Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Software Engineers

Re:Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Softw... by pixl97 on Monday August 10, 2020 @01:34AM (#24105897)

And again, the analogs in software are much more, messy.

A shoe is a physical artifact. It must be made somewhere out of something. Software is much more flexible. If I tell you to build an 'ethical' piece of software with an extensible API, it will only take a tiny amount of work to make it do something unethical.

And much like the shoe companies abusing labour's, that had nothing to do with the engineers that made a a product line, but the management that is driven to ever lower costs.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Softw... by walrus01 on Monday August 10, 2020 @01:37AM (#24105913)

Also unlike a shoe, the management of a company with ethically produced/designed software could fire all of the original developers and sell the company and its IP. To an organization that would make API changes/data storage changes and it would suddenly become something much more harmful.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Microsoft President: We Need a Hippocratic Oath for Softw... by imtringued on Monday August 10, 2020 @07:58AM (#24108305)

It's very easy for management to not disclose unethical intentions. All they have to do is nothing.

[ Parent | on HN ]