11 ms·

1000+ Nokia workers have walked out in protest (in English via Google Translate)

252 points by benwerd 16y ago

majorlazer 16y ago
Well maybe if Symbian wasn't a total piece of shit they wouldn't be shutting it down. Seriously, I owned an N97 for a while and that was the flagship product of Nokia for sometime, the OS is complete shit. Hardware was awesome but the OS was almost as bad as the old Windows Mobile OS.
Kilimanjaro 16y ago
No PR campaign can save Nokia from this well-deserved disaster. Btw, NOK is down 15%
- joelhaasnoot 16y ago
  Not sure this is well-deserved, but it certainly has been a couple of years in the making. Who didn't see this coming? Oh, and there go our tax euros. Symbian has been given EU tax money to develop a "European localized mobile operating system"
  - mayank 16y ago
    In fairness, those tax dollars could be used to "European-localize" WP7 as well.
- shareme 16y ago
  Maybe next they will try Bada?
- pclark 16y ago
  Better than continuing with Symbian and having to lay off all the employees in a few years time.
  - _delirium 16y ago
    The stock market appears to predict otherwise, believing that this move lowers the net present value of the company. Of course, stock markets aren't necessarily accurate prediction markets, but given suitable efficient-market hypotheses they're an approximation of such a thing.
    - pclark 16y ago
      Of course. Nokia is going to take a beating until they have proven they are turning the ship around. The company will be in both public and private turmoil until it either emerges as a turned around company, or a dead one.
    - saturdaysaint 16y ago
      The market could just as easily be registering the fact that new management determined that Nokia's product pipeline was uncompetitive.
    - bvi 16y ago
      The stock market isn't predicting anything. It just believes given the current information and Nokia's decision, $NOK's value deserves to be lower now than what it was prior. It's just a current snapshot - no indication of the company's future whatsoever.
      - stanleydrew 16y ago
        Well technically a company's stock value is supposed to represent the discounted present value of all future profits. So you can interpret a reduction in stock price as an indication that the market expects profits to be lower in the future.
        Groxx 16y ago
        PR scandals do that. They also frequently have little bearing on a company's profits, unless it's sufficiently nasty to warrant significant numbers of boycotters for longer than the average consumer memory is. Stocks are nowhere near that deterministic. When people think others will jump ship, they try to jump first, to lose the least money. When people think others will want buy, they buy first or sell higher, because they can get away with it. There's more games theory than future prediction if you ignore long-term investors, as they make up a microscopic amount of the daily trading and thus the daily prices of stocks.
- notahacker 16y ago
  Hmmm... and RIM is up. I'd be betting on them to be the big losers if Nokia/Microsoft's partnership actually works.
- Kilimanjaro 16y ago
  Wow, they just lost 10B in market cap in the morning. Ten billion dollars!
mise 16y ago
Heh heh, try to back-button yourself out of that page.
- benwerd 16y ago
  Although it works for me, I'd imagine that's a Google Translate issue. Here's the original article URL: http://www.hs.fi/talous/artikkeli/Nokian+ty%C3%B6ntekij%C3%A4t+protestoivat+ulosmarsseilla+Oulussa+pel%C3%A4t%C3%A4%C3%A4n+satojen+ty%C3%B6paikkojen+puolesta/1135263739290 http://www.hs.fi/talous/artikkeli/Nokian+ty%C3%B6ntekij%C3%A...
davidw 16y ago
Whether it was Android, Microsoft, or slowly dying, people working there would be affected, so I'm not sure the choice of Microsoft changes things too much from that point of view. With Android, perhaps they could have kept more people on board to hack on it and customize it, but still, the axe was going to fall. Should be interesting to see how this is handled in Finland. Stock is down, layoffs, and some "arrogant foreigner" in charge would be a recipe for even more change in some places.
- rbanffy 16y ago
  Android could be built/merged with MeeGo. They have the same kernel and all hardware-specific work would be reused. Both userlands could run side by side.
  - zokier 16y ago
    I don't think you realize how different Android and MeeGo (or atleast Maemo) are. They aren't running the same kernel and their userland is completely different. The fact that both have bits of linux inside doesn't really make them alike. It probably would be easier to port Qt for WP7 than integrate Android on top of MeeGo.
    - rbanffy 16y ago
      It cannot be that hard. If Linux, MeeGo and Android kernels diverged too much, maybe it's time to unify them in a way they all can share the maximum amount of code and effort. I agree porting Qt to WP7 shouldn't be much of a problem too, or a much larger one. But I suspect that Nokia's plan may prove hard to follow because it will be very hard to convince people to use WP7 phones.
      - darklajid 16y ago
        That's still missing the point and exactly what _Android_ not did. While MeeGo is quite close to your standard "Linux on the Desktop" (Sorry, was hard to resist), Google suffered from a lot of NIH based design decisions. On the other hand they probably chose the easier route for themselves (instead of solving their problems in a codebase that's outside of their control) by creating things from scratch although "standard" alternatives were available. In short: I'd say it probably _is_ hard and I'd even go so far as to say that MeeGo moving into Android would be pointless. For code and effort sharing maemo/MeeGo was the better stack.
marshray 16y ago
Let's see 1. Hire someone from Microsoft to run the company 2. He says "our platform is burning, we have to do something drastic" which most people interpret as "prepare to come up with a strategy and fight like hell to win". 3. Guess what, he already had something in mind! It was "throw out our current reasonably successful development efforts and become a licensee of Microsoft's failed platform instead". And piss off all our QT-based app developers at the same time. What could possibly go wrong? I seriously wonder if this guy might not end up having to leave and not set foot in Finland (or the EU) again for fear of arrest. I have a feeling some Finland business regulators will be going through his emails with a fine-toothed comb.
- arethuza 16y ago
  "for fear of arrest" Whether you agree with the decision or not, nothing about it sounds in the least bit criminal.
  - rbanffy 16y ago
    It depends on local law and where you are applying it. Elop's action can be interpreted as in breach of his duties towards Nokia shareholders. 15% of Nokia's value evaporated this morning. There are places he could be arrested if there are any hints this value destruction is on purpose.
  - windsurfer 16y ago
    Europe's anti-trust laws are very different from the USA's. I don't know enough about it to be sure, but simply making anti-competative actions such as partnering can be illegal.
    - ianb 16y ago
      Huh, makes me wonder if the alternate platforms they are supporting (MeeGo, two Symbians) are just distractions to help satisfy the political situation (legal or otherwise).
      - 16y ago
taylorbuley 16y ago
Regardless of whether you agree with the CEO's position I think it's pretty childish to walk out on your job.
- darklajid 16y ago
  If you are afraid that this decision means that your job is in danger it's quite okay to show protest in my book. And - they even did it on their own free time (using flexible working time), not 'stealing' paid time for their protest. I like that move a lot.
  - taylorbuley 16y ago
    I apologize for not fully reading the story before I commented. Using your own PTO is quite admirable. I was under the wrong impression.
- marshray 16y ago
  If you think the CEO is leading your company or your job into the trash, there's nothing wrong with taking a vacation day to work on your resume'. You can bet he's working on his on the clock.
- shortlived 16y ago
  I would urge you to read up on the history of labor and unions in the US (or elsewhere). We have a civilized work environment because of strikes. I'm not equating the importance of the Nokia strike with those of the early 20s but, still, they are not "childish".
- rue 16y ago
  For most employees, it's the only recourse.
xbryanx 16y ago
If I understand the garbled translation, the Nokia workers took advantage of extremely flexible work time to stage a coordinated, but totally non-rule-breaking walk out. I've never heard of this sort of half-strike method, but it's interesting. Is this something that is common in Europe or Scandinavian countries where a more flexible work schedule is common?
- dspillett 16y ago
  It has been known to happen in public sector places that work flexitime. If enough people coordinate they can effectively stop business/service for a couple of hours without breaking any hard and fast rules being even bent. There are usually fluffy-wuffy rules regarding reasonableness being broken, but they are so vaguely worded as to be practically unenforceable and anyway no individual can be got by them as they could all make up perfectly plausible reasons to need those particular couple of hours off (as it permitted by their flexitime contract). While not nearly as effective as a day-long strike or other such, it has the advantage of not being covered by certain laws (so a ballot of the union is not required) meaning it can be implemented quickly to send a very visible message if enough people agree strongly enough with the message.
- eli 16y ago
  Workers in the United States sometimes stage "sick outs" where everyone calls in sick on the same day, especially if they're in jobs where they are prohibited by law or contract from striking. Coordinated work slow-downs are another example of a "half-strike"
stcredzero 16y ago
It's exactly this sort of tech expertise revolt that happened at the largest Smalltalk company at the time -- when out of touch management announced the company was going to go the direction of Java/JVM. This is not an indication of mismanagement. This is mismanagement (of employee expectations, culture, and perception) plainly visible in public. Nokia needs to figure this out right now, or they are going to bleed intellectual and technical assets.
- roel_v 16y ago
  In Finland, where are they going to bleed to? What options do the regular (under 80th percentile) Nokia employees have? If a company of that size were to lay off 100's of technical people here in the Netherlands, that'd be a large supply to absorb for the industry, and especially those with 10-15 years of highly specialized skills (antenna design, phone chipset design etc).
  - stcredzero 16y ago
    It doesn't matter if the employees leave for startups or other companies, or if they just don't cooperate wholeheartedly. In either case, resources they used to have access to are lost. Management needs to do something, or they'll bleed intellectual captial. If a company of that size were to lay off 100's of technical people here in the Netherlands, that'd be a large supply to absorb for the industry, and especially those with 10-15 years of highly specialized skills (antenna design, phone chipset design etc). If their jobs were based in something technical and had significant value, they'll be able to find employment elsewhere. This was also true of former employees of the Smalltalk vendor. The thing to remember here, is that your most valuable employees are also the ones that can find new jobs fastest.
    - roel_v 16y ago
      What I meant was, people may not be running so fast if they have no options. Re: the last sentence, yes that's exactly their problem and why I said 'under 80th percentile'. The best employees know the fat days are over and are moving out asap, leaving the hanger-ons to run the place. The rest can't get other employment so will just sit there hoping for a miracle. But yeah, bottom line: Nokia is still screwed.
latch 16y ago
This kind of behavior makes me wish at-will employment was the norm throughout the world. If you aren't happy, quit. Change was clearly needed and change was made. Work hard for your company or find a different place to work that'll make you happier. Everyone thinks they could make better decisions.
- raganwald 16y ago
  This kind of behaviour makes me wish golden parachutes for executives weren't the norm throughout the world. If you can't make money for the company, quit or be fired. Isn't it amazing how "at will" seems to apply to both employees and management, but somehow management's version of "at will" is considerably lower risk than the employees, even though the manager has considerably more influence over their future.
  - ianb 16y ago
    I don't really know the answer, but are golden parachutes really the norm for many executives? We hear about certain extremely-well-connected CEOs of very big companies, but that's hardly a representative sample of executives.
shimi 16y ago
I wonder what was the reaction if Nokia would have decided to adopt Android?
eiji 16y ago
Am I the only one happy that WP7 is NOT dead? I very much prefer a threesome! Every mobil user will benefit from this. And this is not like Desktop. Everybody will have to bring their A-Game.
- access_denied 16y ago
  And that's why it would be even better if Nokia would stick to one of their own OS. Let WP7 survive and compete, sure. But why at the cost of another contender?
- darklajid 16y ago
  I think the reactions are split into camps: 1) "Windows Phone is cool": Think of all the people that like the tech (.Net) or the visuals (Remember the recent "No chrome in the UI" thread). That want this platform to succeed. I guess if you're in this camp the news are great: WP7 gains a very experienced hardware vendor. You can expect a couple of good/decent handsets soonish, pushing WP7 (with a lot of marketing and money) and thereby solving the chicken and egg problem (platform <-> apps) with cash. 2) "I liked Nokias history", "I'm a QT/maemo/MeeGo fan" In this case the news are bad: Nokia changes direction. How much only time will tell, but the company that over the last couple of years slowly started to adopt open source is now going for a closed platform. QT and MeeGo are more or less declassed in the press release (research..? N770, N800, N810.. They did that in the past, the devices were unusable for non-hackers. I know, I own one). In this case you don't care much about WP7, you basically moan about the loss of plans that YOU had for that company/platform. That's what I see alot around now. I understand both points, but the latter seems both easier to understand (I've got a bunch of maemo shirts, the N810 hardware etc..) and at the same time completely irrelevant (Seriously.. While mom and dad might have heard about Windows Mobile and that a new version is coming, who around you cared about MeeGo to succeed?). I'm quite sure this is the death sentence for MeeGo handsets. But we haven't even seen one of those yet. How do we know that we lost something of value? Please - no ideology (while I'd probably be with you, that's not something a company of that size should care about in a self-crisis) based answers about being open etc..
- bayleo 16y ago
  You're not the only one. I am stoked for some nice WP7 handsets. I'm currently an Android user but the new WP7 UI looks gorgeous and Microsoft's response to the Chevron exploit was admirable. It appears that they generally understand the importance of a homebrew ecosystem coexisting with their IP. My career path has me working at or consulting with huge companies who are typically entrenched with Outlook & MS Office and if Microsoft can provide a better integration experience than Android with a piece of hardware that rivals Android handsets I will definitely check them out when it comes time to upgrade. I'm hoping the Nokia alliance works out and starts providing some competitive hardware.
tituomin 16y ago
Human-translated version: http://www.hs.fi/english/article/More+than+1000+Nokia+employees+walk+out+in+Tampere+in+protest+at+Symbian+phase-out/1135263743059 http://www.hs.fi/english/article/More+than+1000+Nokia+employ...
brk 16y ago
If I interpret the page correctly, somewhere between 1000 and 1500 employees at this location ALL worked on the Symbian OS. THAT might have been part of the problem. 1000+ people for a mobile OS? And people wonder why Nokia can't innovate fast enough to keep up with iOS or Android?
beagle3 16y ago
Does this remind anyone else of SGI? - Total domination of their own field - Resting on laurels while others snatch the market from under them - Panic - Get a CEO from Microsoft - CEO quickly decides that the O/S developed in house is not worth maintaining. And that the right O/S is no other than Microsoft's offering - Company continues dive to irrelevance, albeit at a much faster rate than before Well, the last one hasn't happened to Nokia. yet. Goodbye old Nokia. You will be missed.
- marshray 16y ago
  Yeah I was reminded of OpenGL. Haha, at least Nokia isn't claiming that they and Microsoft are going to develop technology "jointly".
  - senko 16y ago
    They are (claiming so). In the press conferences, they stressed that they're going to contribute to WP7 ecosystem (by bringing OVI maps, and their expertise with developing for range hw range, or something along those lines).
    - marshray 16y ago
      Wow they're dumber than I thought then. Or at least they are executing on a plan and think that their employees and investors are dumb.
- protomyth 16y ago
  yep, it is almost and exact match. Don't forget who bought the patents after SGI went http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/01/16/sgi_transfers_3d_graphics_patents/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/01/16/sgi_transfers_3d_gra...
- yuhong 16y ago
  Don't forget Palm too, but they eventually recovered with WebOS, and HP eventually bought them.
- deleted 16y ago
p90x 16y ago
I guess we won't be seeing a RIM, Microsoft merger any time soon then.
yason 16y ago
The end of the last ten years of Nokia's downhill: a quiet disappearance into a puff of irrelevance.
bigB 16y ago
I guess its a ballsy move, but it was much needed. Going with Android would have killed Nokia anyhow as they would be just another face in the already crap filled Android market ( and before anyone shoots me down, for every decent Android handset out there, there are 3 other really crappy ones) Think about it though, what do they have to lose. The company was dying rapidly, There are relatively few WP7 products on the market, so they can stand out in the crowd, Microsoft have absolutely 0 to lose and everything to gain as Nokia may just pull this off. But then again, I actually thought that Paul Thurrot had a good idea when he suggested that Microsoft and Nokia merge. Its not quite a merger but if this move actually works I think a merger is in the future.
fosk 16y ago
Nokia share price has a 15% drop (http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ANOK http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ANOK). Time to speculate?
c0nsilience 16y ago
Turns out Nokia gave those workers the rest of the day off. Journalism fail.
runjake 16y ago
I'll miss Series 40 phones. A basic, no frills dumb phone OS with a UI that made sense. I'll miss the flexibility of Python for Series 60, even though the Series 60 OS was crud.
Flam 16y ago
The Nokia n900 (Maemo) albeit with some flaws, is the greatest phone I will ever own. Allow me to explain. I live in Canada. We get a lot of snow over here. Last winter, I lost my Nokia phone. I remember it was a night we had a huge snowstorm, and I stayed in drinking hot chocolate by the fireplace only to wake up the next day stressing out because I couldn't find my phone. After an hour of searching, I came to terms that I must have lost it in the mall the day before. I end up leaving later that day, and find it on my driveway buried in snow. Snow plows came twice and cleaned my driveway and they must have driven over it with the plow part of the truck. Not only that, it was completely submerged in snow for over 12 hours. I picked it up, brushed off as much snow as I could, and tried using it. It still worked. It didn't even have any scratches (1 minor one). I've owned many phones in my life, and most of them break in the stupidest ways. Nokia is the rambo of phones.
- nagnatron 16y ago
  I like the WP7 UI so I'm looking forward to that combined with Nokia's build quality

252 points by benwerd 16y ago

Well maybe if Symbian wasn't a total piece of shit they wouldn't be shutting it down. Seriously, I owned an N97 for a while and that was the flagship product of Nokia for sometime, the OS is complete shit. Hardware was awesome but the OS was almost as bad as the old Windows Mobile OS.

Kilimanjaro 16y ago

No PR campaign can save Nokia from this well-deserved disaster. Btw, NOK is down 15%

joelhaasnoot 16y ago
Not sure this is well-deserved, but it certainly has been a couple of years in the making. Who didn't see this coming? Oh, and there go our tax euros. Symbian has been given EU tax money to develop a "European localized mobile operating system"
- mayank 16y ago
  In fairness, those tax dollars could be used to "European-localize" WP7 as well.
shareme 16y ago
Maybe next they will try Bada?
pclark 16y ago
Better than continuing with Symbian and having to lay off all the employees in a few years time.
- _delirium 16y ago
  The stock market appears to predict otherwise, believing that this move lowers the net present value of the company. Of course, stock markets aren't necessarily accurate prediction markets, but given suitable efficient-market hypotheses they're an approximation of such a thing.
  - pclark 16y ago
    Of course. Nokia is going to take a beating until they have proven they are turning the ship around. The company will be in both public and private turmoil until it either emerges as a turned around company, or a dead one.
  - saturdaysaint 16y ago
    The market could just as easily be registering the fact that new management determined that Nokia's product pipeline was uncompetitive.
  - bvi 16y ago
    The stock market isn't predicting anything. It just believes given the current information and Nokia's decision, $NOK's value deserves to be lower now than what it was prior. It's just a current snapshot - no indication of the company's future whatsoever.
    - stanleydrew 16y ago
      Well technically a company's stock value is supposed to represent the discounted present value of all future profits. So you can interpret a reduction in stock price as an indication that the market expects profits to be lower in the future.
      - Groxx 16y ago
        PR scandals do that. They also frequently have little bearing on a company's profits, unless it's sufficiently nasty to warrant significant numbers of boycotters for longer than the average consumer memory is. Stocks are nowhere near that deterministic. When people think others will jump ship, they try to jump first, to lose the least money. When people think others will want buy, they buy first or sell higher, because they can get away with it. There's more games theory than future prediction if you ignore long-term investors, as they make up a microscopic amount of the daily trading and thus the daily prices of stocks.
notahacker 16y ago
Hmmm... and RIM is up. I'd be betting on them to be the big losers if Nokia/Microsoft's partnership actually works.
Kilimanjaro 16y ago
Wow, they just lost 10B in market cap in the morning. Ten billion dollars!

mise 16y ago

Heh heh, try to back-button yourself out of that page.

benwerd 16y ago
Although it works for me, I'd imagine that's a Google Translate issue. Here's the original article URL: http://www.hs.fi/talous/artikkeli/Nokian+ty%C3%B6ntekij%C3%A4t+protestoivat+ulosmarsseilla+Oulussa+pel%C3%A4t%C3%A4%C3%A4n+satojen+ty%C3%B6paikkojen+puolesta/1135263739290 http://www.hs.fi/talous/artikkeli/Nokian+ty%C3%B6ntekij%C3%A...

davidw 16y ago

Whether it was Android, Microsoft, or slowly dying, people working there would be affected, so I'm not sure the choice of Microsoft changes things too much from that point of view. With Android, perhaps they could have kept more people on board to hack on it and customize it, but still, the axe was going to fall. Should be interesting to see how this is handled in Finland. Stock is down, layoffs, and some "arrogant foreigner" in charge would be a recipe for even more change in some places.

rbanffy 16y ago
Android could be built/merged with MeeGo. They have the same kernel and all hardware-specific work would be reused. Both userlands could run side by side.
- zokier 16y ago
  I don't think you realize how different Android and MeeGo (or atleast Maemo) are. They aren't running the same kernel and their userland is completely different. The fact that both have bits of linux inside doesn't really make them alike. It probably would be easier to port Qt for WP7 than integrate Android on top of MeeGo.
  - rbanffy 16y ago
    It cannot be that hard. If Linux, MeeGo and Android kernels diverged too much, maybe it's time to unify them in a way they all can share the maximum amount of code and effort. I agree porting Qt to WP7 shouldn't be much of a problem too, or a much larger one. But I suspect that Nokia's plan may prove hard to follow because it will be very hard to convince people to use WP7 phones.
    - darklajid 16y ago
      That's still missing the point and exactly what _Android_ not did. While MeeGo is quite close to your standard "Linux on the Desktop" (Sorry, was hard to resist), Google suffered from a lot of NIH based design decisions. On the other hand they probably chose the easier route for themselves (instead of solving their problems in a codebase that's outside of their control) by creating things from scratch although "standard" alternatives were available. In short: I'd say it probably _is_ hard and I'd even go so far as to say that MeeGo moving into Android would be pointless. For code and effort sharing maemo/MeeGo was the better stack.

marshray 16y ago

Let's see 1. Hire someone from Microsoft to run the company 2. He says "our platform is burning, we have to do something drastic" which most people interpret as "prepare to come up with a strategy and fight like hell to win". 3. Guess what, he already had something in mind! It was "throw out our current reasonably successful development efforts and become a licensee of Microsoft's failed platform instead". And piss off all our QT-based app developers at the same time. What could possibly go wrong? I seriously wonder if this guy might not end up having to leave and not set foot in Finland (or the EU) again for fear of arrest. I have a feeling some Finland business regulators will be going through his emails with a fine-toothed comb.

arethuza 16y ago
"for fear of arrest" Whether you agree with the decision or not, nothing about it sounds in the least bit criminal.
- rbanffy 16y ago
  It depends on local law and where you are applying it. Elop's action can be interpreted as in breach of his duties towards Nokia shareholders. 15% of Nokia's value evaporated this morning. There are places he could be arrested if there are any hints this value destruction is on purpose.
- windsurfer 16y ago
  Europe's anti-trust laws are very different from the USA's. I don't know enough about it to be sure, but simply making anti-competative actions such as partnering can be illegal.
  - ianb 16y ago
    Huh, makes me wonder if the alternate platforms they are supporting (MeeGo, two Symbians) are just distractions to help satisfy the political situation (legal or otherwise).
    - 16y ago

taylorbuley 16y ago

Regardless of whether you agree with the CEO's position I think it's pretty childish to walk out on your job.

darklajid 16y ago
If you are afraid that this decision means that your job is in danger it's quite okay to show protest in my book. And - they even did it on their own free time (using flexible working time), not 'stealing' paid time for their protest. I like that move a lot.
- taylorbuley 16y ago
  I apologize for not fully reading the story before I commented. Using your own PTO is quite admirable. I was under the wrong impression.
marshray 16y ago
If you think the CEO is leading your company or your job into the trash, there's nothing wrong with taking a vacation day to work on your resume'. You can bet he's working on his on the clock.
shortlived 16y ago
I would urge you to read up on the history of labor and unions in the US (or elsewhere). We have a civilized work environment because of strikes. I'm not equating the importance of the Nokia strike with those of the early 20s but, still, they are not "childish".
rue 16y ago
For most employees, it's the only recourse.

xbryanx 16y ago

If I understand the garbled translation, the Nokia workers took advantage of extremely flexible work time to stage a coordinated, but totally non-rule-breaking walk out. I've never heard of this sort of half-strike method, but it's interesting. Is this something that is common in Europe or Scandinavian countries where a more flexible work schedule is common?

dspillett 16y ago
It has been known to happen in public sector places that work flexitime. If enough people coordinate they can effectively stop business/service for a couple of hours without breaking any hard and fast rules being even bent. There are usually fluffy-wuffy rules regarding reasonableness being broken, but they are so vaguely worded as to be practically unenforceable and anyway no individual can be got by them as they could all make up perfectly plausible reasons to need those particular couple of hours off (as it permitted by their flexitime contract). While not nearly as effective as a day-long strike or other such, it has the advantage of not being covered by certain laws (so a ballot of the union is not required) meaning it can be implemented quickly to send a very visible message if enough people agree strongly enough with the message.
eli 16y ago
Workers in the United States sometimes stage "sick outs" where everyone calls in sick on the same day, especially if they're in jobs where they are prohibited by law or contract from striking. Coordinated work slow-downs are another example of a "half-strike"

stcredzero 16y ago

It's exactly this sort of tech expertise revolt that happened at the largest Smalltalk company at the time -- when out of touch management announced the company was going to go the direction of Java/JVM. This is not an indication of mismanagement. This is mismanagement (of employee expectations, culture, and perception) plainly visible in public. Nokia needs to figure this out right now, or they are going to bleed intellectual and technical assets.

roel_v 16y ago
In Finland, where are they going to bleed to? What options do the regular (under 80th percentile) Nokia employees have? If a company of that size were to lay off 100's of technical people here in the Netherlands, that'd be a large supply to absorb for the industry, and especially those with 10-15 years of highly specialized skills (antenna design, phone chipset design etc).
- stcredzero 16y ago
  It doesn't matter if the employees leave for startups or other companies, or if they just don't cooperate wholeheartedly. In either case, resources they used to have access to are lost. Management needs to do something, or they'll bleed intellectual captial. If a company of that size were to lay off 100's of technical people here in the Netherlands, that'd be a large supply to absorb for the industry, and especially those with 10-15 years of highly specialized skills (antenna design, phone chipset design etc). If their jobs were based in something technical and had significant value, they'll be able to find employment elsewhere. This was also true of former employees of the Smalltalk vendor. The thing to remember here, is that your most valuable employees are also the ones that can find new jobs fastest.
  - roel_v 16y ago
    What I meant was, people may not be running so fast if they have no options. Re: the last sentence, yes that's exactly their problem and why I said 'under 80th percentile'. The best employees know the fat days are over and are moving out asap, leaving the hanger-ons to run the place. The rest can't get other employment so will just sit there hoping for a miracle. But yeah, bottom line: Nokia is still screwed.

latch 16y ago

This kind of behavior makes me wish at-will employment was the norm throughout the world. If you aren't happy, quit. Change was clearly needed and change was made. Work hard for your company or find a different place to work that'll make you happier. Everyone thinks they could make better decisions.

raganwald 16y ago
This kind of behaviour makes me wish golden parachutes for executives weren't the norm throughout the world. If you can't make money for the company, quit or be fired. Isn't it amazing how "at will" seems to apply to both employees and management, but somehow management's version of "at will" is considerably lower risk than the employees, even though the manager has considerably more influence over their future.
- ianb 16y ago
  I don't really know the answer, but are golden parachutes really the norm for many executives? We hear about certain extremely-well-connected CEOs of very big companies, but that's hardly a representative sample of executives.

shimi 16y ago

I wonder what was the reaction if Nokia would have decided to adopt Android?

eiji 16y ago

Am I the only one happy that WP7 is NOT dead? I very much prefer a threesome! Every mobil user will benefit from this. And this is not like Desktop. Everybody will have to bring their A-Game.

access_denied 16y ago
And that's why it would be even better if Nokia would stick to one of their own OS. Let WP7 survive and compete, sure. But why at the cost of another contender?
darklajid 16y ago
I think the reactions are split into camps: 1) "Windows Phone is cool": Think of all the people that like the tech (.Net) or the visuals (Remember the recent "No chrome in the UI" thread). That want this platform to succeed. I guess if you're in this camp the news are great: WP7 gains a very experienced hardware vendor. You can expect a couple of good/decent handsets soonish, pushing WP7 (with a lot of marketing and money) and thereby solving the chicken and egg problem (platform <-> apps) with cash. 2) "I liked Nokias history", "I'm a QT/maemo/MeeGo fan" In this case the news are bad: Nokia changes direction. How much only time will tell, but the company that over the last couple of years slowly started to adopt open source is now going for a closed platform. QT and MeeGo are more or less declassed in the press release (research..? N770, N800, N810.. They did that in the past, the devices were unusable for non-hackers. I know, I own one). In this case you don't care much about WP7, you basically moan about the loss of plans that YOU had for that company/platform. That's what I see alot around now. I understand both points, but the latter seems both easier to understand (I've got a bunch of maemo shirts, the N810 hardware etc..) and at the same time completely irrelevant (Seriously.. While mom and dad might have heard about Windows Mobile and that a new version is coming, who around you cared about MeeGo to succeed?). I'm quite sure this is the death sentence for MeeGo handsets. But we haven't even seen one of those yet. How do we know that we lost something of value? Please - no ideology (while I'd probably be with you, that's not something a company of that size should care about in a self-crisis) based answers about being open etc..
bayleo 16y ago
You're not the only one. I am stoked for some nice WP7 handsets. I'm currently an Android user but the new WP7 UI looks gorgeous and Microsoft's response to the Chevron exploit was admirable. It appears that they generally understand the importance of a homebrew ecosystem coexisting with their IP. My career path has me working at or consulting with huge companies who are typically entrenched with Outlook & MS Office and if Microsoft can provide a better integration experience than Android with a piece of hardware that rivals Android handsets I will definitely check them out when it comes time to upgrade. I'm hoping the Nokia alliance works out and starts providing some competitive hardware.

tituomin 16y ago

Human-translated version: http://www.hs.fi/english/article/More+than+1000+Nokia+employees+walk+out+in+Tampere+in+protest+at+Symbian+phase-out/1135263743059 http://www.hs.fi/english/article/More+than+1000+Nokia+employ...

brk 16y ago

If I interpret the page correctly, somewhere between 1000 and 1500 employees at this location ALL worked on the Symbian OS. THAT might have been part of the problem. 1000+ people for a mobile OS? And people wonder why Nokia can't innovate fast enough to keep up with iOS or Android?

beagle3 16y ago

Does this remind anyone else of SGI? - Total domination of their own field - Resting on laurels while others snatch the market from under them - Panic - Get a CEO from Microsoft - CEO quickly decides that the O/S developed in house is not worth maintaining. And that the right O/S is no other than Microsoft's offering - Company continues dive to irrelevance, albeit at a much faster rate than before Well, the last one hasn't happened to Nokia. yet. Goodbye old Nokia. You will be missed.

marshray 16y ago
Yeah I was reminded of OpenGL. Haha, at least Nokia isn't claiming that they and Microsoft are going to develop technology "jointly".
- senko 16y ago
  They are (claiming so). In the press conferences, they stressed that they're going to contribute to WP7 ecosystem (by bringing OVI maps, and their expertise with developing for range hw range, or something along those lines).
  - marshray 16y ago
    Wow they're dumber than I thought then. Or at least they are executing on a plan and think that their employees and investors are dumb.
protomyth 16y ago
yep, it is almost and exact match. Don't forget who bought the patents after SGI went http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/01/16/sgi_transfers_3d_graphics_patents/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/01/16/sgi_transfers_3d_gra...
yuhong 16y ago
Don't forget Palm too, but they eventually recovered with WebOS, and HP eventually bought them.
deleted 16y ago

p90x 16y ago

I guess we won't be seeing a RIM, Microsoft merger any time soon then.

yason 16y ago

The end of the last ten years of Nokia's downhill: a quiet disappearance into a puff of irrelevance.

bigB 16y ago

I guess its a ballsy move, but it was much needed. Going with Android would have killed Nokia anyhow as they would be just another face in the already crap filled Android market ( and before anyone shoots me down, for every decent Android handset out there, there are 3 other really crappy ones) Think about it though, what do they have to lose. The company was dying rapidly, There are relatively few WP7 products on the market, so they can stand out in the crowd, Microsoft have absolutely 0 to lose and everything to gain as Nokia may just pull this off. But then again, I actually thought that Paul Thurrot had a good idea when he suggested that Microsoft and Nokia merge. Its not quite a merger but if this move actually works I think a merger is in the future.

fosk 16y ago

Nokia share price has a 15% drop (http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ANOK http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ANOK). Time to speculate?

c0nsilience 16y ago

Turns out Nokia gave those workers the rest of the day off. Journalism fail.

runjake 16y ago

I'll miss Series 40 phones. A basic, no frills dumb phone OS with a UI that made sense. I'll miss the flexibility of Python for Series 60, even though the Series 60 OS was crud.

Flam 16y ago

The Nokia n900 (Maemo) albeit with some flaws, is the greatest phone I will ever own. Allow me to explain. I live in Canada. We get a lot of snow over here. Last winter, I lost my Nokia phone. I remember it was a night we had a huge snowstorm, and I stayed in drinking hot chocolate by the fireplace only to wake up the next day stressing out because I couldn't find my phone. After an hour of searching, I came to terms that I must have lost it in the mall the day before. I end up leaving later that day, and find it on my driveway buried in snow. Snow plows came twice and cleaned my driveway and they must have driven over it with the plow part of the truck. Not only that, it was completely submerged in snow for over 12 hours. I picked it up, brushed off as much snow as I could, and tried using it. It still worked. It didn't even have any scratches (1 minor one). I've owned many phones in my life, and most of them break in the stupidest ways. Nokia is the rambo of phones.

nagnatron 16y ago
I like the WP7 UI so I'm looking forward to that combined with Nokia's build quality