Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

gigatexal

now? what took them so long??

zawaideh

No need to wonder

jeffwask

A real "Are we the baddies?" moment for them

QuercusMax

For a company supposedly full of smart people they sure do work hard to turn their brains off

leonidasrup

Palantir employees should understand that they are not regular employees at a regular company. They are U.S. defense contractors at an U.S. defense company. Also Palantir customers should understand that by buying Palantir services/products they are doing business with U.S. defense company. I don't say that this is positive or negative, it just clarifies the relationships and it should set the expectations.

nohell

https://archive.ph/9UjjI

sjsdaiuasgdia

Alex Karp is a fascist. The whole company should be ended.

ed_balls

Palantir delenda est

jimmar

Seems analogous to employees of a missile manufacturer being upset that their missiles were used for their intended purpose.

ethagnawl

I look forward to all of these comments being Hoovered into their autonomous surveillance machine in short order. Also, yes, they are.

palmotea

> ...about working for a company named after J. R. R. Tolkien’s corrupting all-seeing orb. Wasn't the the problem that Sauron had one so he could corrupt the other users through the orb, but the orb itself was not corrupting?

chromacity

I think this is a weird side effect of how we portray evil corporations in fiction and in journalism. We imagine that everyone working there is a moustache-twirling villain. And then we get a job at Meta or Flock or Palantir, look around, and don't see any moustache-twirling villains. There's no one saying "ha ha, we should hurt people just for fun". So, it must be that we're the good guys. Even if some of the outcomes seem reprehensible, it's not really evil because we're good people. We do it in a responsible and caring way. We're truly sorry that your grandma is now hooked up on endless AI-generated slop, but shouldn't the media be talking about all the other grandmas whose lives are enriched by our AI? We have strict safety rules for the types of cryptocurrency ads that can target the elderly, too.

shevy-java

Starting to wonder? Everyone know what Palantir was. The name is a dead-give-away. I think it is really time that the superrich are downsized. Certain companies that are working against the people also need to be removed. Key considerations in any democracy need to be consistent. Palantir (and others) create inconsistencies. Granted, none of this will be fixed while the orange king is having his daily rage-fits, but sooner or later this is an inter-generational problem, no matter which puppet is taking over.

waffletower

The company also chose to name itself after a fantasy scrying device corrupted by evil. There might be an ounce of self-fulfilling prophecy here.

swader999

Thought it was an onion article at first glance.

rconti

Weird. I worked near a Palantir office in 2017 and I remember thinking it would be "morally challenging" to work there. 9 years later, it's just becoming apparent?

hd4

It was always really obvious but that recent full-throated-fascist manifesto has left no doubt. One thing Palantir have going for them is this deranged movie-villain-style transparency about their intentions, they don't even care about hiding it.

Insanity

'no shit sherlock' comes to mind.

jmyeet

When your product is used by a military occupation to target and kill civilians and their families [1][2], it's kind of shocking that there's any doubt. But as Upton Sinclair said: > “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” I would go further and argue that Palantir employees are just as valid military targets as occupation soldiers are. [1]: https://www.business-humanrights.org/es/%C3%BAltimas-noticia... [2]: https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/

BugsJustFindMe

Only "starting" to wonder does not speak well of Palantir employees.