parents/schools support children friendly environments (including censorship). Maybe an offshoot site Choogle.com could be created.
If our president can collude with totalitarian foreign powers, why shouldn't American companies embrace the same policy? Seems like unfair discrimination to me. Then again, Google might not feel so conflicted if we just get rid of this president.
2
Software like Dragonfly is a weapon for maintaining ignorance. Good for those google employees who recognise what a monstrosity Dragonfly would become, not only in the hands of the Chinese government, in the hands of all governments.
Don't pretend for a moment that other tyrants won't demand the deployment of Dragonfly. Inevitably, it is too powerful a tool for political control to be ignored by even the most benign democracies. Dragonfly will be everywhere "Just In Case", but once deployed, will be used for less and less significant reasons, until "staying in office" is reason enough to control sensitive topics.
Please don't deploy Dragonfly, and destroy the code so it doesn't go out under a different name after this storm dies down.
16
Oddly, most security conscious people are demanding more transparency, less privacy invasiveness, as well as way over nosy profiling of the people, by Googoo. My life is none of their business!
1
A small but vocal group of employees has run amok because the culture at Google doesn’t allow dissenting opinions from anything resembling the center, let alone the right. Frankly, this mirrors the national conversation (at least in liberal areas, particularly SV).
These employees want Google to stick its head in the sand. If truly concerned, particularly since these technologies are coming to both defense and China regardless, these employees should want Google to have a seat at the table. Ask Neville Chamberlain about hoping yucky things will go away if you don’t pay attention to them.
3
Why on earth compromise on democratic values? For a seat at the table where you’ll receive your instructions? What a deplorable view point. Kudos to the 1400 Google employees who have some moral fibre. I shall try and stop using Google products and services if the company indeed re-enters China kowtowing to that country’s despicable regime.
1
quit whining googlits. from a national security standpoint and from a US economic power standpoint, better to have foot in the door and spy on chinese searches as well as earn profits from chinese market, than to have a chinese company supplant google.
2
Once any content is removed, Tech companies have entered the censorship business. The exercise then becomes what is to be censored, who decides?
> how to print a plastic gun.
> pornography? (Define it.)
> publish stolen emails.
> calls for violence.
> calls to oppose/challenge the government, totalitarian, Republican or other.
> calls to exclude Republicans from restaurants.
> calls to exclude Blacks from restaurants.
> any statement that might offend anyone.
Censorship has a wide range of possibilities. Who knows who will be next to choose what to censor.
FREEDOM OF SPEECH MATTERS
3
@Tony: Private property rights rule here. Whatever you post to Google, or Facebook, or Twitter, is no longer your property. Same goes for comments at nytimes.com. So "censorship" as you're using it is a lie.
poor elon he worked four days without seeing his children and not going outside.. well i worked with a stage crew in nyc for forty years where we did 90 hour weeks six seven days a week., sometimes christmas & thanksgiving.. sorry elon you get no sympathy here.. save it for ya girl grimes..
2
@raymond frederick, thank you for your perspective on Elon Musk ... In the Google Chinese
comment section
1
So he knows nothing about modern cannabis. Just another reason I won't buy one of these ugly office, not really green vehicles.
“It seemed like better karma at $420 than at $419,” he said in the interview. “But I was not on weed, to be clear. Weed is not helpful for productivity. There’s a reason for the word ‘stoned.’ You just sit there like a stone on weed.”
We should not trade with authoritarian regimes at all, rather than put companies like Google in a bind, whose rivals can trade in the US, but they can’t freely trade in China.
2
Google's motto, "Don't be evil." embodies the notion that Google should be good. Rather than build a censored search engine for China or artificial intelligence weapons for the pentagon, Google needs to turn its attention to building the first working model of the human mind. This would add to Google's bottom line, while saving mankind from its own destruction. The computer model of the human abstract thought process can be built only on a "survival" algorithm in a machine that can't feel. And when this computer model is built, we will have irrefutable proof as to how we trick the brain with our ridiculous beliefs about just what is supposed to survive. At that point, we can begin the long journey back to reason.
See: RevolutioOfReason.com
2
It is like an old Chinese probe that translated like " sparrows never understand an eagle's visions". The most of coders, admit or or note, are sparrows who enjoy backyard scrubs. The CEOs are eagles, they do have better visions.
If you can control the flow of information, you can control the news content of the day. That is authoritarianism of which president Trump would be envious. And, by the way, this same vice grip on reality is what keeps the Chinese intellectual creativity lagging behind those of free societies.
9
So Google canceled the AI contract with Pentagon but embraced the authoritarian Chinese efforts to censor Internet?
16
So, can we dispense with the nonsense of big tech leading us to a utopian future?
The reality is they are just another species of corporate monopolists willing to trade your civil liberties for market dominance here and abroad.
But hats off to the Google employees for speaking up.
35
"Don't be evil"--unless it improves your quarterly results.
11
Here is the dilemma for Google:
If they ignore the Chinese market and do not offer a search engine there the Chinese government is not changed. The Chinese government could hardly care if Google search comes or not. In the meanwhile Google loses out on a lot of potential earnings.
If Google search does come they must obey local laws and censor their search. The Chinese government is not changed. Either way the Chinese will not change their censorship. Bottom line is Google has no power. The best they can do is abstain from offering services in that country. In this scenario the vast majority of the Chinese people will not even know Google has made such a decision.
2
So we shouldn’t work with / do business with any country whose political values and practices we disagree with? That would leave us a short list. Google staying out of China does nothing to change their values, as we’ve seen.
I think the biggest fault here is that Google has not been more transparent about its plans, knowing this will be an understandably controversial issue.
3
I agree - Google should just use publicity to state that is building a censored search engine because the Chinese government directs it. It is the truth and the negative publicity will let more people know what dealing with China is not fair trade
Staying out of China signals that you are unwilling to deal with a non-civilised country that keeps its people subjugated and misinformed. It is the only wat to let the Chinese powers that be know that their policies are unacceptable.
Your view of what constitutes “non civilized” is likely questionable at best. Companies world over are forced or willingly comply with various legal or cultural norms in order to work across borders. Google is no different - it’s just more visible.
Wow talk about hypocrisy. Google keeps everything a secret then lies about it then betrays humanity by selling our personal info against our permission. They have NO ethical consideration, they have NO humanitarian values, they have only greed and it's endless. China is right to be scared of "first do evil" Google. We in the US should be terrified of them and march in the streets to break their company up into a thousand pieces.
6
The original Google mission statement, or motto, or some other form of LIE: "Don't be evil."
How's that working for you, Google? Messed up the vast profits so you dumped it, right?
3
its better having Google "self censored," in China, than not having Google at all in China.
3
Google is also the greatest surveillance monster in the world. It is sucking up everything about you. You would be shocked to find out how your personal information has been monetized and sold.
Google knows more about you than your doctor, dentist, psychiatrist, and rabbi but together.
Google is the threat, not China.
4
They are right to be outraged. After doing the right thing 8 years ago, Google apparently has decided to become the handmaiden of a vicious authoritarian regime. Censorship is now okay, because there's money to be made. Greed wins out after all. Shame!
3
Sharing concern and impassioned opinion pieces won't help here. Silicon Valley cares nothing for ethics. If this behavior is to stop, then consumers must punish the offenders. Stop using Chrome. Stop using Google Search. Stop watching YouTube. Google has malicious little scripts in most websites for their analytical services- use browser extensions (e.g. Privacy Badger or NoScript for Firefox) or the Brave browser to block them. Make a point of this- these won't go until Google corrects its course.
4
This gives me hope that there are people who do not just "follow orders" but question and desire to know what they are doing ethically and responsibly. I am guessing many of the signatories are young. That gives me even more hope for the younger generations moving towards ethics first, business second model.
I feel compelled to offer another perspective here.
While I completely understand where the anger and disappointment are coming from regarding Google's re-entry to China, there's always another side of the coin.
The Chinese public not only has been deprived of political information, but also academic/research information due to the sheer incompetency of Baidu, and the Chinese people know that. News on Google's re-entry have been hugely popular in China (the Chinese know it'll be censored) because they've been deprived of all kinds of information, Google can at least help with some aspect of that.
6
@zl
On the other hand the Chinese government controls research, especially that with military applications. Perhaps they should be deprived of any research information with military applications.
I can't believe that Google is having such financial woes that it must make money helping Chine suppress its people even more. But then, google's only ethic seems to be making money at anyone's expense.
1
Let's face it: Google already filters results by way of obeying cultural norms and legal restrictions in each market, United States included.
Outside the US, let's take pornography as an example. It is illegal in Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Singapore, Vietnam, the list goes on. So Google results in those countries are already censored.
China does not stand out because it is more draconian comparing to another country Google is already in, say, Saudi Arabia. China stands out because it's a big easy target.
Let me make it clear that I'm not condone to what the Chinese government does and I'm all for transparency and keeping the Internet open.
But Google is a business. It does not have the responsibility to, overnight, change laws or cultures in each country it operates. It does, on the other hand, have a mandate to maximize profit. By staying out of China, Google is leaving 1/5 of its market value on the table.
4
Here is the dilemma of "socially responsible capitalism": which will win, values or money? When money is so highly valued.....
In order to do business, MacDonald's, for instance, makes food products which confirm to the dietary requirements of its various customers in foreign countries. Kosher meat in Israel, no pork products in Muslim countries. Ford makes cars with right hand drive for its English and Australian customers.
What is so wrong with Google tailoring its product to conform to the requirement of its Chinese customer?
3
@MIKEinNYC When McDonalds changes its menu to exclude pork in places where pork is not eaten it is conforming to the needs of the customers there. When Ford changes the configuration of its cars where right hand drive is the custom they have no choice because that's how the roads are configured. In both cases they are working for the people in those territories. When Google censors in China it tailors its product to the requirements of the Chinese government which works in opposition to the Chinese citizenry. That is what is so wrong.
8
@MIKEinNYC It is telling how MIKE sees no difference between "Chinese customer(s)" and the rulers of China.
It's just the latest example that American companies will do almost anything to get into the Chinese market.
Being censored; handing over trade secrets;moving advanced R&D to China and, increasingly, defending the Chinese position any US-PRC trade disputes... you name it
It's just business. GM sold more cars in China than in the US last year.
Kowtowing pays off.
3
@Woof "GM sold more cars in China than in the US last year. "
That may just reveal how little Chinese car-buyers care about the quality of vehicles they buy. Check the lots where educated people park, or for that matter the ratings of cars posted in Consumer Reports.
1
@boroka....Are some car parking lots designated "Mensa Only"? Besides, why are educated people even driving cars and not transporting themselves around on public transportation? Cars pollute, don't you know. Even electric cars. What? You think those plug-ins are connected to thunderstorms?
@Albert Edmud Preaching-lecturing to the choir, again. I grew up (Europe) loving streetcars, subways even buses . . .
Would you kindly tell us where, in small-town Amerika, can one find public transportation?
My comment (read, please!) was about the still low quality of US cars. Nothing more.
1
Wait a minute, a corporation pursuing profits without consideration of its employees well being? Unheard of! The gall some employees have thinking that their "work". "projects", and "employment", are under their control. Employees are merely cogs in a corporate wheel, existing and spinning to serve the corporation. Follow the money, people don't matter!
1
"A possible re-entry to China, according to current and former employees, is a sign of a more mature and pragmatic company."
So, refusing to allow its search engine to be controlled by a totalitarian government was immature?
3
I find that "maturity", when used by any sort of official, means "complacency". The NSA refers to adding a backdoor into a security system as "responsible encryption". That pragmatism is seen as maturity in the corporate realm surprises me little.
I applaud the actions of these Google employees. Unfortunately, like most corporations, profit trumps ethics (pun intended). Despite Google's "don't be evil" slogan, the only thing that will make them act ethically is cutting into their profits or damaging its public reputation. Articles like this are important in that they shed light on issues a company like Google would rather leave in the dark.
8
There is something so pernicious about Silicon Valley.
Google was founded on the idea of do no evil.
Apple is the first company to be valued at $1 trillion, but says it can't "afford" to make its products in America. Yet, for instance, they set up a shell company in Nevada so they don't have to pay taxes in California.
This is a company that is worth $1 trillion and doesn't want to pay taxes in California. But Tim Cook and all the other top Apple executives live and want to live in California, and have their headquarters in California.
And then there's Facebook, Zuckerberg and the Russians.
For you commenters who smugly say that's capitalism, we've always regulated capitalism in this country, although we seem to have forgotten that idea recently, or, more specifically, the Republicans are beholden to big business and have no interest in regulating business.
This is capitalism run amuck, capitalism that thinks the only thing that matters in the world is money.
66
@V
It's not just SV. GM, bailed out by the American tax payer repaid the favour by moving its advanced research on hybrids, batteries, self driving cars to Shanghai. As well as the manufacture of its most advanced sedan, the Cadillac CT6 hybrid.
2
@V Tax policy has consequences; it motivates behavior.
People exit California, New York, others for Florida for lower taxes.
Rich progressives hire tax advisors to pay less in taxes. They structure their businesses to pay less taxes. Non-progressives do, too.
1
Google drops AI work for the Pentagon, yet wants to build up its AI work in China -- which of course will benefit the Chinese government. "Do No Evil" is out, "Make China Great Again" is Google's new catch phrase.
6
Google is a commercial company driven by commercial profit and loss considerations - as is Alphabet and all its other satellites.
Corporate responsibility, ethical considertions, humanitarian values if practiced play into the coffers of those competitors who chose to ignore the former.
But the most important, almost irreplaceable asset of Google is its workforce and the corporation's reputation as one of the most desirable employers in the business, for whom it is almost an honour to work.
Listening and adapting to the views of its workforce to keep them inspired and productive will ultimately earn the company more through innovation and development than any secretive re-entry into the PRC.
23
Somebody must remind those employees that China not a democracy. If you want to do business there you gotta play by their rules. Unless you have Chinese citizenship if have no right to try to question their government actions.
Would you like that non citizens interfere in our government process? Like the Russian did ..
Mind your own business
2
China is a dictatorship.
You're asking Google to side with it against the Chinese people.
@Fernando but can't not interfering in the Chinese government include not having the Google search engine there? In doing so you are not demanding China change anything. In fact, isn't that just minding our own business?
1
@Jerry Engelbach
Don't mixed china with n korea .There are flights from china to the us on a daily basis. I never see they complaining here about their government. I'm not defending their system at all. But liberals here should stop telling other people what to do. Do you believe our system would work with their 1.5 billion people? I dont know. It's up to their people to answer that
The employees wanting Google to be more transparent about Dragonfly should run for public office. Ethical behavior is sorely lacking in the upper echelons of government and it’s time for a house cleaning.
Google is an American company, and American companies need to show a profit. But, Google has also shown a sense of social responsibility. It may not be perfect, it may be hypocritical at times, but, it’s a damn sight better than a lot of news I’m reading these days. Temptations such as DOD contracts and the huge market in China are worth huge windfalls and have the effect of making ethical people compromise their moral compasses. I challenge any human to leave billions of dollars on the table just so they can look at themselves in the bathroom mirror.
Google employees have a way to remind their leadership that the ball is also ethical. Americans have a way, also. Vote!
8
@Tom Rose
Or they could just quit. Signing a letter is hardly a significant protest.
1
These Google employees join the ranks of those of us working on a certain motor car assembly line in Detroit in the 1960s. We were required to attach a slowly dissolving hard plastic container of sugar into the gas tank of cars rolling off the line. In fact, one in every 100 cars “got sugared” (as we called it)!
In six to eight months, each sugared vehicle would need repair work not covered under the car warranty, thereby ensuring work for mechanics of the certain car manufacturer, and sales of extended warranties!
Welcome to the American manufacturing world, Google “line” workers!
4
Not sure why they are complaining. Google is censored by money. Always has been. And therefore, as a by product, Google sensors its results for the users depending on the influence of the company wanting exposure. This doesn’t even address how users are limited in their searches by physical locations and US government interference.
2
Google is a the pinnacle of suppressing free thought. Just ask James Damore.
5
It is easy to dismiss this protest of the meaningful number of Google employees as naive. Capitalism works only because capitalists manage to find ways of growing profits over time.
Google may claim that they won’t do evil. Obviously, whatever evil means in this context, the statement is not meaningful and is empty rhetoric.
To be allowed to participate in the Chinese market which makes up a very significant percentage of the world market is not compatible with ethics we were taught in philosophy classes. But philosophy is not (capitalist) economics. Capitaliists will sell people the rope to hang them with as Lenin is supposed to have said (the quote is nowhere to be found in his collected works by the way). So, the show of ethical behavior of Brin, Page and their executive puppet is just that, a show. If needed for growth and stock price appreciation, unfortunately, they will sell their grandmothers. Look at Sheryl Sandberg, Google’s previous operating chief, now at Facebook, for a perfect example of hypocrisy.
Given all this, I am impressed that the 1500 employees wrote and signed the letter you posted with the article. I wish them all the best. Maybe they will be able to change the rules of the game. Who knows?
14
@Blunt
Suggest all readers check out Elizabeth Warren's Accountable Capitalism Act and ask her to incorporate provisions that prevent Google's (and any
other) management's willingness to sell-out human rights as it is doing with China.
13
I guess google employees keep forgetting that they r working for a for profit corporation!
They’ll realize it once economy invariably turns and people start getting fired and they shut their mouths.
1
They haven’t forgotten that, how can they? People like you will keep on reminding them. What you seem to have assumed is that people are devoid of ethical inclinations and behavior. These are the people who will save our nation, not people who feel a duty to remind them who and what they work for.
15
@Mark Holbrook: bless you, Sir. People like Kabbaj is what makes capitalism evil. It does not have to be that way and the people who sign the letter may be on to something.
5
@Blunt and Mark
I didn’t mean to cause you offense. It’s unfortunately just a reality. Corporations are generally devoid of any care or feeling. It’s just pressure from majority shareholders ends up being about profits.
If you spend time in a boardroom, you will see that shareholders are generally aloof and don’t care.
Do no evil?
Kudos to these Google employees!!
14
Humanity needs a reboot. Corporations are out of control. There will be no jobs left for humans and the young people are too distracted to see that will be their future. Wake up world. Stop the greed.
43
The "mission" mentioned by Pichai is obviously "profit uber alle." And it is the sole mission of all global corporations.
As for censorship, our government does it too. Our EPA is not allowed to publish anything suggesting global warming is affecting our climate. The FDA held back information on Roundup (glyphosate's) harm to humans and the environment for many years. And I just read that asbestos with all the human suffering it has caused will no longer be banned.
It is in the interests of governments and global corporations to manage public opinion for their own purposes.
And today's technology allows surveillance of the population in ways only dreamed of in novels like Brave New World and 1984.
14
Google is willing to work with China, but not the US Defense Department. How do you explain that?
74
@Reuven if you examine the composition of many tech companies like Google you'd get a pretty good idea of how such a seemingly glaring paradox could be possible. There reality is they are US companies, v really, in name only.
4
Well, in one case they were being asked to help make smarter weapons. That seems pretty obvious to me.
Considering the fact the Google's primary business mission is to collect and sell our personal information, it is not only ironic, but in fact comical that its employees are whining about "ethics".
18
Google is 1 million times more of a traitor to the USA and USA values than Trump could ever be.
1
I'm so shocked that Google would develop a search engine to please China's dictatorship. It's such a betrayal of their famously uplifting corporate slogan, "Don't be evil -- unless it's absolutely necessary for the greater good."
Oh, wait...
8
What better way to field test software that filters information on such a vast scale then the population of China. Then implementing it when its ready at home will be a cinch. Who would know the difference?
33
@Lee You've hit the nail on the head! I must admit: I didn't consider that aspect of Google's adventures. It's even worse that their harvesting, collating, and reselling all they know or infer about its users.
1
Google is probably kicking themselves for their "Don't be Evil" company statement when they first started. Having a separate network specifically designed to NOT show users information s that they can make more money in China is the *definition* of evil. Something the amoral Zuckerberg would do in a heartbeat but google? Et tu Google?
5
After reading this about Google and China, I'm guessing Google’s executive management also works for Trump--i.e., Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, and the rest of the information censors at FoxNews.
4
Google calculus:
Assist repressive, totalitarian regime, fine;
Profit off of same, very fine.
1
Bright young people losing their ideological virginity to the forces of greed is always hard to watch. I was one of them many years ago.
17
Google employees mean well - they're googly after all!
However, let's be realistic - US companies have invested over $256 billion in the insidious Communist country - according to recent estimates.
Everyone of those companies had to comply and capitulate to the Government's restrictive rules and regulations - regardless of whether it's detrimental to the Chinese people.
President Xi Jinping says companies do business our way, or its the highway. We're all in some ways supporting a Chinese regime which suppresses human rights.
It's the world we live in.....by the way, studies have shown most Chinese don't like Americans - I wouldn't lose sleep over the fact they're being censored.
2
That argument is akin to saying, "Everybody does it."
All the more reason to not do it when the opportunity presents itself.
It's always better to avoid adding yet more evil to the world.
1
Leave the companies that enable data collection and tracking.
Leave Google search for Duck Duck Go.
Leave Google Chrome for Mozilla Firefox (and donate to support the Mozilla non profit).
What are YOU doing to protest?
52
The article states “uncompromising idealism” as a fact to label the sound interface between basic human rights and information.
It then attempts to legitimize “do evil slowly” by mini-citing the phrase “more mature and pragmatic company” as the singular take on compliance with an authoritarian regime’s information control.
5
The article didn't advocate it. It just reported it.
Me thinks I need to stop using google chrome. I have no problem with free trade even in countries with different governing philosophies, but to facilitate oppression - that is what censorship is - is something I do not want to knowingly support. Yes, I know my government engages in oppression but I vote as well as I can and I’m not leaving.
2
"serious moral and ethical issues" arise with search tracking, selling personal info, web traffic history and profiles, aggregating data points about individuals from many sources, location tracking, psycho-social profiles from media postings, and most certainly from censorship of search results - in the US we are already "filtering" search results or giving priority to paid ads as search results. All tools for censorship, social manipulation, surveillance, in the worst cases may be used for disenfranchisement or oppression. The horse is already out of the barn.
2
"outrage among employees who worried they had been unwittingly working on technology that would help China withhold information from its citizens"
These folks obviously don't know withholding information from its citizens is the least of the world's worries when misinformation, part of the FUD, is aplenty
Having said that, Google is no longer the only AI company. While the conventional narrative is that China stole all the technologies from the U.S. - and there is a lot of stealing, overtly and covertly - China has indeed leapfrogged a lot of advances, never mind if they are built on some pilfered foundational stuff
So it is the eternal struggle between "don't do evil" and "having a seat at the table." Especially when the Bidus of the Chinese world have similar technologies. The Chinese may not even want to use the Dragonfly
True, Google may have some sharpest technologists, search engines are not like ICBMs, implementing machine learning and deep learning is difficult with enough PhDs. Still, as stated, Google has some sharpest minds, you don't want to write them off as just another bunch of engineers. No one has come up with another DeepMind yet! So we are back to the dilemma: Do you want to plant your flag and at least stake your claim of ownership or do you allow China to steal the codes in some ways with no regard of your ownership?
So Google employees need to think deep and hard. But Mr Pichai has not been handling it well considering his predicament is predictable
2
It's not really a dilemma.
If Google implements a censored serach engine, it will be aiding a dictatorship against its people.
If the Chinese government steals Google's codes for its own search engine, they will be thieves.
There's only one ethical side for Google here.
As with major spectator sports enterprises (NFL, NCAA, IOC, USOC, and FIFA), ideals, morality and ethics always seem to be for sale in the business world, and not for that much. It is time for some fundamental changes.
2
In an attempt to “gain” access to gmail accounts. Gain is missing. Love your work!
Microsoft employees objected to the company working on Facial Recognition and now, Google employees object to working on AI development and a search engine for China. While all this moral self righteousness is refreshing, employees need to remember they are not the only bright lights in the fixture... their work can be done almost anywhere, as well, and for less money. No company can tolerate such arrogance. There will be consequences; outsourcing, spinoffs, joint ventures, stalled careers, a hollowing out of US operations, and the reluctance of foreign countries to open operations in a country were employees can tell employers where to invest their money.
2
@DEH Companies will always be able to recruit people with fewer scruples. Advanced software that is produced for beneficial or positive individual or government use can be altered for more sinister ends. And employees are always free independent beings with their own morality and principles or lack thereof, and they can choose to do other work. Employers and investors can be dismissive of ethical concerns because of greed and yes, arrogance. Nothing has changed under the sun, other than the emergence of more sophisticated applications that open the door to manipulation and oppression.
2
@DEH
There will be consequences! shouts the king as his subjects
call out his nakedness.
1
“ A possible re-entry to China, according to current and former employees, is a sign of a more mature and pragmatic company.”
In others words, a company more concerned with making money than anything else.
49
Google should go into China, saying what the government wants to hear, and then do what they please, allowing any searches. Classic Chinese way of handling conflict.
10
Google would sell your Mother to make money, is it a surprise that they would allow an authoritarian regime to dictate to them what is and is not allowed ? It did not surprise me.
18
Are they also going to protest Sen. Warren’s plan to nationalize American companies?
7
@Jackson - I'm not familiar with this plan of nationalizing American companies which you refer. Please inform us ...
4
I doubt it, since there is no such plan.
If there were, I would vote for it.
I would rather see US companies in the hands of working people than those of the rich predators who control both them and the politicians.
1
@Jackson
Not nationalize--regulate. It is the relaxing and repealing of regulations in the interests of the 1% that caused the tech stock debacle and the 2008 near depression.
Now we have Trump and the republicans doing away with all regulations in the name of making America great again and treating our friends as enemies. They are taking the American people down a path to law of the jungle.
While the 1% are seeking an ever diminishing group of islands to escape to.
2
Well, Google itself is not very transparent about what it does with our data. The mote and the beam...
12
Surprise, surprise. The naïveté of these tech workers is the real story. Do they really believe that a modern corporation with the size and reach of Google can allow something as airy and insignificant as as a value (e. g. freedom) stand in the way of profit? The very definition of their industrial sector—tech, a means to an undefined end—screams the amoral status of their work. And now, after they’ve signed the contracts for their souls, their hipster identities balk at being used by Chinese communists? Were these tech workers ever forced to take a philosophy or ethics of technology class? Probably not. They were probably too busy honing their programming skills for their first big paycheck. And now they “protest” by signing a letter.
66
I fail to understand your mockery.
They may not have taken an ethics class, but despite that they have discovered ethics on their own.
I find that a cause for admiration, not scorn.
Cynicism is far less attractive than idealism.
1
@Chris Buczinsky Your comment blames the victims, the young tech workers for the misdeeds of the corporate powers that be. they are simply asking for an explanation as to why they are being asked to perform certain work tasks. Victim blaming has far too often become the reaction for metabolizing disapproval or despair with decisions made by people who have masterfully positioned themselves to sharply reduce or eliminate their accountability. Justifying any part of taking employees to task for objecting to not being kept in the loop Is just plain wrongheaded.
At least they're not rolling over like yahoo did, when that company helped put Chinese pro-democracy writers in Chinese prisons.
For now, the question might be, are more US jobs about to be moved off shore...to China.
37
As it is now, there are two search engine regimes, one inside and one outside China. Even if censored, some blending within China would be an advance. Leave it up to China's citizens to peel the censors' fingers off the controls.
8
Google employees shouldn't be the only ones upset. What Google is doing as an American company facilitating censoring in the world shows the greed and pomposity of American companies especially Tech companies. Society in general should protest the capitulation of these Tech companies and their complicity in trying to serve totalitarian regimes. But these company's see it as another technical challenge and of course their talent can solve it and the money they'll earn and keep overseas doesn't hurt. They don't think about the morality of the application of their genius. American society should make it clear that they don't find this technological achievement moral.
78
@Gloria Morales
So not providing a customized search engine would improve the lives of people who live under totalitarian regimes . . . how?
1
You have it backwards.
The principle is "do no harm." Not everything one does will help people. But some things will hurt them.
Providing a censored search engine aids the Chinese government against its own citizens. It legitimizes the suppression of information.
1
@Gloria Morales
Agreed and including Microsoft whose employees also wrote a letter protesting their work for ICE....By the way...how many MS13 members have they deported? So far they have tried to deport a teacher assistant with 3 American kids and an American husband who dutifully reported to ICE meetings, a pizza delivery man who has an American family,....just 2 examples I can document. Both paid taxes and never committed a crime. Also how about the 500 plus children who are still orphaned because the parents came to ask for asylum? Can you see them growing up to love the country that orphaned them? Cruelty begets cruelty.
Censorship.....ask Julian Assange about censorship in the West; or Edward Snowden about massive State surveillance?
19
@Richard B. Stealing data hardly qualifies as censorship.
5
This is why there has to be some kind of controls on monopolies and corporations in general. By definition they have no soul. I am in Europe, where new privacy laws are in effect. But that appears to have changed nothing. I searched Google for something this week and now I am receiving ads from Ebay for the very same product. So Google is selling my person data to eBay. Where is the EU regulator?
5
@Walker Rowe
You can choose to use another browser, like Mozilla firefox (faster than Chrome now) which has a feature you can turn on that puts a stop to the ad tracking (and other tracking) while still using Google for search. You can also install an addon that makes it harder for Facebook to track your activity on other websites. Then you'd be supporting a non profit (Mozilla) that advocates and funds initiatives pertaining to privacy, net neutrality, and an open internet.
I am surprised that China would accept Google under any conditions. Google's business model is collecting information about its users. If push comes to shove, it would hand that information over to the U.S. government. Why would any foreign country want that? The same goes for Facebook and Whatsapp.
4
@Andreas, you're dead on about Google, but are you seriously asking why China would want spy tech. These two are a match made heaven.
3
@Andreas
@Mike S
Because Google sees the writing on the wall. For a company that's probably 40% Chinese, it wouldn't escape them that competition from China is coming and without access to the largest and most dynamic market, Google cannot compete.
1
Ethical tech companies? An oxymoron if ever there was one.
45
...and this is exactly, to the word, what I mean when I say marketing-NOT-"tech" megacorps defame actual tech.
Look up the Free Software Foundation for just one example of programmers with a spine and a conscience.
Many call them weird. I call them wise, even prophetic.
2
Quite right. Google should apply its massive engineering skills to make internet censorship obsolete.
2
So much for "don't be evil".
33
"Don't be evil" doesn't include "don't pander to totalitarian regimes even if it means you lose a few bucks". Despicable.
89
In October 2015 Google‘s parent company Alphabet dropped „Don‘t be evil“ for „Do the right thing“.
What can you make of this? Turns out a lot.
While censorship is always evil right away, you can argue that China will be a more and more open society and therefor it‘s the right thing to provide it with a good search engine.
Editor’s note: This comment has been anonymized in accordance with applicable law(s).
The employees have no problem demonetize YouTube channels that did not lean sufficiently left, lower search results for websites they disagrees with but when it comes to protecting other people's sensitivity, they demand transparency and objectivity. Hypocrites much?
China do not tolerate fake news and unconformity much. That's true in East Asia in general. Google can either abide by Chinese sensitivity or they can stay out. From the look of things, stay out is no longer possible as China replace the US as the center of tech.
6
Hong Kong tolerates nonconformity and thrives. Taiwan tolerates nonconformity and thrives. They both embody Chinese values.
6
@AmateurHistorian, if China replaces US as the center of tech, it'll be due in large part from the US' open assistance in educating Chinese students in its top universities, and rolling out the red carpet in its largest and most prestigious tech companies. What bitersweet irony that will feel like someday. I say that as someone on the inside of it all.
8
AmateurHistorian,
YouTube has nothing to do with it. And Google's employees don't control search engine results, management does. The workers are not hypocrites.
China doesn't tolerate fake news? What are you talking about? China manufactures it.
The sensivity to which you refer is not of the Chinese people, but of the dictatorship.
Whether Google is in China or not will make no difference to China's own tech development.
1
GOOGLE INDEED Finds itself on the horns of a very tough dilemma. If the company capitulates to Chinese censorship, they may be violating their principle of, Do no evil. And if they cooperate with Chinese censorship, they may be coopted into evil acts. One option would be for Google to license the Chinese the right to install modules that create the desired limitations of information to its citizens. Being so adept at replicating and selling electronics, allegedly, China will have no problem taking care of their own dirty work. And google could print a disclaimer that the Chinese government, not the owners of google, have responsibility for censoring the search engine.
1
Search for "china uncensored", which is a YouTube channel. You will learn that "Do no evil" has been dropped at G and much about how the country of C really treats its people and the rest of the world. I thought I knew but didn't.
4
@BrockTronics
"China Uncensored" is part of New Tang Dynasty's internet division. New Tang Dynasty, in case anyone here don't know, is the banned spiritual cult Falun Gong's propaganda TV channel. To get news from China Unsensored is literally like getting news from Unification Church and Scientology.
The fact China Uncensored is brought up and receive so many "recommend" makes me wonder if Falun Gong's internet army is here.
How odd that Google employees should object to the Chinese government's censorship regulations when they have the support of 80% of Chinese.
Google itself actively and publicly censors information it provides to us but I would be surprised if half as many Americans would approve of the job they're doing.
9
@godfree
I'd say it's reasonable to be a tad suspicious of numbers like that coming from such a rigidly controlled system.
11
@godfree
It's naive to think the Chinese people really have a vote in what they approve of.
The extent to which Google censors search results in the US is exaggerated.
I've Googled many "controversial" topics and always found what I've been looking for.
1