HACKER Q&A
📣 andreygrehov

What are some gray area industries you know?


Examples of what I mean by gray area industries:

  - Programmatic advertising with its privacy issues

  - Cryptocurrencies with its KYC issues
What else?


  👤 hemlokc Accepted Answer ✓
I was a developer at a blockchain company based out of Seattle Washington. We did an ICO (still unsure if it was legal), we built cool shit, I left for a better job offer, learned a lot about blockchain development, dapp architecture, solidity coding, erc token standards, and the legal spaghetti that crypto companies inevitably find themselves in if they are based in the U.S.

👤 bediger4000
I always wonder about the places that pay for scrap light metals, open to the public. This seems like an industry that has to deal with a lot of sketchier people, that drive up in a pickup full of materials whose provenance is impossible to determine. I'm certain that recycling is legal, I just wonder how much the recyclers have to ignore from their suppliers.

👤 jolmg
Web search? Because it requires scraping websites and redistributing their content in the form of text excerpts and images on search result pages. I mean, isn't that technically against copyright?

👤 TheAdamAndChe
Payday loans, the vaping industry, poultry and cattle farming, pharmaceuticals, electronics manufacturing... I could keep going, but most industries have rough spots somewhere along the chain.

👤 yasp
weed industry, ignoring federal law