A company that profits from violence and war really can't be expected to be terribly trustworthy.
Their business does not center around tracking down terrorists. They do all things "Big Data". That includes finance and tracking the source of E-Coli outbreaks. The problem is that people like yourself know nothing about the company, yet still feel qualified to condemn them.
That's great, but it's more likely a publicity play than a notable source of revenue.
"Early investments came in the form of $2 million from the CIA's venture arm In-Q-Tel." They've been catering to the defense industry from the beginning. That's not inherently bad, and there's no reason to skirt around the issue.
One of Palantir's cofounders was recently interviewed (http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=3052). He reminisced about pitching the product to two defense industry suits who actually high-fived each other at the end of his presentation. That was when he knew he had made it.
> Their business does not center around tracking down terrorists. They do all things "Big Data".
The company is a defense contractor. Yes, they've successfully commercialized their technology for law enforcement, bank fraud detection, disaster recovery, and whatnot, but you'd be silly to think that intelligence (and "tracking down terrorists") is not central to their business. They were funded by the CIA's VC firm.
Well just to cut the apple in two pieces. Maybe for this point it's the fault of Palantir. Their business is in the finance, government with secret projects, and others B2B areas that are far away of any american's ear. For this reason they didn't manage their public image, and now you have this exploding in their hands... So at the end, they deserve what they get.
As far as the company's contracts with the government are concerned, yes, those should be totally transparent. Otherwise it is stupidly easy for the government to do an end-run around transparency: just pay a private company to do your dirty tricks for you.
You can't have it both ways. If private companies are going to provide important government services, then those companies must accept a certain measure of public scrutiny and transparency, a much greater measure than an ordinary private company would need to accept.
If the companies don't like it, then they shouldn't bid on government contracts. No one is forcing them to do so. And if you don't think the government should occupy such a large segment of the economy, AWESOME! I'm all for that! I say dismantle the whole military-security-industrial complex!
I remember hearing on the talk radio shows about one former NSA guy saying that to circumvent US laws, they established centers in England and sent all the data over there to be "interpreted" and "analyzed" - LOL! I now hear that Joe Lonsdale, cofounder of Palantir, is now backing Oculus the HMD VR company everyone is excited about. How far do the tentacles of these people like Lonsdale, In Q Tel, and others reach?
Yes they deserve it especially as you said because they made the choice to ignore everyman. And now you have all this story with their name on it, and all the war, government and secrecy effects around that. How people can't be at least frustrated or even more feeling themselves fooled with a total absence of marketing by Palantir?
I am not saying it's like "If you've got nothing to hide, you should tell us what you're doing". I am saying that you have to be able to manage the public image of your company even if it is a private company. Or things like that will happen and it will be hard to restore your reputation over people you ignored.
It's all about the communication, public image, reputation... There are even companies dedicated to do that for you. I don't know for instance they should use the same idea behind their website: a company of high quality dedicated to BigData, and advertise that in every public media with nothing related to war, secrecy or others things... Just a company providing high value products to who you want.
I think GP's point wasn't that their secrecy makes them deserve negative public opinion, rather that a policy of secrecy in general makes it rather difficult to believably deny allegations of questionable behavior -- that secrecy is a double-edged sword.
Also, I don't think it's entirely fair to construct a black-and-white dichotomy between government and private company. Companies working on government contracts are by definition somewhere between the two, so perhaps it's fair to demand transparency somewhere in between? I don't know where to draw those lines, I'm just trying to point out that there isn't, logically, much room for absolute arguments about private vs public on this particular topic.
"Our products are built for real analysis with a focus on security, scalability, ease of use and collaboration. They are broadly deployed in the intelligence, defense, law enforcement and financial communities, and are spreading rapidly by word of mouth into applications in other industries and realms of impact."
2 of the 4 named industries sound like "terrorist hunters" and 3 of the 4 are not generic big data. None of them are e-coli outbreaks.
Palantir is easy to condemn because from their own messaging to third party analysis, every angle you look at them they look like a boilerplate "evil company" on par with Blackwater/XE/whatever they're called now.
Glassbox reviews and interview reviews are absurd and eye opening, tangles with RICO law and unethical business partners seem the norm, and on and on and on. Other than some nice looking tech, they're public image is one of "mercenary nerds for hire".
