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Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

bbc.com

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Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#351

Post by crystal_revenge »

ar_lan wrote: post #252
sollewitt wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we need to unionize, across companies. We need to be able to block stuff like this, and to be able to demand that you can’t lay off someone to replace them with AI (bringing US workers rights up to the bar set by China). We also need to be able to hold our leadership to some kind of code of ethics. I don’t want to work for a company that makes kill bots, or can renege on climate pledges.

> bringing US workers rights up to the bar set by China I don't strive for 996. Is this really the bar we want to meet?

The funny thing most Americans don't realize about 996 in China is that the Chinese, while very hard workers, don't work the same way as Americans do. For example lunch is expected to be good (and taken pretty seriously) and followed by an in office nap. This is not some secret thing either but typically encouraged by the company (most office works will have blankets, pillows, eye masks etc at their desk).

Even the Chinese don't believe you can grind at your desk non-stop for 12 hours.

Don't get me wrong, 996 is awful, but the American re-imagining of it is even worse.

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#352

Post by palmotea »

> Now, according to Reuters, external, new controls will allow employees to pause the data collection for "up to 30 minutes at a time" as well as request exemptions from the initiative altogether.

30 minutes of opt out should be enough for anyone. Let's all praise Meta and Mark Zuckerberg for their thoughtfulness, kindness, and empathy!

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#354

Post by patmcc »

schnitzelstoat wrote: post #174
macNchz wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is something that genuinely runs the gamut across different companies—plenty don't even know the serial numbers of company-owned machines, never mind which devices individuals have, while others do effectively have live feeds of every employee's screen available to managers at all times. In between you have many businesses that manage their devices but only insofar as to enforce some basic protection and reserve…

Yeah, many companies don't want the liability issues. Like what happens if I open my bank account on my work computer? You could argue I can expect someone to be watching but I have no warning that someone is? Here in the EU that would probably be an easy lawsuit.

Why would you ever login to a sensitive account on a device you don't own and have root on? Like I trust my employer not to do anything shifty with my banking info, if I were to use it, but I'm not going to take that chance for a dozen reasons.

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#355

Post by mrguyorama »

MattDamonSpace wrote: post #177
sollewitt wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we need to unionize, across companies. We need to be able to block stuff like this, and to be able to demand that you can’t lay off someone to replace them with AI (bringing US workers rights up to the bar set by China). We also need to be able to hold our leadership to some kind of code of ethics. I don’t want to work for a company that makes kill bots, or can renege on climate pledges.

A heavily unionized tech industry over the last 30yrs would be an interesting counterfactual. IMO the ability for individual employees to negotiate for themselves is a positive? As is being able to get rid of bad performers Unionization would hurt the startup ecosystem, at least at the margins, no?

>IMO the ability for individual employees to negotiate for themselves is a positive?

Why in the world are you convinced that you as an individual have a stronger bargaining position than the entire labor pool?

How in the world does that work in your head?

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#356

Post by mjanx123 »

crispyambulance wrote: post #20

It'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…

When AI takes all the jobs, it will also need to take care of supplying all the demand/customers, as humans will no longer have the resources for that.

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#357

Post by switchbak »

gausswho wrote: post #308
ryandrake wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always, throughout a 25+ year career, kept personal business on personal devices and work business on work devices, and never cross the streams. Oddly, this is really controversial on HN, though! I've gotten so many weirdly angry responses when suggesting people try it, like it's a huge inconvenience to just bring a personal phone to work in order to do your banking and fuck around posting on HN. It's so much ea…

I did find this odd at first too, but then I realized something: it's a pain to maintain a device. Customizing it to the way you like it is not only a waste of time, it's tedious and never ends in an age where defaults are often adversarial to your interests. It's enough work taking care of one pet/kid, you might not want another. Now I'm a nerd and I went through a realization that I should treat my devices as 'live…

"your employer won't provision you a Linux with root" - there's your problem!

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#358

Post by frez1 »

crystal_revenge wrote: post #344
veber-alex wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. One time my manager did a hour long lecture for our team on how personal growth is important and that we all should expand our horizons and learn new stuff. When I tried to reserve 2 hours A WEEK for studying tasks I got push back that I should do it on my own time. It was a complete joke.

> When I tried to reserve 2 hours A WEEK for studying tasks I've never understood why employees push for official approval like this. It's not surprising you don't get officially dedicated "study time". The vast majority of programmers aren't hourly anyway, so officially sanctioned study hours doesn't even fit in with how work is prioritized. Not to mention the optics look terrible if your team is ever behind your ma…

[dead]

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#359

Post by vharuck »

MattDamonSpace wrote: post #219
9rx wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A union is merely a group of people who agree to work together for a shared benefit. That doesn't mean that there cannot be individual negotiation, nor does it mean you can't get rid of bad performers. There is no reason why it would need to hurt the startup ecosystem either. If the tech workers wanted those things they could make it so, but they already could have made those things so already and didn't so...

Isn’t Collective Bargaining a cornerstone of the Union pitch?

Take the National Basketball Players Association as an example. They represent NBA players and collectively bargained for a minimum wage, benefits, and processes to address grievances with management. NBA players aren't all paid the same, and they don't have identical terms in their contracts. The union sets the floor.

Re: Meta workers can opt out of being tracked at work up to 30 min

#360

Post by [deleted] »

Balgair wrote: post #268
crispyambulance wrote: post #20

It'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…

> We will soon have to brace ourselves for an absolute draconian level of tracking. Somehow this reminds me of the old adage in finance :"The optimal amount of fraud is not 0" Meaning that you could of course come up with a system in your accounting or banking or stocks or whatever that is totally 100% fraud proof. But that system would be so onerous that none would use it. They'd go back to a more fraudulent system…

[deleted]
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