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There Is No .bro In Brotli: Google/Mozilla Engineers Nix File Type As Offensive

Posted by Soulskill on from the trying-harder-than-academia dept.

theodp writes: Several weeks ago, Google launched Brotli, a new open source compression algorithm for the web. Since then, controversy broke out over the choice of 'bro' as the content encoding type. "We are hoping to establish a file ending .bro for brotli compressed files, a command line tool 'bro' for compressing and uncompressing brotli files, and a accept/content encoding type 'bro'," explained Google software engineer Jyrki Alakuijala. "Can I talk you out of it?," replied Mozilla SW engineer Patrick McManus. "'bro' has a gender problem, even though the dual meaning is unintentional. It comes of[f] misogynistic and unprofessional due to the world it lives in." Despite some pushback from commenters, a GitHub commit made by Google's Zoltan Szabadka shows that there will be no '.bro' in Brotli. "I have asked a feminist friend from the North American culture-sphere, and she advised against bro," explained Alakuijala. "We have found a compromise that satisfies us, so we don't need to discuss this further. Even if we don't understand why people are upset from our cultural standpoint, they would be (unnecessarily) upset and this is enough reason not to use it."

27 of 781 comments (clear)

  1. Big Sister is watching by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Call it .sis or .vag, that'll work, right?

    Male bad, female good?

    1. Re:Big Sister is watching by war4peace · · Score: 5, Funny

      Those choices are offensive.
      For gender equality, I propose a dual extension. .bro for male users and .ho for female users. That way, everyone's happy.

      --
      ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
    2. Re:Big Sister is watching by h33t+l4x0r · · Score: 5, Funny

      This is unacceptable. When sorted by type, .bros would come before .hos

    3. Re:Big Sister is watching by dreamchaser · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You really need to get a sense of humor, or have you not ever heard the crude expression 'bros before hos?' It was a joke. You can laugh now.

    4. Re:Big Sister is watching by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Remember, git is a derogatory term in England/Great Britain.

      And that's exactly why Linus chose that name. "I'm an egotistical bastard, and I name all my projects after myself. First 'Linux', now 'git'".

    5. Re:Big Sister is watching by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 5, Insightful

      "I have asked a feminist friend from the North American culture-sphere, and she advised against bro,"

      I asked a friend from a subgroup of the Congolese Luba people and in their dialect of Luba-Kasai "br" means "sodomise my three-year-old with a cucumber". Only three people actually speak this dialect and they're all over ninety, but still, someone somewhere finds it offensive, so your choice of "br" cannot be used as it is both offensive and racist.

      I demand that you change the extension to "cutefluffybunniessoftcottonwoolwarmness", but only after polling every single ethnic group, subculture, and political and religious belief in the world to ensure that none of them can figure out a way in which it offends them.

    6. Re:Big Sister is watching by jones_supa · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There's no need to artificially truncate filename extensions to 3 letters anymore. Just call it ".brotli" and call it a day. Adobe Premiere professionals deal with ".prproj" every day.

    7. Re:Big Sister is watching by Hognoxious · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Picking a neutral name that doesn't have any negative connotations is just sensible.

      It's not just sensible, it's impossible. If your whole raison d'etre is being offended, you will find something to be offended about.

      Now excuse me, I need to go and turn off the ... ummm ... green cauliflower.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  2. The North American culture-sphere? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Who says that?

    1. Re:The North American culture-sphere? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Twats say that, Billy. Twats do.

    2. Re:The North American culture-sphere? by 0123456 · · Score: 5, Funny

      Who says that?

      Metrosexuals who think being 'feminist' will help them get laid?

  3. Re:Dear SJW morons by tnk1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Or failing that, perhaps they could not read gender politics into a three letter file extension.

  4. What next? by jbmartin6 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I guess the FAT filesystem has to go too.

    --
    This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    1. Re:What next? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Oh noooo. Don't forget the man pages.

      Better prerapre for person pages now...

    2. Re: What next? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You're too late.

      http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/FreeBSD's_man_page_misogyny

      Note the example there with gendered terms... Is being called fucking HATRED OF WOMEN.

      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7121268.
      Bro pages (man pages with example) are raked over the coals

      http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Man-Page/
      Man pages now have disclaimers to explain that man is short for manual, so please don't be offended

      This HOWTO explains what you should bear in mind when you are going to write on-line documentation -- a so-called man page -- that you want to make accessible via the man(1) command. Throughout this HOWTO, a manual entry is simply referred to as a man page, regardless of actual length and without sexist intention.

    3. Re:What next? by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Funny

      FAT has to go. It will be replaced by the CURVY table.

      "man pages" are now "person pages" and include a provision to reword everything to a gender neutral wording.

      "cat" is no longer acceptable due to the outcry of people allergic to feline fur and is now "domestic_animal". Softlinks to "cat" may be permissive if the owner of the system can show that no allergic person could ever be subjected to the computer, which means that laptops, tablets and the like must not use such a symlink.

      It will no longer be able to use the "force" option in commands. Such behaviour is unacceptable and the option is now being ignored by the command and its use logged, with mandatory monthly reviews to correct such behaviour in users who continue to try to use it.

      "sendmail" is no longer acceptable due to the obvious gender bias and is renamed "sendmessage".

      The "touch" command may only be used on files the creation date of which is longer than 18 years in the past and where the user is in the touch_permitted database of the file. By default touch is not allowed until the program explicitly allows it to a certain user.

      "LaTeX" is no longer to be used due to environmental concerns.

      "kill" has always been a command of great concern and is now entirely limited to use for root only, who may only execute it after the process has been deemed required to be killed by at least 12 other processes running.

      "history" has been completely rewritten and will now be "herstory".

      abort() is now choice()

      And finally, XWindow is now NC-17Window.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  5. Re:Dear SJW morons by Panoptes · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "bro' has a gender problem"

    No. North America has a gender problem.

  6. Re:SJWs, 'ten-hut! by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 5, Funny

    Brazil is gonna have a hell of a time with the Olympics next year.

    Oh, I think they'll have plenty of support...

    --
    You have the right to remain sentient. If you give up the right to remain sentient, you will be elected to public office
  7. Re:Dear SJW morons by Tokolosh · · Score: 5, Funny

    God was niggardly with the sense of humor dispensing.

    --
    Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
  8. Re:Dear SJW morons by kheldan · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Get a sense of humor

    Friend, there is something I've been saying for decades now: The surest way to ruin a Good Thing is to get a bunch of people involved in it. That's what's happening here: There are too many people in the world, and more to the point too many people on the Internet, and it's just ruining everything for everyone because whereas it's actually a small percentage of people who might get offended at something so small, that small percentage represents a huge number of people, who are not going to allow themselves to be ignored. Case in point: I work at a large technology corporation. There is a small software tool that developers use, and a 32-bit hexadecimal value that shows up in one dialog box defaults to the hex value "DEADBEEF". Clever, right? Also harmless and not at all intended to be offensive. But someone got offended and they made them change it. Stupid, isn't it? Get enough people together and collectively they don't have a sense of humor anymore.

    --
    Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
  9. Oh for FUCKS sake by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Funny

    Damn feminists, grow a pair!

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  10. Re: What the fuck by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The end of the patriarchy. And it is awesome. 50000 years of injustice are about to be unravelled.

    Because nothing says "We're strong enough to take over!" like screaming "I need to be protected!" whenever dealing with such horrible things as "offensive file extensions".

  11. Re:Dear SJW morons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    rant:

    No. The world has a "Whiny immature woman without a spine" problem. Lately we can't even bring up the topic of "gender" without having some fucking whore (yes, I'm using it intentionally. It's the internet. If you don't like it close the window. No one is forcing you to read this comment.) whining that "It's SOOOOOO offensive, and my little brain can't deal with the (non-intended) meanings so let's ban it!"

    /rant

    I've got a one step solution to all of this:
    1. Stop giving a fuck until these morons grow up and actually have a real issue to present.

    Seriously, every time I read shit like this, I wonder what kind of fucked in the head woman read / heard / whatever the material. Because a rational person would not read ".bro" and immediately think of "Gender inequality!" A person who would is either seriously fucked up in the head, or out to get something by taking advantage of others. This needs to stop. It's not solving any real issue and it takes away focus from the real issues that need to be addressed. For example: Equal pay regardless of gender, better support for abuse victims, etc.

    As for the sane women out there, 1. I apologize, but it needed, and still needs, to be said. 2. You need to start decrying these abusers and force them off the stage. Because for every single time you bring up a real issue that does need to be addressed, people think of these abusers and that puts them into a mindset of suspicion of intent, or just an outright unwillingness to help you.

  12. Political-correctness gone insane .. by nickweller · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Yet another example of political-correctness gone insane. People are not upset, some SJWarrier decides to be insulted by 'bro' and therefore it must be changed. Anyone who says different is a misogynist. Enough of the PC bullshit already. If some people decide to be insulted by some aspect of contemporary culture then that's their prerogative. It's got nothing to do with me, I am under no compulsion to adjust my behaviour or opinions to suit them.

  13. Re:Dear SJW morons by 0xdeadbeef · · Score: 5, Funny

    There is a small software tool that developers use, and a 32-bit hexadecimal value that shows up in one dialog box defaults to the hex value "DEADBEEF". Clever, right? Also harmless and not at all intended to be offensive. But someone got offended and they made them change it.

    My name is a trigger word.

  14. .vag is PS1 and PS2 audio by tepples · · Score: 5, Informative

    Except .vag is taken by ADPCM audio on the PlayStation 1 and 2.

  15. Re:Dear SJW morons by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    > As amply demonstrated by the SJWs who down-modded my comment.

    If you are arguing that people shouldn't be so sensitive, your whining about being downmodded isn't doing your cause any favors.