zlacker

Transparency can give bad actors a way to game and workaround the system.

>>2OEH8e+(OP)
More likely, ammo in a potential legal battle between GitHub and the banned party.

>>2OEH8e+(OP)
We're living with transparent juridical system and it works fine. Imagine that you could be thrown to jail without explaining a reason. That would be outrageous.

>>2OEH8e+(OP)
How is "game and workaround the system" different from "comply with policies"? Is compliance not the objective?

>>vbezhe+35
> transparent juridical system and it works fine

Yeah, criminals are always arrested and convicted. /s

It's a balance. With something as essential as human rights and personal freedom, people (tend to) err on the safe side. Online moderation can err on the other side, since consequences are relatively modest. If you get banned on GH, move to Gitlab or host your own, that's hardly a tragedy.

>>underd+01
So far it's been mostly small / independent developers or organizations that were banned, and Github has Microsoft behind it, a $125bn / year revenue company with a legal team 1,500 strong (https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2019/12/02/how-brad...). I don't think fear of litigation is the issue.

>>2OEH8e+(OP)
So just to be clear, are you arguing that rules shouldn't be clearly laid out, because then people would be able to follow them?

>>toyg+x9
Online moderation is an issue of personal rights.

>>bhk+R5
Compliance with the spirit is the objective. Sometimes the spirit and the letter differ for any number of reasons (many of which are completely reasonable).

People tend to get pretty upset when someone is very clearly complying with the letter while flying in complete opposition to the spirit, and it's not always an easy fix.

>>saagar+Pg
Not in the Constitutional sense, and not in anything administered by GitHub.

>>pc86+3l
In that case, it sounds like the letter needs to be fixed. It's not fair to expect people to follow an ephemeral ideal of what the rules are rather than what they're told the rules actually are.

>>renata+pm
Like I said, it's not always that simple. When it's not, something less than 100% transparency allows one to look at the given particulars of a case and determine whether or not someone is simply trying to evade the spirit of a rule or not. It gives enforcement actors a little lee-way that they wouldn't otherwise have.

>>toyg+x9
That is exactly what I do. I use self hosted solutions for my source code repositories. I just can't digest my code being handled by some other entity. Too important.

>>Notori+wg
Not taking a side on this, but there do exist people who exactly follow the letter of the law to circumvent the spirit of the law.

For example, people who harass others just within the confines of the rules so that they can't be banned from a community solely using the rules.

This is why we need humans to judge the spirit of the rules.

>>pc86+3l
That's why the letter of the law needs to be updated to better reflect the spirit. Imagine if police could arrest you, and keep you, without telling you why. That's something that society figured out a long time ago isn't healthy.

>>vbezhe+35
1) You can be thrown into jail without any explanation whatsoever.

2) You can be shot without any explanation whatsoever.

3) Your possessions can be taken away, and sold off without any explanation and without recourse.

Links about each of these claims:

https://abovethelaw.com/2018/07/innocent-people-who-plead-gu...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Walter_Scott

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobsullum/2014/09/11/how-cops... (also applies to, say, cars)

>>renata+pm
Law in many countries comes down to "I know it when I see it" from the judges.

>>jonny_+Sv
> Imagine if police could arrest you, and keep you, without telling you why. That's something that society figured out a long time ago isn't healthy.

The judicial system that backs it is a massive beast. If someone wants that level of assurances, they should be paying thousands of dollars for a github account. You get the level of perfection you pay for.

>>bhk+R5
Do you honestly not understand a difference between people who comply in good faith vs people who simply skirt the rules?

>>vbezhe+35
Are you willing to pay taxes for github usage!? You get what you pay for.

>>Cthulh+7e
The very first thing a corporate lawyer does is proactively prevent litigation through protective policies that specifically do NOT emphasize transparency.

>>FpUser+5u
Amazing that you got downvoted for this. I pay for code hosting precisely because I want to see an ecosystem of code hosts, and monocultures are dangerous.

>>candio+Cx
So GitHub should aspire to do the same?

>>endgam+KY
Well I've never downvoted a single post no matter how much I disliked it. Personally I consider this a kind of weakness and the whole system as promoting herd mentality. But whatever floats their boat.

>>pc86+Sn
> It gives enforcement actors a little lee-way that they wouldn't otherwise have.

Which can be and often is subject to abuse.

>>koheri+6Q
If it guaranteed that the repos stay up in perpetuity, that sounds amazing, actually.

>>renata+pm
That sounds like it will lead to a lot more restrictions than there are today.

>>yellow+1v1
One of the worst things about engineers in general and HN specifically is we all pretend that law is executed like code, in a vacuum, idempotently based on the inputs. That's was, is, and will never be the case.

Abuse can be exposed and punished, and very often is.

>>pc86+hl
It should be!

>>toyg+x9
Exactly. Screw around and try to game/skirt the law IRL and the risk is way too high that you'll goto jail anyway. There are usually no consequences for doing this online.

>>pc86+7e2
> Abuse can be exposed and punished, and very often is.

But nowhere near often enough.