wow just wow while i can’t say i didn’t see this one coming but it always amazes me where greed could lead someone

  • 🍹Early to RISA 🧉@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    1 year ago

    Not the main point, but this is the first time I’ve seen “allowlisted”. Lol

    …are they trying to avoid saying whitelisted because of the word “white”?

    • Andreas@feddit.dk
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Yes, it started from this terminology change at Twitter in 2020. They’re the reason that version control systems call the primary branch ‘main’ instead of ‘master’ by default, because ‘master’ comes from the master/slave terminology that is used in electronics hardware design.

      There’s a comment here saying that master/slave in hardware design is being replaced by primary/secondary because of the software trend, which I think is stupid. Master/slave works much better in that context because the master device controls the slave device. Primary/secondary implies that the slave device is a fallback of the master device.

      • 𝒍𝒆𝒎𝒂𝒏𝒏@lemmy.one
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        A lot of companies seem to be doing this, personally I think trying to make a connection between race and tech is a bit far fetched. Nobody thinks of race when talking about whitelists and blacklists…

        In public repos where these changes are merged in to FOSS projects, they get little resistance too - although I could see concern of a potential backlash if anyone questioned the alleged benefit of such a change.

        Imagine if this approach was taken with the (now outdated) IDE interface? Instead of “Primary Master, Primary Slave, Secondary Master, Secondary Slave”, there’d maybe be “Primary Primary, Primary Secondary, Secondary Primary, Secondary Secondary” 😵‍

      • static@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        The best reasoning I saw for this change was for clarity for non native English speakers. If you’re learning the language “allowlist” is definitely more clear in meaning than “whitelist”

    • clehaxze@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      1 year ago

      Just like “master” in git. WTH is wrong with it. I feed “master” as “the master of kung-fu” is much better then “main”.

      • sping@lemmy.sdf.org
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        I do think dropping master is absurd, since it in no way implies slavery or any such thing. master mostly has uses that are entirely inoffensive, unless post-graduate degrees are racist, for example.

        But I do think there is some merit in moving off the idea of white is good and black is bad. There are some good arguments that we shouldn’t bestow magic powers upon words, but there is also a lot of merit in the idea that these words affect our perception in negative ways and there is really nothing lost by shifting to equally good alternatives.

        • Kir@feddit.it
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          The idea of “black list” has nothing to do with black people, to my understending

          • sping@lemmy.sdf.org
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            0
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            1 year ago

            That’s not the issue. The issue is inherently seeing white as meaning good and black as meaning bad.

            • Kir@feddit.it
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              1
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              1 year ago

              This has absolutely nothing to do with racial features.