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Michael, I have seen you comment here many times. I don't know you, and have never met you, but I feel it's hard to believe your stories. Almost every time you

Michael, I have seen you comment here many times. I don't know you, and have never met you, but I feel it's hard to believe your stories. Almost every time you comment, there's immediately a comment from an active Googler telling everyone how you see things in a completely different way. For example, you casually mention here how you must be black listed because you have seen career problems since. Yet this is nothing to do with unions, and all about anti poaching agreements. I don't intend to slander you here, I just find it extremely hard to believe anything you say isn't delivered with an agenda.

michaelochurch 13y ago
Almost every time you comment, there's immediately a comment from an active Googler telling everyone how you see things in a completely different way. Google has almost 50,000 employees. Not all of them are intelligent, well-adjusted people. For example, you casually mention here how you must be black listed because you have seen career problems since. I don't think I'm "blacklisted". I've definitely caught inappropriate communications behind my back, to the point that I've had to pursue litigation and have collected a couple of (small) tortious interference settlements. "Blacklisted" implies inability to get jobs, and it hasn't been nearly that bad for me because I'm ostensibly good at what I do. I've just had to deal with annoyances, like inappropriate questions on job interviews. Yet this is nothing to do with unions, and all about anti poaching agreements. The original purpose of shared blacklists was to shut out union risks ("troublemakers"). No-poach agreements are a similar, illegal, collusion among employers who are supposed to be competing. There are also HR departments in tech companies who share salary and performance reviews down to the level of the individual, and that's also (if not illegal) extremely immoral. Three heads of the same beast (no-poach lists, blacklists, salary databases) but the infrastructure of collusion is the same. I just find it extremely hard to believe anything you say isn't delivered with an agenda. I'd like to fix technology. That's an agenda. What's wrong with having "an agenda"? The alternative would be not having one. I wouldn't post on this forum if I didn't care about the future of this industry.
- hahainternet 13y ago
  > Google has almost 50,000 employees. Not all of them are intelligent, well-adjusted people. Their responses to you that I have seen show no indication of underlying issues. Indeed they almost all seem to indict you as being overly obsessed with showing your infallibility with regards to you leaving Google. This conversation has started off in a similar manner. > "Blacklisted" implies inability to get jobs, and it hasn't been nearly that bad for me because I'm ostensibly good at what I do. I've just had to deal with annoyances, like inappropriate questions on job interviews. This is incredibly vague and you use it to imply that Google employees have emailed potential employers of yours and 'poisoned the well'. Lets make this clear. Have you collected any tortious intereference settlements against Google relating to potential employers you have interviewed for? > The original purpose of shared blacklists was to shut out union risks That is utterly irrelevant. This is not about union problems in any way, this is about a different illegal agreement. > I'd like to fix technology. That's an agenda. What's wrong with having "an agenda" This is pretty deliberately obtuse, you know exactly what I am stating, that you appear to have an anti-Google agenda in your comments, regardless of the actual topic of discussion.
  - jfjdjrnfmfm 13y ago
    larry?
    - hahainternet 13y ago
      I wish! I doubt Google will even buy my IP :( I just think the whole 'Google fired me' angle Michael always brings to the discussion irrelevant. These anti poaching agreements were seriously immoral and they have literally nothing to do with Unions.
  - goblin89 13y ago
    This discussion is curious to me. I've heard the sentiment “fire your employee when they show attitude”, and no doubt that an attitude coupled with mental instability (hinted at by another commenter) would make an employee troublesome in the eyes of the employer. However, I can't see how at all this is relevant and why it's taken into account in evaluating michaelochurch's comment. For example, one of his statements is: > The Valley is fucking terrified of unions. So terrified that if you even seem like you might be leaning that way, executive-level people in major companies will go out of their way to fuck up your career. A lot of the back-channel reference checking that goes on in the Valley is to avoid taking on a potential unionist. No one cares if you were a mediocre performer 3 jobs ago. We surely could question the anecdotal nature of OP's experience and call for more evidence, yet commenters start implying that the person is writing this out of mental instability or evil agenda. > you appear to have an anti-Google agenda in your comments IMHO it seems natural that pro-Google comments from other employees of the company, which you mention as answering to OP elsewhere, too might likely have an agenda of their own.
sheepmullet 13y ago
I find it easy to believe him. He posts using his real name. If he is lying then ....well Google has an army of lawyers. He is almost certainly telling what he believes is the truth. In contrast all the active Google employees who follow him around are anon posters. Anon posters who never worked with Michael and are only repeating office gossip or pointing out differences in perspective. Edit: Anon people sign up to hn simply to try and discredit MichaelOChurch by attacking his (admittedly a little rough around the edges) reputation. See shanterer's post below for evidence in this thread.
- danielweber 13y ago
  > I find it easy to believe him. He posts using his real name. If he is lying then ....well Google has an army of lawyers. Without taking any side here, this isn't indicative of much. One has to work very hard to be able to actually lose a libel or slander lawsuit in the US. And while it would be very easy for Google to start a lawsuit it knows it can't win just to pressure some guy to shut up, Google probably understands the Streisand effect very well.
  - sheepmullet 13y ago
    > Without taking any side here, this isn't indicative of much. I think it does up the ante. If a Google employee (or anyone who doesn't like him really) could catch him in a lie his reputation would be damaged as he is a "public figure". On the other hand if you caught me in a lie... well only around 5-6 people know who I am and I copied this nick off another bloke on a different forum because I thought it was cool. So it wouldn't really bother me.
    - danielweber 13y ago
      Whether he's a public figure is debatable (the Wiki article gives a good summary of the questions we'd need), but all it means for a defamation suit is that Google would not have to prove malice. There would be many other hurdles to clear. IANAL.
- deleted 13y ago

michaelochurch 13y ago

Almost every time you comment, there's immediately a comment from an active Googler telling everyone how you see things in a completely different way. Google has almost 50,000 employees. Not all of them are intelligent, well-adjusted people. For example, you casually mention here how you must be black listed because you have seen career problems since. I don't think I'm "blacklisted". I've definitely caught inappropriate communications behind my back, to the point that I've had to pursue litigation and have collected a couple of (small) tortious interference settlements. "Blacklisted" implies inability to get jobs, and it hasn't been nearly that bad for me because I'm ostensibly good at what I do. I've just had to deal with annoyances, like inappropriate questions on job interviews. Yet this is nothing to do with unions, and all about anti poaching agreements. The original purpose of shared blacklists was to shut out union risks ("troublemakers"). No-poach agreements are a similar, illegal, collusion among employers who are supposed to be competing. There are also HR departments in tech companies who share salary and performance reviews down to the level of the individual, and that's also (if not illegal) extremely immoral. Three heads of the same beast (no-poach lists, blacklists, salary databases) but the infrastructure of collusion is the same. I just find it extremely hard to believe anything you say isn't delivered with an agenda. I'd like to fix technology. That's an agenda. What's wrong with having "an agenda"? The alternative would be not having one. I wouldn't post on this forum if I didn't care about the future of this industry.

hahainternet 13y ago
> Google has almost 50,000 employees. Not all of them are intelligent, well-adjusted people. Their responses to you that I have seen show no indication of underlying issues. Indeed they almost all seem to indict you as being overly obsessed with showing your infallibility with regards to you leaving Google. This conversation has started off in a similar manner. > "Blacklisted" implies inability to get jobs, and it hasn't been nearly that bad for me because I'm ostensibly good at what I do. I've just had to deal with annoyances, like inappropriate questions on job interviews. This is incredibly vague and you use it to imply that Google employees have emailed potential employers of yours and 'poisoned the well'. Lets make this clear. Have you collected any tortious intereference settlements against Google relating to potential employers you have interviewed for? > The original purpose of shared blacklists was to shut out union risks That is utterly irrelevant. This is not about union problems in any way, this is about a different illegal agreement. > I'd like to fix technology. That's an agenda. What's wrong with having "an agenda" This is pretty deliberately obtuse, you know exactly what I am stating, that you appear to have an anti-Google agenda in your comments, regardless of the actual topic of discussion.
- jfjdjrnfmfm 13y ago
  larry?
  - hahainternet 13y ago
    I wish! I doubt Google will even buy my IP :( I just think the whole 'Google fired me' angle Michael always brings to the discussion irrelevant. These anti poaching agreements were seriously immoral and they have literally nothing to do with Unions.
- goblin89 13y ago
  This discussion is curious to me. I've heard the sentiment “fire your employee when they show attitude”, and no doubt that an attitude coupled with mental instability (hinted at by another commenter) would make an employee troublesome in the eyes of the employer. However, I can't see how at all this is relevant and why it's taken into account in evaluating michaelochurch's comment. For example, one of his statements is: > The Valley is fucking terrified of unions. So terrified that if you even seem like you might be leaning that way, executive-level people in major companies will go out of their way to fuck up your career. A lot of the back-channel reference checking that goes on in the Valley is to avoid taking on a potential unionist. No one cares if you were a mediocre performer 3 jobs ago. We surely could question the anecdotal nature of OP's experience and call for more evidence, yet commenters start implying that the person is writing this out of mental instability or evil agenda. > you appear to have an anti-Google agenda in your comments IMHO it seems natural that pro-Google comments from other employees of the company, which you mention as answering to OP elsewhere, too might likely have an agenda of their own.

sheepmullet 13y ago

I find it easy to believe him. He posts using his real name. If he is lying then ....well Google has an army of lawyers. He is almost certainly telling what he believes is the truth. In contrast all the active Google employees who follow him around are anon posters. Anon posters who never worked with Michael and are only repeating office gossip or pointing out differences in perspective. Edit: Anon people sign up to hn simply to try and discredit MichaelOChurch by attacking his (admittedly a little rough around the edges) reputation. See shanterer's post below for evidence in this thread.

danielweber 13y ago
> I find it easy to believe him. He posts using his real name. If he is lying then ....well Google has an army of lawyers. Without taking any side here, this isn't indicative of much. One has to work very hard to be able to actually lose a libel or slander lawsuit in the US. And while it would be very easy for Google to start a lawsuit it knows it can't win just to pressure some guy to shut up, Google probably understands the Streisand effect very well.
- sheepmullet 13y ago
  > Without taking any side here, this isn't indicative of much. I think it does up the ante. If a Google employee (or anyone who doesn't like him really) could catch him in a lie his reputation would be damaged as he is a "public figure". On the other hand if you caught me in a lie... well only around 5-6 people know who I am and I copied this nick off another bloke on a different forum because I thought it was cool. So it wouldn't really bother me.
  - danielweber 13y ago
    Whether he's a public figure is debatable (the Wiki article gives a good summary of the questions we'd need), but all it means for a defamation suit is that Google would not have to prove malice. There would be many other hurdles to clear. IANAL.
deleted 13y ago