Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

omaha.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 548 posts

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#21

Post by corobo »

The meat of the story is that Omaha man worked for Marriott hotels on customer support. Their support system allows their agents to like tweets.

The man appears to have inadvertently clicked like on a tweet while dealing with a large influx of support messages (due to a promo going on) thanking Marriott for listing Tibet as its own country which was a huge no-no due to Mariott's presence in China. Execs fire him as a part of their "sorry China" grovelling.

My kneejerk is to believe fired man. I've clicked like on things by accident browsing regular Twitter, never mind a support system designed to skim through hundreds of requests. Unfortunately belief isn't going to restore the job, this is another lesson for the pile that companies will axe employees over fixing (heck, explaining) a problem with the system. It's the cheapest option.

If liking a tweet will infuriate the largest (by population) country in the world, maybe $14/hr support agents shouldn't be able to one-click like tweets.

Another question does occur - if it's such a big deal for them, why is/was Tibet listed as its own country in their system that prompted the liked tweet in the first place?

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#22

Post by joe_the_user »

Aside from other questions, in what way does this mid-level management position wherein one is constantly surveiled a "dream job"? Ah, because the employers only hire people who claim it's their dream job? Because mostly a simple unfair firing situation wouldn't get the outrage it deserved unless the situation would flogged someone losing their dream job?

None of the rhetoric inflation involved is the fault of this unfairly fired guy but it is an unfortunate sign of today.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#23

Post by djrogers »

avree wrote: post #11

It's strange to me how much emphasis they're putting on the tweet. Wasn't the spark that incensed China so much their decision to list Tibet as a country in the survey?

Nobody really knew about that until the yeeet was liked by the Marriott corporate account, so in a sense you’re right but the ‘like’ was the proximate cause of the firestorm.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#25

Post by intopieces »

Even if it wasn't an accident -- even if he saw the Tweet, and on behalf of Marriott and in full intention of broadcasting such, he clicked "Like" on this tweet, it's completely insane he would be fired for it. The tweet exhibits a positive sentiment. I would not expect most people to know that this sentiment matters to China.

This is another example of China exerting influence on the open web, and it's shameful that we have ceded leadership to China like this.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#26

Post by kodablah »

Stories like this are how companies end up on my mental boycott list which is fairly indefinite especially when their value-add over competitors is limited or non-existent. I'd be glad to read the other side of this as I usually don't like to draw conclusions from pieces like this, but I suspect it's pretty clear in this case. /me slots Marriott just above Nestle in mental Rolodex. Bet they can't quantify that, I don't have a Twitter account.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#27

Post by zeth___ »

Up next, all atheists and homosexuals get fired from any company that deals with Saudi Arabia.

We can't let backwards dictatorships have any say in how a democracy is ran.

Marion should be made an example of in the US. Say a wink wink nudge nudge major tax audit of every single Marion hotel.

Re: Omaha man ‘liked’ a tweet, then lost his job

#28

Post by zeth___ »

djrogers wrote: post #24
your-nanny wrote: post #12

Firing the employee seems counterproductive. It hurts morale, and doesn't actually solve the problem.

I’m not sure Tiebtan independence is a problem that Marriott can solve.

Oh good, then China has nothing to worry about and can leave everything as was is.
Post reply on HN