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Lot's of people seem to think so. Masterpiece Cake shop was a supreme court decision around, essentially, that question, that upheld the right for the private entity to discriminate.

So yes I think everyone would agree you have some responsibility (otherwise no one would care about the outcome of the case, why request the right to discriminate if you don't feel that you have any responsibility for the resulting acts?)




It was more specific than that: a cake shop participates directly in the creative effort with the client in the way a software service provider does not.


Software service providers certainly do implement features requested directly by clients.


Features, yes. Are those features directly connected to those clients' work, or is it a more general feature that has to do with the execution of the service?

I will agree that it's dubious that that nuance is reflected in the rulings on the Masterpiece case. I'm trying to follow the same lines set there, though, in my argumentation.


> Are those features directly connected to those clients' work

How can they not be?


Let me rephrase to see if it answers your question:

Would the added features be useful in another context? Would they be useful regardless of the type of work being done? Are they merely enhancements of the platform, or are they specifically tailored to the client's domain?


FWIW, in my work I've seen both. But I'm sort of asking things at a higher level. If a client is asking you to prioritize a generic enhancement over others, they are presumably doing so because they believe that generic enhancement will have the greatest value to their work.

So if ICE asks github to prioritize better native CI support for Windows, or something, they're doing it because it is of maximum benefit to ICE.


It is still debatable how much this has to do with the matter at hand. It is completely possible that github only utility is to process applications faster so that people will stay detained for shorter times. Or that it serves a completely unrelated purpose that has no influence on the issue.


This seems like a difference between like Palantir working on specific projects for ICE (I made this up) vs Github providing a platform that ICE uses.

IMO the former is more objectionable than the latter.


If the client is large enough, it does. Same as with a cake shop. Someone buying a slice of cake doesn't participate as someone asking for the design of a cake at a much higher cost.




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