Comment by herodoturtle
16 hours ago
> What does “take full responsibility” mean in the present context?
Aside from Pete's reply (see adjacent comment), I'd add that him taking full responsibility is also his way of saying his post was nobody else's fault but his.
In other words it's less about forfeiting assets and descendant peonage, and more about saying "the buck stops with me".
At least that's my read of his sentiment. Pete can expand if need be.
“Nobody else’s fault but mine” is a perfectly good way of asserting “nobody else’s fault but mine”; “I take full responsibility” is something else entirely and the two are not synonymous. Hyperbole needs to be radically discounted.
Would "I take sole responsibility" work better for you?
No. He is not solely responsible. A sequence of bugs introduced by developers created a hole. Information about how to deal with this calamity was not privy to him. He is not “solely responsible”. He merely reacted (publicly) to information that he was not beholden to maintain secret about things others had done inadvertently in the past. He’s not alone. He does not bear that “sole responsibility”. He acted within the UK’s freedom of speech doctrine (IANAL). He need not place this burden upon himself.
I know nothing of who Pete is or his associations, so any accuracy on the following speculation is purely coincidental.
"Take full responsibility" is also something someone set up as a scapegoat might say. By claiming nobody else influenced, coerced, or otherwise convinced them to make that statement, every/any one else involved can then wash their hands of the situation.
I'm merely playing devil's advocate here, and it's just a sign of the times that a person making an honest admission can be interpreted in such a manner.
[Devil's advocate noted.]
I'm not a scapegoat. Aside from a few brusque messages and a few people from my past finding me on LinkedIn, I've heard nothing from anyone.
I've seen my HN username mentioned on various outlets, and That Post© has been linked from a Wikipedia article, so I can chalk this up to experience. My fear (?) is that HN would get a reputational clobbering from me 'leaking', but given the other moving parts in this whole event I probably shouldn't be too concerned.
It's been a while since I've been involved in an international event, I'm a bit rusty on it!
To be honest, your accounting of the situation reminds me of a scene from the West Wing where the press secretary lets slip info about a grand jury but then spins herself up realizing grand juries are meant to be secret and leaking that info could have consequences. After an entire episode of a tv show where she's not been able to sleep, she finds out that because someone else told her about the information, she's not liable for leaking it. Hopefully, you'll similarly be able to get some sleep now that you know the world isn't going to come crashing down on you.
You did as good as you could with the information available to you. You don’t need to “take full responsibility”.
>At least that's my read of his sentiment. Pete can expand if need be.
That's about it.