Activists at Microsoft looked at the success of activists at Google at pushing company to drop military contracts, and now feel more encouraged to push the company than they were decades ago, when military contracts were seen as a completely normal thing.

I think you've nailed it. Unfortunately, I think those Microsoft employees are going to see a different reaction from their management.

Probably uninformed opinion given I haven’t worked at either, but I suspect you’re right.

Microsoft seems to be a lot more grounded in the dollars and cents of running a business. I doubt a few squeaky wheels distract them.

Google seems to still attract many idealists who feel they’re creating a better world (ironically, through advertising). They seem to operate with a flatter management structure that gives engineers freeer reign.

Also, the nature of the projects seem to be fundamentally different.

I don't think that's true with the current MSFT under Smith and Nadella.

I think there's social and legal precedent the differentiates between a generally useful tool that can be used in the commission of violence (eg. cars), and a tool specifically meant for the commission of violence (eg. guns).

You have it backwards. Computers, software engineering, networking, cryptography, wireless digital comms, and so on, were made for war. It so happens they turned out to have some good peacetime applications too.

Computer, internet, CPU, and pretty much a lot of modern tech was created/refined out of funding by and for armed forces.

I find this news to be incredibly ironic.

And I disagree with the demands, just in my personal opinion.

We have real, powerful enemies that would love to dethrone US as the dominant nation. Those who demand this restriction for working on military contracts have to seriously consider this.

After looking at what happened with Google, never even mind this, I think we need to seriously consider having the military taking the Apple approach to systems: own the whole damn widget, or system.

If private sector workers can regularly get their private sector companies to pull out of US military contracts, we have a problem.

Are you talking about the distinction between weapons and non-weapons? Is there another legal distinction?

"Dual use" in the ITAR sense? A rule of thumb would be if you wouldn't sell it to Iran you shouldn't sell it to the Saudis, and selling it to the US will result in the Saudis having it.

What about a humvee? Is that a 'car' or a 'gun'? Is a jacket with pouches necessary to hold rifle ammunition a weapon, or merely innocent clothing?

Wherever you draw the distinction, know that it's arbitrary.

It's not that arbitrary and in any case that doesn't invalidate their position.

You've avoided my question, probably because you know I'm right. The line between 'car' and 'gun' is fuzzy when you consider a car that's specifically been designed to carry guns.

A military with guns but no transportation is like a clock with an escapement but no gears. Gears are used by lots of things, not just clocks, and clocks need an escapement, but without gears that clock doesn't function. The gears don't define the clock in quite the same way as an escapement, but they're nevertheless necessary.

My point here is that making cars for the military but refusing to make guns for them is quite silly. If you really want to opt-out of the military industrial complex, you'll need to make more sacrifices.

It was a bad question, but I'll answer it now for you to clear up your confusion. A Humvee is neither a car nor a gun. Not sure why you think it must be one of those things. It's a Humvee. There are all kinds of consistent policies a person could have for ethical work: refusing to manufacture weapons, refusing to manufacture anything designed primarily for war, etc. I don't see any contradiction or inconsistencies there. If you were trying to point one out, maybe try again.

Ah I see, you're pedantry to avoid the meat of the discussion.

"Car" in this case is shorthand for

> "generally useful tool that can be used in the commission of violence (eg. cars)"

A humvee is just that. However it's also specifically designed to be one component of various weapon systems; e.g. humvees with TOW anti-tank guided missiles mounted on top. When configured in that way, a humvee is no less a weapon than a tank. So a humvee is also "a gun" (shorthand for "something that kills".) That's not hypothetical either, such humvees were used in the killings of Uday and Qusay Hussein.

So let me reiterate. Just about anything the military uses is used to facilitate killing in one way or the other. The degree to which any particular widget contributes to the lethality of the military is a smooth gradient. This was my point with the humvee, it exists somewhere in the middle. Since we're dealing with a gradient, where you decide to draw your line in the sand arbitrary.

Nearly everything is "arbitrary" in the sense that you are using it. Wherever a machine learning classifier draws the line between categories is going to be arbitrary, but that doesn't mean it's not useful. Having some policy for ethical behavior is better than nothing.

I don't think it's that arbitrary. If Microsoft employees really wanted to bring the US military to a screeching halt, they could just turn off the DOD's email.

Pretty sure the Navy/Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI) is the largest Active Directory deployment in the world still.

It doesn't help that the Army's own PR for the specific contract emphasized increasing the "lethality" of American soldiers.

Lethality is a term of art in milx.

And PowerPoint. Beaucoup powerpoint.