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When I read your post I was like… 😬 this will generate a lot of discussion yet still a good post Aral :)
SIncerely
@aral @precariousmind @element Hahaha. So next time I see someone putting down Signal and boosting Matrix, I can say “signal isn’t run by fascist bootlickers.”
@aral this looks like a promising solution that might work for some people https://peergos.org/
I haven't fully research it fully but might test it soon.
@aral This is not the case. See https://element.io/en/legal/ethics for the public ethics policy of who we sell to.
Is there a public list of the governmental & police entities that are your customers?
Also, some clarification is needed what you mean by »We don’t sell to governments who are under investigation by the #UN for international atrocities«. Which organs or specialized agencies of the UN do you mean? You seem to be referring to the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, who doesn't investigate, but merely creates reports, within an early warning system.
Also, you're saying »We don’t sell to organisations who are committing human rights abuses (i.e. abusive organisations within a government, even if the wider government itself isn’t in scope).« Who is performing that assessment, and according to which criteria? Which potential customers have been rejected so far, after this assessment?
You're also saying »We don’t sell to governments with poor human rights, to avoid risk of harm to their population. This is currently defined as countries scoring 20 or less« in the Freedom House ranking. Among others, this allows e.g. #Qatar, #Algeria, #Turkey, #HongKong, #Serbia or #Israel to become your customers. Are they?
Without specifics, especially evidence, verifying that you abide by your policy becomes impossible, and it stays yet another text.
@element Bro, this you? Don’t piss in my face and tell me it’s raining.
@aral Your position implies that the police is an enemy and that states shouldn't have any kind of law enforcement called "police". But can you pledge that you will never, ever call the police, nor expect any police intervention or involvement, no matter what?
States are human super-organisms and their existence is both necessary and unavoidable in our world. And states need a police force to be effective. @element
Imagine regaining effective, broadly inclusive democratic control where it was lost (or winning it where it was absent). Then the problem of slave-patrol mentality will be easy to solve. Otherwise, you will end up recreating the same thing under a new name. It's not the name that is the issue, it's the shape of the institution within societies that don't adhere to democratic standards.
@aral What is exactly your problem here? Matrix is an encrypted messaging standard - as a maintainer of an Internet standard quite natural to sell consulting services to commercial clients, including your government. This is exactly the same case with HTTP or SMTP, which are widely used by governments and law enforcement, so why single out IM?
@ahltorp @aral @element Personally I think it's a big difference between selling to police, so they can be independent from US oligarchical tech companies, which will give all their data to the fascist US government if asked, and to sell to the Gestapo.
You don't have to agree with me, of course, but I don't see for example my own country disbandoning its police force any time soon, and I'd rather not have them reliant on MS Teams or the like. So imo Element having this distinction is good
@forteller I don’t necessarily agree completely with @aral, but I think Element should be really clear here. They posted a non-denial denial while referring to a policy that suggests ICE would be a welcome customer. I don’t have any other information on who they’re actually selling to, I’m only judging their behaviour.
@KarlHeinzHasliP @ahltorp @element Depends who you consider to be human, I guess.
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@element @aral this is just a page that says “unable to decrypt message”
more seriously, instead of giving a generic “this is not the case” in response to aral’s post that included receipts of the partnerships you’ve entered, are you able to confirm in writing that you will not provide services or technology to ICE or its affiliates? if one of the American police departments you have partnered with has become affiliated with ICE, have you done anything to end that partnership?
@element @aral in the context that these are public institutions and that you’ve been very public in supporting them with partnerships and technology: are you able to show me a case where an organization you partnered with violated items #5 or #6 in the link you posted and forced you to end the partnership?
@element @aral come on guys, I gave you such a softball with this one. I didn’t even talk about how your stated ethics are neoliberal claptrap desperately searching for a non-paradoxical definition of a good cop who can never exist.
all you gotta do is tell us explicitly you won’t work with ICE and give us an example of the consequences for a public institution that violated your ethics policy.
yes you can share that exact information; you’re receiving public money for your services.
@davidgerard @mlen @aral @element I fucking should
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@fuckfetish @element There used to be Mattermost but I just took a look at their site and it looks like they’ve gone full “military fuck yeah”.
This is what happens when people believe the “we care about human rights blah blah” bullshit of open source enterprise software corporations. The hint’s in “enterprise software” – that’s that they’re about, nothing else.
@aral @fuckfetish @element Zulip is a better alternative.