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Mitchell Kapor Leaves Groove Over TIA 231

Posted by timothy from the conscious-conscience dept.
Deao writes "Mitchell Kapor, one of the founders of the EFF, has quit Groove. Supposedly he has left to pursue open source software interests, but insiders say he is unhappy with Groove's products forming a crucial part of the Total Information Awareness project. Read all about it at the NYTimes (Free Registration required)."
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Mitchell Kapor Leaves Groove Over TIA More

Mitchell Kapor Leaves Groove Over TIA

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  • Reg Free Link (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:32PM (#5485555)

    Click here [nytimes.com].

  • hmm (Score:4, Interesting)

    by DonFinch ( 584056 ) <s2djfinc@@@vcu...edu> on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:35PM (#5485585)
    I'm glad he's doing what feels right to him but, given the choice, I rather know the inside of the beast then be at its mercy.

    • Mod parent up! (Score:4, Insightful)

      by TopShelf ( 92521 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:49PM (#5485707) Homepage Journal
      All too often our first reaction to something that we don't approve of is to distance ourselves from it, and by doing so we relinquish any opportunity to effect change. In international affairs, consider the differences over the last 10-20 years between the US relationships with Russia and China, and our relationships with Cuba and North Korea. In the former, we've taken steps to open up the lines of commerce and seen those countries change dramatically. In the latter, we've taken a hard-line embargo position, and haven't seen an iota of positive result.

      While I respect Kapor's stand, I'd encourage him to stay engaged and voice his opinions.

      • All too often our first reaction to something that we don't approve of is to distance ourselves from it, and by doing so we relinquish any opportunity to effect change.

        I dunno, sometimes the best way to incite change is to show your own disagreement. And sometimes the best way to do that is to distance yourself. By leaving the company he is telling everyone just how much he is against it, which is perhaps more powerful then staying on the board and trying to limit the damage.

  • Ethics (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Joe the Lesser ( 533425 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:37PM (#5485604) Homepage Journal
    "Computer scientists are going to have the same kinds of battles that physicists did amidst the fallout of Hiroshima and Nagasaki,"

    I hadn't actually thought of it this way, but it's a good point. If in the future I find myself coding something dubious for a government or corporation, what is the correct ethical choice?

    • Re:Ethics (Score:3, Insightful)

      by banzai51 ( 140396 )
      Whatever you feel is right, of course. However, don't be shocked if your decision has consequences, i.e. loss of job.

    • Re:Ethics (Score:5, Funny)

      by Elwood P Dowd ( 16933 ) <judgmentalist@gmail.com> on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:46PM (#5485681) Journal
      The correct ethical choice would be to include a back door that would allow you to later hack their computers and bring them to their proverbial knees.

      Yes, I'm kidding.
    • The atomic bomb worked.

    • Re:Ethics (Score:5, Insightful)

      by PhxBlue ( 562201 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:49PM (#5485708) Homepage Journal

      If in the future I find myself coding something dubious for a government or corporation, what is the correct ethical choice?

      If you're relying on someone else to answer that for you, then you've made the wrong choice already. Just follow whatever course of action is most ethical for you; because, at the end of the day, it's not your naysayers you'll see when you look in the mirror.

      • You're right, but there is a tension between the subjective for you and the objective most ethical .

        You clearly frame the real-world question.

        Nevertheless, the human mind is capable of rationalizing anything <insert historical example here>.

        What sort of feedback loop monitors the conscience?
      • If you say it's dubious, then you've already evaluated it. There's two or three possibilities, but I assume you know which one you mean.

        Clearly the most ethical course is to refuse to do something if it is unethical. This won't keep someone from less scruples from doing it, but it keeps your hands clean. Anything more than that can get you in real trouble.

        An alternative course is to plan several widely varied courses of action forwards, assuming that you did different things. Then figure out which one terminates in the most desireable future, and act on that one. Where you end up will depend on what you consider, and how accurate your projections are.

        Saying "I was only doing my job" is a clear wrong answer. But there are a lot of other ways forwards from that. Depending on who was asking you to do what, you might try leaving the country, but figure out your costs and benefits first. And check on the immigration requirements. (Your choices will be more limited than you expect -- there are no more frontiers.)

        A better choice is to avoid getting into that situation in the first place. One benefit of being a college radical is that it can eliminate that temptation... from the most obvious sources.

    • I'm considering quitting my current job, without another one lined up, because I have a moral dilemma (seriously) developing with Microsoft's products. I feel support of their products is support of their actions, some of which I consider immoral. I was just given my first .NET project to work on, but I'm quickly looking for something elsewhere with Linux or Unix. As a last resort I might just quit within a few weeks and look for something while living off savings for 6 months.

      If you've got an open position for a linux developer in the NY metro area, please contact me.

      • Re:Ethics (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Soko ( 17987 )
        You must have very strong ethics my friend. Perhaps too strong?

        Like it or not, you will at some time or another support Microsoft in this industry. They're just too big and too pervasive to ignore and still put food on the table. (By your logic, SAMBA and WINE should not exist for Linux, since they support products from an un-ethical company, but I digress.)

        Realistically, Microsoft isn't going away any time soon - if ever. It takes quite a while to fritter away $40 Billion, and that's just the war chest. IMHO, we can either continue to tilt at windmills or we can be more constructive and try to modify the beasts behaviour. If Microsoft were to stop being so arrogant and paranoid at the same time, they would likely be a pretty cool company (Aside: Look at what's happened to the stuffiest corp of all time - Big Blue). Then, these moral dillemas won't de-rail us from getting our jobs done.

        BTW, I'm not saying you should tone down or compromise your ethics in any way - I'm saying that you should try to find more constructive ways [go-mono.com] to uphold them than possibly hanging your future out dry. We need advocates, not martyrs.

        God bless, and best of luck to you - I hope you make a wise decision.

        Soko

        • Re:Ethics (Score:2, Informative)

          by mdxi ( 3387 )
          Wrong. It is possible, though difficult, to work in computers without supporting Microsoft. I do it every day, though I had to go 5 months without work to find a place where I could do it.

          In my present job we use 100% Linux and OpenBSD, we write our systems in Perl, we are formally GPLing and releasing our work, we're gently pushing for our peer agencies across the state to join us, and they're starting to realize that not only have the best solution available, but that our methods give everyone the biggest payback for the least expenditure.

          Also, I *do* believe that Samba and WINE shouldn't exist, in much the same way that the GPL shouldn't have to exist. In an ideal world, we all work together and horrible hacks like WINE aren't needed. More viscerally, I feel that people who take the easy way out and fall back to WINE and friends for everything are being spineless, opportunistic cowards with no real ethics at all. "But gaming!" is no excuse; either start coding or go get a console. "But Word files!" is no excuse; tell people to send you plaintext/RDF/HTML/CSV/any other standard, interoperable format. The network effect of Office won't go away until people stop reflexively duck-and-covering before it.

          People say they wish they didn't have to put up with Microsoft. Well, that's only going to happen if you're willing to shut up and then put up, and work to make it happen.

          • Speaking as someone who has never paid for Microsoft software and doesn't use it, I have to say, bravo.

            Not working with Microsoft has not been the death of my career. Hackers of the world, you have nothing to fear but fear itself.
      • It would be even better if you just did it instead of crowing about it on Slashdot (of all places). Indeed, saying "I quit my job because blah blah blah Micro$soft is evil, blah blah" would be several magnitudes better than what you're doing, here.

        In my opinion this is about the most ass-backwards thing a person can do, mainly because -by your own admission - you work with Microsoft products, not on Microsoft products. I personally know two people who have quit Microsoft because they felt they were working for a company whose value system was diametrically opposed to theirs. I respect that, even though I don't necessarily agree with it.

        You, on the other hand, come across as more pathetic and grandstanding than anything else.

    • Re:Ethics (Score:5, Interesting)

      by RocketScientist ( 15198 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:58PM (#5485779)
      OK, here's your ethical dilemma. Linux is Free Software (GNU/Linux is Free Software....heh). That means you can't put restrictions on use into the software license. That means that if the TIA wants to use Linux...they can. And we can either all stop working on it or we can assume that we're working for a greater good than TIA is evil.

      An interesting aside to the free software movement, no? Think about it, if you license something under GPL, you can't say who can or can't use it, just what baggage they have to handle in order to resell or distribute it (provide source if they modify it and resell it). Free means free, so that means terrorists, Palestinians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, no matter which side of any particular war you choose, if you develop free software one implication is that people that you don't like can pick it up and use it to do things you don't like.

      That means that the government can use it also. To watch you. And that they've got the source to make sure there aren't any backdoors.

      A little bit of new perspective. I'm not saying it's a good thing or a bad thing, just an unexplored thing.
      • Think about it, if you license something under GPL, you can't say who can or can't use it...

        Why not come up with a variation of the GPL, the GPLL (Gnu Public License for Liberty) that has a direct stipulation in it that it can't be used by various agencies of world governments.

        I mean, hell, if Microsoft can include a EULA that has such ridiculous measures as their right to log into your machine and examine applications and data, certainly saying that TIPS, or the CIA/FBI/Homeland Security can't use the program would quite legal.

        In fact, it might be a way to help get EULA's struck down in court: perhaps the US government would fight over the right to use anything GPLL'd and consequently invalidate all stupid EULA's in the process.

        • Because at that point, where do you draw the line? Government agencies are bad? What about NGO's that push a specific agenda? What about places like the Palestinian Authority, that aren't quite a government? How about the Red Cross, the Red Crescent? You going to keep up a list of who can and can't, and for what? And then take the heat for doing it in a way that's politically motivated?

          not so much, I think. It's either free software, or it's not free software. Middle grounds are very slippery.
        • You can make any rules you want for code that you write.

          However you could not incorporate any GPL code into it because the GPL does not allow it's code to be restricted by such rules.

      • I'd be glad if the software I write makes life better for Palestinians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, etc. Even people whose actions I don't approve of deserve better than to have to deal with a MicroSoft interface or have their computers crash on them. Sure, I don't think much of the Bush administration, but my life isn't any better if they're annoyed by their computers. And if they're going to be watching me, I certainly don't want there to be backdoors in the tools they're using; it's bad enough for the government to have that information.

        Most of all, I hope that my work makes life more pleasant for terrorists. Perhaps it will serve in some small way to make up for the government activity which supposedly represents me, and serve to distinguish the behavior of US citizens from that of the US government.

        War is a lot of wasted effort (since there's effort on both sides intended to counteract the other side's effort). Providing general tools to everyone simply reduces the duplicated and wasted effort.
      • It's not new or unexplored. That clause was put in on purpose. Yes, governments can use it too... but you know that they could anyway. Governments only obey the rules when it's convenient (well, the powerful arms of government, anyway). Ditto for "rogue nations", and "the axis of evil", and "criminal conspiracies". So since we can't stop the bad guys, we might as well acknowledge it up front. And write it into the contract that anyone using it can't stop us, either.

        This doesn't mean that I think they won't break it, but the GPL is a bit difficult to break unless you are a software distributor. So I doubt that they will. Why should they? MS and Adobe may have reasons to want to break the GPL agreement, but I doubt that the three letter agencies do. In order to do that they'd need to be distributing code outside their agencies. And that's a rare event.

      • If I may paraphrase your argument, you're saying it is unethical to contribute to free/open source software, because it benefits everybody, including people who work for the TIA.

        I think that's silly. What other products, other than operating system software, does the TIA use? Are the makers of all those other products also committing an ethical breach?

        I believe that contributing to free/open source software is ethically good. Making the world a better place is a good thing. Generosity is a good thing. If your main concern in distributing free software that you write is: how can I manipulate the licence terms to hurt those people that I don't like, then your ethical system is in serious need of debugging.

        There is a good pragmatic reason why the Free Software and Open Source rules forbid us to put restrictions into our licences forbidding our enemies from using our software. If we did that, then a software distribution containing software from thousands of different authors (like Red Hat) would have a combined enemies list that would probably prohibit just about everybody from using the software. But beyond that, I also think such restrictions are unethical.

        Doug Moen.

        • Am I saying it's unethical or unwise to release software under the GPL? Nope, but I'm saying contributors need to consider how they feel about their software being used for both good and bad purposes, and perhaps weigh in their minds whether that software is going to do more harm than good.

          Ethics are the responsibility of the indivdual contributor (Ethics are always an individual responsibility), and the GPL gives you the capability to make very powerful unrevokable decisions that should be carefully considered beforehand.

    • I've always been a firm believer in listening to your instincts. If the voices in your head are raising doubts, there's probably a problem. In those situations, I would argue that the choice is obvious -- quit.

      The more damning problem is situations where the feature creep slowly brings on new capabilities. Until one day you look at the big picture and wonder what you had done.

      "In Germany, they first came for the communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Catholic. Then they came for me -- and by that time there was nobody left to speak up."

      -Martin Niemöller

    • The choices aren't always cut and dried,either. Imagine you are working on a project that helps a company keep track of it's public reputation (and presumably do something about it.) Then you discover that one of the top customers for the product is an organization you find ethically dubious, like a tobacco company or the Church of Scientology. (Real examples, folks, not just theoretical ones.)

      The software itself isn't unethical, but you find the fruit of your labor being used in ways you didn't expect.
    • There is never a single "correct" ethical choice. Recognize that what seems "dubious" to you may be seen as desirable and beneficial by others, and vice versa. Make your own decision and don't worry if anyone else sees it as "correct".

  • Can you blame him for having a conscience? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by hafree ( 307412 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:39PM (#5485625) Homepage
    "Mitch cares very much about the social impact of technology" - I think that really says it all here. How would you feel knowing that you are the reason certain civil liberties and rights to privacy no longer exist?

    • Re:Can you blame him for having a conscience? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by pnatural ( 59329 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:35PM (#5486061)
      Please forgive my picking nits, but I really don't like it when people express this idea incorrectly.

      Rights do not "no longer exist". You may have them or not have them, but they don't vanish because they are ideas. They are central to the human experience, and it's only thru collective will (or the end of a gun) do we decide who gets to exercise them and who does not.

      It's like that song that says "and I won't forget the men who died who gave that right to me". Those men didn't give me my rights - a higher power did. The founders of the USA realized this -- that these rights are inalienable.

      Only thru systematic, Orwellian control of language and thought can rights "no longer exist".

      • Re:Can you blame him for having a conscience? (Score:4, Interesting)

        by jd142 ( 129673 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @03:29PM (#5486596) Homepage
        The founders of the USA realized this -- that these rights are inalienable.

        And yet they denied them to women, blacks, non-land owners, etc. If the founders really believed all men were created equal, why did only certain men get rights?

        And don't forget, some of the first bills passed by Congress were the Alien and Sedition acts. The Alien act allowed the government to lock up non-citizen males age 14 and up who belonged to any country we were at war with. Didn't matter if they were innocent of any wrong doing. Congress threw the right to a fair trial right out the window. Luckily the British (you know, the people we were upset with) still had Magna Carta to protect their rights.

        And the Sedition act would punish you if you "write, print, utter or publish. . . writings against the government of the United States, or either house of the Congress of the United States, or the President of the United States, with intent to defame the said government, or either house of the said Congress, or the said President, or to bring them, or either of them, into contempt or disrepute; or to excite against them, or either or any of them, the hatred of the good people of the United States," which means that Rush Limbaugh could have been arrested for Sedition during the Clinton administration if the act were still enforced.

        Because of its weakness at the time, the Supreme Court didn't even rule them as unconstitutional (I don't know if they were ever approached about it; I couldn't find that.) The acts were eventually allowed to expire about 10 years later.

        So please, don't venerate the founders of the USA. They were human. In other words, they were hypocrites. They talked about the inalienable rights of men, but kept slaves. The south wanted slaves counted as men for population reasons, so they could have more representatives, but they didn't want them to have rights. They engaged in acts of terrorism (Boston Tea Party) and used biological weapons against indigenous peoples (small pox blankets). And even today this country engages in taxation without representation: the citizens of the District of Columbia pay federal taxes but have no elected Federal representatives. And their population is greater than Wyoming's. Imagine if Congress decided to tell Wyoming citizens that they would continue to pay federal taxes but would lose their Senators and Representatives!

        Sorry, don't mean to be a troll or flame bait, but the veneration of the "Founding Fathers" really gets to me after awhile.
        • The supreme court had not at that time established it's right to judge whether or not laws adhered to the constitution. During that period there came a case when the supreme court supported an act of the government "For the reason that it was supported by the constitution" (paraphrase: I don't remember the exact wording.) Then it quickly shut up about that right for around 70 years, until during the period before the Civil War it started asserting this right again. Since then it's right to judge the acts of congress hasn't been seriously questioned. But it's tradition more than the constitution that gives them this right.

      • Hoo boy. Your idea is noble, but ultimately flawed. While you might choose to believe that rights are gifts to us from God, and many people do, that's not a terribly useful position when trying to deal with real-world problems.

        In the real world, rights are guarantees. That's all. The Bill of Rights says that Congress is prohibited from making a law abridging the freedom of speech. That's a guarantee to the people of the United States that their federal government won't interfere with their liberty when it comes to expressing themselves. It's not a recognition of a divine right; it's merely a guarantee.

        The reason I say your position isn't useful is this: of the people who subscribe to your theory, every one has a different idea of what rights his creator has endowed him with. Some people think they have a right to refuse to pay income taxes; hardly anybody agrees with them. "But this right is inalienable," they say. Nobody listens. So the position that rights-- whatever you think your rights might be-- are divine in nature and origin just won't get you very far.

        Please forgive my picking nits, but I really don't like it when people express this idea incorrectly. ;-)
      • O?
        "Rights" is a piece of information. It was created out of environmental noise during the 1400-1700's. But information can not only be created, it can be destroyed.

        For rights to manifest, they need a social context that supports them. If they don't manifest, then no one sees them. If no one sees them, then the idea of what they are becomes fuzzier and fuzzier. Until it fades into the environmental noise.

        Do you have free speech? The only proof is free speech. A "right" to free speech? What proof can exist?

        Possibly "rights" could be defined in some objectively measurable way that comes near to matching our intuitive knowledge of them. But if so, I haven't seen the definition. So I suspect them of being the form of information called belief.

  • The world needs more good examples (Score:4, Insightful)

    by SolemnDragon ( 593956 ) <solemndragon.gmail@com> on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:45PM (#5485671) Homepage Journal
    1. He left his job because he was uncomfortable with what was happening with what they'd built.
    Anybody remember the line that was used on production lines/ development for the atom bomb? "Our job is to build them, not to decide where they fall."

    Take heart, folks. Add this one to the tiny corner of the bulletin board labelled "The world is not all bad." People really do sometimes help total strangers, people really do sometimes care about what their work is being used for, and frankly, i'm ALL IN FAVOUR of a guy who can turn around and quit based on what he thinks is an appropriate use of his work. (of course, i might not feel that way if he felt that what he was building SHOULD be spyware and they hadn't been headed there)I'm more willing to respect a belief the less it looks like it's going to mess with other people's- relatively innocent people's- lives. Granted, we can't all pay the rent if we walk off the job for moral reasons, so choose your battles carefully, and we don't all have a widespread fanbase to keep the world aware of what we've just done. (So when you choose them, do it as publicly as possible.) But sometimes, it's worth it, and i'll lead the cheer. Thanks!!!! Good example of what's not all wrong with the world.

    • This whole thing is rather silly. Are people here equating building a P2P collaboration app with shared whiteboads and calendaring with building the atom bomb? I'm sorry, but the two things aren't even CLOSE to morally equivalent.

      If they are, all you hackers out there better put down your keyboards, because this is a wakeup call. Practically everything written out there in software-land could be used for nefarious purposes -- whether open source, closed source, or you name it. Remember the Marine training program using Doom?
      • To quote (emphasis mine):
        If they are, all you hackers out there better put down your keyboards, because this is a wakeup call. Practically everything written out there in software-land could be used for nefarious purposes -- whether open source, closed source, or you name it. Remember the Marine training program using Doom?

        According to Dictionary.com [dictionary.com] the definition for nefarious [reference.com] reads:

        Wicked in the extreme; abominable; iniquitous; atrociously villainous; execrable; detestably vile.

        Can someone explain to me why the Marine's using Doom for training could even be closed to being called "nefarious"? Why are so many of the examples on Slashdot when describing the "evil" ways technology can be used usually include only the U.S. government or the U.S. military? What about terrorists? What about evil dictators? What about cults?

        Since when is training the armed forces considered a "nefarious" use of software?

        • I wasn't holding it up as one. But for some people, it might be.

          I was simply using it to demonstrate the fact that software can be used for purposes far afield from the purpose a developer envisoned when it was written. Certainly, being shocked when that happens is rather naive.

          Does Kapor think that the DoD has no need for desktop collaboration? If not, does it matter what organization? Is the Army a "good" user and the NSA a "bad" user? What about if the actual user is an Army person, who is doing some duties for the NSA (this is frequently the case)? It gets grey pretty fast.
        • If you're a pacifist, then making tools to trains soldiers would be nefarious. Try to keep up.
        • The marines using Doom for training is nefarious because it will get too many of them killed. In a foolish and dangerous manner.

          Seriously, Doom doesn't attempt to be a realistic simulation. It's entertainment.
      • I'm paralleling the moral dilemma of 'leaving one's job because one's otherwise harmless and useful shared whiteboards and calendars have been snapped up by the government as a handy tool for a goal which one doesn't agree with' ...to ... well, 'the moral dilemma of having one's hardware technologies and one's physics work appropriated as part of a government project with goals that one doesn't agree with.'

        The point here is not the measure of the potential threat, it's the matter of taking action as a matter of principle. It's a valid statement that the two are not morally 'equivalent'- but it IS true (at least in my view) that the two actions are morally parallel in that they do both make a public statement against an actively directed specific use by the government of a specific technology.

        When the TIA creeps are sharing your desktop, then you at least have one person who will have said, hey, i worked on this, and this was NOT what we had in mind.

        You're right. Practically anything written out there in softwareland could be used to erode rights, could be used to persecute individuals- the question isn't can a hammer be used to break heads? but more importantly, When the company you design hammers for starts selling them to the guys using them to break heads, are you still going to be there designing hammers for them?


        Remember, folks, if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
        • Far be it for me to tell people where to draw their own moral boundaries. If Mitch felt he had to do that, no problem there.

          However, if you place your cutpoint too far to one side, you are going to have an awfully hard time getting up in the morning. Someone further down in the posting thread asked a good question: What if TIA decides to start using his whizzy new open-source PIM? Does he pack up and leave that too? You can say "I worked on this, and this is NOT what I had in mind" without washing your hands of the whole thing every time it doesn't go the way you envisioned.

          And, a lot of people out there work on things where the DON'T (or might not) know all the plausable uses of their product. I work for a Large East-Coast Telephone Company (tm). It would not surprise me if we provided phone lines to TIA employees. Should I quit?

  • do you think.... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rob-fu ( 564277 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:46PM (#5485683)
    kapor would have stepped down if he wasn't incredibly wealthy? IIRC he was one of the founders of Lotus...

    • Re:do you think.... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Surak ( 18578 ) <surakNO@SPAMmailblocks.com> on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:14PM (#5485905) Homepage Journal
      Yup. There's an (admittedly somewhat out of date) bio on his web site [kapor.com] here [kapor.com]. Mitch was pretty much the guy that ripped off Dan Bricklin's VisiCalc...errr..I mean designed Lotus 1-2-3 and co-developed it along with Jonathan Sachs.

      Kapor wasn't always considered one of the good guys, either. Many in the software industry considered him to be somewhat obnoxious and it was widely grokked that at least some of Lotus' downfall in office suites can be attributed to Kapor's bad decisions. In retrospect, I'd say Microsoft just ate their lunch by being the first to market with a Windows-based office suite, personally.

      But yeah, Kapor made his fortune by cocreating the PCs first killer app.

    • Not only was he the founder of Lotus, he split off and founded Groove (as stated in the article). Groove is a really kick ass program that allows some of the coolest colloboration between remote users. We looked at it to satisfy several needs for us, including video conferencing. It provides a great platform to develop on as well. You can create some jaw dropping integrated tools very easily.

      The deal breaker we found, however, was that it is only for windows. The SDK is even based in COM. Talk about forward thinking!

  • *blinks* Does anybody else see it? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Taldo ( 583925 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:46PM (#5485685)
    but insiders say he is unhappy with Groove's products forming a crucial part of the Total Information Awareness project. Read all about it at the NYTimes (Free Registration required)."

    Is it just me? Or is the irony here almost toxic?

  • So then... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Loki_1929 ( 550940 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:52PM (#5485728) Journal
    So then why not come out and say what you're thinking, Mitchell?

    I applaud the gesture, as it's a very strong response to what many see as a massive invasion of the rights of Americans, but why not be more public? If you're going to stand up for something - even putting your financial future on the line for it (giving up employment in a poor economy), why not stand up and say, "hey, I quit because my employer wanted me to help our government invade and catalog every moment of your life." I wish more people involved in developing the technology had such courage, and I think if someone stood up as a leader, we'd see a much larger defection. I'm sure there are many people working on the systems like CAPPS and the TIA who have thought that maybe their job just isn't worth the damage they're doing to the American ideal, but who stay because change is difficult and they're uncertain about leaving.

    A leader who stands up and says, "come, follow me, it's the right thing to do" may end up gathering more people following in his footsteps than anyone would have expected. What better statement is it to see a room full of people walk out, refusing to help work on something they don't believe in?

    Well, sure, there are those guys who set themselves on fire to protest something - but that may be a little extreme. :)

    • Watch his blog (Score:5, Informative)

      by truthsearch ( 249536 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:57PM (#5485772) Homepage Journal
      Watch his blog [osafoundation.org] and maybe he will say something.

    • Re:So then... (Score:2, Insightful)

      by sharekk ( 654035 )
      So assuming he's leaving for the implied reasons (hard to tell without him coming out and saying it) he probably keeps it quiet becasue he doesn't want to spend the rest of his life in court. I'm sure if he did that he could get sued for slander or breaking NDAs or ~something~.
      There's a large difference between standing up and refusing to do something immoral and being willing to sacrifice your life to make sure people know it's going on. While the latter would be laudable I can understand why people aren't jumping to do it, esp. as you wouldn't be getting much help from the government at your trial...
      • While the latter would be laudable I can understand why people aren't jumping to do it, esp. as you wouldn't be getting much help from the government at your trial...

        You're assuming he'd get a trial -- Ashcroft would probably call him an enemy combatant and leave him to rot in Guantanamo.
    • So then why not come out and say what you're thinking, Mitchell?

      Has the thought occurred to you that perhaps his government had made it illegal to discuss any aspects of TIA, and that even saying something vague like "I'm quiting because I don't like TIA" could land him in jail...or worse?

      TIA is all about identifying and neutralizing threats to the U.S. government. No one seems to remember that the distinctive trait of U.S-style government is the guarantee that whatever administration is in power can be tossed out on it's ear every four years.

      How can a challenger hope to win an office when the incumbent can legally root his campaign comittee, expose any (real or imagined) missteps, (while silencing for reasons of national security any of his own), etc?

      The threat from TIA is not that it won't work, or that it will be abused, or be too costly to maintain, or invade the privacy of innocent people. The threat is that it will work exactly as designed, neutralizing any individual or party which could threaten the party currently in power.

      • Re:So then... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Loki_1929 ( 550940 )
        "saying something vague like "I'm quiting because I don't like TIA" could land him in jail...or worse?"

        That's a joke, right? I mean, if a well-known person says "I don't like x" and is then jailed, you really think the American people will stand for that? Secondly, he doesn't have to go into details about how different aspects of the TIA are designed, he only needs to point out that he thinks compiling as much information as possible about every moment of every American's life violates the most fundamental principles of a free and open society.

        "How can a challenger hope to win an office"

        Because the presidency is limited to 10 years (practically speaking, two terms)?

        "The threat from TIA is not that it won't work, or that it will be abused, or be too costly to maintain, or invade the privacy of innocent people. The threat is that it will work exactly as designed, neutralizing any individual or party which could threaten the party currently in power."

        The threat of the TIA comes from many directions. The threat is that it will work so well that terrorists will be driven underground to the point that law enforcement finds all traditional methods ridiculously ineffective. The threat of the TIA is that individuals in the law enforcement community will abuse it to extremes, much like other law enforcement databases already have, or that the government will use the system to identify those who have broken no laws, but are engaged in something undesirable. The threat from the TIA is that it will go far beyond invading privacy - that it will strip every American of his and her God-given dignity by turning their entire life, their entire existence, into data cataloged and searched through in a massive database. The biggest threat is that a human being will be reduced to data entries. At that point, there is no morality - and oppression, murder, genocide become little more troublesome than deleting a file.

        This isn't about threats to power - it goes far beyond that. This goes to the very heart of what makes a human being worthy of the rights guarenteed in the US Constitution. Once you reduce human beings to data, any action deemed desirable is perfectly acceptable, and that is the danger of the TIA.

        • Because the presidency is limited to 10 years (practically speaking, two terms)?

          In my United States, the president serves four-year terms. Where's your United States located?

          Seriously, we are already effectively data cataloged and searched through in massive databases. The TIA is a way for those databases to be coordinated with one another, a "metaindex" correlating everything together for data miners. I think it'll fail because it's a government agency, with an overtly Orwellian name to boot, and people will (rightly) be up in arms over it.

          The problem is, such a metaindex will come sooner or later, and it'll come because we've trained ourselves to be only suspicious of the government--complaints about the dangers of corporate power are routinely dismissed as only belonging to the Loony Left, even as we strive to dismantle as many regulations on what corporations have access to in the name of market reform. When the TIA happens, it won't be a secretive intelligence agency--it'll be a new service from Experian or Citibank, slapped with a bright happy new marketing name. The ACLU will be sounding alarms, but, hey, they're always blabbing on about the rights of flag-burners, atheists and maybe even accused terrorists--why should we listen to those damned liberals? (Sarcasm, -1, yeah yeah.)

          • "In my United States, the president serves four-year terms. Where's your United States located? "

            Ooo, sarcasm - can I try?

            Let's see, my Unites States is in North America. Our President also serves 4-year terms, but we have something called the 22nd amendment here, which states:

            " no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once."

            Now, let's see if we can try some of that addition stuff. Two times four, plus two, equals ten. I know, let's make it a word problem!

            Ricky is Vice President of the United States when, after 2 years, 1 day, the President tragically falls ill and dies. Ricky becomes acting President. Ricky is the acting President for 2 years, after which, he is elected President, because Ricky did a very good job! After four years, Ricky is re-elected to the office of President, which is allowed because he didn't serve more than two years as acting President. When Ricky serves out his second term, how many years will Ricky have been President?

            Ans: 10 years.

            Question2: How many terms can a President serve?

            Ans1: Two.
            Ans2: Two and one half.
            Ans3: "(practically speaking, two terms)"

            Oh how fun this sarcasm is! Anyway, I'm at work, so enough screwing around for now. :P

    • So then why not come out and say what you're thinking, Mitchell?

      To put it simply, he may be legally enjoined from commenting on his reasons for leaving Groove. They may have a contractual clause stipulating that he not air his dirty laundry or his beef with the company. That's a pretty common thing these days -- no "poisoning the well," so to speak.

      The obvious way to circumvent this is for "close friends" to reveal his reasons to the media, which is exactly what has happened in the NY Times article.

      I'm not saying that this is what happened, but it's a guess based on my past experiences with employment contracts and so forth. Hell, they might even say his NDA covers his reasons for leaving!

  • Smooth... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mgkimsal2 ( 200677 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @01:56PM (#5485763) Homepage
    So, they wait until they've closed another $38 million in funding - THEN he announces he's resigning. Nice to be able to follow your principles on your own timetable.

    Should Bill Gates dismantle Microsoft because the Pentagon uses Microsoft products? Should open source coders rework the GPL to say 'you can do anything you want EXCEPT use this for purposes we don't like'?

    So, because government is going to use Groove, he needs to quit? How about freeing Groove, so that *everyone* can use it to counter the surveillance of the government? Make sure strong encryption is in there, open it up, and let people build on this 'revolutionary' product. The little I saw of Groove was interesting, but it never seemed 'there'. Maybe I just didn't get it at all, but I like to think I've been able to get my head 'round most new technologies (seeing pros/cons/etc).
    • Should Bill Gates dismantle Microsoft because the Pentagon uses Microsoft products?


      No, that's not the reason...

      • Should open source coders rework the GPL to say 'you can do anything you want EXCEPT use this for purposes we don't like'?

        It already does: you can't close-source it. There is nothing that stops someone from creating a license that says "This software can not be used for any product that is designed to cause a loss of human life".

        The BSD folks don't include certain restrictions. The GPL folks do. Just because you don't like it doesn't mean that a group can't create a license that excludes weapons or TIA-type use, and I know I'd like such a license.

    • I have groove 2.5; its kind of usefule and better than before. But I dont see how you can build a police state from it. Its like saying X11 or SMTP is unethical because the government uses it.

      IMO this 'TIA uses Groove' story is probably marketing trying to convince people that groove is good enougth go use (including its encryption), and perhaps provide a collaboration environment above and beyond what they have today.

      I think if groove does take off then the government stays in windows land forever; groove is in bed with COM, and the money MS sends them stops them from trying to be portable (like base it all on XUL)

  • Hmmm... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by johndiii ( 229824 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:01PM (#5485802) Journal
    Mr. Kapor is quitting Groove, where he worked on software that the Pentagon had (presumably) paid to license, to work on software that the Pentagon can use for free... Interesting.

  • Positively impacting technology we build (Score:4, Interesting)

    by tazochai ( 213288 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:08PM (#5485859)
    This whole TIA thing is what pushed me over the edge and I finally joined the ACLU because of it.

    At the same time, I'm a developer for a company that creates products that use certificates, PKI, encryption, etc. We have also begun recently agreeing to create something with a federal agency. We still incorporate anonymous ways to use the products (to some degree at least), and that's something I will always want to push for.

    • OT:the TIA (Score:3, Interesting)

      by lommer ( 566164 )
      I know this is offtopic, but it is relevant to the TIA.

      Anyone remember the evil pyramid and eye logo that the TIA used to have? Well, in my english course we have been studying Margret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, a dystopian future novel in grand Orwellian style. We recently watched a movie rendition of it, and I noticed one thing that somewhat scared me: the logo used for the oppressive gestapo-like police in the movie was almost the exact same eye and pyramid logo used by the TIA project!

  • Why doesn't he say it outright? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by I Am The Owl ( 531076 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:09PM (#5485865) Homepage Journal
    I'm confused. Why is this a rumor? If he feels so strongly about it, why doesn't he come out and make a public statement to that effect?


    If he's quitting on principle, then he has my admiration. It is a rare person these days, it seems, who considers the potential evil ramifications of their technological creations and feels strongly enough to oppose that evil.

    • as long has he is still related to groove, even as a stockholder, his actions and words (especially) are libel. if he says anything against the company that causes its stock price to drop, he is acting in violation of the law and can be sued for the loss in stock value, or even sent to jail.

      A CEO of a company is responsible for the money of the company. If a CEO takes an action that negatively affects the stock value or profits of the company, even if it is the morally correct decision (and doesn't break the law in and of itself), he is violating the law and violating the trust of his shareholders.

  • Can someone explain (Score:3, Insightful)

    by saddino ( 183491 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:20PM (#5485949)
    the connection between Groove and this project? I thought Groove was a collaborative application space; in other words, their P2P, UI and extensibility are their key technologies.

    I gather isn't very applicable towards data mining, so what exactly is the technology that Groove owns that fits so well with DARPA's TIA project?

  • leaving=giving permission. staying=keeping control (Score:5, Interesting)

    by linuxbaby ( 124641 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:24PM (#5485979)
    If you're ever put into a situation like this - where the company you started is turning into something you didn't intend, and don't approve of:

    If you leave, it gives the others free rein to make it even worse. (Oh good - the voice of conscience is gone. Now we can do ANYthing we want!)

    But if you stay, you can be the good shepherd, the veto power, the one that keeps it from all going to hell.

    • Sometimes all you can do is leave. It is nice to think that there is always a chance, but sometimes fatalism takes over. Someone who founded the EFF doesn't strike me as a quitter and yet he is quitting. Only the individual can offically say how bad it is and act accordingly.

      I left a dream-job chief securtiy architect's position at a fortune 500 company for similar reasons. Before I was out the door they were offering me the world to stay, but I knew that wouldn't change my true feelings. In the end the only way I could live with my self was to leave.

      You have to decide if you want to deal with the devil, because when you get in bed with him sooner or later you will have to get fscked.
    • Good point, but that's assuming that the software capabilities aren't already required in the government contract, if it's already signed. Government software contracts are usually pretty exacting and don't leave much room.

  • Our peers work for TIA (Score:3, Insightful)

    by hey ( 83763 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:35PM (#5486051) Journal
    Think about it ... some computer science types answered a want ad for the TIA. Did a few interviews and security checks then accepted a job there. What is wrong with these people?

  • Groove backdoor will FEED the TIA? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Bigger R ( 131370 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:43PM (#5486118) Homepage
    Maybe he's unhappy about certain "modifications" to his core technology?

    Just like Zimmerman hinting that newer versions of NAI PGP (post 6.58?) might have issues.

    And why he refers to it as a delicate situation.

    Just a thought.
  • The new Office suggests that Microsoft finally has their Groupware act together, and from what I understand, the beta is selling like wildfire on the web site. At $20 shipping, half a million copies might sellout before the week is over.

    Office + Sharepoint, will kill the market for Groove before they can get one.

    This is NOT a troll either, if you dont agree, do a little research. This Office version might actually be worth upgrading to.

  • Conscientious Brain Drain (Score:3, Insightful)

    by lucasw ( 303536 ) <`gro.sulucci' `ta' `wsacul'> on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:44PM (#5486132) Homepage Journal
    In Howard Rheingold's Tools For Thought [rheingold.com] it is mentioned that three decades ago many top scientists working on the government funded computer and communications projects left their posts out of dissatisfaction with government policy:

    In 1970, a combination of growing opposition to the Vietnam war, and the militarization of all ARPA research, meant that an extraordinary collection of talent in the new fields of computer networks and interactive computing were looking for greener pastures...

    Luckily, XEROX and other private companies were around to snatch them up and not let their talents go to waste.

    This kind of phenomenon can't be do much good: It doesn't help legitimate national security interests, and scientists and engineers without the means to innovate don't benefit the economy. If young persons decide to avoid engineering or science completely when a perceived immoral government taints those fields, there's even more fallout...
    • If young persons decide to avoid engineering or science completely when a perceived immoral government taints those fields, there's even more fallout...

      Dude, the reason that young people are leaving science and engineering isn't because evil government security taints it - it's because there aren't any jobs!!! These days, I'd go into a field where there's more security - like acting...

  • Thanks Google! (Score:2, Informative)

    by FsG ( 648587 )
    Thanks to this google link, you don't need to register: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/11/business/11PRIV. html?ex=1047963600&en=b851b67c98e9787e&ei=5062&par tner=GOOGLE [nytimes.com]

  • When I read this, I momentarily thought he left because he had a Transient Ischemic Attack.

    Can anybody else think of overloads for this acronym? TIA for contributions. :)

  • groove not central to TIA... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by bigpat ( 158134 ) on Tuesday March 11, 2003 @02:57PM (#5486292)
    why would it be a big deal if they are using the software for collaboration. I'm sure they are using email, telephones and pencils too... If Groove is actually acting as a subcontractor and doing TIA research then I could understand being upset, since TIA is very very very unamerican.

    What's next... people boycotting boxcutters?

  • I did a consulting gig recently where I had to network a small conference room. The meeting was to train a group of people how to use Groove to collaborate with each other. I thought it odd at the time that all the people there were government personnel, but now it makes some sense, I guess.
  • ...is of course Chandler [osafoundation.org], from the Open Source Applications Foundation [osafoundation.org].

    This was featured earlier on Slashdot: Mitch Kapor's Outlook-Killer [slashdot.org]

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