Google is evil, Assange is an ass, and I’m no CEO

Regular readers know that I like to end each blog post with a question. Some people respond in the comments (and invariably get into a fight with other readers). But some Cringesters take the time to write to me via my cringe@ address, where only I can see them. Here are some of the best answers I received.

First, in “Assange’s latest victim: WikiLeaks,” I wrote about Julian “Albino Aussie” Assange and his release of some 250,000 unredacted State Department cables on his whistleblower site. I ended by asking, “Is Assange an angel or an ass?”

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The overwhelming verdict in Cringeville: Ass.

Reader R.G. sounds like he’s ready to round up a posse and a rope:

Why is this guy only releasing stuff from/about the U.S.? I don’t recall seeing him releasing info on other nations (other than stuff the U.S. has said about them). This doesn’t make him valiant; it makes him a terrorist. I hope the feds catch him and hang him from the highest tree.

Y.O. responds that Assange is a little of both.

[An] angel for daring to release the till then unreleasable. An ass for doing it the way he did. Matters little if he did so to bolster his ego or save his own arse. … He’s apparently able to take care of himself despite all of these revelations, most of which are of the “Ah! I sure didn’t know, but now that I know, what of it?” variety. What will they change except a little more care for the security of future communications?

Meanwhile, D.F. says WikiLeaks isn’t great, but somebody needs to holds the U.S. government accountable.

What WikiLeaks did is a very mixed bag, but what is clear is that our government repeatedly committed acts that were debatably illegal and misrepresented the events to a gullible press. If you watch the news, you know journalism has turned into distracting fluff that avoids hard issues and analysis. While this mode is bad, it’s all that is left for democratic oversight.

In “Just how evil is Google?” I asked, well, just how evil is Google? The consensus: pretty evil, but not exactly Hitler-Stalin-Bieber evil. Reader P.L. offers these timeless words of wisdom:

Google may not have started out with evil intent, but if you don’t structure your organization to enforce ethical decision-making, once the big bucks start flowing in, the evil ones among us, and the big bucks that tempt us all, will soon have anybody headed down the slippery slope of evil. Money is power, and power, when wielded by any human for any significant length of time, will corrupt. Given enough time, any organization will end up encouraging evil. The price of “goodness,” as is the price of liberty, is eternal vigilance.

But N.C. came to Google’s defense, citing the good it does via open source projects like Android and Chromium. He also defended Google’s practice of allowing ads for Canadian pharmacies despite U.S. laws forbidding it:

There was nothing wrong with Google supplying ads from Canada. They were the same meds available in the U.S., just cheaper. Being Canadian doesn’t make a difference, and it’s only “illegal” because big pharma wants to limit free trade to make more big bucks. The real issue if that big pharma is able to lobby to make that sort of thing happen.

I also heard from Ben Edelman, whose own blog post on Google’s mendacity was the source for mine. Turns out I got his affiliation wrong — though a Harvard-trained lawyer, he teaches at Harvard Business School, not the Law School. (Oops, sorry Ben. You Havahd types all look the same to me.) I also suggested he had a “particular obsession” with Google. He responded thusly:

At one point, folks thought I was obsessed with domain names. Then folks thought I was obsessed with adware, especially Gator and WhenU. (Perhaps you had the pleasure of removing those apps from friends’ or colleagues’ computers. …) Then Yahoo and its bad ad practices (for which I brought suit, my first work as an attorney). Now Google, including various controversial practices you noted. There’s a certain truth to this — I do tend to write modest-sized articles, at most a couple thousand words each, not books, and so I write a series of articles on a related general topic as I develop that topic fully. But I don’t see anything unwise or improper about that.

Finally, in “Steve Ballmer: Have you seen this man?” I asked the Cringe Crowd who they’d name to replace the bald sweaty one as the head of Microsoft (because Lord knows somebody ought to).

Here are some of the nominees:

R.Z. suggested Jeff Bezos, because Microsoft needs a visionary. (Also, Bezos has experience with things that crash, which makes him eminently qualified to deal with Windows.)

G.W. nominated Michele Bachmann (yes, that Michele Bachmann), calling her the “perfect candidate.” I suspect he’s just trying to keep her as far away from the White House as possible.

Regular correspondent W.S. A-A. proposed Dan Savage, sex columnist for a Seattle alternative newspaper. Could he really run a $70 billion company? It’s doubtful, but I understand he does one hell of a Monkey Boy Dance.

One Cringester with the initials J.B. even foolishly nominated me. If you really want to see somebody sweat, just suggest that idea to Microsoft’s shareholders. I have two responses to that: a) No, and b) Hell no. That might just be the worst idea anyone has ever come up with.

Got any more bright ideas? Post them below or send them my way via cringe@infoworld.com.

This article, “Google is evil, Assange is an ass, and I’m no CEO,” was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Follow the crazy twists and turns of the tech industry with Robert X. Cringely’s Notes from the Field blog, and subscribe to Cringely’s Notes from the Underground newsletter.