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Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

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Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#431

Post by [deleted] »

monocasa wrote: post #391
Crash0v3rid3 wrote: post #387

“After conducting a review of this manager’s conduct, we confirmed that there were multiple violations of our code of conduct, as well as of our security policies, which included the exfiltration of confidential business-sensitive documents and private data of other employees,” a Google spokesman said in a statement. This feels pretty cut and dry to me. Meg exported business material from the company. That a fire-abl…

The rumor going around is that she thought she was going to be retaliated against, and the documents were her backing up some of her emails in case she was fired illegally to discuss with her lawyer.

[deleted]

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#432

Post by prepend »

monocasa wrote: post #420
jeffbee wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A company, Google included, will not comment on the circumstances of an employee's exit unless provoked. It is uncharacteristic for them to comment at all. If they are willing to go public with any statements, that indicates to me that they feel their reasons are iron-clad.

Or they think that the PR win for going to the press early is worth more than the lawsuits. Comparing this situation to your standard firing situation isn't going to add up. The calculus is different, as can be seen from the mere fact that it's being discussed here and has news articles written about it.

Unlikely I think as if they weren’t iron clad, they would muffle up and prepare for the wrongful termination lawsuit that will only be greater if they lie about the departure. Since a lie would be slander, damage reputation and lead to lots more money.

I think them issuing this statement means they feel confident in their defense. It also being so specific seems more credible since that’s something to easy to verify (emailing company info out of company).

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#434

Post by s1artibartfast »

pseudalopex wrote: post #426
HunterWare wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn’t that “actually” exfiltrating company documents? Not Google, but I don’t remember any of my NDAs mentioning that I couldn’t share confidential/privileged/company information unless I really wanted to with my lawyer...

Laws override NDAs. Legal counsel is a common exception. Different jurisdictions have different specific rules. Your NDAs probably don't say you can cooperate with law enforcement investigations either. But it's very unlikely a court would say you can't.

You still might need a legal order to obtain the documents.

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#435

Post by refenestrator »

monocasa wrote: post #391
Crash0v3rid3 wrote: post #387

“After conducting a review of this manager’s conduct, we confirmed that there were multiple violations of our code of conduct, as well as of our security policies, which included the exfiltration of confidential business-sensitive documents and private data of other employees,” a Google spokesman said in a statement. This feels pretty cut and dry to me. Meg exported business material from the company. That a fire-abl…

The rumor going around is that she thought she was going to be retaliated against, and the documents were her backing up some of her emails in case she was fired illegally to discuss with her lawyer.

She probably should have discussed this plan with her lawyer before exfiltrating the documents.

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#436

Post by monocasa »

prepend wrote: post #432
monocasa wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or they think that the PR win for going to the press early is worth more than the lawsuits. Comparing this situation to your standard firing situation isn't going to add up. The calculus is different, as can be seen from the mere fact that it's being discussed here and has news articles written about it.

Unlikely I think as if they weren’t iron clad, they would muffle up and prepare for the wrongful termination lawsuit that will only be greater if they lie about the departure. Since a lie would be slander, damage reputation and lead to lots more money. I think them issuing this statement means they feel confident in their defense. It also being so specific seems more credible since that’s something to easy to verify…

How much is a wrongful termination going to cost them? Max a couple million?

How much do they lose from the PR of gutting their AI ethics division of people who didn't toe the company line? More than a couple million easily, IMO.

I can see them being just willing to take the loss on the wrongful termination if they get to smear her on the way out and think they can get her to accept a deal in the end that comes with a more stringent NDA.

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#437

Post by tired_goog »

sn41 wrote: post #404
spicyramen wrote: post #390

Good riddance, work is work, political agendas outside the office space please.

The mandate of the department is ethics. Ethics is not agnostic to one's personal convictions, unlike code. People assume that because someone got fired, they "lost". Another viewpoint is that they retained their ethical integrity at great personal cost - doing so is precisely their actual job.

I’ve seen this bait and switch a couple of times now, but there’s not really any reason to expect a researcher working in an Ethics Research team to only do ethical things, in the same way that you wouldn’t expect someone working on a Truth Team to only do true things. The nominal mandate over her team does not extend as if a veneer to all of her personal actions. It’s just a name.

Her team was very specifically engaged in culture war, and wanted to wield Google’s clout in that war. Google disagreed. That disagreement led to her co-lead refusing to withdraw and edit a paper, so that co-lead was terminated. This really shouldn’t have escalated as much as it did, but it happened, tough shit. Meg was understandably upset about this, but then [appears to have] made the unforced error of sending internal documents to external accounts, and thus was canned.

Companies generally need to be able to trust that you aren’t going to violate their security policies, even when you’re upset about and disagree with their decisions. That’s why she was fired. Every other goddamn thing about this is an irritating optics war between the people that want to use this as ammunition in a crusade to prove that Google doesn’t care about ethics-and-also-minorities [which is manifestly not the case], versus the people that are legally obligated to never say anything publicly about internal matters.

It’s shitty and tiresome, but it has nothing to do with ethics.

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#438

Post by jariel »

aerosmile wrote: post #261

You will learn a lot about Margaret Mitchell's firing by simply reading this piece she shared publicly on Twitter: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ERi2crDToYhYjEjxRoOzO-uO... A few punchlines: "Every moment where Jeff Dean and Megan Kacholia do not take responsibility for their actions is another moment where the company as a whole stands by silently as if to intentionally send the horrifying message that Dr. Geb…

"she was getting paid handsomely while calling out her bosses by name and taking them through the dirt. I have nothing but respect for people willing to fall on their sword for the sake of making the world a better place. "

There is a major implied assumption here that those she was 'calling out' were actually doing bad things.

I sincerely doubt this of Jeff Dean & Co. and a look at this specifics of the Timnit case I don't think make Google look bad.

In summary - she was castigating her managers and peers who were actually acting within reason.

This employee was toxic, furthering more toxicity.

Just because you believe that you're 'doing good' doesn't mean that you are, or those who you disagree with are evil.

This is the big blind spot of (some of) the ostensible promoters of Social Justice: the self absolution and assumption of perfect moral clarity.

Ironically, Google is full of good people, more or less, by virtue of their every day practices, making the world a tiny bit of a better places. (Except for the anti-competitive things of course, but that's more strategic impetus)

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#439

Post by xiaolingxiao »

rmk wrote: post #75
xiaolingxiao wrote: post #19

She gave a talk at my school once, she was invited by my then advisor. This was in 2017 right after she left MSR. We had a brief change, and even back then you can tell she’s not into kowtowing to the patriarchy. It’s quite hard for ambitious women in compsci, they have to walk a tight edge between firm and “motherly”. Men have no such constraints. —————————————— Clarification: I’m speaking about women researchers in…

I have heard that academic departments literally bend over backwards to cultivate women as professors and extend every possible advantage to them in order to promote them. This is from a classmate who did her PhD and is now a tenure-track professor at a prominent school. I know for a fact that she was also the recipients of various scholarships, grants etc. while she was in school, many of which she attributed to bei…

Yeha I’ve noticed structural programs that help women, especially at the undergrad level. And the grad level (where people mentioned operated) it’s highly advisor/manager dependent. At the academy, each PI run their own independent fiefdom so some can be very abusive across the board. This is where being a minority makes it worse because it’s more difficult to form commodory with those around you. These are all first hand accounts and observations I’m reporting. So both can be true: favored at the institutional level but still lagging at the personal level.

Re: Margaret Mitchell fired from Google

#440

Post by moistly »

D13Fd wrote: post #310
thirtyseven wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why hire an Ethics team if you won't let them interrogate unethical behavior?

Interrogating corporate behavior and publicly embarrassing the corporation are two totally different things. You can employ someone and have them develop and even publicly espouse ethics principles, while also instructing them to keep their criticism of corporate behavior confidential to the corporation. This is super common in other professions sometimes charged with enforcing ethical and legal corporate behavior, i…

> This is super common in other professions sometimes charged with enforcing ethical and legal corporate behavior, including law and accounting. It's not a new idea.

It has not worked out well. Making employees keep unethical behaviour on the down-low has resulted in immense, catastrophic harm.

If we are to maintain a healthy society we need a lot more whistleblowing. We need to put work into being better.

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