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Google's Civil War

fortune.com

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Re: Google's Civil War

#61

Post by fyoving »

DFHippie wrote: post #45
fyoving wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For one, they are would be retaliating against employees who generate bad PR for them. For another the rest of the tech companies don't seem to enable let alone tolerate this shenanigans.

Retaliating against whistle blowers is a great way to generate bad PR for yourself. You may disagree that this is whistle blowing. You may view these employees as entitled troublemakers. I expect the googlers doing this view themselves as making personal sacrifices for the greater good. In any case, I doubt Google wants to lose talent to competitors because they are viewed as a hotbed of right-to-workers ideology in…

1. Any bad PR resulting from firing these types would be a one time thing instead of this ongoing situation.

2. Google shouldn't accommodate the delusional and entitled.

3. Labor unions are antithetical to sound economic theory and practice, and no other company in the business supports them.

Re: Google's Civil War

#62

Post by pasabagi »

fyoving wrote: post #41
pjc50 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of somewhere like Google is that they don't want people who will do what they're told, because such people are only capable of doing what they're told. You can't order someone to innovate unless they have no other choice. Silicon Valley has spent years setting itself up as an inheritor of the counterculture, a place where it's possible to "think different". Employees are given a share of the business…

Tell that to the suits who invented the future at IBM and Bell labs. Counter cultural types don't have a monopoly on innovation.

Have you seen a photo of Kernighan & Ritchie? They sure look like counterculture types to me - or at the very least, that's a lot of hair.

Re: Google's Civil War

#63

Post by pjc50 »

mcguire wrote: post #42
pjc50 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a long history of naming yourself after the negative term your enemies use for you in order to neutralise it. Also "entitled vocal minority" works nicely as a parody of "moral majority".

The Bolsheviks were actually a minority.

I was referring to Falwell's lot, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_Majority ; I never knew that "Bolshevik" came from the Russian for "majority"! Every day this website teaches something.

Re: Google's Civil War

#64

Post by UncleMeat »

idlewords wrote: post #17

I'd be curious to hear rank-and-file Googlers' views on how this dynamic is playing out within the company. It's in both journalists' and organizers' interests to play it up, so the reality can be hard to discern.

It has come up precisely twice in my immediate working group in the last few years (the Damore thing and the first walkout).

It has affected by work literally not at all.

Some people care deeply about this stuff. I agree with a fair amount of it. But from my perspective calling it a civil war is frankly ludicrous.

Re: Google's Civil War

#65

Post by malvosenior »

pjc50 wrote: post #14
fyoving wrote: post #7

I don't understand how someone can proudly be a nuisance to those who sign their paychecks nor how can an employer tolerate any of it, at the very least this situation is unfair to the majority of employees who are just "going to work". Not sure what's behind Google's inaction here, they really shouldn't be worried about the trouble makers defecting to somewhere else that most likely won't tolerate their bullshit.

The whole point of somewhere like Google is that they don't want people who will do what they're told, because such people are only capable of doing what they're told. You can't order someone to innovate unless they have no other choice. Silicon Valley has spent years setting itself up as an inheritor of the counterculture, a place where it's possible to "think different". Employees are given a share of the business…

Of all the Silicon Valley companies, Google with its intense focus on traditional academia is not very counter culture at all. They're basically part of the educational industrial complex.

Re: Google's Civil War

#66

Post by pjc50 »

fyoving wrote: post #41
pjc50 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole point of somewhere like Google is that they don't want people who will do what they're told, because such people are only capable of doing what they're told. You can't order someone to innovate unless they have no other choice. Silicon Valley has spent years setting itself up as an inheritor of the counterculture, a place where it's possible to "think different". Employees are given a share of the business…

Tell that to the suits who invented the future at IBM and Bell labs. Counter cultural types don't have a monopoly on innovation.

Did you have anyone specific in mind?

Re: Google's Civil War

#68

Post by AlexB138 »

eropple wrote: post #48
NotPaidToPost wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's how employment works. As an employee you are paid to execute the company's strategy. If you disagree you can of course, and even should, voice your disagreement but that should be done in a professional in diplomatic way, in private. If you cannot do that or cannot accept the company's strategy then yes, your alternative is to leave quietly. The new "red guards" of the left may not like it, but that's what pro…

This is an extremely...one-sided...view of things. Consider a more healthy one: capital and labor should be partners , and labor gets to have a say in the direction of the company, too. It must be said, again and again: corporations exist at the sufferance of the society that grants them their charter and only exist for the benefit of that society. A company that can't do that should have its charter revoked. And its…

> It must be said, again and again: corporations exist at the sufferance of the society that grants them their charter and only exist for the benefit of that society.

I'm assuming you're talking about the US.

We are not subjects of our government, or of some other sovereign, whether that be society or anything else. Our society is founded on individual pursuit of happiness, not collectivism.

Put another way, corporations exist for whatever reason their creators decide. So long as they operate within the law and are able to sustain themselves, societal good is a side effect and a concern of the State, not the corporation itself.

Re: Google's Civil War

#69

Post by lawrenceyan »

> at Microsoft, employees say they don’t want to build technology for warfare

Does anyone know what exactly Microsoft is doing with the military? Is this like better image recognition for drone strikes / targeting humans or more like providing operating systems for military administration? Because those could both be technically construed as “building technology for warfare” with only the first choice being the actually bad type of work.

Re: Google's Civil War

#70

Post by pjc50 »

fyoving wrote: post #61
DFHippie wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Retaliating against whistle blowers is a great way to generate bad PR for yourself. You may disagree that this is whistle blowing. You may view these employees as entitled troublemakers. I expect the googlers doing this view themselves as making personal sacrifices for the greater good. In any case, I doubt Google wants to lose talent to competitors because they are viewed as a hotbed of right-to-workers ideology in…

1. Any bad PR resulting from firing these types would be a one time thing instead of this ongoing situation. 2. Google shouldn't accommodate the delusional and entitled. 3. Labor unions are antithetical to sound economic theory and practice, and no other company in the business supports them.

Ah yes, because dumping a bunch of people who will tell the "I was screwed over by google" story to all their friends into an economy where hiring is driven by personal recommendations can't possibly have any ongoing consequences?
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