They simply say they have that memo. Who knows whether they even drafted it for real? And if anyone starts looking, Gemini can quickly draft one itself. Nice!

Also the Supreme Court, half of Congress, and apparently something like 40% of the American populace.

And since the court has no way to physically force anything - that's the executive branch's function, (it's right there in the name) - lawful has no meaning whatsoever if it's the executive branch that wants to break the law.

> Congress and the courts obviously.

The first is fully neutered. The second is far too slow.

"Nothing unlawful" needing to be in the contract is inherently concerning, as it's typically the default, assumed state of such a thing.

Please! That ship sailed a long time ago. Sure tell your congressman, who is most likely bribed (lobbying is bribing, lets use the real words) by the same companies to accept the deal. The courts can try, but who is going to enforce it when the people above says that its fine.

Why would you write a letter if you don't know what you're objecting to or even if you should be objecting?

> Private corporations shouldn't be telling the government what it can and can't do.

So Google can't tell the government it needs a warrant to perform a search? Google can't sue over something the government did?

It's Google's product they want to buy.

> If this were 3M making nasty stuff for Northrop to put in bombs and drop on brown people or Exxon scheming up something bad in Alaska or bulldozing a national park for solar panels or some other legacy BigCo doing slimy things that are in the interests of them and the government but against the interest of the public they'd have 40yr of preexisting trade group publications, bought and paid for academic and media chatter, etc, etc, they could point to and say "look, this is fine because the stuff we paid into in advance to legitimize these sorts of things as they come up says it is" though obviously they'd use very different words.

My friend, this paragraph needed some periods. I could not follow what you were trying to say - but it seemed interesting enough to consider retyping.

It’s funny to me how many progressive people I know and am friends with who work at these AI companies which are marginalized demographics (Trans, Gay, Latino, Black).

Still have faded Bernie stickers on their cars, No Kings organizers, “fuck SF I’m in the east bay for life fuck tech” - and you all make 7 figures Monday - Friday by supporting the death of society and democracy.

I don’t dare say anything though because “money is money”, the bay is expensive..but I do sure as shit judge every single person I know who joined OAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta.

I'm not anti-military as a rule but... c'mon. Opinions on the US military vary.

In extremis, were the people working for Pol Pot just good patriots with no moral culpability?

We could surely at least agree that there are cases where working for the military of your home country doesn't fully excuse you from your actions.

In fact, I think international tribunals have existed which operated on just those principles.

We can all agree that working for the Nazi government’s military would be morally compromising, right?

You propose that other governments militaries would not be so compromising. Seems reasonable.

But the question then becomes, what is the operative distinction between the two?

It’s not morally wrong per-se but just because you are working with your government does not mean what you’re doing is necessarily moral

Idk about morality, but it’s certainly a way to stop dystopian mass surveillance nightmares if everyone capable of building one refuses.

So if you live in the US and don’t want one government agency in the US to have this power (that is ambiguous under current law), one way you can try to avoid it is by refusing to sell it to them and urging others to do the same.

It’s a long shot sure, but it certainly seems more effective than hoping the legislature wakes up and reigns in the executive these days.

Given most government policies and direct engagement in all kind of monstrosities over the last millennia, there is really no reason to limit the case to USA, indeed.

The acts of the government being wrong in an upsetting amount of cases would be a big reason.

It’s not, but legal is not the same as ethical.

For a long time, and probably still, it was legal for the US to torture enemy combatants. It was never ethical.

working to directly advance a product used substantially to oppress people via surveillance or war crimes, when you have many other choices, is immoral. easy.

I don't know if you're being sarcastic(sounds like you are!) but indeed a lot of engineers left Russia after the war in Ukraine started as they didn't want to be drafted and didn't want to contribute to the war effort in some way, even if indirectly. Of course, many stayed or even willingly help. See how many engineers from Iran work abroad too, for moral and other reasons.

The point is - this happens everywhere, it's not just some weird western thing.

what immense power?

IF the feds are a sufficiently large market your viability as a business might depend on keeping them happy.

btw i am not making a judgement call on the ai usage issue itself, just saying that this and taxes are more equivalent than it might seem