00:00:14.920
Oh.
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And the day is coming to an end, but we're going to go out with a bang. This is one of my favorite speakers ever. All her talks are just short of amazing, if not more than that.
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Let's all welcome Coraline who is with us.
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Welcome, Carolyn! Hi there, it’s very wonderful to be here, and thank you for such a wonderful introduction. It’s the minimum I can do. All of your talks are always mind-blowing and eye-opening.
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You talk about the most epic topics ever. We’re here to make a dent in the world with our work, and that’s what we all aspire to do.
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If we can do it in a way that is inclusive, thoughtful, and makes a big impact in the world, that’s even better.
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Right? That’s my job! Thank you for being with us today.
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I don’t think I need to really introduce you because you are one of the most noteworthy people in our community.
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The topic you are talking about today has been debated quite a bit in the open-source software community, but we haven’t yet come to a way to get out of the debate and move more into action.
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Point being, open source is ubiquitous today. Twenty years ago, when we started talking about it, we had no idea how far it could come. Right now, it’s everywhere. And unfortunately, this means it’s also in places where we as contributors wouldn’t really like it to be.
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We’re talking about seriously big issues like mass surveillance, anti-immigrant policies, and weapon production and sales.
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Most of us out there are not particularly keen to see our work being used in those areas. What can we actively do to change that? And that’s why you’re here today, to discuss this.
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Thank you again for being here. For those of you who don’t know, my name is Coraline Ada Ehmke, and I’m a big-time troublemaker. In the early 2010s, I advocated for codes of conduct at tech conferences.
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Believe it or not, that was once incredibly controversial. I am also the creator of the Contributor Covenant, the first and most popular open-source code of conduct.
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The Ruby community honored me with the Ruby Hero award in 2016. A few years ago, I spoke at the United Nations Forum on Business and Human Rights.
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I am most recently the author of the Hippocratic License, which is an ethical open-source license based on the U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights. I’m also the founder of the Organization for Ethical Source.
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In the 1960s, amidst growing tensions between the U.S. and the Soviet Union, a computer scientist published a short piece he called 'The Parable of the Locksmith.' This is my retelling.
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One day, a mysterious stranger walked into a locksmith shop and presented a proposition. He said, 'I have a job for someone with your specialized skills. I’ve done my research, and you’re one of the smartest locksmiths in town.'
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The locksmith felt flattered and intrigued. The stranger continued, 'I want to hire you to open a safe. Never mind whose safe it is. Just do the job I ask of you, and I will make you rich beyond your wildest dreams.'
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Excited at the proposition, the locksmith felt nervous about not knowing who owned the safe. The stranger added that there were other conditions: he would blindfold the locksmith and take away his phone before leading him to the safe location.
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The locksmith found this odd, but he thought of the wealth he could gain. He struggled all his life and had never felt fairly rewarded for his hard work. He was told he could use the best tools for this job.
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Despite his hesitation, he realized that if he didn’t take the job, the stranger would simply go to another locksmith. The next day, when the stranger returned, the locksmith agreed to take the job.
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After multiple blindfolded trips to and from the unknown location, the locksmith finally cracked the safe. He wasn’t allowed to see what was inside the safe, but as soon as the lock clicked, the stranger blindfolded him again.
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True to his word, the stranger made the locksmith very rich. We’ll come back to this parable and find out what happened when the safe was opened shortly.
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First, I need to tell you another story. This is an HP LaserJet, one of the first laser printers on the market, released in 1983.
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At that time, a man named Richard Stallman was working in an AI lab at Xerox. The lab had one of these printers, but the problem was that it constantly jammed. The lab had time-sharing software for its resources, including the printer.
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You had to schedule time to use the printer, and if you set aside 30 minutes and it jammed just three minutes in, of course you would be upset. Stallman and his co-workers decided to update the printer driver.
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They aimed for it to report jams back to the time-sharing software, allowing users to be notified. However, he discovered that the software was proprietary, and HP wouldn’t share the source code.
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Stallman learned that a colleague at MIT had the source code, but had signed a non-disclosure agreement and couldn’t share it. Stallman became really angry, which not only pertained to the printer but also highlighted a broader shift toward proprietary software.
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This incident led to the creation of the free software movement and later the open-source movement.
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In the mid to late 90s, when the world first discovered the internet, free and open-source software became popular for web servers. Technologies like the Apache web server and the LAMP stack were based on open-source.
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Christina Peterson coined the term 'open source' in 1998, and that same year, Bruce Perens created the Open Source Definition. Nine months later, the Open Source Initiative was founded to promote open-source software.
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Over the past 20 years, the open-source community has thrived and greatly changed the technology landscape.
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But the world has also changed significantly in the past two decades. Globally, we’re witnessing technology being used to commit human rights violations, and the technology enabling these abuses includes free and open-source software.
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Today, open-source software is playing a critical role in mass surveillance, anti-immigrant violence, protester suppression, racially biased policing, and the development of cruel and inhumane weapons.
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Open-source complicity is not a bug; it’s a feature by design. The Open Source Definition allows for software to be used for any purpose, including explicitly for evil purposes.
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They argue that giving everyone freedom means giving evil people freedom too. This makes no sense to me. Under what other circumstances in human society do we grant complete freedom to evil people to do evil things?
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There’s increased debate and discussion among open-source developers about our ethical responsibilities as creators. The debates are heated, and the media has been paying attention. The fundamental question seems to be whether we are responsible for how the technologies we develop are used.
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Many of us are beginning to accept that our work in open source might contribute to human rights violations and other atrocities. We are horrified by these developments, and we feel powerless, wanting to do what is right.
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The conversation around ethics and technology is not new; it has been happening since before software even existed. I want to introduce you to Edmund Berkeley, one of the most important pioneers of ethics in computer science.
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He worked with computers during World War II, side by side with Grace Hopper, and published the world's first computer magazine. He was among the first people to propose personal computers.
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Berkeley co-founded the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) at Columbia University in 1947. Their charter is to foster open interchange of information and promote the highest professional and ethical standards.
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Berkeley settled on a committee for the social responsibility of computer scientists, which published a historic report in 1958 on the ethical obligations of computer scientists.
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The report’s findings boiled down into four simple statements: first, we cannot rightly ignore our social responsibilities; second, our social responsibilities can’t be delegated to others.
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Third, we cannot neglect to think about how our special roles can benefit or harm society. Finally, we cannot avoid deciding between conflicting responsibilities. We must think about how to choose.
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The report said that those of us in the computing profession hold a heavier than average share of responsibility due to the power we wield. Given the power and potential of computers, ethical considerations are paramount.
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Berkeley wrote the parable of the locksmith during the height of the Cold War. A month later, the retired locksmith saw a news headline about the theft of top-secret military schematics.
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Soon after that, the mysterious stranger appeared on the world stage, declaring himself master of all nations, backed by the threat of a devastating stolen super-weapon.
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Berkeley asked if the locksmith did what was right, and contended that the locksmith had the responsibility to determine whether the stranger was a criminal before accepting the job.
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No, the locksmith did not do what was right. Berkeley argued that computer scientists do not have the right to ignore their responsibilities, just as the locksmith does not.
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He called for his colleagues to shoulder their social responsibilities, but he was largely ignored.
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Fast forward about four decades to 1972, during the Vietnam War. Berkeley was invited to address the Association of Computing Machinery at a special dinner for their 25th anniversary.
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His colleague Franz Alt gave a celebratory retrospective of advances in computer science, but Berkeley took a different tone. He urged those working on unethical uses of computers, including weapons technology, to quit their jobs.
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Many audience members were so upset by his comments that they stood up and walked out. Sadly, Admiral Grace Hopper was among those who left.
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Berkeley concluded his speech, saying it was a gross neglect of responsibility that computer scientists weren’t considering their work for societal benefit or harm.
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Other scientists faced significant ethical dilemmas as well. World War I saw the first large-scale deployment of chemical weapons, which led to international efforts to limit chemical warfare.
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After the horrors of the atomic bomb, scientists sought to eliminate its threat to human civilization. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists became the voice for ethical responsibilities in physics.
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Nazi Germany used technology and services from IBM to identify and destroy Jewish and Roma minorities, leading to claims of IBM's complicity in the Holocaust.
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The computer science community faced its ethical conflicts with the realization of potential complicity in genocide and other atrocities. They walked out, refusing to confront their responsibilities.
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This shirking of responsibility is evident in the open-source world today. Technology companies rely on open-source software to provide services for entities such as ICE in the U.S.
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How would we feel about IBM’s complicity in the Holocaust if their punch card system had been released under the MIT License? This situation is exactly what we face now.
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In 1998, when the Open Source Definition was created, the greatest evil conceivable was Microsoft’s market domination with its operating system. Founding thinkers understood the impact of technology on society but did not frame it ethically.
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In 2021, we face threats that are far larger than browser market domination. We’re in an age where corporations and governments are conducting mass surveillance, suppressing legitimate political protests, and perpetrating state-sanctioned violence.
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In the U.S., ICE has been separating children from their parents at the border for years, placing immigrants and asylum seekers in cages without proper legal assistance or medical care.
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An estimated 40,000 people are currently in ICE custody, with many documented deaths due to gross neglect. U.S. tech companies are collecting billions of dollars in contracts to support this terror.
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What does this have to do with open source? Let’s consider Palantir Technologies, a software company co-founded by Trump advisor Peter Thiel, which collects millions from ICE annually.
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Palantir has over 200 projects hosted on GitHub that rely on thousands of other open-source projects. Every dependency used by ICE in Palantir contributes to human rights violations.
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Palantir explicitly leverages open source to aid in human rights abuses, and it is not alone. In 1999, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced the U.N. Global Compact.
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This initiative encourages businesses worldwide to adopt sustainable and socially responsible policies. It is the world's largest corporate responsibility initiative with 13,000 corporate participants.
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The first section of the compact addresses human rights, stating that businesses should support and respect the protection of internationally proclaimed human rights.
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Businesses must ensure they are not complicit in human rights abuses. Complicity has two definitions: providing services that a company knows will be used to violate human rights, and benefiting from such abuses without direct involvement.
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Many large tech companies have profited from human rights abuses for years. Each time I give this talk, I call on those with the privilege and safety to accept their ethical responsibilities and either organize, change, or quit their jobs.
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This includes tech workers at Amazon, Microsoft, GitHub, Salesforce, Cisco, and many others. Technology companies are profiting from human rights abuses and are complicit.
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Are we going to get up and leave the room again? Are we going to accept responsibility for how our work is being used?
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In 2014, the Ruby community came together to demonstrate their commitment to diversity and inclusion by embracing the Contributor Covenant.
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Today, I’m asking the Ruby community to stand up once more. I don’t expect you to re-license your gems under an ethical license, but I do expect us to come together as a community and reflect on our shared values.
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We need to center those values in every action we take, accepting our responsibilities as technologists and preventing our work from being used to cause harm.
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It’s time for us to go beyond being nice. Frankly, I’m sick of nice. Being nice is meaningless if we’re not equitable; we can’t hide behind nice as a shield.
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We face a far bigger challenge today than merely the threat of proprietary software. Stallman wanted a printer driver; we want to keep our work from being used by fascists.
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That’s what this revolution is about. It’s my hope that the Ruby community will stand up and lead the way, just as we did seven years ago.
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I founded the ethical source movement and the Organization for Ethical Source to empower us as developers, creators, and contributors to take responsibility.
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It’s time to find ways to promote justice and equity in our work, ensuring that our work benefits society and preventing harm caused by the pretense that technology is neutral.
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I hope you’ll join us. Thank you for listening.
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Thank you, Coraline. This was a great call to action for all of us.
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Thank you for being so passionate and speaking out for all of us who often don’t think about the implications of our work.
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Thank you. While we wait for some questions to come in, I do have one from my side.
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Do you feel that ethics in coding, or software engineering, is being addressed outside the open-source community, perhaps in colleges?
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In my experience, we’re actually seeing a lot more interest in this. In fact, over the last six months, many of my new Twitter followers have been from academia. A lot of people have been joining our ethical source working group.
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I lecture at various institutions, such as the Colorado University Center for Democracy and Technology, and tomorrow I’ll speak at Carnegie Mellon’s ethics and policy in computing program.
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People are starting to recognize that computer science as a discipline alone isn’t enough to prepare someone for their role in the industry and their responsibilities.
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We’re seeing more programs combining social sciences with computer science to understand the impact of technology on society and hopefully produce better outcomes.
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I’m very hopeful that people are talking about these issues and working on solutions.
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If we want to educate ourselves more, can you recommend any sources or influential figures to follow?
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We have many resources on our website, ethicalsource.dev. There’s background reading, talk recordings, and an ethics in open-source podcast in collaboration with Sustain OSS.
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If someone is interested in joining us in this work, there’s also a form on the website.
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What prompted you to launch this initiative?
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It connects with the work I’ve been doing for the past 10 years. The biggest change in open source in the early 2010s was not just adopting codes of conduct.
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These codes represent a shift in focus towards community building beyond appealing to corporations.
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People began to examine not just the outcomes of open source but the practices surrounding it: how we treat each other, for whom we design, and preventing negative outcomes.
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We need to design for accessibility as a human right, and respecting privacy protections is part of this process.
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Accessibility was heavily discussed in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but it's less present in today's designs.
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We created ethical source principles to highlight accessibility as one of our seven ethical principles. Accessibility is a human right that we should focus on.
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We often build web applications with our own experiences in mind, ignoring those who might be left behind.
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It's vital that we think about how the software we create impacts those who don't actively use it, meaning it should be about society as a whole.
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I'm concerned because my team is starting to work on a community-oriented part of our application, yet conversations often lack focus on risks and misuse.
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It’s difficult to communicate these risks to people who haven’t faced similar problems; it’s more ignorance than malice.
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Coraline, first of all, I’m sorry for mispronouncing your name during the introduction.
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Thank you so much for being with us today and for being a light bearer in confronting difficult topics. These issues are part of being human.
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Thank you for the opportunity today; I really appreciate it.
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I've missed the Ruby community over the past year. I'm so happy to be here with everyone.
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We hope to see you in person next year.
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Goodbye!
