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Google Removes 'Don't Be Evil' Clause From Its Code of Conduct (gizmodo.com)
Kate Conger, reporting for Gizmodo: Google's unofficial motto has long been the simple phrase "don't be evil." But that's over, according to the code of conduct that Google distributes to its employees. The phrase was removed sometime in late April or early May, archives hosted by the Wayback Machine show.
"Don't be evil" has been part of the company's corporate code of conduct since 2000. When Google was reorganized under a new parent company, Alphabet, in 2015, Alphabet assumed a slightly adjusted version of the motto, "do the right thing." However, Google retained its original "don't be evil" language until the past several weeks. The phrase has been deeply incorporated into Google's company culture -- so much so that a version of the phrase has served as the wifi password on the shuttles that Google uses to ferry its employees to its Mountain View headquarters, sources told Gizmodo.
"Don't be evil" has been part of the company's corporate code of conduct since 2000. When Google was reorganized under a new parent company, Alphabet, in 2015, Alphabet assumed a slightly adjusted version of the motto, "do the right thing." However, Google retained its original "don't be evil" language until the past several weeks. The phrase has been deeply incorporated into Google's company culture -- so much so that a version of the phrase has served as the wifi password on the shuttles that Google uses to ferry its employees to its Mountain View headquarters, sources told Gizmodo.
You all may joke, but I'd wager something really nefarious happened at Google and this is the warrant canary.
I've found that the best definition of evil that applies across all culture and times is the following:
Intentionally harming others to benefit yourself.
Whether that benefit is emotional, resources, or a political cause, it's all in the direction of what most cultures would consider more and more evil.
Without harm, it's generally more mischief or taboo, and without any form of benefit from that harm, it's generally considered more madness/confusion or misunderstanding. Without intention, it's considered an accident, though blatant enough recklessness its own intention in many cases.
Discarding the intention to avoid evil, because it might make you more money is definitely going in the evil direction in my book at least.
Ryan Fenton
No, they did not kill it. They had a new motto for Alphabet, but Google's CoC continued to have instances of "don't be evil." Here's a version of its CoC, captured in January this year by Internet Archive.
Pretty much describes the life cycle of every country and corporation, from its idealized conception to its fall into the corrupt and greedy abyss.
This is not true. Plenty of corporations start in the corrupt and greedy abyss right from the beginning. For instance, Microsoft never went through an "idealistic" phase. Oracle is another example of primordial slime.
It may have still been on paper, but that practice was not followed for years. Now the code of conduct is more aligned with what the organization actually does.
The tail wagging the dog, so to speak.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Google has replaced already obsolete don't be evil with be politically correct, progressivist and mandatory neo-marxsist-leninist-feminist.
I think you mean, don't bother applying if you are a white hetero male aka the bane of silicon Valley and the cause of all mankind's problems. /s
Well that or their new motto is:
Don't be evil (if you think you may be caught)
Or maybe there are a bunch of executives sitting in their lairs/offices stroking their white cats and buying islands.
It's certainly true, though, that Gates stole CPM from Gary Kildall, and (after modifying it to run on a then-incompatible filesystem) sold it to IBM, as PC-DOS
No, neither Bill Gates nor Microsoft did steal anything from DRI, including CP/M. If CP/M was ever stolen, it was by Tim Paterson, who had nothing to do with MS back then. And BTW, Paterson didn't steal CP/M; he merely created a CP/M work-alike OS, that ran on Intel 8086, and its APIs were designed to be backward-compatible with these of CP/M, which, together with the 8080-to-8086 source code compatibility, made porting software to the new OS almost trivial. Later, Paterson won a lawsuit for defamation against some DRI fanbois, who, just like you, accused him of theft, so, if you want to donate some money to Mr. Paterson, you may continue with your accusations.
How could they be the 'baddies' when a top Google executive made personal visits to the White House averaging more than once a week while Obama was president? Weren't they just spreading their pure-good ethos to the government?
It's kind of funny that those researchers only got huffy about their research being used for military purposes but all the social engineering and other fuckery Google does is just fine.
I'm sure they unironically believe the US military exists for the explicit purpose of killing brown people and that Google just wants to "make the world a better place".