Reflections on Palantir

1. As per usual, the things that make palantir well known not even close to being the most dubious things.

2. I agree that the rank and file of palantir is no different from typical sv talent.

3. The services -> product transition was cool, I didn't weigh it as much as should've, but I did purchase fomo insurance after they ipo'd

4. The shadow hierarchy was so bad, it's impossible to figure out who you actually needed to talk to.

Edit: aha, found. https://doctorow.medium.com/how-palantir-will-steal-the-nhs-...

"Palantir is one of the most sinister companies on the global stage, a company whose pitch is to sell humans rights abuses as a service. The customers for this turnkey service include America’s most corrupt police departments, who use Palantir’s products to monitor protest movements.

Palantir’s clients also include the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, a federal agency who rely on Palantir’s products for their ethnic cleansing..."

I don't think you have to look that far back to find fairly convincing arguments that the US is the architect of much of its own immigration "problems." Most illegal immigrants come to the US from Latin American countries that the US spent a lot of time interfering with in very recent history.

Consider Guatemala. Democratically elected president overthrown with CIA support in 1954 so that US fruit companies could keep up their profits by exploiting people. The 1950s weren't that long ago.

Consider El Salvador. During their recent (ended: 1992) civil war the US funded the right-wing government that according to the UN committed 85% of atrocities during the war. The US government then refused to grant asylum and legal protections to refugees, which contributed heavily to MS13 forming in LA. The US then deported many of these gang members back to El Salvador, which did a huge amount of damage to their development after the war.

Wrt Mexico's gangs, most of the demand for their products come from US customers.

Wrt Venezuela, whether the sanctions are right or wrong there's no doubt that they're hurting people there economically.

Given what the US has done to these countries (and others) in living memory, I don't think we have much of a moral right to turn these people away. I've also never had a single negative experience (and many positive ones) with immigrants from these countries (I live in an area with many of them), nor am I convinced that they're even an economic drag on the country.