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Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by vmh1928 on Sunday January 10, 2021 @09:50AM (#25715092)
In Germany the government used census data tabulated on IBM punchcard equipment to find who to round up. Later, during the liquidation phase of the effort each camp had punch card equipment to help with maintaining the inventory of slave labor skills. That's what the number on the arm was for - the primary key. Copies of punched cards were sent to the central administrative HQ of the camp organization for additional processing and were used to identify specific skilled people who needed to be moved to other camps. Authoritarians rely on the stupid for the grunt work but they're not stupid themselves and can exploit technology to achieve their goals.
Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by dash2 on Sunday January 10, 2021 @10:29AM (#25715549)
How is this relevant to my point or the article?
Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by vmh1928 on Sunday January 10, 2021 @11:21AM (#25716208)
it was in response to the comment about decentralized apps built by idealistic silicon valley types being used by MAGA types. The point being that it might be funny to him but authoritarians do have a track record of exploiting technology.
Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by dash2 on Monday January 11, 2021 @07:10AM (#25727866)
But these apps are explicitly designed to be decentralised and avoid state control! I'm no fan of e.g. the capitol rioters, but the analogy with IBM and the Nazis seems to get things backwards. The rioters don't control the government apparatus, they are trying to subvert it. And the use of this technology is to aid that by preventing centralised censorship and snooping.

If you really want to power past Godwin's law, then you could compare them to Hitler in the 1920s, subverting the Weimar constitution.

Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by AndrewUnmuted on Sunday January 10, 2021 @10:23AM (#25715481)
Given their past, I found it just a little rich, that IBM so publicly decried the recent "insurrection." [0]

[0] https://twitter.com/ArvindKrishna/status/1346932293991079936

Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by spockz on Sunday January 10, 2021 @10:37AM (#25715677)
Well the IBM of today has little to do with the IBM of 80 years ago. Just like the Germany of today has little to do with what happened 80 years ago and people living now are not and should not be held responsible for the misdeeds of previous generations.
Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by AndrewUnmuted on Sunday January 10, 2021 @04:09PM (#25719881)
> people living now are not and should not be held responsible for the misdeeds of previous generations.

I'm sure we could all agree on this point.

However, the aspects of IBM that led to their assisting the Third Reich are still very much alive at IBM today. It remains in the form of their core business model of assisting the world's most powerful regimes in automating oppression, autocracy, and authoritarianism at a global scale.

Re:Scuttlebutt – A decentralized secure gossip platform by spockz on Sunday January 10, 2021 @04:42PM (#25720258)
Okay fair point. But sadly that holds for most companies. There are remarkably few of them that do not sell or provide support on FOSS to big governments that in turn do all kinds of nasty things. How can we change this, if at all? Isn’t it part of capitalism?