Mitchell Kapor Leaves Groove Over TIA

Deao writes "Mitchell Kapor, one of the founders of the EFF, has quit Groove. Supposedly he has left to pursue open source software interests, but insiders say he is unhappy with Groove's products forming a crucial part of the Total Information Awareness project. Read all about it at the NYTimes (Free Registration required)."

Comments

Reg Free Link

[Anonymous Coward]

Click here.

Re:Reg Free Link

[jd142]

Better yet, why do so many people bitch about getting access to free information? Come on people, just sit down and generate a random id, sign up for it on hotmail and use that for everything. Why do you think I have such an odd id? Check the hotmail account once a month, delete everything there. Is that so hard to do to get free access to something?

hmm

[DonFinch]

I'm glad he's doing what feels right to him but, given the choice, I rather know the inside of the beast then be at its mercy.

Ethics

[Joe the Lesser]

"Computer scientists are going to have the same kinds of battles that physicists did amidst the fallout of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,"

I hadn't actually thought of it this way, but it's a good point. If in the future I find myself coding something dubious for a government or corporation, what is the correct ethical choice?

Re:Ethics

[banzai51]

Whatever you feel is right, of course. However, don't be shocked if your decision has consequences, i.e. loss of job.

Re:Ethics

[Elwood P Dowd]

The correct ethical choice would be to include a back door that would allow you to later hack their computers and bring them to their proverbial knees.

Yes, I'm kidding.

Re:Ethics

[PhxBlue]

If in the future I find myself coding something dubious for a government or corporation, what is the correct ethical choice?

If you're relying on someone else to answer that for you, then you've made the wrong choice already. Just follow whatever course of action is most ethical for you; because, at the end of the day, it's not your naysayers you'll see when you look in the mirror.

Re:Ethics

[RocketScientist]

OK, here's your ethical dilemma. Linux is Free Software (GNU/Linux is Free Software....heh). That means you can't put restrictions on use into the software license. That means that if the TIA wants to use Linux...they can. And we can either all stop working on it or we can assume that we're working for a greater good than TIA is evil.

An interesting aside to the free software movement, no? Think about it, if you license something under GPL, you can't say who can or can't use it, just what baggage they have to handle in order to resell or distribute it (provide source if they modify it and resell it). Free means free, so that means terrorists, Palestinians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, no matter which side of any particular war you choose, if you develop free software one implication is that people that you don't like can pick it up and use it to do things you don't like.

That means that the government can use it also. To watch you. And that they've got the source to make sure there aren't any backdoors.

A little bit of new perspective. I'm not saying it's a good thing or a bad thing, just an unexplored thing.

Re:Ethics

[gpinzone]

It's always a race. For example, if we don't come up with a method to crack 2,048 public key encryption, someone else will. You can't assume it could only happen by perfecting a quantum computer; someone could find a way to calculate products of primes quicker. The point is, it's not a matter of if, it's when.

Re:Ethics

[Soko]

You must have very strong ethics my friend. Perhaps too strong?

Like it or not, you will at some time or another support Microsoft in this industry. They're just too big and too pervasive to ignore and still put food on the table. (By your logic, SAMBA and WINE should not exist for Linux, since they support products from an un-ethical company, but I digress.)

Realistically, Microsoft isn't going away any time soon - if ever. It takes quite a while to fritter away $40 Billion, and that's just the war chest. IMHO, we can either continue to tilt at windmills or we can be more constructive and try to modify the beasts behaviour. If Microsoft were to stop being so arrogant and paranoid at the same time, they would likely be a pretty cool company (Aside: Look at what's happened to the stuffiest corp of all time - Big Blue). Then, these moral dillemas won't de-rail us from getting our jobs done.

BTW, I'm not saying you should tone down or compromise your ethics in any way - I'm saying that you should try to find more constructive ways to uphold them than possibly hanging your future out dry. We need advocates, not martyrs.

God bless, and best of luck to you - I hope you make a wise decision.

Soko

Re:Ethics

[mdxi]

Wrong. It is possible, though difficult, to work in computers without supporting Microsoft. I do it every day, though I had to go 5 months without work to find a place where I could do it.

In my present job we use 100% Linux and OpenBSD, we write our systems in Perl, we are formally GPLing and releasing our work, we're gently pushing for our peer agencies across the state to join us, and they're starting to realize that not only have the best solution available, but that our methods give everyone the biggest payback for the least expenditure.

Also, I *do* believe that Samba and WINE shouldn't exist, in much the same way that the GPL shouldn't have to exist. In an ideal world, we all work together and horrible hacks like WINE aren't needed. More viscerally, I feel that people who take the easy way out and fall back to WINE and friends for everything are being spineless, opportunistic cowards with no real ethics at all. "But gaming!" is no excuse; either start coding or go get a console. "But Word files!" is no excuse; tell people to send you plaintext/RDF/HTML/CSV/any other standard, interoperable format. The network effect of Office won't go away until people stop reflexively duck-and-covering before it.

People say they wish they didn't have to put up with Microsoft. Well, that's only going to happen if you're willing to shut up and then put up, and work to make it happen.

Can you blame him for having a conscience?

[hafree]

"Mitch cares very much about the social impact of technology" - I think that really says it all here. How would you feel knowing that you are the reason certain civil liberties and rights to privacy no longer exist?

Re:Can you blame him for having a conscience?

[pnatural]

Please forgive my picking nits, but I really don't like it when people express this idea incorrectly.

Rights do not "no longer exist". You may have them or not have them, but they don't vanish because they are ideas. They are central to the human experience, and it's only thru collective will (or the end of a gun) do we decide who gets to exercise them and who does not.

It's like that song that says "and I won't forget the men who died who gave that right to me". Those men didn't give me my rights - a higher power did. The founders of the USA realized this -- that these rights are inalienable.

Only thru systematic, Orwellian control of language and thought can rights "no longer exist".

Re:Can you blame him for having a conscience?

[jd142]

The founders of the USA realized this -- that these rights are inalienable.

And yet they denied them to women, blacks, non-land owners, etc. If the founders really believed all men were created equal, why did only certain men get rights?

And don't forget, some of the first bills passed by Congress were the Alien and Sedition acts. The Alien act allowed the government to lock up non-citizen males age 14 and up who belonged to any country we were at war with. Didn't matter if they were innocent of any wrong doing. Congress threw the right to a fair trial right out the window. Luckily the British (you know, the people we were upset with) still had Magna Carta to protect their rights.

And the Sedition act would punish you if you "write, print, utter or publish. . . writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States," which means that Rush Limbaugh could have been arrested for Sedition during the Clinton administration if the act were still enforced.

Because of its weakness at the time, the Supreme Court didn't even rule them as unconstitutional (I don't know if they were ever approached about it; I couldn't find that.) The acts were eventually allowed to expire about 10 years later.

So please, don't venerate the founders of the USA. They were human. In other words, they were hypocrites. They talked about the inalienable rights of men, but kept slaves. The south wanted slaves counted as men for population reasons, so they could have more representatives, but they didn't want them to have rights. They engaged in acts of terrorism (Boston Tea Party) and used biological weapons against indigenous peoples (small pox blankets). And even today this country engages in taxation without representation: the citizens of the District of Columbia pay federal taxes but have no elected Federal representatives. And their population is greater than Wyoming's. Imagine if Congress decided to tell Wyoming citizens that they would continue to pay federal taxes but would lose their Senators and Representatives!

Sorry, don't mean to be a troll or flame bait, but the veneration of the "Founding Fathers" really gets to me after awhile.

The world needs more good examples

[SolemnDragon]

1. He left his job because he was uncomfortable with what was happening with what they'd built.
Anybody remember the line that was used on production lines/ development for the atom bomb? "Our job is to build them, not to decide where they fall."

Take heart, folks. Add this one to the tiny corner of the bulletin board labelled "The world is not all bad." People really do sometimes help total strangers, people really do sometimes care about what their work is being used for, and frankly, i'm ALL IN FAVOUR of a guy who can turn around and quit based on what he thinks is an appropriate use of his work. (of course, i might not feel that way if he felt that what he was building SHOULD be spyware and they hadn't been headed there)I'm more willing to respect a belief the less it looks like it's going to mess with other people's- relatively innocent people's- lives. Granted, we can't all pay the rent if we walk off the job for moral reasons, so choose your battles carefully, and we don't all have a widespread fanbase to keep the world aware of what we've just done. (So when you choose them, do it as publicly as possible.) But sometimes, it's worth it, and i'll lead the cheer. Thanks!!!! Good example of what's not all wrong with the world.

Re:The world needs more good examples

[xyzzy]

This whole thing is rather silly. Are people here equating building a P2P collaboration app with shared whiteboads and calendaring with building the atom bomb? I'm sorry, but the two things aren't even CLOSE to morally equivalent.

If they are, all you hackers out there better put down your keyboards, because this is a wakeup call. Practically everything written out there in software-land could be used for nefarious purposes -- whether open source, closed source, or you name it. Remember the Marine training program using Doom?

do you think....

[rob-fu]

kapor would have stepped down if he wasn't incredibly wealthy? IIRC he was one of the founders of Lotus...

Re:do you think....

[Surak]

Yup. There's an (admittedly somewhat out of date) bio on his web site here. Mitch was pretty much the guy that ripped off Dan Bricklin's VisiCalc...errr..I mean designed Lotus 1-2-3 and co-developed it along with Jonathan Sachs.

Kapor wasn't always considered one of the good guys, either. Many in the software industry considered him to be somewhat obnoxious and it was widely grokked that at least some of Lotus' downfall in office suites can be attributed to Kapor's bad decisions. In retrospect, I'd say Microsoft just ate their lunch by being the first to market with a Windows-based office suite, personally.

But yeah, Kapor made his fortune by cocreating the PCs first killer app.

*blinks* Does anybody else see it?

[Taldo]

but insiders say he is unhappy with Groove's products forming a crucial part of the Total Information Awareness project. Read all about it at the NYTimes (Free Registration required)."

Is it just me? Or is the irony here almost toxic?

Not the same

[Codex The Sloth]

The atomic bomb worked.

Mod parent up!

[TopShelf]

All too often our first reaction to something that we don't approve of is to distance ourselves from it, and by doing so we relinquish any opportunity to effect change. In international affairs, consider the differences over the last 10-20 years between the US relationships with Russia and China, and our relationships with Cuba and North Korea. In the former, we've taken steps to open up the lines of commerce and seen those countries change dramatically. In the latter, we've taken a hard-line embargo position, and haven't seen an iota of positive result.

While I respect Kapor's stand, I'd encourage him to stay engaged and voice his opinions.

Our peers work for TIA

[hey]

Think about it ... some computer science types answered a want ad for the TIA. Did a few interviews and security checks then accepted a job there. What is wrong with these people?

Groove backdoor will FEED the TIA?

[Bigger R]

Maybe he's unhappy about certain "modifications" to his core technology?

Just like Zimmerman hinting that newer versions of NAI PGP (post 6.58?) might have issues.

And why he refers to it as a delicate situation.

Just a thought.

Maybe he's leaving after seeing the new MS Office?

[LibertineR]

The new Office suggests that Microsoft finally has their Groupware act together, and from what I understand, the beta is selling like wildfire on the web site. At $20 shipping, half a million copies might sellout before the week is over.

Office + Sharepoint, will kill the market for Groove before they can get one.

This is NOT a troll either, if you dont agree, do a little research. This Office version might actually be worth upgrading to.

Conscientious Brain Drain

[lucasw]

In Howard Rheingold's Tools For Thought it is mentioned that three decades ago many top scientists working on the government funded computer and communications projects left their posts out of dissatisfaction with government policy:

In 1970, a combination of growing opposition to the Vietnam war, and the militarization of all ARPA research, meant that an extraordinary collection of talent in the new fields of computer networks and interactive computing were looking for greener pastures...

Luckily, XEROX and other private companies were around to snatch them up and not let their talents go to waste.

This kind of phenomenon can't be do much good: It doesn't help legitimate national security interests, and scientists and engineers without the means to innovate don't benefit the economy. If young persons decide to avoid engineering or science completely when a perceived immoral government taints those fields, there's even more fallout...

Thanks Google!

[FsG]

Thanks to this google link, you don't need to register: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/11/business/11PRIV. html?ex=1047963600&en=b851b67c98e9787e&ei=5062&par tner=GOOGLE

groove not central to TIA...

[bigpat]

why would it be a big deal if they are using the software for collaboration. I'm sure they are using email, telephones and pencils too... If Groove is actually acting as a subcontractor and doing TIA research then I could understand being upset, since TIA is very very very unamerican.

What's next... people boycotting boxcutters?

Well, no. specifically...

[SolemnDragon]

I'm paralleling the moral dilemma of 'leaving one's job because one's otherwise harmless and useful shared whiteboards and calendars have been snapped up by the government as a handy tool for a goal which one doesn't agree with' ...to ... well, 'the moral dilemma of having one's hardware technologies and one's physics work appropriated as part of a government project with goals that one doesn't agree with.'

The point here is not the measure of the potential threat, it's the matter of taking action as a matter of principle. It's a valid statement that the two are not morally 'equivalent'- but it IS true (at least in my view) that the two actions are morally parallel in that they do both make a public statement against an actively directed specific use by the government of a specific technology.

When the TIA creeps are sharing your desktop, then you at least have one person who will have said, hey, i worked on this, and this was NOT what we had in mind.

You're right. Practically anything written out there in softwareland could be used to erode rights, could be used to persecute individuals- the question isn't can a hammer be used to break heads? but more importantly, When the company you design hammers for starts selling them to the guys using them to break heads, are you still going to be there designing hammers for them?

Remember, folks, if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.

Re:If it is dubious, the choice is obvious

[MyNameIsFred]

For more info check out Who Was Martin Niemoller?. Two major points. First, he was a pastor who was held prisoner in Sachsenhausen and Dachau concentration camps. Second, he was a major force behind the Stuttgart Confession of Guilt, in which the German Protestant churches formally accepted guilt for their complicity in Hitler's reign of terror. BTW, my original post is a quote from a speech he gave to the U.S. Congress in the late 60s.