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Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

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Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#51

Post by dboreham »

Programmatic wrote: post #50
throwanem wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a hard stop for me; no employer may have that degree of control over anything I own. I won't even configure an account with Exchange's protocol, because that enables remote device wipe. If an employer wants to issue me a company phone, that's fine. If an employer wants to enable IMAP, that's fine. Otherwise, I won't have mobile access to email, because the risk is unacceptable. And if that's not fine - well, i…

I like seeing more awareness of this! It's always depressing to hear people say that they don't care or that it's not a big deal. There are various third party applications that will allow you to use Exchange protocols without the OS integration: they'll let the Exchange server admins wipe the application's container/data rather than the entire phone. I think it's a much fairer implementation.

The requirement to agree to honor the remote wipe request is optional at the server. That is to say, you can use the EAS protocol and not also require remote wipe, if you want to. In theory you could also interpose an EAS proxy between your device and the server that pretended to honor the remote wipe request but not not pass it on to the device (unless the server is setup to check client certs).

Source : I have implemented this protocol.

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#52

Post by rrdharan »

Programmatic wrote: post #50
throwanem wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a hard stop for me; no employer may have that degree of control over anything I own. I won't even configure an account with Exchange's protocol, because that enables remote device wipe. If an employer wants to issue me a company phone, that's fine. If an employer wants to enable IMAP, that's fine. Otherwise, I won't have mobile access to email, because the risk is unacceptable. And if that's not fine - well, i…

I like seeing more awareness of this! It's always depressing to hear people say that they don't care or that it's not a big deal. There are various third party applications that will allow you to use Exchange protocols without the OS integration: they'll let the Exchange server admins wipe the application's container/data rather than the entire phone. I think it's a much fairer implementation.

These days the risk of an accidental wipe seems so trivial to me, since every app (photos, music, notes, docs, podcasts etc) I use is of the local-sync-backed-by-cloud variety.

So I guess I can understand not trusting the IT department but I worry very little about losing the data on the device.

Of course if you're not sold on the cloud-backed model because of privacy concerns and you prefer treating your device itself as a source of truth and a secure store then I can understand the attitude.

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#54

Post by dllthomas »

cbanek wrote: post #6
urahara wrote: post #2

This is very much like a sign that Uber again takes an old path of silencing people and problems instead of fixing toxic culture. Makes me think that they also prepare to blackmail Fowler.

Seems like they have probably already started: https://twitter.com/susanthesquark/status/835193441814392833

She says in her next tweet that she doesn't know who it is or what their aims are. I doubt Uber is attempting to smear her. I don't think the people involved are that evil, but I'm pretty confident they aren't that stupid.

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#55

Post by dominotw »

urahara wrote: post #2

This is very much like a sign that Uber again takes an old path of silencing people and problems instead of fixing toxic culture. Makes me think that they also prepare to blackmail Fowler.

Huffington said this time all problems will be fixed. I trust her, can we give them some time before saying 'takes an old path '.

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#56

Post by alphonsegaston »

uberthrowaway1 wrote: post #45
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems to be Uber's modus operandi every single time they're in trouble and it almost always seems to backfire on them, PR wise. I'm curious though, what tipped her off? While I've worked at tech start-ups before and can believe all the behavior she outlined (because I've seen similar things myself, it's very believable) it still bothers me to continue to take someone's word at face value. I mean I do, I would tr…

Using a throwaway for obvious reasons. >This seems to be Uber's modus operandi every single time they're in trouble and it almost always seems to backfire on them, PR wise. From attending all hands meetings I get the sense TK has a victim mentality and sees himself doing no wrong or Uber doing no wrong. Since we're clearly not wrong, it has to be the critic, right? /S To be fair, we do get some BS scandals related to…

Thanks for the insights. Question about the inside view - do people really buy Kalanick's fake apologies/victim act at this point? We've gone through this ruse so many times, from the outside it just seems like a laughable caricature of malignant narcissism. From your comments about the CTO, I'm guessing he surrounds himself with "empathizable cover" after the classic abusive pattern (if you come after me, think about the damage it will do to the nice people around me).

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#57

Post by alphonsegaston »

dllthomas wrote: post #54
cbanek wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like they have probably already started: https://twitter.com/susanthesquark/status/835193441814392833

She says in her next tweet that she doesn't know who it is or what their aims are. I doubt Uber is attempting to smear her. I don't think the people involved are that evil, but I'm pretty confident they aren't that stupid.

They previously (and probably illegally) hired a private intelligence firm to dig up dirt on their opponents in a court battle:

http://www.theverge.com/2016/7/10/12127638/uber-ergo-investi...

They did the same to intimidate journalists:

http://fortune.com/2014/11/18/uber-rides-into-new-pr-storm-o...

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#58

Post by zouhair »

k_sh wrote: post #4

> "Our activity at Uber has gone up 3x since they blocked us on their WiFi," Shin says. Streisand Effect in 3... 2... 1... It's 2017. Have we really not learned this lesson yet?

For the same reason where even in countries where the death penalty exist, people still commit murder.

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#59

Post by mcguire »

watwut wrote: post #37
BinaryIdiot wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems to be Uber's modus operandi every single time they're in trouble and it almost always seems to backfire on them, PR wise. I'm curious though, what tipped her off? While I've worked at tech start-ups before and can believe all the behavior she outlined (because I've seen similar things myself, it's very believable) it still bothers me to continue to take someone's word at face value. I mean I do, I would tr…

I find it fascinating that on one hand many people call what she described as standard and on the other people still call SV meritocracy. Even if you ignore sexism, the environment seemed to favor political maneuvring over skill and achievement.

In a venture capital-funded world, the primary marketable skill is capturing venture capital. Follow the money.

Re: Uber blocks employees at work from chatting on Blind App

#60

Post by Nitramp »

beaconstudios wrote: post #47
jordigh wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, so when I object and say "cronyism" you hear "let's hire idiots just because they're women". It doesn't have to be either of these. A simple thing you can do is publicly state, "we encourage women and other minorities to apply". And that's all. You encourage them. You don't have to give them any preferential treatment to pad your numbers (and I don't think anyone ever really does that, but a lot of people seem…

I wasn't suggesting you were saying "let's hire idiots just because they're women", I was pointing out a hypothetical scenario in which meritocracy plays second fiddle. There's no need to get defensive. I agree with your suggestion that encouraging women and minorities to apply, and ensuring that one's company culture is inclusive, is a good start. However, this doesn't really help with the core issue, which is that…

> I wasn't suggesting you were saying "let's hire idiots just because they're women", I was pointing out a hypothetical scenario in which meritocracy plays second fiddle.

You suggested "if the majority of developers are mal, then a majority of high-performing developers will also be male". So far so good. Then you made the non sequitur jump to "Hiring lower-performing females to attempt to achieve balance does not fix the original issue". That's a straw man, nobody suggests that. You risk being perceived as creating an absurd hypothetical ("let's hire worse people for social justice reasons") just for the sake of winning the argument, or even believing this is the choice that's posited.

I think this is a recurring problem with these kinds of discussions, people tend to put forward very extreme views of reality where what'd be useful is to seek the middle ground, understand the problem, and then nudge a bit in the right direction.

Additionally, even the basic premise that we currently hire for merit is questionable. Of course everyone tries to hover the best and brightest, but it's easy to see see how a very homogeneous group like SV software devs might mistake group conformity for competence.

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