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IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

theregister.com

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Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#281

Post by ghaff »

wileydragonfly wrote: post #270
ghaff wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it was typed by a secretary. At a computer company I worked at starting in the mid 1980s it was not unheard of for some execs to have their admins print out emails for them and type in the handwritten responses. This was an internal-only system. No external email.

Being a touch typist was seen as kind of blue collar until everyone could afford personal computers at home..

Never learned to touch type. I can type pretty quickly but never took a course. Same with shorthand.

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#282

Post by disambiguation »

harimau777 wrote: post #97
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #21

I am curious if anyone can find the text for "IBM's Policy Letter #4" written by IBM's chairman in 1953, which is referenced in this article. I did some searching but all the links I found to the full text were broken. I ask because I think it shows what a Rorschach test the arguments over DEI have become. I at least found one quote from the Policy Letter #4 which stated "It is the policy of this organization to hire…

The issue that I have is that I've almost never seen an anti-DEI advocate actually engage with the issues. Even if I ultimately disagreed with them, I could respect someone who was willing to look at the problems the US is having with inequality and present a reasoned argument for alternatives to DEI. However, what I usually see is people either ignoring the issues people are facing, ignoring the arguments put forth…

All social injustice stems from the first law of economics: there isn't enough to go around. DEI will come and go, but so long as we lack the wealth to meet everyones needs (and wants), there will always be inequity. The real question is, does anyone have an idea of what a fair world looks like in the mean time? Why do people disagree on what that fair world looks like? Is it a fools errand to try and make the world fair when there's no clear goal to move towards? How do folks who support DEI think of it in the above context?

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#283

Post by onetimeusename »

rayiner wrote: post #232
archagon wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe the emphasis on racial identity in society will prove harmful in the long run. But it's plain to see that the anti-DEI push from the Trump administration is little more than a return to white, male supremacy. For example: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/07/park-service... If I had to choose between the two, white supremacy is not what I would pick. And if it sticks around, it's going to be much mor…

The anti-DEI push is not about “white supremacy,” but rather what some disparagingly call “multiracial whiteness.” It’s basically a return to the 1990s, when we retained a distinctly Anglo-flavored dominant American culture, but anyone could assimilate into that culture.

[flagged]

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#284

Post by hackable_sand »

rayiner wrote: post #183
skizm wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "anit-DEI stuff" is the same as the DEI stuff from before this administration: performative. Originally DEI was because the people demanded it of companies, now the anti-DEI version is because the administration will make your life hell if you don't fall in line. Personally I fully agree that building a diverse workforce is more profitable in the long run than ignoring diversity (unless your company will die in t…

Do you think people who have different skin colors do their jobs differently? Can you articulate how you think your white workers do their jobs differently than say your hispanic workers?

You are obsessed with race. It's weird.

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#285

Post by chimpanzee »

chimpanzee wrote: post #205
rayiner wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because I view DEI and ethnic identity as a personal threat to my mixed kids. Followed closely by the fact that i’m from a third world country, and I know that promoting ethnic identity invariably corrodes and destroys a society. It wrecks every facet of society and governance. Every issue becomes overtaken by ethnic scorekeeping and jockeying. Democracy itself disappears, replaced with ethnic machine politics.

In which “third world” country have you experienced this? How does ethnic identity threaten a mixed person? Being mixed myself, I'd love to know why you think ethnic identity is a threat to me and others like me. In my experience, it has been a tremendous advantage, despite the fact that I have lost friends and opportunities simply because I am not "white enough". And that isn't a guess or misread, I've been told tha…

I’m quite curious why this, me sharing my own highly-applicable experience, is being downvoted. I’ll take the additional downvotes simply to be given an answer.

If it’s due to a lack of clarity, I’ll gladly elucidate here. (I can’t directly edit the comment at this point)

Edit: Haha thanks for the extra downvotes HN. So predictable.

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#286

Post by rayiner »

jdgoesmarching wrote: post #274
rayiner wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think people who have different skin colors do their jobs differently? Can you articulate how you think your white workers do their jobs differently than say your hispanic workers?

Everyone does their jobs differently due to innumerable variables, including life experience and cultural background. What exactly are you trying to accomplish here? Your bad faith anti-DEI rants are basically half this thread.

I’m trying to establish what people think “diversity” means. The foundational premise of the civil rights movement is that race is a superficial characteristic and people are the same. Accepting that as true, the concept of “diversity” makes sense only as a confirmation about the absence of irrational racial discrimination.

But OP suggested that diversity itself was a good thing, which makes no sense because racial differences aren’t meaningful. All else being equal, it’s not possible for a “racially diverse” team to function differently than a racially homogenous one.

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#287

Post by Symbiote »

bigfatkitten wrote: post #276
MyPasswordSucks wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Veering off topic, but this letter is in a variable width font. Were there typewriters that could do that? Yes, and in fact one of the most popular was from IBM itself [1], released in 1944. > The letterhead and body text aren’t aligned, so if it did go through a press it took two passes. It was pretty standard practice to have pre-printed letterhead, hence the cachet of something being issued on "company letterhea…

> It was pretty standard practice to have pre-printed letterhead, hence the cachet of something being issued on "company letterhead". Take a sheet of company letterhead, pop it in the ol' Executive, and type-type-type. This was indeed standard until colour laser printers became cheap (and physically printing letters became less common), well into the 2000s.

At work, we still have several boxes of "company letterhead" in the basement, maybe 15,000 A4 sheets.

I should probably use it as scrap paper, there's no way it will ever be used for sending letters at the current rate.

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#288

Post by rayiner »

hackable_sand wrote: post #284
rayiner wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think people who have different skin colors do their jobs differently? Can you articulate how you think your white workers do their jobs differently than say your hispanic workers?

You are obsessed with race. It's weird.

[flagged]

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#289

Post by jensensbutton »

disambiguation wrote: post #282
harimau777 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue that I have is that I've almost never seen an anti-DEI advocate actually engage with the issues. Even if I ultimately disagreed with them, I could respect someone who was willing to look at the problems the US is having with inequality and present a reasoned argument for alternatives to DEI. However, what I usually see is people either ignoring the issues people are facing, ignoring the arguments put forth…

All social injustice stems from the first law of economics: there isn't enough to go around. DEI will come and go, but so long as we lack the wealth to meet everyones needs (and wants), there will always be inequity. The real question is, does anyone have an idea of what a fair world looks like in the mean time? Why do people disagree on what that fair world looks like? Is it a fools errand to try and make the world…

I think this is a perfect example of gp's comment.

Re: IBM orders US sales to locate near customers, RTO for cloud staff, DEI purge

#290

Post by [deleted] »

relaxing wrote: post #250
scoofy wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a conflation in the idea behind this comment that drives me crazy. This version of equity based on race is using race as a proxy for outcomes in life that are actually based on a wide variety of factors. Equality based on race is treating peoples race as equal. The idea that we care about equity is important , but using race as a proxy means we need to care especially about the proxy and making sure the prox…

> This version of equity based on race is using race as a proxy for outcomes in life Because racism is ongoing and negatively impacts people of color, it makes sense to focus where harm is being done. There is a leftist school of thought that agrees with you (focus on class instead of race). But I personally don’t believe that a focus purely on outcomes would be applied equitably while racism still exists. > we're so…

[deleted]
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