Happened to know quite a few people from Google who has been frustrated by the policy made by his team and they clearly disagree with many of it’s implementation details. It might be interesting to hear from insiders how much they appreciate his org
Which is fair, but it seems like an org with the task of keeping the company from being evil would generate some friction with people seeking the shortest path to product (and therefore promotion).
That the work they do is unpopular doesn't imply the work they do is bad. I, personally, was always grudgingly respectful of the privacy auditing team, even if their suggestions could delay a project upwards of two quarters.
Seems like Google needs an executive leadership team where these types of questions are addressed and decisions are made. A human rights board sounds like a good idea to me but I can see why a company would not pursue one. We largely expect the US government to take the lead with respect to human rights. Not saying that I agree or disagree with that but it is how many businesses operate.
Googlers who disagree could voice to the ELT and then make decisions on their own if the ELT disagrees if they want to stay, leave or what not. They could unionize too and use the power of collective bargaining. It seems like the cafeteria workers figured out how to do it.
I'm openly curious if even the creation of some kind of leadership team for human rights questions opens the company up to more liability by creating a paper trail that a prosecutor could point to.
What happens when the documented human rights decisions differ from US law (which has its own places where it's fallen on its face in the human rights department)? Or from the law of any country in which Google operates, for that matter?
(I agree this is a good idea in principle, but it's possible for good ideas to be bad to implement for liability reasons).
It isn't that the creation of such a group is itself a crime. It's that such a group creates a formal paper trail that (whatever crime Google could be accused of) could come under discovery. And "We thought about this and came to the 'wrong' conclusions" is no defense, and the penalties for such a paper trail can be higher than the penalties for "we didn't think of this."
Indications that a company considered alternatives and chose the "wrong" one can indicate intent, which can aggravate damages depending on the law in question.
