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Discrediting the source or his delivery doesn't change what this looks like on face value: People of color coming out of a building who have no access to the s

Discrediting the source or his delivery doesn't change what this looks like on face value: People of color coming out of a building who have no access to the same perks as other employees and where the intention is clearly to avoid publicity of their low cost labor.

haberman 16y ago
There are lots of white people who come out of buildings at Google every day who don't have access to the same perks as the CEOs. Is this news? The intention is to avoid someone making a big stink over a non-issue, because empirically people like yourself will latch onto Michael Moore style "exposes" and make a non-issue into a big problem.
- bradshaw1965 16y ago
  you don't get to decide what is or is not a "non-issue". You have opinions just like anybody else.
- rhizome 16y ago
  Which Michael Moore expose(s) concern themselves with non-issues?
- rdtsc 16y ago
  > The intention is to avoid someone making a big stink over a non-issue A better way to do that is to ... not raise a big stink over it. That is exactly what Google didn't do. If they'd just let this guy talk to people and post his video or photos online, maybe a a couple hundred readers of his blog would have seen the story and it would have been a real "non-issue" as you say. By getting the guy (especially a guy they determined likes to film "exposes") fired they pretty much guaranteed this to become and "issue". This the basic Streisand effect in action : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
  - haberman 16y ago
    > If they'd just let this guy talk to people and post his video or photos online, maybe a a couple hundred readers of his blog would have seen the story and it would have been a real "non-issue" as you say. Most of the indignant comments on this story are about the faux-racism/classism, not about his getting fired. Slacktivism on reddit and even HN loves stories about purported injustice. Those flames have plenty of fuel whether or not "the man" is involved in shutting down the messenger.
yanw 16y ago
Again these are not Google's employees they are the employees of the company which was contracted by Google. Sadly the majority of low wage contract workers are minorities, it's not Google's fault.
mekoka 16y ago
That's what it looks like at face value, but consider these facts and tell me your perception of this story doesn't get swayed a bit: - This guy was an employee of Transvideo, a company subcontracting for Google. - He was filming other employees from another company, we'll call it ScanOps, also subcontracting for Google. - Neither he, nor the ScanOps employees he filmed were employees of Google. - As per the arrangement between Transvideo and Google, he had access to certain privileges that the ScanOps employees didn't. - He never disclosed what he eventually learned from the ScanOps employees. His story had nothing on their working conditions, salaries, workload, benefits, health. Nothing. He entirely focused on what was happening to him. He only leaves to the reader to infer from his implications that there's some mistreatment and discrimination going on. For all we know, ScanOps employees might have a better package overall than Transvideo's. - The steps leading to his termination were all handled by his own superiors at Transvideo. Google's involvement is only implied by third parties. He never directly spoke to someone at Google (other than the security guard). Even his letter was first given to his own managers for approval, before it is implied that it was forwarded to Google. For all we know, the big Kahunas at Transvideo may have decided of their own accord that he was trying to be a smart-ass, potentially causing more trouble than necessary for them, and decided to preemptively terminate him. End of Facts. Now for my biased opinions, I think this guy is a manipulator. He carefully chooses words to play in his favor: - hired jointly by Transvideo Studios and Google: somehow I doubt it. I think he was hired by Transvideo to work on their Google account. - I found this social arrangement interesting: the implication is that there's some social stratification going on, when in fact we're talking about employees from a different operation working on sensitive enough issues that their badge specifies a number to call if someone asks questions. - I'll just mention in passing the many hot buttons he pushes to manipulate both the article's readers and the different administrative layers who read his letters. Using the race card, social inequalities and acting as if he's just a simple bystander interested in observing these issues. He'd be my employee and behaving like that towards one of my major clients and he'd be fired, even without my client requesting it.
- rdtsc 16y ago
  > sensitive enough issues that their badge specifies a number to call if someone asks questions. Nobody doubts that there are sensitive issues, we are just debating what those issues are. Presumably you are implying they are security issues relating to what they are scanning (Well because ... Google told us that). I read sensitive as an euphemism of "please don't let anyone know how much you make or the benefits you don't have".

haberman 16y ago

There are lots of white people who come out of buildings at Google every day who don't have access to the same perks as the CEOs. Is this news? The intention is to avoid someone making a big stink over a non-issue, because empirically people like yourself will latch onto Michael Moore style "exposes" and make a non-issue into a big problem.

bradshaw1965 16y ago
you don't get to decide what is or is not a "non-issue". You have opinions just like anybody else.
rhizome 16y ago
Which Michael Moore expose(s) concern themselves with non-issues?
rdtsc 16y ago
> The intention is to avoid someone making a big stink over a non-issue A better way to do that is to ... not raise a big stink over it. That is exactly what Google didn't do. If they'd just let this guy talk to people and post his video or photos online, maybe a a couple hundred readers of his blog would have seen the story and it would have been a real "non-issue" as you say. By getting the guy (especially a guy they determined likes to film "exposes") fired they pretty much guaranteed this to become and "issue". This the basic Streisand effect in action : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
- haberman 16y ago
  > If they'd just let this guy talk to people and post his video or photos online, maybe a a couple hundred readers of his blog would have seen the story and it would have been a real "non-issue" as you say. Most of the indignant comments on this story are about the faux-racism/classism, not about his getting fired. Slacktivism on reddit and even HN loves stories about purported injustice. Those flames have plenty of fuel whether or not "the man" is involved in shutting down the messenger.

yanw 16y ago

Again these are not Google's employees they are the employees of the company which was contracted by Google. Sadly the majority of low wage contract workers are minorities, it's not Google's fault.

mekoka 16y ago

That's what it looks like at face value, but consider these facts and tell me your perception of this story doesn't get swayed a bit: - This guy was an employee of Transvideo, a company subcontracting for Google. - He was filming other employees from another company, we'll call it ScanOps, also subcontracting for Google. - Neither he, nor the ScanOps employees he filmed were employees of Google. - As per the arrangement between Transvideo and Google, he had access to certain privileges that the ScanOps employees didn't. - He never disclosed what he eventually learned from the ScanOps employees. His story had nothing on their working conditions, salaries, workload, benefits, health. Nothing. He entirely focused on what was happening to him. He only leaves to the reader to infer from his implications that there's some mistreatment and discrimination going on. For all we know, ScanOps employees might have a better package overall than Transvideo's. - The steps leading to his termination were all handled by his own superiors at Transvideo. Google's involvement is only implied by third parties. He never directly spoke to someone at Google (other than the security guard). Even his letter was first given to his own managers for approval, before it is implied that it was forwarded to Google. For all we know, the big Kahunas at Transvideo may have decided of their own accord that he was trying to be a smart-ass, potentially causing more trouble than necessary for them, and decided to preemptively terminate him. End of Facts. Now for my biased opinions, I think this guy is a manipulator. He carefully chooses words to play in his favor: - hired jointly by Transvideo Studios and Google: somehow I doubt it. I think he was hired by Transvideo to work on their Google account. - I found this social arrangement interesting: the implication is that there's some social stratification going on, when in fact we're talking about employees from a different operation working on sensitive enough issues that their badge specifies a number to call if someone asks questions. - I'll just mention in passing the many hot buttons he pushes to manipulate both the article's readers and the different administrative layers who read his letters. Using the race card, social inequalities and acting as if he's just a simple bystander interested in observing these issues. He'd be my employee and behaving like that towards one of my major clients and he'd be fired, even without my client requesting it.

rdtsc 16y ago
> sensitive enough issues that their badge specifies a number to call if someone asks questions. Nobody doubts that there are sensitive issues, we are just debating what those issues are. Presumably you are implying they are security issues relating to what they are scanning (Well because ... Google told us that). I read sensitive as an euphemism of "please don't let anyone know how much you make or the benefits you don't have".