13 May
2014
13 May
'14
7:42 a.m.
On Mon, May 12, 2014 at 12:49 PM, Ryan Bethencourt
<ryan.bethencourt(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Marc I know you have a belief in moving technology
that helps people and
increases access for all and act on it, which I fully support and partner
with you on where I can. I believe in putting people first too but I'm not
against the profit motive, especially if it's driven by a mission to do
broader good.
I don't however agree with your view on google or engineers that work for
google. I've met some really great people who work at google and are very
giving of their time and resources to help their local communities and I'm
sure there are some who are part of the Sudo community who do likewise. I
think it does us no good to speak in exclusionary terms of any group of
people, I think it's okay to criticize an individual for their actions if
they're not being excellent to people or animals but whenever we clump
people into groups we risk doing exactly what we're against, which is being
exclusionary.
I don't think there is any danger of that. Our community already
includes many people who work for large tech companies. Some of my
favorite people. They generally have nuanced analyses of the ethics
involved, recognize the compromises they are making, and will probably
say they are "working within the system," or at least donate their
disposable income towards good things. Very few would say "I'm
profiting. Yay!"
In fact, I'd say the average tech worker is very bad at profit motive.
Otherwise we'd have a strong union, be earning a larger piece of the
pie, and not letting our labor, talent and wealth be so transparently
leeched off by big companies and landowners, which is exactly what's
happening, to the detriment of everybody else.
I know you're not exclusionary, I just wanted to
make sure there's a clear
voice in the discussion that welcomes all people, Google engineer or not, to
Sudo room to come and help us make the community and world better through
technology.
Standing up for the subjugated voice of Google engineers is great and
all, but I wouldn't quite call it "welcoming all people". May any of
us someday earn the right to use that phrase.