5 ms·

> It also struck me as a red flag that Canonical is 100% BYOD (Bring Your Own Device), and they do not provide a work computer. You can apply for a _loan_ to bu

by lbhdc 3y ago

> It also struck me as a red flag that Canonical is 100% BYOD (Bring Your Own Device), and they do not provide a work computer. You can apply for a _loan_ to buy a computer for work, but they will not pay for one. If a company is too cheap to provide a computer at a job where you work remotely and exclusively on a computer, I don't want to be a part of that company. That doesn't seem so bad to me. I have always preferred personal device whenever possible. Why not cut out the ewaste?

pixl97 3y ago
Eh, because it sounds like the violation of labor laws in many places. My company gives me a stipend for use of my own phone every month.
AlexandrB 3y ago
This might be OKish as long as Canonical doesn't insist on installing any management software or centrally-managed malware mitigation. You're still incurring wear and tear on your own hardware due to work activities though.
mostlysimilar 3y ago
Only if the employment agreement upholds your privacy if you use your own device. I've seen employment agreements that claim the right to access your personal device at any time if you use it for work.
manifoldgeo 3y ago
I don't know many other jobs that work this way. Imagine getting a construction job and having to supply your own jackhammer or take out a temporary loan to buy one. Doesn't the company have some they should supply you with? Gig-economy jobs work this way, e.g. Uber and Lyft, but those are problematic for the same reason (and a lot more reasons imho). As another commenter said, you're adding wear and tear to your own device. Sure, I have my own computers, but they're all spoken for, hosting VMs and containers or acting as my lab. Why should I subsidize the profits of a multi-million-dollar, for-profit company by letting them use my computer at no extra cost? Your e-waste point is a good one, but I don't think Canonical's managers were looking out for mother nature when they made that choice.
- HumblyTossed 3y ago
  Mechanics tend to bring their own tools.
  - manifoldgeo 3y ago
    That's true. And for new mechanics that don't have their own tools yet, there are vendors like Snap-On that drive tool trucks to different garages will sell them tools on a payment plan. This creates a situation where a person in a new job starts out in the red, being indebted from the start simply because they need new tools. At least it's not as bad as the gilded age where workers got paid in company-store scrip and lived in company housing in a company-run town. Still, I think it's a step in the wrong direction. I'm not trying to be dramatic or imply that Canonical's device policy is some act of pure evil, but it was a contributing factor to my decision not to move forward. I have a computer that would serve the purpose just fine. It's more about principles. By itself, that policy wouldn't have been so bad, but combined with other red flags it was enough for me to stay away.
    - jes 3y ago
      Snap-On tools are great. They also cost an arm and a leg. Yet if you put a 3' pipe on your 1/2" ratchet and break the ratchet, the tool guy will fix it or replace it on his next visit.
- presbyterian 3y ago
  Construction workers (and mechanics and most other jobs where you're using standard tools) do require you to provide your own tools, that's why you'll often see Snap-On trucks touring around garages. Obviously for bigger, specialized equipment like a jackhammer or an excavator, they provide them, but I think a laptop is much closer to a set of tools in this analogy.
  - manifoldgeo 3y ago
    That's a good point, a computer is probably more screwdriver and less jackhammer. I still dislike companies that externalize their costs to their employees, but I do agree my analogy was slightly off. Funny, I actually mentioned Snap-On by name in one of my other replies, probably around the same time you were commenting. They've got good brand recognition, apparently!
HumblyTossed 3y ago
> That doesn't seem so bad to me. I have always preferred personal device whenever possible. Why not cut out the ewaste? Sounds horrible to me. Work and personal are always completely separate.
yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
> That doesn't seem so bad to me. I have always preferred personal device whenever possible. Why not cut out the ewaste? Because it externalizes their costs to employees and creates a bidirectional privacy nightmare (company data is exposed to programs running on a personal machine, and personal data is exposed to company programs - worse if they have any sort of management software but iffy even if not).
tedivm 3y ago
The biggest reason I separate work and personal devices is that I do not want my personal devices subject to discovery if my employer is involved in a lawsuit. I can't stress this enough- if my employer is sued, I don't want the opposing law firm to get copies of my data. The second reason is that I don't want my personal devices subject to security monitoring, and most companies that at least pretend to care about security require some level of endpoint monitoring.
- sdfghswe 3y ago
  What industry is this?
  - gumby 3y ago
    I don't know where tedivm works, but their concerns are reasonable for almost any industry. Small companies usually can't be bothered worrying about those risks (and small companies aren't typically worth suing anyway). But a company of any appreciable size needs to worry about the kinds of things mentioned in the comment.
  - bragr 3y ago
    It doesn't matter. A subpoena is a subpoena and could happen at any job.
  - pjmlp 3y ago
    Usually any consulting industry where everything done during the project is owned by the customer.
- unmole 3y ago
  > do not want my personal devices subject to discovery if my employer is involved in a lawsuit. Why won't your personal devices be subject to discovery anyways?
smitty1110 3y ago
I work in Contracting, so YMMV. For me, I have a separate laptop for every contract I work on, sometimes more than one for a given contract (for complicated compliance reasons). The reason for this is to a) prevent cross-contamination between projects, and b) because the laptops could get caught up in legal shenanigans. If one contract ends up in dispute, the laptop could end up getting subpoenaed, and if it was my only laptop I would be SOL. Or god forbid, code from two projects gets mixed by accident, and now I'm in violations of multiple NDAs. In one case, the customer paid for my hardware during development, and when we were done they took ownership of the laptops along with the code. Your work computer is just like your work code: At the end of the day it's not really yours, don't get attached.
- twic 3y ago
  Have you thought about having one machine plus a hot spare, and swapping out hard drives? If it gets subpoenaed for job X, put the job X drive in and give it to the lawyers, then put the drive for the current job in the spare, order a new spare, and carry on. Of course, if you can bill the machines through to the clients, why bother!
  - sitzkrieg 3y ago
    swapping out hard drives in modern laptops sounds like an easier time for you? even w nvme sticks im gunna go with "no way"
    - fsckboy 3y ago
      with linux? i swap hard drives all the time
      - pjmlp 3y ago
        With whatever OS you like. Good luck switching hard drives on locked down customer provided laptops, or from the own IT on the consulting firm for that matter.
FreshStart 3y ago
Cause anything developed on your private device becomes company IPiif touched?
afandian 3y ago
I enjoy closing the lid at the end of the day and leaving work behind. Separate user accounts doesn’t cut it. With WFH it’s tempting enough to spend too much time “at work”.
dmurray 3y ago
Specifically for Canonical, BYOD seems like a great way to dogfood running Ubuntu on all kinds of machines, rather than everyone having the same model of Dell workstation and a separate testing lab being the only place they encounter diverse hardware. Not saying this is their reasoning - and if they're not too cheap, it would surely be better for tax purposes to buy your employees computers than pay them the equivalent in cash - but it's a reason at least.
- stubish 3y ago
  This was one of the reasons. Also, how does a small company provide a laptop to remote workers across the globe in just about every locale and tax jurisdiction, many with specific job requirements and most with Strong Opinions? There are many reasons not to work for Canonical, but the opportunity to pick and choose your own hardware rather than suffer what someone else thought your would need seems an odd choice.
happymellon 3y ago
Never access your personal accounts on a work device. Thats just asking for trouble.

by lbhdc 3y ago

pixl97 3y ago

Eh, because it sounds like the violation of labor laws in many places. My company gives me a stipend for use of my own phone every month.

AlexandrB 3y ago

This might be OKish as long as Canonical doesn't insist on installing any management software or centrally-managed malware mitigation. You're still incurring wear and tear on your own hardware due to work activities though.

mostlysimilar 3y ago

Only if the employment agreement upholds your privacy if you use your own device. I've seen employment agreements that claim the right to access your personal device at any time if you use it for work.

manifoldgeo 3y ago

I don't know many other jobs that work this way. Imagine getting a construction job and having to supply your own jackhammer or take out a temporary loan to buy one. Doesn't the company have some they should supply you with? Gig-economy jobs work this way, e.g. Uber and Lyft, but those are problematic for the same reason (and a lot more reasons imho). As another commenter said, you're adding wear and tear to your own device. Sure, I have my own computers, but they're all spoken for, hosting VMs and containers or acting as my lab. Why should I subsidize the profits of a multi-million-dollar, for-profit company by letting them use my computer at no extra cost? Your e-waste point is a good one, but I don't think Canonical's managers were looking out for mother nature when they made that choice.

HumblyTossed 3y ago
Mechanics tend to bring their own tools.
- manifoldgeo 3y ago
  That's true. And for new mechanics that don't have their own tools yet, there are vendors like Snap-On that drive tool trucks to different garages will sell them tools on a payment plan. This creates a situation where a person in a new job starts out in the red, being indebted from the start simply because they need new tools. At least it's not as bad as the gilded age where workers got paid in company-store scrip and lived in company housing in a company-run town. Still, I think it's a step in the wrong direction. I'm not trying to be dramatic or imply that Canonical's device policy is some act of pure evil, but it was a contributing factor to my decision not to move forward. I have a computer that would serve the purpose just fine. It's more about principles. By itself, that policy wouldn't have been so bad, but combined with other red flags it was enough for me to stay away.
  - jes 3y ago
    Snap-On tools are great. They also cost an arm and a leg. Yet if you put a 3' pipe on your 1/2" ratchet and break the ratchet, the tool guy will fix it or replace it on his next visit.
presbyterian 3y ago
Construction workers (and mechanics and most other jobs where you're using standard tools) do require you to provide your own tools, that's why you'll often see Snap-On trucks touring around garages. Obviously for bigger, specialized equipment like a jackhammer or an excavator, they provide them, but I think a laptop is much closer to a set of tools in this analogy.
- manifoldgeo 3y ago
  That's a good point, a computer is probably more screwdriver and less jackhammer. I still dislike companies that externalize their costs to their employees, but I do agree my analogy was slightly off. Funny, I actually mentioned Snap-On by name in one of my other replies, probably around the same time you were commenting. They've got good brand recognition, apparently!

HumblyTossed 3y ago

> That doesn't seem so bad to me. I have always preferred personal device whenever possible. Why not cut out the ewaste? Sounds horrible to me. Work and personal are always completely separate.

yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago

> That doesn't seem so bad to me. I have always preferred personal device whenever possible. Why not cut out the ewaste? Because it externalizes their costs to employees and creates a bidirectional privacy nightmare (company data is exposed to programs running on a personal machine, and personal data is exposed to company programs - worse if they have any sort of management software but iffy even if not).

tedivm 3y ago

The biggest reason I separate work and personal devices is that I do not want my personal devices subject to discovery if my employer is involved in a lawsuit. I can't stress this enough- if my employer is sued, I don't want the opposing law firm to get copies of my data. The second reason is that I don't want my personal devices subject to security monitoring, and most companies that at least pretend to care about security require some level of endpoint monitoring.

sdfghswe 3y ago
What industry is this?
- gumby 3y ago
  I don't know where tedivm works, but their concerns are reasonable for almost any industry. Small companies usually can't be bothered worrying about those risks (and small companies aren't typically worth suing anyway). But a company of any appreciable size needs to worry about the kinds of things mentioned in the comment.
- bragr 3y ago
  It doesn't matter. A subpoena is a subpoena and could happen at any job.
- pjmlp 3y ago
  Usually any consulting industry where everything done during the project is owned by the customer.
unmole 3y ago
> do not want my personal devices subject to discovery if my employer is involved in a lawsuit. Why won't your personal devices be subject to discovery anyways?

smitty1110 3y ago

I work in Contracting, so YMMV. For me, I have a separate laptop for every contract I work on, sometimes more than one for a given contract (for complicated compliance reasons). The reason for this is to a) prevent cross-contamination between projects, and b) because the laptops could get caught up in legal shenanigans. If one contract ends up in dispute, the laptop could end up getting subpoenaed, and if it was my only laptop I would be SOL. Or god forbid, code from two projects gets mixed by accident, and now I'm in violations of multiple NDAs. In one case, the customer paid for my hardware during development, and when we were done they took ownership of the laptops along with the code. Your work computer is just like your work code: At the end of the day it's not really yours, don't get attached.

twic 3y ago
Have you thought about having one machine plus a hot spare, and swapping out hard drives? If it gets subpoenaed for job X, put the job X drive in and give it to the lawyers, then put the drive for the current job in the spare, order a new spare, and carry on. Of course, if you can bill the machines through to the clients, why bother!
- sitzkrieg 3y ago
  swapping out hard drives in modern laptops sounds like an easier time for you? even w nvme sticks im gunna go with "no way"
  - fsckboy 3y ago
    with linux? i swap hard drives all the time
    - pjmlp 3y ago
      With whatever OS you like. Good luck switching hard drives on locked down customer provided laptops, or from the own IT on the consulting firm for that matter.

FreshStart 3y ago

Cause anything developed on your private device becomes company IPiif touched?

afandian 3y ago

I enjoy closing the lid at the end of the day and leaving work behind. Separate user accounts doesn’t cut it. With WFH it’s tempting enough to spend too much time “at work”.

dmurray 3y ago

Specifically for Canonical, BYOD seems like a great way to dogfood running Ubuntu on all kinds of machines, rather than everyone having the same model of Dell workstation and a separate testing lab being the only place they encounter diverse hardware. Not saying this is their reasoning - and if they're not too cheap, it would surely be better for tax purposes to buy your employees computers than pay them the equivalent in cash - but it's a reason at least.

stubish 3y ago
This was one of the reasons. Also, how does a small company provide a laptop to remote workers across the globe in just about every locale and tax jurisdiction, many with specific job requirements and most with Strong Opinions? There are many reasons not to work for Canonical, but the opportunity to pick and choose your own hardware rather than suffer what someone else thought your would need seems an odd choice.

happymellon 3y ago

Never access your personal accounts on a work device. Thats just asking for trouble.