Wow that is crazy may be YC next funded company will be on this. But there are so many ethical considereations here. Tracking immigrant means they will track citizens as well. We need to see how these companies are moderated
Too often on this site you see the opinion "keep politics out of it" expressed.
But there are going to be software engineers working at these surveillance and tracking firms, probably some on this site.
Just like there are people here getting paid to work on Facebook or Instagram despite knowing deep down (even if they're in denial) that those products are profoundly harmful to society at large and young people in particular.
Technology is only becoming more intertwined with daily life, not less. When does the software industry develop scruples?
1. Partisan/tribal personality driven with a core of "us vs. them"
2. Government policy and the application of same.
The first has no business here, but I'd argue the second does in the context of "hacking civilization". Of course a lot of politics gets smeared about so you can't have one without the other (which is not an accident), but we should strive to find ways to talk about policies and their their merits and concerns.
Part of the problem is that software engineers aren't real engineers. Engineering disciplines formally recognize their responsibilities to the public, and are expected to refuse to build dangerous or harmful systems.
The mechanical engineers who design cars and the civil engineers who design the roads and bridges they traverse are held to these standards, and hold themselves to these standards. The software engineers who write code that actually controls vehicles in practice have no such culture. Relevant professional organizations like the ACM should be leading the charge, but they aren't because their membership doesn't care.
One solution is to license software engineers. What do people working in the industry think about that?
I think the issue is less the politics but "their politics" it's absolutely sickening what is going on in that country. On par with the most horrible countries of the world. Nobody wants to hear and read about North Korea all the day.
I am reminded of Eisenhower's Chance for Peace Speech: "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."
The story that is being spun and maintained by news entertainment outlets like Wired is quite impressive.
Even more impressive is how effective it is to pull small sleight-of-hand moves, like referring to these processes as “immigrant-tracking”, as if the federal government is somehow at war with immigrants. One really has to admire the raw narrative-building chutzpah of these outlets.
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[ 54.7 ms ] story [ 325 ms ] thread> Like I said, America's a third world country as it is and... and we're just basically in a hopeless situation as it stands
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pP8XBJc2p_g
I keep GY!BE playing on repeat for the past several months.
But will ICE be able to track immigrants using whatever Apps are created here?
Scary times we live in. Stay safe everyone.
But there are going to be software engineers working at these surveillance and tracking firms, probably some on this site.
Just like there are people here getting paid to work on Facebook or Instagram despite knowing deep down (even if they're in denial) that those products are profoundly harmful to society at large and young people in particular.
Technology is only becoming more intertwined with daily life, not less. When does the software industry develop scruples?
The mechanical engineers who design cars and the civil engineers who design the roads and bridges they traverse are held to these standards, and hold themselves to these standards. The software engineers who write code that actually controls vehicles in practice have no such culture. Relevant professional organizations like the ACM should be leading the charge, but they aren't because their membership doesn't care.
One solution is to license software engineers. What do people working in the industry think about that?
There was a huge poll last year in the US and most people sided with Trump and his electoral program of enforcing immigration law.
The two are not comparable.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chance_for_Peace_speech
Oh how far we've wandered from that old promise of "small government".
Even more impressive is how effective it is to pull small sleight-of-hand moves, like referring to these processes as “immigrant-tracking”, as if the federal government is somehow at war with immigrants. One really has to admire the raw narrative-building chutzpah of these outlets.