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Comment by notacoward | Hacker News Reader

Probably multiple, but this one certainly seems to qualify.

http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf/current/msg93416.h...

"TLS everywhere is great for large companies with a financial stake in Internet centralization. It is even better for those providing identity services and TLS-outsourcing via CDNs. It's a shame that the IETF has been abused in this way"

Looks like a very unprofessional and offensive attribution of motive, which completely fails to keep the conversation on a constructive course.

P.S. Nice to see someone's trying to bury this. It's exactly the kind of thing the OP talks about, provided in direct response to a question. How could that possibly be worth a non-partisan downvote?

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> http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf/current/msg93416.h...

This post seems like reasonable criticism to me. It doesn't attack any individual.

It's fair to attribute motive for a particular agenda. The discussion would not be complete without considering conflict-of-interest motivations of the participants.

It also seems fair to say that Google and other companies with the goal of Internet centralization have been pushing this, and that this is one of the likely motivations for them.

It also seems fair to point out, in a technical way, that HTTPS-everywhere is not capable of achieving the goals that its proponents claim it will, and that it is more likely to be harmful to those goals.

The last sentence that you quote is perhaps unhelpful but the "rough consensus" decision-making model of the IETF creates a perfect situation for lobbyists from large companies to control the agenda. This can be seen as an abuse.

Edited to add: I would be very concerned if the chair of the IETF was seeking to quash discussion of this type. That would only prove there is a serious problem.

I agree, in fact the author seemed to go out of their way to explain everything.

No. Attribution of motive is never helpful or appropriate as part of a supposedly-technical discussion. If it were, then maybe someone should also mention Fielding's own interest in enabling insertion of ads by proxies. But no, that's exactly the kind of thing the IETF chair's message was trying to address, for all parties involved. If there's a problem with lobbying and conflicts of interest, that needs to be taken up at an organizational level, not as part of the technical debate.

In any case, whether you think that kind of behavior is appropriate or not is kind of irrelevant. That wasn't the question. The question was what motivated the IETF chair's message. Can anyone deny that the hostility and accusatory tone of a message that has been splattered all over the internet today might be part of that motivation?

Many engineers often seem to forget that their work has impact on the lives of people. I think that, in the part of the email that you are not quoting, Roy Fielding makes a very good point that TLS everywhere is not just a technical issue, but has significant social implication.

Thus, incentives and motives are very valid concerns. If the IETF's idea of professionalism precludes the discussion of ethical concerns, it needs to change.

Discussion of ethical concerns is important, but vague accusations that fail to identify any specific party or the nature of their interest are not a discussion, nor are they conducive to such a discussion being productive.

Like it or not, technology is not politcally neutral.

Saying "we should not be doing this because it only benefits multinationals and harms internet users" is an important part of any technical discussion.

Identifying conflicts of interest when evaluating systems is mentioned in the ACM Code of Ethics. It's possible to do this in a neutral/professional way.

Section 2.5: http://www.acm.org/about/code-of-ethics

2.5 refers to 1.3, which is clearly about identifying one's own possible conflicts of interest. There is no suggestion that one should accuse others of having such conflicts. Even if such an accusation were to be made, it should be specific and neutrally phrased, not a passive-aggressive blanket condemnation of anyone who might disagree.

The only way that applies, even considering that IETF and ACM are two separate organizations, is to Fielding's own conflicts of interest.

Point is, it's relevant to technical discussions like this. Also Section 2.5 doesn't really limit itself to one's own conflicts of interest (only by reference to the other section). But that's beside that point anyhow I think, as either way it rebuts your point that "Attribution of motive is never helpful or appropriate as part of a supposedly-technical discussion".

Yes, ACM doesn't really mean anything for IETF, but ACM and IEEE are (pretty much) the only two professional associations for us.

Only an ACM member would claim they're still relevant.

See how helpful that was?

Attribution of motive is never helpful or appropriate as part of a supposedly-technical discussion.

Disagree. Here's why: Other people's motives should never be a deciding factor in technical discussions. However, questioning participants' motives can be a very useful heuristic for deciding where to look for potential traps or previously unnoticed disadvantages of complicated proposals. Simply put, it's a heuristic that helps discover trojan horses.

The point is that technical discussions should be decided on technical merits, but it's important that everybody understands what those merits are. Looking into motives helps to achieve this understanding.

If it were, then maybe someone should also mention Fielding's own interest in enabling insertion of ads by proxies.

Absolutely. All those interests should be out in the open.

"I would be very concerned if the chair of the IETF was seeking to quash discussion of this type."

Is it trying to quash the discussion, or merely move it to an appropriate (and more effective) forum?

"That would only prove there is a serious problem."

Only if you accept Fielding's attribution of motive, which is a bit circular. What if we assume, for the sake of argument, that Fielding himself is the bad actor here? Would this still prove there's a serious problem, or would it be addressing a problem? See how it all depends on which assumptions you start with? That's why allowing stuff like this into a supposedly rational debate is so problematic. Do you think it would be useful for anyone to make assumptions about your agenda*? People need to stick to the facts, not try to paint anybody who disagrees with them as thralls to some evil agenda.

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