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No accusations were leveled and, as far as I can tell, at best, Google overreacted. To make an analogy: the guy points out the sky is blue and he's promptly fir

No accusations were leveled and, as far as I can tell, at best, Google overreacted. To make an analogy: the guy points out the sky is blue and he's promptly fired. Wtf?

tkahn6 16y ago
> No accusations were leveled It doesn't matter. That's exactly what was being implied. Google wants to prevent any legal disputes or inquiries into their operations which can be very costly. The guy is a low-level low-importance asset so they had him terminated. It makes perfect sense.
- gradstudent 16y ago
  His importance to the Google machinery is irrelevant. According to the post, he was fired for using Google video equipment during working hours. Even though he'd been given explicit permission to do so. At worst he should have been given a warning. I hope, for the sake of consistency, "Carl" was also fired.
  - tkahn6 16y ago
    > he was fired for using Google video equipment during working hours. Even though he'd been given explicit permission to do so. Yes they used that as a reason to fire him but that's not why they fired him.
    - gradstudent 16y ago
      Perhaps things are different in the U.S. but here -- in Australia -- you can only be fired for breach of contract. If that didn't occur, as the blog post seems to suggest, then he was unfairly dismissed.
      - pstack 16y ago
        As dangrossman points out, above, you can be fired for any reason whatsoever, on the spot. I believe the only protections are sex, race, gender, religion, and age. And as for sex, that means you can't be fired for being a male or a female. It has nothing to do with sexual orientation, for which you can still be fired in something like two or three dozen states. (Look into the ENDA which has been repeatedly proposed for the past 17 years, but never passed -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Non-Discrimination_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Non-Discrimination_A... ). And for those things which are protected, there is often little you can do. Prove that they fired you for being too old and not just because you smelled bad or performed poorly at work or pissed the wrong person off. It therefore isn't really concerning that someone would not want to deal with the hassle of some jackass and would just ask for him to be fired, instead.
        doe88 16y ago
        > the hassle of some jackass nice
        scotty79 16y ago
        US seem like horrible country to work in. You are expected to donate unpaid overtime to your company, you can be fired on a whim. What else?
        davidw 16y ago
        It's easy to get hired because employers aren't afraid that they're wedded to you for life. And you generally make pretty good money - depending on your job of course. I think 'job protection' is a bit misguided. What makes more sense to me is 'people protection' - that even if you lose your job, you'll still be able to pay rent, eat, etc... It would make more sense to aim for that goal directly rather than force employers to keep people they don't want.
        mikecane 16y ago
        >>>What else? You are expected to STFU and be a "team player" despite what trouble the team is cooking up.
        16y ago
      - asmithmd1 16y ago
        In CA you can be fired for no reason or any reason except: Age, Ancestry, Color, Creed, Disability, Genetics, Marital status , Nat’l Origin, Race, Religion, Sex, or Sexual Orientation. Every state has a slightly different subset of these factors. Here is a good summary: http://www.cga.ct.gov/2003/olrdata/jud/rpt/2003-R-0641.htm http://www.cga.ct.gov/2003/olrdata/jud/rpt/2003-R-0641.htm
    - dangrossman 16y ago
      @gradstudent Most employment in the US is at-will; either party can terminate at any time without reason.
      - travisp 16y ago
        It may be technically at-will, but anyone can tell you that you have to be very careful when firing an employee.
      - hieronymusN 16y ago
        Employment may be at will, but the courts are full of lawsuits against employers for wrongful termination/dismissal. If you've ever dealt with a large HR dept you know that one of their main jobs is to prevent lawsuits brought/caused by employees.
        flomo 16y ago
        "Wrongful termination" is largely a myth. I know a lot of educated professionals who believe they have the right to a "fair" termination, but except for very specific instances, it isn't the case, and these threats go nowhere. In most cases, unless there is a smoking gun, employers just sidestep the issue by targeting "layoffs", rather firing for cause. The bigger issue HR deals with is sexual harassment or discrimination cases. And, even nuisance lawsuits can be expensive to deal with, and HR/clerical staff is a lot cheaper than lawyers.
        jarin 16y ago
        I myself have witnessed the "layoff with a nice severance bonus". It actually seems to work out nicely for both parties.
        flomo 16y ago
        I had a boss whose philosophy was "Four weeks severance is cheaper than hiring a HR manager", and it did seem to work out pretty well. The company still had to deal with a 'nuisance' lawsuit, but was something totally out of the blue.
  - deleted 16y ago
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  - deleted 16y ago
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pstack 16y ago
To put it bluntly, he was the employee of a company that Google hired to do some work for them and he was bothering employees and then he become someone else's problem up the chain and it then become his direct employer's problem who value their contract and the employment of their other employees over the personal project and whims of someone who was hired to do some film work and not to conduct an investigation into the socio-economic makeup of the campus. Now that he's no longer employed, he can go ahead with his pursuit without doing it under the advantage of his employment or his employer and I'm sure that if his insinuations are remotely true, then there are sure to be a bunch of people beating down his door for the opportunity to speak with him about their work at Google, under journalistic protection.
JabavuAdams 16y ago
Mentioning the word "race", "class", or "gender" in a tech setting is a big no-no. They're huge hot-button words. It scares people and they counter-attack reflexively, without deeply considering the arguments. That's been my experience from work, Reddit, and HN, in any case. Notice that I'm not saying anything about the correctness of any particular position on a specific issue. It's that the specifics are barely able to be discussed because people are already in war mode.
- hieronymusN 16y ago
  I think you bring up a good point, and its also worth exploring why "race", "class" and "gender" are such hot button issues in tech. These are issues that many other very large companies (ex: I've worked for large financial corps in NYC that have vibrant & entrenched diversity programs) have dealt with in much more constructive ways. So why do these topics blow up so big amongst the valley crowd?
  - dspeyer 16y ago
    For one thing, wrongful firing and wrongful failure-to-hire lawsuits are common and painful. No one wants to give the employment trolls more ammunition.

No accusations were leveled and, as far as I can tell, at best, Google overreacted. To make an analogy: the guy points out the sky is blue and he's promptly fired. Wtf?

tkahn6 16y ago

> No accusations were leveled It doesn't matter. That's exactly what was being implied. Google wants to prevent any legal disputes or inquiries into their operations which can be very costly. The guy is a low-level low-importance asset so they had him terminated. It makes perfect sense.

gradstudent 16y ago
His importance to the Google machinery is irrelevant. According to the post, he was fired for using Google video equipment during working hours. Even though he'd been given explicit permission to do so. At worst he should have been given a warning. I hope, for the sake of consistency, "Carl" was also fired.
- tkahn6 16y ago
  > he was fired for using Google video equipment during working hours. Even though he'd been given explicit permission to do so. Yes they used that as a reason to fire him but that's not why they fired him.
  - gradstudent 16y ago
    Perhaps things are different in the U.S. but here -- in Australia -- you can only be fired for breach of contract. If that didn't occur, as the blog post seems to suggest, then he was unfairly dismissed.
    - pstack 16y ago
      As dangrossman points out, above, you can be fired for any reason whatsoever, on the spot. I believe the only protections are sex, race, gender, religion, and age. And as for sex, that means you can't be fired for being a male or a female. It has nothing to do with sexual orientation, for which you can still be fired in something like two or three dozen states. (Look into the ENDA which has been repeatedly proposed for the past 17 years, but never passed -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Non-Discrimination_Act http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Non-Discrimination_A... ). And for those things which are protected, there is often little you can do. Prove that they fired you for being too old and not just because you smelled bad or performed poorly at work or pissed the wrong person off. It therefore isn't really concerning that someone would not want to deal with the hassle of some jackass and would just ask for him to be fired, instead.
      - doe88 16y ago
        > the hassle of some jackass nice
      - scotty79 16y ago
        US seem like horrible country to work in. You are expected to donate unpaid overtime to your company, you can be fired on a whim. What else?
        davidw 16y ago
        It's easy to get hired because employers aren't afraid that they're wedded to you for life. And you generally make pretty good money - depending on your job of course. I think 'job protection' is a bit misguided. What makes more sense to me is 'people protection' - that even if you lose your job, you'll still be able to pay rent, eat, etc... It would make more sense to aim for that goal directly rather than force employers to keep people they don't want.
        mikecane 16y ago
        >>>What else? You are expected to STFU and be a "team player" despite what trouble the team is cooking up.
        16y ago
    - asmithmd1 16y ago
      In CA you can be fired for no reason or any reason except: Age, Ancestry, Color, Creed, Disability, Genetics, Marital status , Nat’l Origin, Race, Religion, Sex, or Sexual Orientation. Every state has a slightly different subset of these factors. Here is a good summary: http://www.cga.ct.gov/2003/olrdata/jud/rpt/2003-R-0641.htm http://www.cga.ct.gov/2003/olrdata/jud/rpt/2003-R-0641.htm
  - dangrossman 16y ago
    @gradstudent Most employment in the US is at-will; either party can terminate at any time without reason.
    - travisp 16y ago
      It may be technically at-will, but anyone can tell you that you have to be very careful when firing an employee.
    - hieronymusN 16y ago
      Employment may be at will, but the courts are full of lawsuits against employers for wrongful termination/dismissal. If you've ever dealt with a large HR dept you know that one of their main jobs is to prevent lawsuits brought/caused by employees.
      - flomo 16y ago
        "Wrongful termination" is largely a myth. I know a lot of educated professionals who believe they have the right to a "fair" termination, but except for very specific instances, it isn't the case, and these threats go nowhere. In most cases, unless there is a smoking gun, employers just sidestep the issue by targeting "layoffs", rather firing for cause. The bigger issue HR deals with is sexual harassment or discrimination cases. And, even nuisance lawsuits can be expensive to deal with, and HR/clerical staff is a lot cheaper than lawyers.
        jarin 16y ago
        I myself have witnessed the "layoff with a nice severance bonus". It actually seems to work out nicely for both parties.
        flomo 16y ago
        I had a boss whose philosophy was "Four weeks severance is cheaper than hiring a HR manager", and it did seem to work out pretty well. The company still had to deal with a 'nuisance' lawsuit, but was something totally out of the blue.
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]

pstack 16y ago

To put it bluntly, he was the employee of a company that Google hired to do some work for them and he was bothering employees and then he become someone else's problem up the chain and it then become his direct employer's problem who value their contract and the employment of their other employees over the personal project and whims of someone who was hired to do some film work and not to conduct an investigation into the socio-economic makeup of the campus. Now that he's no longer employed, he can go ahead with his pursuit without doing it under the advantage of his employment or his employer and I'm sure that if his insinuations are remotely true, then there are sure to be a bunch of people beating down his door for the opportunity to speak with him about their work at Google, under journalistic protection.

JabavuAdams 16y ago

Mentioning the word "race", "class", or "gender" in a tech setting is a big no-no. They're huge hot-button words. It scares people and they counter-attack reflexively, without deeply considering the arguments. That's been my experience from work, Reddit, and HN, in any case. Notice that I'm not saying anything about the correctness of any particular position on a specific issue. It's that the specifics are barely able to be discussed because people are already in war mode.

hieronymusN 16y ago
I think you bring up a good point, and its also worth exploring why "race", "class" and "gender" are such hot button issues in tech. These are issues that many other very large companies (ex: I've worked for large financial corps in NYC that have vibrant & entrenched diversity programs) have dealt with in much more constructive ways. So why do these topics blow up so big amongst the valley crowd?
- dspeyer 16y ago
  For one thing, wrongful firing and wrongful failure-to-hire lawsuits are common and painful. No one wants to give the employment trolls more ammunition.