Is Google Evil? Is Apple Evil? Am I evil for thinking about these things?
TL/DR dunno.
I was riding home on my motorbike the other day, and I was thinking what makes Google be seen as an evil company. I think it's mostly it's 'cos of it's information gathering practices. But. It doesn't really profit from those directly. The data (generally) go to ad companies and in the end companies who sell products/services who know what Google stand for. It's like YouTubers who embed adverts for questionable products in their videos. They know, but they take the money. Is it Evil to want to make enough money to get by? Is it OK to do "little evils" in the pursuit of a greater good?
This is just my random rant so I'm not really aiming for a conclusion here. But I don't think pinning all the Evil on Google is fair. I especially think Apple painting themselves as the Privacy Platform of choice is a bit rich when you consider how intertwined Google and Apple are; Google pay money for preferred placement on Apple devices and Apple supposedly even get a cut from this... And is Microsoft any different? They have almost gone full IBM and as a result they are making most of their money from services and subscriptions like Office and Gamepass. They probably want to make Windows go that way too... Are software subscriptions evil? Most consumers, including me, don't really like them, but from a business point of view it's the only way to make software scale; the more customers you have the greater the support, but if you just sell once then you end up losing money long term...
Is Open Source NOT evil? Well it's kinda free.... but it's kinda not as it's supported by big business who ultimately want to make money and it exposes the absurdity of people who expect something for nothing but then get sad when their own work does not allow them to be free of the tyranny of day-to-day expenses.
So is Money evil?
Yeah. Probably. But it's a tool to allow trade and distribution so it's also not. Is man evil? Dunno. Most people think they are doing things for the right reasons. It's just that few people agree on motivations, and often they aren't even understood.
Am I evil? Maybe. I certainly am selfish, but I like to think I am motivated with long term goals to support friends and family.
Am I different to others? Where am I going here?
Dunno. Need some more motorbike zen time.
