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Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

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Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#431

Post by marricks »

prirun wrote: post #72
qbasic_forever wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We deserve to have input into how we work best and if that means walking away from companies run by egomaniacs that need to see butts in seats, then so be it. The logical conclusion of this line of thinking is to organize your coworkers. You have much more bargaining power about your work conditions as an organized union. The history of unionization stems primarily from workers demanding safe working environments.

> You have much more bargaining power about your work conditions as an organized union. You also give away your power as an individual to those running the union.

What power? You as an individual employee have absolutely no power to change Apple's behavior. Case in point the director of this story quitting because they couldn't convince Apple to change.

As the other comment mentioned the biggest individual power you have is quitting and a union doesn't prevent that.

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#433

Post by dehrmann »

filoleg wrote: post #153
thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #28

Good for him. These companies touting their solutions for creating a more connected world can't have it both ways. Apple was able to ship the M1 and roll out new iterations of many other offerings since the pandemic hit. They're just fine. Apple didn't collapse since the pandemic hit, and the flexibility offered by remote work is far more valuable to lots of people than the loss of in-person collaboration opportuniti…

Not to undermine your point, wich which i agree wholeheartedly, but I wanted to address one thing. I imagine quite a lot of people who worked on M1 hardware probably still had to show up to the office. For some positions it is just required. A friend of mine who worked on hardware at Apple had to go to the office almost every day throughout the pandemic (and no, i dont know what product he worked on, and I am not goi…

When I worked on drivers for a datacenter managed switch, we had hardware (sometimes prototypes) to work with, and would often have to swap hardware out, wire up network cards in some way, attach a traffic generator, etc. It was borderline of if I needed to be there on most days, but we had people in the lab doing rework, so some people definitely needed to be there.

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#434

Post by LoveGracePeace »

ensan wrote: post #222
buzzert wrote: post #146

I can’t help but notice the timing of this. ML is starting to fizzle out as a “savior” of the industry after lofty promises were never fulfilled. Goodfellow was hired right at the peak of ML hype, so I have to assume his salary/total compensation was extraordinarily high, so he was very expensive to keep around. Apple would’ve made an exemption for exceptional talent. They didn’t make the exception for him.

"ML is starting to fizzle out as a “savior” of the industry after lofty promises were never fulfilled." What? Siri, text completion, all the health- and activity-tracking features of Apple Watch, computational photography, Photos app, Face ID, and many, many more depend on machine learning. And let's not forget the Neural Engine in M1.

It used to be AI then was renamed to ML (I know, ML is supposed to be a component of AI). AI has been touted since, let's see, my first encounter with it was in the early 1990's. It sucked. Then again in the early 2000's. It sucked. ML today is almost somewhat barely usable with hurculean efforts, IOW...it still sucks.

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#435

Post by dehrmann »

otterley wrote: post #127
thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #28

Good for him. These companies touting their solutions for creating a more connected world can't have it both ways. Apple was able to ship the M1 and roll out new iterations of many other offerings since the pandemic hit. They're just fine. Apple didn't collapse since the pandemic hit, and the flexibility offered by remote work is far more valuable to lots of people than the loss of in-person collaboration opportuniti…

It takes years to design and ship new silicon. For all we know, the M1 was taped out just before COVID hit and people started working from home.

It was also the result of a decade of work on ARM chips for iPhones and iPads.

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#436

Post by [deleted] »

filoleg wrote: post #153
thr0wawayf00 wrote: post #28

Good for him. These companies touting their solutions for creating a more connected world can't have it both ways. Apple was able to ship the M1 and roll out new iterations of many other offerings since the pandemic hit. They're just fine. Apple didn't collapse since the pandemic hit, and the flexibility offered by remote work is far more valuable to lots of people than the loss of in-person collaboration opportuniti…

Not to undermine your point, wich which i agree wholeheartedly, but I wanted to address one thing. I imagine quite a lot of people who worked on M1 hardware probably still had to show up to the office. For some positions it is just required. A friend of mine who worked on hardware at Apple had to go to the office almost every day throughout the pandemic (and no, i dont know what product he worked on, and I am not goi…

[deleted]

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#437

Post by noisy_boy »

csande17 wrote: post #400
noisy_boy wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Say, for sake of argument, that I'm the World's Greatest Widget Engineer. Say, I am not. > so I can get stuff I want by negotiating individually with my employer I cannot, see above. Does that mean I don't deserve to have the bargaining power for the best deal for myself? > A union's interests are probably not completely aligned with mine—they're focused on protecting the majority of employees, who are probably not…

> Does that mean I don't deserve to have the bargaining power for the best deal for myself? No, I do not believe you are entitled to a wealth transfer from people who are better at your job than you are. (Or, to put it another way, you're certainly free to do a little collective bargaining if you'd like, but the World's Greatest Widget Engineer has no reason to join your union.)

Thats ok - they are one in a million anyway. We are talking about people in general, not exceptional diamonds (they clearly can take care of themselves).

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#438

Post by jstarfish »

donthellbanme wrote: post #351
lizknope wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had an office with a door and window for 12 years at 2 different companies. It was great. I left the door open 90% of the time but it was great to be able to close the door for privacy the other 10%. I changed to a much better job in 2019 regarding work and salary but everyone including the VP's are in cubicles. It is really annoying when everyone around you is on a different conference call and you have to block t…

I sometimes think that some Managers, and even primary founders, have such ungratifing gratifying social lives outside of work; They need the social bonding, and drama, that goes on in certain work settings Kinda like my last girlfriend. I honestly felt if she didn't have an office to go to, and couldn't boss around someone beneath her in the organization around, gossip, and socialize; she couldn't sleep well. Yea, i…

> don't know how many times I heard we are a family here.

Depending on my mood, my response to this sort of nonsense is one of either:

"All the more reason to have as few of us as possible in the same place."

"Ah, family-- the people in your life most likely to molest you."

I'm great at parties.

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#439

Post by karaterobot »

Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #301

Some people are extremely sensitive to the issue of the remote work, like it is some kind of inalienable right, and any (perceived) threat to it makes them want to grab a pitchfork and proteat. I don't get it. Things are simple. The employer sets the terms, where you work and how the work is paid. The employee either accepts the terms or walks away. Sometimes the sides engage in negotiations, where the side with more…

> If you don't like to work in office, find a remote job, end of story.

That's exactly what's happening (in the linked story).

I think the drama comes because there's a cost to quitting your job and finding a new one. It's annoying to say the least, and if the only reason you have to do it is because the company is making what will undoubtedly be seen in a few years as a huge, obvious, frankly stupid mistake about their remote work policy, it rises to the level of a pain in the ass worth arguing about.

Re: Apple's director of machine learning resigns due to return to office work

#440

Post by ojkelly »

Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #301

Some people are extremely sensitive to the issue of the remote work, like it is some kind of inalienable right, and any (perceived) threat to it makes them want to grab a pitchfork and proteat. I don't get it. Things are simple. The employer sets the terms, where you work and how the work is paid. The employee either accepts the terms or walks away. Sometimes the sides engage in negotiations, where the side with more…

> I don't get it. Things are simple. The employer sets the terms, where you work and how the work is paid. The employee either accepts the terms or walks away.

The employer makes an offer. Every job should be one where all parties see it as a fair exchange of value.

For a majority in software engineering, offers are not that hard to come by. There is an onus on both employer and employee to ensure the exchange of value continues to remain fair.

Things are not simple though, because people are messy. We’re all different. We need slightly different things. We have different challenges we’re working with.

Remote work has been a dream for some, and a reality for a small group. The pandemic forced a trial under less than ideal circumstances and productivity generally didn’t suffer (sometimes it went up).

The desire to work in an office or remote is something I keep finding differs person to person. If you mandate either all remote or all in an office you’re going to annoy someone.

We’re human. We need different things.

If your employer is refusing, in this industry you have options.

“Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.”

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