What happens when you talk about salaries at Google • Hacker News Board

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#251

Post by jfoster » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:27 PM UTC

Anechoic wrote: post #231

chasing wrote: post #171

This is not journalism. Do not treat it as such. Molly McHugh and Wired need to reach out to this woman and ask a few questions. They need to reach out to Google and ask a few questions. Otherwise, this information is just a shade better than useless. There's a lot of detail missing in these tweets. There's a lot of handwaving where the audience is essentially invited to fill in the blanks with whatever stereotypes -…

Molly McHugh and Wired need to reach out to this woman and ask a few questions. Erica has explicitly written that she's not interested in speaking to reporters about the story: https://twitter.com/ericajoy/status/622154558140080128

Sure, but there are still lots of ways to turn this into a good article. I like that they included the original source, but to not write a single word of their own? They could have summarized the tweets, provided history on who Erica is and what her role at Google was, got a statement from Google, talked to Googlers "off the record", reported on any history of allegations against Google in the areas that the tweet brings up, reported on how other companies handle salary information, etc.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#252

Post by jasondecastro » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:28 PM UTC

antsar wrote: post #182

toyg wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, Google respects robots.txt (and the atrocious "right to be forgotten"), and they won't stop you from using GMail if you encrypt everything with PGP. Unlike others ( cough -Facebook- cough ), they usually don't feel the need to trick users into sharing more than they'd want. The classic "if you've done nothing wrong" attitude is more a personal opinion of certain individuals (a certain Eric Schmidt comes t…

> they usually don't feel the need to trick users into sharing more than they'd want Like the time they didn't feel the need to harass everyone into signing up for G+ any time one used an unrelated service?

That's totally different, antsar. I'm 95% sure the motive for that was to simply grow the user base of G+ and try to get more people to know that the platform even exists.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#253

Post by vonmoltke » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:28 PM UTC

aaronem wrote: post #242

vonmoltke wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> absolutely no upside to same from the perspective of management Are you asserting that 95%+ of companies in the US have, and sometimes enforce, a policy that actively hurts them? I know companies do stupid shit from time to time, but you are basically saying salary confidentiality policies are some sort of mass MBA psychosis. After all, if there is "absolutely no upside" to management, why do we need labor laws to…

Where on Earth did you get the idea that labor laws prohibit employees from discussing remuneration with one another?

Somehow I got thoroughly confused and thought the management comment referred to preventing, not permitting.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#254

Post by jessaustin » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:29 PM UTC

chasing wrote: post #229

fixxer wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you define journalism? Obviously, this isn't an article, but it is information and I found it entertaining. True, only a single point of view... shall we call it Gonzo? If you compiled all those tweets into a paragraph, it wouldn't require substantial edits to generate smooth prose.

Journalism is about getting to the truth. That involves doing a bit of legwork to assess the veracity of what someone is saying.

Why does this only go in one direction? "Journalists" regularly publish reformatted company press releases, and quote "insiders" without attribution. That's fine because most news narratives support the status quo and those in power. When the (relatively) little guy has something to say, however, we're going to need some hard evidence! Our biases are telling.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#255

Post by hockley » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:29 PM UTC

learnstats2 wrote: post #221

chasing wrote: post #171

This is not journalism. Do not treat it as such. Molly McHugh and Wired need to reach out to this woman and ask a few questions. They need to reach out to Google and ask a few questions. Otherwise, this information is just a shade better than useless. There's a lot of detail missing in these tweets. There's a lot of handwaving where the audience is essentially invited to fill in the blanks with whatever stereotypes -…

This comment is derailing. The precise definition of journalism is totally irrelevant. Erica Joy has shared an important story that we should listen to.

How'd that work out for Rolling Stone? When you report without fact-checking it's a disservice to readers, and sometimes, the people's voices you are trying to amplify.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#256

Post by codemonkeymike » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:30 PM UTC

chasing wrote: post #171

This is not journalism. Do not treat it as such. Molly McHugh and Wired need to reach out to this woman and ask a few questions. They need to reach out to Google and ask a few questions. Otherwise, this information is just a shade better than useless. There's a lot of detail missing in these tweets. There's a lot of handwaving where the audience is essentially invited to fill in the blanks with whatever stereotypes -…

I agree, it is also hard to start a conversation around a handful of tweets. In the end all we can say is that wired messed up and this story will not get a proper write up and conversation.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#257

Post by pessimizer » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:30 PM UTC

learnstats2 wrote: post #221

chasing wrote: post #171

This is not journalism. Do not treat it as such. Molly McHugh and Wired need to reach out to this woman and ask a few questions. They need to reach out to Google and ask a few questions. Otherwise, this information is just a shade better than useless. There's a lot of detail missing in these tweets. There's a lot of handwaving where the audience is essentially invited to fill in the blanks with whatever stereotypes -…

This comment is derailing. The precise definition of journalism is totally irrelevant. Erica Joy has shared an important story that we should listen to.

That Erica Joy has shared a story is totally irrelevant to the way Wired has chosen to (not) report on it.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#258

Post by pjc50 » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:31 PM UTC

abrahamepton wrote: post #90

staticelf wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And in my opinion as a young talent, Google is highly overrated when it comes to creating good software. Sure they have some hits, but a lot of it also is kind of bad. To be regarded as the best of the best, I think they make pretty shitty software.

I feel similarly about Facebook. I feel it with some justification, but I'm probably wrong. To do what they do at the scale they do it, for it to even work let alone work pretty much perfectly, pretty much all the time for pretty much everyone is a goddamn miracle. But there are so many little things about FB software (mostly the UI/UX) that annoy the shit out of me, so I get grumpy and think their software sucks. Ha…

Gmail is good. Search is good. Docs+Sheets are .. ok for small things. The rest of Drive is a mess. I've not used the photos nor ever been linked to someone's gallery there. Youtube is technically impressive but also notorious for its comments section, and of course all of these are subject to the usual data retention questions.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#259

Post by teddyuk » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:31 PM UTC

fixxer wrote: post #217

billyhoffman wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reposting tweets is not valid journalism. For that matter, including tweets from random people in reaction to a news event is also not valid journalism either. I don't care what muffycat1974 on Twitter has to say about the Iran nuclear deal, unless muffycat1974 is the Secretary of State.

By that same token, who cares what "billyhoffman" has to say?

This is a page of user generated content, wired isn't.

I have seen it on the bbc website as well really poor.

Re: What happens when you talk about salaries at Google

#260

Post by braythwayt » Tue, Jul 21, 2015, 2:32 PM UTC

jessaustin wrote: post #239

scott_s wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the record, I misunderstood your point, too.

Me three. Sometimes I wonder if obtuseness is intentional, to give one the opportunity to bitch no matter what the response. It's like one of those managers who helicopter in while you're doing something else with: "something minor; it'll take you literally no time, we need some data in that one format for tomorrow's meeting, ". After one gets burned, one will start sending confirmation emails.

Something, something about "English being twice as hard to read as it is to write, therefore anything written to be clever is guaranteed to be misunderstood."

Including this follow-up. Thanks for the feedback!