… doubt no more. The government — and now the UberGovernment — is filled with idiots.
Here’s an email (with names redacted) sent by a friend about one of their more less amusing stupidities:
Dear Claire,
We thought we were under scrutiny because of the words we use, but it turns out the FBI also don’t like the word “Subversion”.
My firm (and probably 100,000 other small and large businesses) use the open-source software package Subversion to provide version control of documents and code. The idea of version control is alien to the uber-government, but ignorance has never deterred thugs.
Name redacted
———- Forwarded message ———-
From: Other Name Redacted
Date: Sun, Aug 11, 2013 at 9:24 PM
Subject: Suggestion to change the name “Subversion”
To: users@subversion.apache.orgHello Apache,
I know it is standard practice in programming to use common words in the English language for specific software terminology or naming. However, this has often caused confusions.
If you go through the story of Goldman Sachs programmer Serge Aleynikov who was accused & convicted of “stealing” open source software code, the link below, you will see that one of the factors that affected the case was that to the FBI investigator who was a software layman, the word “subversion repository” had a negative connotation to it. He assumed it was the verb form of the word ‘Subvert’. In the story below, Agent McSwain of the FBI, who took the investigation of Aleynikov, had no idea about version control of code, let alone SVN. Later Aleynikov was found innocent and released from incarceration.
Hence this is my strong suggestion: next release, please consider altering the name subversion to something else. At least “Sub-version”. This is to prevent confusion to non-technical people who could mistake the meaning of the name and associate it to negative activity like hacking or stealing. Just a thought and suggestion that could have far reaching implications. Please consider this.
Thank you,
Name redacted
Can’t see a reason in the world why anybody should change the name of their software, though. Just because “your a idiot” doesn’t mean your betters should lower themselves to your level, FBI.
The VF story contains several helpful tips to prepare yourself for being arrested — at least one of which you’ve already got memorized if you’ve hung out in these parts very long.
Subversion, could make a good trendy name for a sandwich shop. My town has one named Substandard, which according to customers really is substandard.
I’d suggest the FBI get some reading is fundamental workshops, maybe some programs to expose agents to advanced vocabulary and language use.
Not to give approval to our rotten system, but Sergey screwed himself it seems to me. I know programmers get attached to their code, but every firm I ever worked for emphasized in my employment contract that while working on their projects, anything I came up with belonged to them. It’s crazy to take code. Just leave the damn stuff behind. If you need to re-create it from scratch, it won’t be that difficult, but it also won’t be a copy either.
Add in the usual soulless prosecutor and all the hangers-on in the court system, and you are asking for trouble doing this kind of stuff.
While it’s true that the use of Subversion is a minor complicating factor, the nub, according to the article (here’s the TL;DR version) is:
The letter reproduced above is misleading, in that it claims that Serge as accused of “stealing” open source software code, and there’s a bit of implication that Subversion is what he was “stealing”. Subversion has been around for a long time, and I suspect the the only reason it raised an eyebrow was due to the clueless nature of this rookie FBI agent. So I grant that point, as far as it goes.
Anyone with experience in the IT industry should know that taking code home to work on, without expicit prior consent and blessing is a big no-no, and the larger the company, the worse it gets, particularly in certain industries, including major financials. I’m sympathetic, as his intentions seemed to be honest, but he should’ve known better. I’ve signed plenty of intellectual-property contracts attending to employment. I’d bet Kruggerands to doughnuts that Goldman requires them too.
And, in the world of Free and Open-Source software, there’s all kinds of warnings about mingling such code with proprietary stuff. In fact, In most cases, it’s a license violation.
Gaack! Guess i didn’t close my blockquote properly. 🙁 Should’ve ended right after the bold part.
Claire, I remember you used to suggest that if “we” all deliberately attached key words in otherwise innocuous emails, then it just might overload the surveillance apparatus. Do you still recommend “we” all do that? If so, I wholeheartedly think adding the word, “subversion,” to the Grand List, as it were. 😉
jed — Fixed that for ya.
Claire, I found an amazingly good essay on The Problem:
http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/killer-myth.html
Someone posted it on Western Rifle Shooters in a comment. Reminded me a bit of my own much more modest effort:
http://www.ncc-1776.org/tle2009/tle544-20091115-06.html
Thanks, Claire!
Been mulling this over in my head during an emergency trip to Wal-Mart for a new dish drain rack. Lots of interesting ways to look at this, but I’ll let it percolate.
I don’t’ know who jed is working for, but every employer I’ve worked for, from 3 person startup to 40k+ giant bureaucracy has expected me to work on code from home. Just last night I fired up my laptop and did work while in my own bed.
This case is even more ridiculous than the Schwartz case from the 90’s.
Tom, the difference is in the way in which such activity is conducted. I’m well aware of people who work for companies such as CTL and Lockheed Martin who work from home. They don’t mingle proprietary code with FOSS, and they don’t randomly set up repositories on just any old free service website to host the company’s code.