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It's frankly unprofessional for Jeff Dean to post only his email in this document without providing more context. The news media has in cases provided balanced

It's frankly unprofessional for Jeff Dean to post only his email in this document without providing more context. The news media has in cases provided balanced coverage that included the email from Timnit that prompted Google's action: https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-an-ethical https://www.platformer.news/p/the-withering-email-that-got-a... This post from Jeff Dean simply underscores that he has failed to balance the need for diplomacy with the research thesis of his own research group. I'm not saying he's being malicious, but incredibly tone deaf. While I appreciate he gets "attacked" at nearly every talk (at one retinopathy talk I saw him grilled for 10 minutes on race), he's going to continue to get this sort of attention until he can stop being the Googler who wants to tell you why their view is right.

saagarjha 6y ago
I mean, this is obviously a place where Jeff Dean is providing the voice of Google on the topic. Why would they provide balanced context?
- hackcasual 6y ago
  A large part of the criticism directed towards google is that they weren't particularly transparent in their handling of this situation. This is making that look worse.
gundmc 6y ago
It seems reasonable to choose to publish something you wrote yourself (and presumably cleared with legal/PR) and not publish something written by someone else with an intended internal audience. It would be WAY worse if they unilaterally published Timnit's private emails publicly.
- bagacrap 6y ago
  Indeed, it's usually considered poor form to forward emails to broader mailing lists.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
I'm not sure what you mean by "unprofessional" here. In my eyes, a vague statement that they had some irreconcilable differences but she's still a great researcher is nearly the archetype of professionalism. It would be extremely unprofessional for him to publicly criticize an email Timnit sent privately to the Women in Google Brain group.
nullc 6y ago
Excerpts were already being leaked on HN. The 'email from Timnit' doesn't exactly look good... I would expect a manager posting company lists in that manner to be dismissed (or a junior employee to receive some mentioning about professional conduct, if not dismissed). I don't believe anyone has published the ultimatum email, which I think would be more accurately described as what precipitated the outcome.
- aylmao 6y ago
  I hope Timnit finds it [1]. Google has it in their email servers but I doubt they'll publish it. [1]: https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334881120920498180 https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334881120920498180
  - bigbubba 6y ago
    Surely the email can be found in the inboxes of some of her friends still at Google. Any of her friends that were on the same mailing list could give her a copy. Assuming she has any friends at Google.
    - nullc 6y ago
      The ultimatum was what was sent to management, not the list.

saagarjha 6y ago

I mean, this is obviously a place where Jeff Dean is providing the voice of Google on the topic. Why would they provide balanced context?

hackcasual 6y ago
A large part of the criticism directed towards google is that they weren't particularly transparent in their handling of this situation. This is making that look worse.

gundmc 6y ago

It seems reasonable to choose to publish something you wrote yourself (and presumably cleared with legal/PR) and not publish something written by someone else with an intended internal audience. It would be WAY worse if they unilaterally published Timnit's private emails publicly.

bagacrap 6y ago
Indeed, it's usually considered poor form to forward emails to broader mailing lists.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago

I'm not sure what you mean by "unprofessional" here. In my eyes, a vague statement that they had some irreconcilable differences but she's still a great researcher is nearly the archetype of professionalism. It would be extremely unprofessional for him to publicly criticize an email Timnit sent privately to the Women in Google Brain group.

nullc 6y ago

Excerpts were already being leaked on HN. The 'email from Timnit' doesn't exactly look good... I would expect a manager posting company lists in that manner to be dismissed (or a junior employee to receive some mentioning about professional conduct, if not dismissed). I don't believe anyone has published the ultimatum email, which I think would be more accurately described as what precipitated the outcome.

aylmao 6y ago
I hope Timnit finds it [1]. Google has it in their email servers but I doubt they'll publish it. [1]: https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334881120920498180 https://twitter.com/timnitGebru/status/1334881120920498180
- bigbubba 6y ago
  Surely the email can be found in the inboxes of some of her friends still at Google. Any of her friends that were on the same mailing list could give her a copy. Assuming she has any friends at Google.
  - nullc 6y ago
    The ultimatum was what was sent to management, not the list.