* This started out because NixOS mastodon account posted on chaos.social local timeline which is rather German Mastodon instance with a strict no-military-content-without-content-warnings moderation policy. People got angry for NixOS posting about the sponsor there and started complaining en masse to drop it. I think most people complaining aren't affiliated with NixOS at all but I'm sure there were also attendees of the conference complaining on Mastodon.
* NixCon is a (compared to other open source conferences like kubecon) extremely small community conference, organised by volunteers who have been under immense pressure this week to pull off all the organisation whilst also having to handle this drama on Mastodon.
* We as a community should definitely discuss during the conference this weekend what we're gonna have as policies for sponsorship going forward. Because as far as I know we haven't had any real formal policies regarding NixCon organisation at all. It has always been kind of community-driven.
* This year the role of the NixOS foundation has been made way more clear in the NixOS community. Before it really was just an entity for receiving donations but it did not actively do anything community building. I'm happy that we have an active Foundation board now that isn't just an administrative formality but an actual voice that can make statements.
* NixOS foundation is having a board meeting today and will have a more clear statement later from what I understand
* I am looking forward to Nixcon this weekend despite this hiccup. And I'm sure we'll figure it out.
Edit:
Also for context a statement from the founder of Anduril: https://twitter.com/PalmerLuckey/status/1699590452847272044
This is what I tried to communicate to Anduril via email but it must have been lost in translation.
as said by a friend this morning:
> i, personally, would not accept money from the company actively militarizing the southern US border but that's just me
What do you mean by "having to"? It is unreasonable to set a standard where every single complaint on social media deserves a reply. Either the sponsor is dropped or it is not -- where is the handling?
This is completely unrelated, but if you like weapons with cool names (or are looking for names for your next defense-industry startup) the Tolkien legendarium has many!
Angrist - the dagger that cut a Silmaril from Morgoth's iron crown. Means "Iron Cleaver" in Sindarin
Dagmor - "dark-slayer", Beren's short blade
Aranruth - The terrible sword of Thingol, King of Doriath. Means "King's Ire"
The twin bastard swords "Anglachel" and "Anguirel" -- Forged by Eol the Dark Elf from a meteor, these swords were both sort of malevolent and I think were probably inspired by the Norse Tyrfing. Probably also influenced Stormbringer and Mournblade in those terrible Moorcock books.
Celeg Aithorn - A legendary sword from the First Age. Reference to a Valar (God's) blade "lightning", and said to be the blade that will one day cleave the world.
Edit: Ack! I forgot my favorite. "Dramborleg" -- the axe that the man Tuor found during the Fall of Gondolin. He slew three balrogs (!) and many orc champions with it. Means "thudder-sharp", because it both smashes and cuts at the same time. ("smote both a heavy dint as of a club and cleft as a sword")
... that's enough. I know the posted tweet is a serious topic and what I have posted is not, but that's where I'm at today.
So they hijacked a name from Tolkien's works and the Tolkien estate did nothing about it?
They threatened to sue TSR for using "hobbit" in D&D in the 70s [0], which prompted D&D authors to change the name to "halfling" and later on change their lore a bit.
[0] https://www.museumofplay.org/blog/cease-and-desist-dont-mess...
"Hobbit" is rather central to the Tolkien brand; Palantir and Anduril are essentially props, so it could be that these were seen as less important instances of name-theivery.
Sidenote: the foundation of current computing is built on DoD money.
I think you'll find they'll loose goodwill from some other non-paying folks. There are many people who code and use this technology who are pro-military. They may not speak up in the same circles as those who are against this but they exist. I'm only pointing this out to showcase the market is more diverse than people often realize.
But are they pro-US military or they might be pro-other countries military?
It's been a while since the US was in a war that we looked at afterward (or during, frankly) and said "yeah it was a good and smart thing we did that, worth the costs."
H&K, Anduril, Boston Dynamics, are just a few examples of companies who have entire product lines inaccessible to me, a private citizen who is not military, LEO, or a contractor of either.
Anduril, in particular, rubs me the wrong way because Palmer Luckey talks a big game about being pro-liberty, but his company will only sell to the pigs.
I'm not American, and to me it just seems like a very vocal minority is doing a lot of the talking on behalf of everyone else.
US Tech in the past: "we dislike the military, the government, the military-industrial complex (and generally all authority) because we skew hippy and/or libertarian. Let us be creative and free!"
US Tech today: "we dislike the military, the government, and the military-industrial complex because our particular flavour of cultural identity politics doesn't like it. Let us conform to the moral outrage of the day."
Meanwhile, the best reason IMO -- "we dislike the military, the government, the military-industrial complex because it serves the interests of the wealthy first and foremost (at the expense of the poor)" -- seems to get less discussion.
But all of these are reasons why tech can dislike the military or at least be uncomfortable with it, even while DARPA funding has helped progress tech and many innovations have come out of military-first applications.
Growing up in republican midwest and living in CA later I haven't met someone who just goes "military bad bc political party and moral outrage". I think that is just a twitter thing
Palmer Luckey and Peter Thiel themselves are also quite controversial political actors.
Do you know how many people die attempting to cross that border? Hundreds every year.
Maybe when the temperature is extreme, you want to have an idea of where people are.
I miss the early 2000's when hacker culture / defcon culture etc could exist on its on merits and wasn't coded by race, gender, politics or orientation...
I would never work at a company that designs and builds missiles or fighter jets, but I would work at a cloud provider that provides infrastructure that is used to design missiles or fighter jets, in the same way that I would work at a telecoms company that provides the phone systems to a defence contractor.
Being one level removed, and providing "neutral" services, is a substantial difference for me, and I suspect for most people.
I'd be overjoyed to help create the tools to drive the invaders out of Ukraine for example, but not so much to try to finally kill the rest of the browser market or to serve shady ads.
Yes, while I am not exaggerating I am probably a bit one sided here - I know there are parts of Google that I have nothing against like GCP - but I am serious: Much rather work for the military than Google.
Actually there was a big uproar about exactly this several years ago https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/mar/07/google-ai...
Project Maven? Dragonfly?
Claiming you want "peace" without accounting for how you will defeat the bullies, abusers, and autocrats only helps them, not you. It brings war, not peace. Bullies, abusers, and autocrats do not give a fork about scolding and condemnation; if they succeed in taking what they want, regardless of any talk, they WILL take more — failure to stop them is literally seen as permission to do more.
So, this is the action of absolute fools and cowards. Specifically, Useful Idiots in the Vladmir Lenin sense. Or worse yet, the actions of active supporters of genocidal autocracies.
(And, do not even try to do whataboutism about the failings of the Democratic nations. Even their worst historical failings do not begin to compare vs the active genocide and war crimes being systematically committed today by the autocracies today, Russia in Ukraine, China on Tibet and Uighurs, Myanmar, etc..).
This kind of bullshirt move by sniveling cowards and poseur fauxgressives is a move in the direction of literally getting us all killed.
edit: Also possible that they are just thoughtlessly responding to some clueless complaints, but the failed to even call out even who made the complaints. Nevertheless, this still literally carries water for Xi and Putin.
