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Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

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Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#81

Post by [deleted] »

sillysaurusx wrote: post #56
rsweeney21 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work at Meta. 1) Work with top minds in ML 2) Money But I have enough money now and no amount of more money (that Meta could reasonably offer for my role) would make it worth staying. This place sucks now.

Are you brave, or ready to resign by posting publicly that your current employer sucks? Either way, it’s wild watching several people in this thread literally not care if they get fired. I guess the article really is accurate. Maybe I’m miscalibrated, but “I work at X. This place sucks” has never been a safe thing to say openly, so it’s interesting seeing it from multiple people here. Plus there’s the usual angle of…

[deleted]

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#82

Post by renegade-otter »

ninininino wrote: post #69
renegade-otter wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to stop suggesting that someone who is "neurodivergent" is more likely to be a sociopathic asshole. The two are not related at all. Back in the day you could mention in passing "oh that guy is on a spectrum", but it was always because they were awkward and quiet, not anti-social. Zuck has spent his life from birth in a walled garden. He cannot relate to normal human emotions. In a way, that's not his fault, b…

Someone who is neurodivergent (which is itself an umbrella term) may very well struggle to accurately detect the level of morale amongst their coworkers (or signs of low morale), or may have a more difficult time fostering the level of closeness to their coworkers to build the trust with those people that they'd be vulnerable and share their feelings of low morale.

That all may be true, but we have other data points. There are multiple stories of Zuckerberg being warned about the dangers of "X" and "Y". "This is going to harm children", for example. He repeatedly overrides those concerns and gives the go-ahead. This is not some poor soul who has trouble connecting with people, this is a sociopath.

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#83

Post by hsuduebc2 »

ninininino wrote: post #23
glaslong wrote: post #8

Currently at Meta. This place has always been a bit ruthless in the 8+ years I've been around to observe. But the article is accurate. Never seen people this universally fed up. I thought tech was too cushy for it to happen, but there's serious collective action posting out in the open all over the place. It's also never been more cutthroat, backstabby, scope-grabby, political, and uncertain. There seems to be a flyw…

Is Zuck just too...neurodivergent or lacking in social awareness or low EQ or whatever the case may be to understand morale? Or just so cut-throat/trusting that people who don't currently work there want the META paycheck badly enough that even if morale is horrible they can just backfill departures?

I personally believe that he is just piece of shit. Unhinged, greedy, selfish one. Some people are made this way, some people evolve into that state. I don't really think it's some sort of diagnosis.

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#84

Post by bradlys »

discordance wrote: post #43

Hey Meta folks, remember that time when Facebook: - harvested user data which helped a company manipulate a US election and the Brexit outcome? - played a role in spreading hate speech, which was used to support a genocide in Myanmar? - harmed the mental health of a generation of young people. Just highlighting some data points. I'm really not suggesting you stand up for yourself and do something that might harm your…

Wonder when Americans will apply this to themselves with their own government which does far worse things everyday instead of posting these comments.

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#85

Post by nsagent »

glaslong wrote: post #8

Currently at Meta. This place has always been a bit ruthless in the 8+ years I've been around to observe. But the article is accurate. Never seen people this universally fed up. I thought tech was too cushy for it to happen, but there's serious collective action posting out in the open all over the place. It's also never been more cutthroat, backstabby, scope-grabby, political, and uncertain. There seems to be a flyw…

I also hear from people I know at Meta that there is a very strong push to use AI to speed up developer work. One person I know complains that their velocity is slowed down because they have to fix some of the slop that gets checked in as code review is too lax about AI generated code.

My guess is that if the planned layoffs remove these "underperforming" devs that are actually fixing AI introduced bugs at the detriment of their own velocity, that will hopefully lead to a correction that AI isn't actually dramatically increasing efficiency, but rather that it trades efficiency amongst individuals with likely a slight positive trend in efficiency overall.

Interestingly, since I'm also from an academic background, it seems professors have leaned in heavily on AI and are essentially using their PhD students as filters for AI ideas (which have a MUCH lower signal to noise in that domain).

Interesting times (speaking as an NLP researcher).

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#86

Post by coldpie »

apsurd wrote: post #68
coldpie wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I decided very early in my career that I would never work for a place that sells ads. Don't think I could sleep at night if I worked at a place like Meta or Google.

How different is it really though, if you work for a company that buys the ads? I've thought about this because it's true for most every place I worked, we just funnel money into Google & Meta's coffers and play the SEO and social hacks game just like everyone else.

I think it's pretty different. As much as you might not want to and put effort into avoiding it, sometimes you must make a deal with the devil to live your life or operate your business, simply because the world is what it is. But working for the devil is a choice.

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#87

Post by 1-more »

stephc_int13 wrote: post #34

I am wondering if Zuckerberg somehow stumbled upon the old Decimation thing on Wikipedia one late evening and decided it was a good idea to try. I don't really understand the rationale otherwise, hiring is hard, and they are not forced to reduce cost now. This seems like a colossal mistake. Not the first of course.

> stumbled upon the old Decimation thing on Wikipedia

He took Latin at his first high school and at Exeter when he went there for 11th and 12th grades, so he almost certainly knew it without Wikipedia.

But yeah, whenever I've survived a layoff it feels a bit like surviving a decimation or some other collective punishment.

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#88

Post by [deleted] »

bradlys wrote: post #76
fooker wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The usual bet is that you double your salary by tolerating a toxic work environment for a few years. If you are not in the Bay Area, the absolute numbers might seem unbelievable but here you go - I have seen mid-senior engineers (4-5 years exp) get Meta offers with 700k yearly TC.

No one is getting $700k tc for senior eng outside of speciality AI roles. That’s beyond even staff level. You can stay at the company and get stock appreciation up to that but you’re not getting a new hire offer at $700k below staff level. (Even for staff, it’s high)

[deleted]

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#89

Post by 1-more »

percentcer wrote: post #70
stephc_int13 wrote: post #34

I am wondering if Zuckerberg somehow stumbled upon the old Decimation thing on Wikipedia one late evening and decided it was a good idea to try. I don't really understand the rationale otherwise, hiring is hard, and they are not forced to reduce cost now. This seems like a colossal mistake. Not the first of course.

what is the Decimation thing?

Roman legions would execute every 10th man as collective punishment. Kept the survivors in line. No idea if it ever actually happened.

Re: Meta's New Reality: Record High Profits. Record Low Morale

#90

Post by stephc_int13 »

percentcer wrote: post #70
stephc_int13 wrote: post #34

I am wondering if Zuckerberg somehow stumbled upon the old Decimation thing on Wikipedia one late evening and decided it was a good idea to try. I don't really understand the rationale otherwise, hiring is hard, and they are not forced to reduce cost now. This seems like a colossal mistake. Not the first of course.

what is the Decimation thing?

It is something that occured a few times in Roman history.

A collective punishment, 10% of the soldiers killed by their peers, randomly choosen.

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