7 ms·

Here's a tweet with more details about her conditions and how that ties in to her resignation: https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334341991795142667 https

by busrf 6y ago

Here's a tweet with more details about her conditions and how that ties in to her resignation: https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334341991795142667 https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334341991795142667 > Apparently my manager’s manager sent an email my direct reports saying she accepted my resignation. I hadn’t resigned—I had asked for simple conditions first and said I would respond when I’m back from vacation. But I guess she decided for me :) that’s the lawyer speak. > I said here are the conditions. If you can meet them great I’ll take my name off this paper, if not then I can work on a last date. Then she sent an email to my direct reports saying she has accepted my resignation. So that is google for you folks. You saw it happen right here. In the email she posted, it seems that they "accelerated the timeline" for her termination because "certain aspects of the email you sent last night to non-management employees in the brain group reflect behavior that is inconsistent with the expectations of a Google manager", i.e. a separate email from her conditions email. It seems like she was ready to leave if they didn't meet her conditions, and that this would have been a reasonable outcome for her. However, it bothers me that they wouldn't even come to the table about the non-condition email. Like OK, "inconsistent with the expectations of a Google manager". That's some weak shit. It had better be something pretty fucking severe for them to fire her immediately and not, I don't know, do some planning around transitioning her projects? Work out what to do with the team she herself managed? Be given the grace of leaving on a good note that an engineer of her caliber deserves? She's a leader of their ethical AI group. What happens to that group and all of their research and direction now? Who do they hire to replace her? This isn't the same level of impact as firing a cog in the wheel IC who gets too uppity with organizing. This stinks like a convenient excuse to shoo an AI ethics researcher asking some inconvenient questions out the door.

MaximumYComb 6y ago
To me, it stinks like a convenient excuse to remove someone who was difficult to work with. Only last week she slandered her bosses on Twitter, which is a public forum.
- busrf 6y ago
  Matthew Garrett, a senior security researcher at Google, is very critical about Google on his Twitter all the time. As he has pointed out, he's still very employed. https://twitter.com/mjg59/status/1334382463498391557 https://twitter.com/mjg59/status/1334382463498391557 Neither of us are on her team at Google. (I'm certainly not and I doubt you are.) We have no idea how easy it is to work with her. Certainly if I were working with an AI ethics researcher I would expect them to ask difficult and uncomfortable questions. I think that's part of the job description.
  - mam2 6y ago
    Because he was provinding real value. Her job was mostly a PR play by google, and she went contrary to that by actually slandering google all the time and stiring tensions...
  - spoopyskelly 6y ago
    > Matthew Garrett, a senior security researcher at Google Not fired because that's a real job and not a diversity hire?
  - thu2111 6y ago
    Google historically tolerates generic criticism of the firm or its actions. Gebru routinely makes slanderous and offensive allegations against specific individuals, not Google as a whole. That said, Garrett makes clear his ideological sympathies on Twitter. Undoubtably comments like this one don't endear him to his management chain: When @computerfemme was fired, the VP of security at Google Cloud sent out an email to the security organisation containing one absolutely false statement and one misleading statement, both of which portrayed her acts in a more negative light. Pretty serious stuff. He doesn't elaborate on what those claims were. The woman in question was fired from the security team for violating IT security policies: in her words, "All I did was make a popup to share the labor notice Google has to share with its workers", something that Google seems to have recurrent problems with staff doing. In other words she was rewriting the contents of web pages to meet her own political objectives. If I were the VP of Security at Google I would have serious concerns at that point about insider threats from sympathisers on the security team. You can't be publicly slamming your own VP as dishonest for firing someone who subverted IT policies if you actually work in security.
anonvenger 6y ago
"Who do they hire to replace her?". That is an excellent question, and a good time to remember that Identity Politics != Ethics. Most big ethical questions in AI have nothing to do with race or gender, instead affect us all. Some say AI is an existential risk for Humanity at large.

by busrf 6y ago

MaximumYComb 6y ago

To me, it stinks like a convenient excuse to remove someone who was difficult to work with. Only last week she slandered her bosses on Twitter, which is a public forum.

busrf 6y ago
Matthew Garrett, a senior security researcher at Google, is very critical about Google on his Twitter all the time. As he has pointed out, he's still very employed. https://twitter.com/mjg59/status/1334382463498391557 https://twitter.com/mjg59/status/1334382463498391557 Neither of us are on her team at Google. (I'm certainly not and I doubt you are.) We have no idea how easy it is to work with her. Certainly if I were working with an AI ethics researcher I would expect them to ask difficult and uncomfortable questions. I think that's part of the job description.
- mam2 6y ago
  Because he was provinding real value. Her job was mostly a PR play by google, and she went contrary to that by actually slandering google all the time and stiring tensions...
- spoopyskelly 6y ago
  > Matthew Garrett, a senior security researcher at Google Not fired because that's a real job and not a diversity hire?
- thu2111 6y ago
  Google historically tolerates generic criticism of the firm or its actions. Gebru routinely makes slanderous and offensive allegations against specific individuals, not Google as a whole. That said, Garrett makes clear his ideological sympathies on Twitter. Undoubtably comments like this one don't endear him to his management chain: When @computerfemme was fired, the VP of security at Google Cloud sent out an email to the security organisation containing one absolutely false statement and one misleading statement, both of which portrayed her acts in a more negative light. Pretty serious stuff. He doesn't elaborate on what those claims were. The woman in question was fired from the security team for violating IT security policies: in her words, "All I did was make a popup to share the labor notice Google has to share with its workers", something that Google seems to have recurrent problems with staff doing. In other words she was rewriting the contents of web pages to meet her own political objectives. If I were the VP of Security at Google I would have serious concerns at that point about insider threats from sympathisers on the security team. You can't be publicly slamming your own VP as dishonest for firing someone who subverted IT policies if you actually work in security.

anonvenger 6y ago

"Who do they hire to replace her?". That is an excellent question, and a good time to remember that Identity Politics != Ethics. Most big ethical questions in AI have nothing to do with race or gender, instead affect us all. Some say AI is an existential risk for Humanity at large.