I don’t know the specifics of this case, but in Canada, calls like this (all wrapped up in the flag), usually come from Canadian companies hoping for some sort of sole sourced contract that they have no business getting.
So so perhaps we should be excluding American companies at this time, but in the name of competition and openness, we should allow bids from our real allies, such as the Europeans or the Asians.
"America or not" is a red herring. Palantir is the specific problem.
The kind of people running these companies don't have true allegiance to anything but their own objectives. If necessary, they'd move all operations to Europe or East Asia in a month, and you'd have "Palantir 2" under a different name with no better ethics or privacy.
Increased emphasis has to be on running things domestically with on-premises hardware. As long as the vendor is elsewhere and not subject to oversight, the risks remain.
It's pretty obvious this comment didn't come from a Canadian. Because if it was, you'd know that Palantir is elbow-deep in the Trump administration, the same one that has repeatedly threatened to annex Canada. That is not a threat to be taken lightly, and the Canadian public agrees, which is why the trump-opposing Liberal party is currently enjoying a parliamentary majority. A more relevant question would be "Why would anyone with Canada's interests in mind even consider Palantir in the first place?"
> Palantir is elbow-deep in the Trump administration, the same one that has repeatedly threatened to annex Canada. That is not a threat to be taken lightly, and the Canadian public agrees
Are they making any preparations for war, at all, that they weren't also doing in 2021?
Better yet, build a domestic product for government use and tightly regulate and oversee it so that you can be sure it's being used lawfully, only when needed for government use, and only when necessary. Democratic nations have power over their government but not over corporations. I know which one I'd rather have ruling over me and spying on my every move.
> ... build a domestic product for government use and tightly regulate and oversee it ...
Government to tightly regulate and oversee itself, I perceive.
> Democratic nations have power over their government but not over corporations.
Democratic governments and corporations have been around about as many centuries, and both have long ago perfected techniques to make sure the people have no direct power over either of them, often in tandem. That said, it seems remarkable that you're less anxious about the partner in this age-old dance that has the warplanes and myriads of armed enforcers.
I don't think there's a government in the world, including the US, that should allow Palantir anywhere near their data or systems. I consider Palantir a national security threat. I also feel this way about McKinsey (and Bain, BCG, etc).
I also think any form of platform AI usage to be a national security threat in the absence of stringent controls over that data and the platform. At some point I think governments and companies will wake up to this and demand local LLMs or, in the very least, a cloud platform within their jurisdiction, ownership and control.
The 1980s and 1990s ushered in this idea of "small government", privatization and public-private partnerships that I think was a huge mistake with catastrophic consequences. It's simply letting the foxes into the hen house. It leads to regulatory capture, a revolving door and a massive government-to-private wealth transfer.
What's funny is that a lot of this stems from a now throughly debunked idea of the "tragedy of the commons" [1].
I mean no public strategy should include secret bills, Palantir or no Palantir.
If you're idealogically opposed to Palantir, how will a home-grown Palantir help? It would likely do the same things Palantir does but with a Canadian Alex Karp
Well there's a clear difference between a creepy company spying on you and a creepy company closely aligned with a government that has threatened to annex you spying on you.
The sovereign initiative in Canada is laughable, most if not all critical infrastructure are 100% relying on US cloud products, from the usuals like MS and google all the way to cybersecurity and other products, and we are not even talking about supply chains and the likes. So practically speaking, the US can in a click, turn off Canada’s grid and banking, in minutes without a single bullet, the country will collapse. That’s why whenever I see all that buzz words of “sovereign xyz” I know it’s a just a way to funnel tax money back to some companies or programs, without having so much questions about it.
There’re no steps taken, when I brought it to different managers in both utilities and banking, they laughed and some even rolled their eyes, because everything (and I mean everything from operations to hr to all) is built on top of these products, no way to rebuild the multi billions company from scratch and train the employees on a whole new systems only to find out they are not reliable or at least not how they used to do their work.
For example in some power utility companies, to install few auxiliary sensors to monitor xyz only in a pilot project is a 3 years work.. upgrading old 3G modems is done in stages over years just not to interrupt the operations, and all of these are terminal devices, not core or servers where a tiny mistake in that foundation migration will send the city into dark ages.
You can throw a rock and hit another company (for example, HR/Payroll companies), these aren't exactly industry secrets that can’t be swapped out. Half of the IT depts current existence is replacing systems software just because “hip new thing”.
Canada and domestic product simply not possible
The only two countries who can run domestic products of this kind are USA and China . The rest is just gimmick or a lie.
Palantir's software stack is not really that complex, and their FDE workforce is famously... undereducated. Canada should be able to pull it off, there's much to improve on.
If that's true then why hasn't Canada managed to produce a credible competitor already? What are they missing? Will the opportunity to win domestic government contracts change that situation or are there other obstacles?
You overestimate the willingness of Canadian software engineer employers to pay anything beyond peanuts.
Any competent developer already immediately flees to the US to triple their take-home pay at first chance and Canadian employers are fully aware of this.
I don’t know the specifics of this case, but in Canada, calls like this (all wrapped up in the flag), usually come from Canadian companies hoping for some sort of sole sourced contract that they have no business getting.
So so perhaps we should be excluding American companies at this time, but in the name of competition and openness, we should allow bids from our real allies, such as the Europeans or the Asians.
"America or not" is a red herring. Palantir is the specific problem.
The kind of people running these companies don't have true allegiance to anything but their own objectives. If necessary, they'd move all operations to Europe or East Asia in a month, and you'd have "Palantir 2" under a different name with no better ethics or privacy.
Increased emphasis has to be on running things domestically with on-premises hardware. As long as the vendor is elsewhere and not subject to oversight, the risks remain.
Excluding China, I hope.
Canada shouldn't include Palantir at all.
Why not?
They’re a technoauthoritarian think tank masquerading as an enterprise software firm.
https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/palantir-posted-a-manifest...
https://www.newsweek.com/us-draft-update-major-tech-company-...
It’s a shit company with a shit “product” run by shitty people aligned against Canadian sovereignty.
Was this a serious question, or just boring contrarianism?
It's pretty obvious this comment didn't come from a Canadian. Because if it was, you'd know that Palantir is elbow-deep in the Trump administration, the same one that has repeatedly threatened to annex Canada. That is not a threat to be taken lightly, and the Canadian public agrees, which is why the trump-opposing Liberal party is currently enjoying a parliamentary majority. A more relevant question would be "Why would anyone with Canada's interests in mind even consider Palantir in the first place?"
> Palantir is elbow-deep in the Trump administration, the same one that has repeatedly threatened to annex Canada. That is not a threat to be taken lightly, and the Canadian public agrees
Are they making any preparations for war, at all, that they weren't also doing in 2021?
Instead, buy domestic product, and out in the open.
Better yet, build a domestic product for government use and tightly regulate and oversee it so that you can be sure it's being used lawfully, only when needed for government use, and only when necessary. Democratic nations have power over their government but not over corporations. I know which one I'd rather have ruling over me and spying on my every move.
> ... build a domestic product for government use and tightly regulate and oversee it ...
Government to tightly regulate and oversee itself, I perceive.
> Democratic nations have power over their government but not over corporations.
Democratic governments and corporations have been around about as many centuries, and both have long ago perfected techniques to make sure the people have no direct power over either of them, often in tandem. That said, it seems remarkable that you're less anxious about the partner in this age-old dance that has the warplanes and myriads of armed enforcers.
What a title. I misread and thought an "AI Vigier" was an official tasked with being vigilant about AI.
I don't think there's a government in the world, including the US, that should allow Palantir anywhere near their data or systems. I consider Palantir a national security threat. I also feel this way about McKinsey (and Bain, BCG, etc).
I also think any form of platform AI usage to be a national security threat in the absence of stringent controls over that data and the platform. At some point I think governments and companies will wake up to this and demand local LLMs or, in the very least, a cloud platform within their jurisdiction, ownership and control.
The 1980s and 1990s ushered in this idea of "small government", privatization and public-private partnerships that I think was a huge mistake with catastrophic consequences. It's simply letting the foxes into the hen house. It leads to regulatory capture, a revolving door and a massive government-to-private wealth transfer.
What's funny is that a lot of this stems from a now throughly debunked idea of the "tragedy of the commons" [1].
[1]: https://www.usnews.com/opinion/economic-intelligence/2015/03...
I mean no public strategy should include secret bills, Palantir or no Palantir.
If you're idealogically opposed to Palantir, how will a home-grown Palantir help? It would likely do the same things Palantir does but with a Canadian Alex Karp
Well there's a clear difference between a creepy company spying on you and a creepy company closely aligned with a government that has threatened to annex you spying on you.
Neither are great, but one is worse.
The sovereign initiative in Canada is laughable, most if not all critical infrastructure are 100% relying on US cloud products, from the usuals like MS and google all the way to cybersecurity and other products, and we are not even talking about supply chains and the likes. So practically speaking, the US can in a click, turn off Canada’s grid and banking, in minutes without a single bullet, the country will collapse. That’s why whenever I see all that buzz words of “sovereign xyz” I know it’s a just a way to funnel tax money back to some companies or programs, without having so much questions about it.
Step by step we need to de-Americanize, for sure. Can’t just happen overnight.
There’re no steps taken, when I brought it to different managers in both utilities and banking, they laughed and some even rolled their eyes, because everything (and I mean everything from operations to hr to all) is built on top of these products, no way to rebuild the multi billions company from scratch and train the employees on a whole new systems only to find out they are not reliable or at least not how they used to do their work.
For example in some power utility companies, to install few auxiliary sensors to monitor xyz only in a pilot project is a 3 years work.. upgrading old 3G modems is done in stages over years just not to interrupt the operations, and all of these are terminal devices, not core or servers where a tiny mistake in that foundation migration will send the city into dark ages.
You can throw a rock and hit another company (for example, HR/Payroll companies), these aren't exactly industry secrets that can’t be swapped out. Half of the IT depts current existence is replacing systems software just because “hip new thing”.
Canada and Europe call for banning American companies in their the name of sovereignty: upvoted and praised as necessary
America tries that for valid reasons (unfair subsidies, human or labor rights violations, BYD): get called fascist or stupid
Canada and domestic product simply not possible The only two countries who can run domestic products of this kind are USA and China . The rest is just gimmick or a lie.
Palantir's software stack is not really that complex, and their FDE workforce is famously... undereducated. Canada should be able to pull it off, there's much to improve on.
If that's true then why hasn't Canada managed to produce a credible competitor already? What are they missing? Will the opportunity to win domestic government contracts change that situation or are there other obstacles?
Canada do have an ai company Cohere that has potential to be big. Personally I do think they are one of the credible competitors.
You overestimate the willingness of Canadian software engineer employers to pay anything beyond peanuts.
Any competent developer already immediately flees to the US to triple their take-home pay at first chance and Canadian employers are fully aware of this.