Thread

GitHub has not removed malicious imitation software after 3 weeks

279 points · 119 comments · hermitcrab

hermitcrab · 1790267696 · focus · HN ↗
Author of the post here. Github finally took the offending page down approximately 10 minutes after the post appeared on the front page of HN. Total coincidence. I'm sure!
Moral of the story. If you want even the most basic level of support from Github, you need to get on the front page of HN first.
And it seems they are able to do things very quickly, when they want to. Bastards.
1. koolba · 1790268882 · focus · HN ↗
  > Moral of the story. If you want even the most basic level of support from Github, you need to get on the front page of HN first.
  This also works for Google support.
  > And it seems they are able to do things very quickly, when they want to. Bastards.
  I wouldn’t chalk any of this up to malicious intent. I’m sure they are swamped with such requests.
  It was already a problem before agents could automatically perform these actions.
  And it’s not something you can really automate on their end either. At least not the judgement call on the removal. Imagine if there was a fully automated process and it inadvertently took down a legit project.
  1. debugnik · 1790269406 · focus · HN ↗
    > I wouldn’t chalk any of this up to malicious intent. I’m sure they are swamped with such requests.
    Stalling in the hope that reporters won't escalate, instead of allocating a tiny bit of their billions in profit to hiring for this, is malicious in my book.
    ktm5j · 1790274324 · focus · HN ↗
    I mean.. for better or worse, this is how corporate America works. Hiring to solve a problem that's not costing them money (and solving it doesn't make money) is probably not going to happen, especially with the current state of the economy. They have more of an obligation to make money for their investors than they do anything else, that's just how it works.
    Paracompact · 1790276401 · focus · HN ↗
    > They have more of an obligation to make money for their investors than they do anything else, that's just how it works
    Where does this myth come from, and how does it survive? It's either an excuse for parasitic corporatism, or an expression of learned helplessness. Nobody has been successfully sued for prioritizing the long-term health and reputation of a company over self-starving quarterly profit.
    Is there a perverse incentive toward the latter anyway? Yes. But it mostly serves current leadership, who are evaluated and paid on short horizons, at the expense of the long-term investors who own most of the equity.
    ktm5j · 1790276611 · focus · HN ↗
    Definitely not a myth, friend. Read this article from Harvard Business School: <a href="https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/fiduciary-duty-to-investors" rel="nofollow">https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/fiduciary-duty-to-investors
    "Accepting funding from investors puts you in a fiduciary role in which you’re responsible for managing their money and putting their needs above your own"
    mindcrime · 1790278695 · focus · HN ↗
    The reality is "it's complicated". But the strongest form of this - that "companies must maximize profits over ALL over concerns NO MATTER WHAT" is basically a myth. See:
    <a href="https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2012/06/26/the-shareholder-value-myth/" rel="nofollow">https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2012/06/26/the-shareholder-v...
    <a href="https://www.legislate.ai/blog/does-the-law-require-public-companies-to-maximise-shareholder-value" rel="nofollow">https://www.legislate.ai/blog/does-the-law-require-public-co...
    <a href="https://lawreview.law.ucdavis.edu/archives/56/5/end-shareholder-wealth-maximization" rel="nofollow">https://lawreview.law.ucdavis.edu/archives/56/5/end-sharehol...
    <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20325023">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20325023
    <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shareholder_value" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shareholder_value
    So yeah, "fiduciary duty" is a real thing, but that's not quite the same thing as saying that every single decision has to be focused on nothing but profit maximization.
    [deleted] · 1790280516 · focus · HN ↗
    [deleted]
    ktm5j · 1790280937 · focus · HN ↗
    So you think making bad business decisions is holding up to fiduciary duty? You can't throw money at every problem that you'd like to solve, calling that malice is silly was the point I was trying to make.
    joe_the_user · 1790283679 · focus · HN ↗
    Neglecting all other ethical duties beside profits is so close to malice it takes ...an, ah, expert, to tell you the differences and how important they are.
    And this neglecting all duties besides profits thing is real, it is institutionalized by decisions of investors, by managers hired by investors, by regulators "captured" by investors and so-forth. It is the norm. But that doesn't it's a legal or ethical that a given manager or employee has, at least not currently.
    applfanboysbgon · 1790285154 · focus · HN ↗
    Paying staff to avoid distributing literal malware on your platform is not a bad business decision. And even if it was - yes, bad business decisions are within the scope of fiduciary duty. Have you ever seen someone successfully sued under this clause for making a bad business decision, in your life? Fiduciary duty is more like, you can't take the money and run or pay your nephew a $10,000,000 salary to play ping pong in the office. As long as you're not doing something clearly, intentionally harmful to the business and investors, you're clear.
    ktm5j · 1790336898 · focus · HN ↗
    They are paying people to do that. What I said was that hiring more probably won't happen in this economy.
    mindcrime · 1790298025 · focus · HN ↗
    > So you think making bad business decisions is holding up to fiduciary duty?
    I didn't say anything remotely like that, so I'm going to assume you're not trying to have a good faith discussion here, and decline to participate any further. Have a nice day.
    ktm5j · 1790336586 · focus · HN ↗
    You're the one jumping all over what I said, I'm trying to explain what I said since you seem to have such a problem with it. Wow.

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