"Developers are blameless" is a uniquely HN take, for obvious site demographic reasons.
I see a worthwhile product as a stool with at least three legs: Technical feasibility, business viability, and ethical acceptability. Take one leg away and the stool should fail. Yet, HN commenters endlessly discuss/debate the first two and largely ignore the third. I think we all have a duty to work on projects that are ethically sound (defining that is a whole other discussion). There are plenty of companies out there and plenty of products to work on--it's not like we have to pick an evil one in order to survive and "feed our families."
There should be more choices rather than "find another company". The problem is that it is an economically valid argument to say "if I don't, someone else will".
I believe that professions should have codes of ethics, and people should be expected to adhere to those codes of ethics. Right now there is no licensing or apprenticeship or registration associated with the profession of "software developer". There are some organizations that issue professional certifications in adjacent areas (MCSE, CISSP, etc.) that have codes of ethics associated with them, but I rarely see disciplinary action associated with them, and in any case employability is not linked to these certifications.
Conversely, lawyers have bar associations that evaluate complaints and can withdraw permission to practice.
Doctors have the Hippocratic Oath, but I'm not sure that it's enforced for medical licensure. However doctors do have medical licensing boards and licenses can be revoked.
Pilots have revocable licenses but I'm not sure they have a code of ethics.
Civil engineers have codes of ethics and licensure, but licensure revocation appears associated with legal malpractice, not ethical malpractice.
In any case, there are societal mechanisms that could be used to associate codes of ethics with software developers, if we as a profession and a society chose to, which I'm not optimistic will happen.
Sure, but the issue is, someone might not think ticket master is evil. And I’d argue the things they do that should at least be illegal (in my view) have nothing to do with developers.
Take away their exclusive rights (on both sides of the business) to 80+% of large live music venues and they’re just another ticket platform.
Yeah, but only one of those legs controls the money. At least in the US, no money means no food, no shelter, no healthcare, etc, so it is not a viable choice for most. So rightfully most of the blame should be assigned to those that control the money: management and executives. Rarely hear of required ethics guidelines and handwringing about ethics from the MBA types.
I'll accept a share of developer blame in places with strong unions and the ability for workers to strike.
And the developer job market has changed. We can act like everyone can just go get a job that pays well somewhere else, but I’ve got friends who are very senior developers who’ve been laid off and had a hard time finding a good job in recent years.
The market isn’t what it once was and while overall still good, we do all have bills to pay.
I guess I'd turn it around and ask those developers: Are there any projects you wouldn't do, no matter how much you needed the money, because you found them ethically unacceptable? If the answer is yes, then they actually agree with me, and we're maybe just discussing where the evilness threshold line should be drawn. I don't know many actual people who would say "No, I would willingly work on absolutely any project, no matter how harmful or depraved it is, as long as I get paid," but then again maybe I don't know enough truly desperate people.
I see a worthwhile product as a stool with at least three legs: Technical feasibility, business viability, and ethical acceptability. Take one leg away and the stool should fail. Yet, HN commenters endlessly discuss/debate the first two and largely ignore the third. I think we all have a duty to work on projects that are ethically sound (defining that is a whole other discussion). There are plenty of companies out there and plenty of products to work on--it's not like we have to pick an evil one in order to survive and "feed our families."