[bradleyjg]

I get that you have the caveat and all, but seriously? The tech industry has widespread cooperation with a regime in China that is brutalizing Hong Kong and committing ethnic cleansing of the Uigurs--and you want to know if he can sleep at night because he codes software to show ads for socks to people that don't want to see ads (but somehow can't bring themselves to live without content that's ad supported)?

[dmm]

> (but somehow can't bring themselves to live without content that's ad supported)?

Every day that becomes less and less of an option and presenting it as an option is disingenuous. Are you seriously suggesting that people live without search engines?

I think it's valid to question the role of cars in our society even if the critic took a car to the meeting, for example.

[bradleyjg]

There’s a difference between questioning the role of cars in our society and morally condemning car engineers while riding around in a car.

As for living without a search engine, people have gone through much worse for their moral beliefs. I personally don’t see the moral issue at all, but if you feel so strongly about it—-then yes I expect you to sacrifice your own interests for those beliefs and not just go around making cheap condemnatory statements.

[bravoetch]

False dichotomy. Other options might be paid search. Personal search engines. Peer to peer search. Or new business models. Yes, it's possible to imagine a world without Google et al screwing everyone out of their privacy.

[crematoria]

Can you list any of these exciting alternatives? As a layman, I don't know of anything besides Google, Bing and DDG.

[MayeulC]

I'm not sure... I think I'd be more comfortable working for a weapons shop than for (tracking) adtech. Ethics is a spectrum, so there can be many opinions on the topic.

Going back to adtech, I more or less equate it to the tech you alluded to, as well as global tracking, NSA-sized surveillance, and a complete disregard for "privacy", regulations and civility. Would any self-respecting person follow their neighbors around, write their every moves on a notebook, and sell that to the highest bidder? It's literally what is being done by those tracking giants, on a much bigger scale (and Google does track your every move, or does its best to do so).

I feel like I'm distancing myself more and more from conventional Internet platforms as a result.