2 pointsby nativeit8 hours ago2 comments

arter457 hours ago
Well at least Anduril refers to a sword used by the “good guys” so, industrialization aside, it is a somewhat reasonable name for a US defense company.
Palantir really doesn’t make sense. It’s like developing a bulletproof vest and naming it Horcrux… sure, in the HP world a Horcrux does protect you from death, but it is very associated to evil, so no one who is really fan of the saga would choose that name, especially for a publicly known product.
Then again maybe they just asked an LLM “I have a surveillance solution. I want to name it after a fantasy concept. Any ideas?”
halperter8 hours ago
Either they are
a) buffoons who have surface level comprehesion of LoTR,
b) impulsively decided on a famous fantasy name for their tech (surprisingly common), or
c) playing up the "morally ambiguous" trope. Palantir serves evil as a service to whoever is willing to pay (USFG).
My money is on c.
- ben_w6 hours ago
  Probably all three, at a minimum (c): there's a rumour going around (that I can't source) the people working there are very happy every time the press calls them "bond villains" because it correlates with the stock price going up.
  Thiel's associate Musk has been accused of (a) with regard to Iain M Banks' Culture series.
- stop507 hours ago
  my gues would be a+b+c