The movie Antitrust but on steroids in real life. Also the Crossover white collar sweatshop ended up as trendsetter.
Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
271–280 of 799 posts
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#272It's always been hard to know the extent of how draconian tracking actually is (IT pros tend to not talk about it much). In the US, there's the expectation that when you use an employer-provided device that any and all activity on it can be fully monitored/recorded and used against the employee for any reason. In practice, however, few people worry about reasonable amounts web-surfing, being on hacker-news or doing l…
> With AI, this changes significantly since the man can now employ a robot to categorize and finely scrutinize every little thing
Corporate endpoint monitoring software has been able to track time spent in apps and websites for a very long time. They could produce breakdowns of time spent in apps and even categorize popular websites based on a database.
This is unrelated to the topic, but worth mentioning in case someone assumes that AI tools were needed for time tracking and breakdowns.
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#273I don't work for Meta, but how many more years do I need to work in tech? I'm in my 40s and my kids are young. I've already set up 529s for them, and am paying for some expensive home upgrades. Maybe when that is finished and I've built up a buffer I can switch industries for the last 5-10 years of my working life. Curious if anyone here has any similar plans.
I retired last year at 38. I live off 4% of my investments and I get to travel around to different countries every 6 months. The key is budgeting and living a not so extravagant lifestyle. Figure out how much you need per year and multiply it by 25. That's your FIRE number, what you need in an investment portfolio with a return of 10% per year on average. Then live off 4% for the rest of your life.
Do you live in a city? That's my number one concern. I don't need a lot of luxury but living in a major cosmopolitan city is a non-negotiable for me.
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#274Somehow this is way more dystopian than not having an opt out at all.
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#275Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have a dear friend who works at Meta. The conclusion that all meta workers are valuing money over "something good" is not reasonable. This fellow, who I know to be a good man of excellent character btw, for example has to support his family (which all together number 6), and be prepared to pay tuition for 4 kids starting in a decade and then one after another for the other 3! Is providing for your family and their…
There are many, many ways to provide for one's family, Meta is but one. And I say this as a father providing for mine. Additionally, putting the blame for using Meta products on the users in spite of all of what we know about how the company has strived to make the productive terribly addictive is a very wild take.
Well, this fellow is a programmer, that's his trade and at his level he would be working for one of the fangs or whatever they are called these days and they're all creepy as far I am concerned. Which one of them is 'responsible'? Google and its pervasive tracking and selling of our data to all and sundry? Microsoft and "let's make our AI addictive"? Working for Amazon and contributing to the gutting of small businesses and bookstores? ... Really, you speak as if you have slept through the past 26 years in this field.
> Additionally, putting the blame for using Meta products on the users in spite of all of what we know about how the company has strived to make the productive terribly addictive is a very wild take.
Really? It's like me complaining that my pot and smoking habits were due to evil designs of their vendors. I take full responsibility for taking those initial puffs knowing full well that they were addictive and not good for me.
p.s. my general point is this: The entire industry was pushing developers to think nothing of 'ethical concerns' and 'just move fast and break things'.
And I find it disengenous to now pick on a single solitary entity, Meta, as if the rest of these newly arrived big techs were/are clean and ethical. Possibly some want to virtue signal while earning big $ at some other VC unicorn.
(Anyone working for "AI" companies here complaining about Meta? ...)
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#276I don't work for Meta, but how many more years do I need to work in tech? I'm in my 40s and my kids are young. I've already set up 529s for them, and am paying for some expensive home upgrades. Maybe when that is finished and I've built up a buffer I can switch industries for the last 5-10 years of my working life. Curious if anyone here has any similar plans.
I quit tech at 40. I still do cool things with technology, but now at a community-owned grocery co-op. I can't recommend leaving tech highly enough. My cortisol levels are so much lower than they used to be. I don't have to schedule my life around EMEA and APAC meetings outside of my normal hours. I only work more than 40 hours a week if I feel like it, which I sometimes do, because I actually enjoy my work now. I ma…
> now at a community-owned grocery co-op
I find that space really interesting. Do you by any chance have a blog, or would you mind sharing a bit of your experience with it?
Also, any advice on research or reading materials? :) Thank you!
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#277I don't work for Meta, but how many more years do I need to work in tech? I'm in my 40s and my kids are young. I've already set up 529s for them, and am paying for some expensive home upgrades. Maybe when that is finished and I've built up a buffer I can switch industries for the last 5-10 years of my working life. Curious if anyone here has any similar plans.
I see all this complaining from people in big tech nowadays, but I can't help but wonder, why act like the industry is just big tech? There are so many small companies, research groups etc that can pay a livable wage (just not as exuberant as big tech) without the ethical scruples, while still posing challenging technical problems.
A lot of those companies are located in the middle of nowhere or don't make enough for you to live in a city. If you are a minority in America, living outside of a city represents a MASSIVE hit to quality of life.
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#278I don't work for Meta, but how many more years do I need to work in tech? I'm in my 40s and my kids are young. I've already set up 529s for them, and am paying for some expensive home upgrades. Maybe when that is finished and I've built up a buffer I can switch industries for the last 5-10 years of my working life. Curious if anyone here has any similar plans.
I dream about it everyday. I love building software, but I can't stand working in the industry. It's such an unholy combination of bad corporate culture and questionable moral principals.
There was a part of me who dreamed of doing simple entry-level jobs instead of working in tech, so I got a part-time job cleaning hospital ER rooms on the weekends. Everything has been fine for the most part, but it has been made clear to me how easy it is to get fired at entry-level jobs. The pay is really pretty dismal and the stability really isn't there. Overall the experience has made me a lot more inclined to not leave money on the table. If there are things I can do to earn more and make my life more comfortable I just do them now.
Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#279It's always been hard to know the extent of how draconian tracking actually is (IT pros tend to not talk about it much). In the US, there's the expectation that when you use an employer-provided device that any and all activity on it can be fully monitored/recorded and used against the employee for any reason. In practice, however, few people worry about reasonable amounts web-surfing, being on hacker-news or doing l…
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Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min
#280Earlier quoted context omitted.
This sounds like the "everything you create in your own time is company property since we cannot distinguish if what you do in your own time isn't company related" clause in some contracts. Under no circumstance is it actable where I live, but it can sure scare the hell out of people and presents a line of thought. Yes, some companies think they can own copyright on the things you write at home.
I always ask companies to remove that clause from contracts, I think all offers I've ever got had that clause, but also 100% removed it on request.
Interesting. I've always asked, too, and 0% were willing to make any changes to their policies. I suppose it has a lot to do with the size of the company and your relative bargaining power.