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Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

nytimes.com

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Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#91

Post by reustle »

Bud wrote: post #70
jimsimmons wrote: post #24

As time goes on, Apple, the de-facto emperor of tech, will lose more of its clothes. They haven't had anything new in 10 years and each year their keynotes get more typical and lacklustre. Yet, Cook is up there using all sorts of superlatives, doing cargo cult innovation.

I guess you missed Apple Watch (which basically invented its category and leads it by a wide margin), and AirPods (also leads its category by a wide margin), and the M1 (instantly made a joke out of Intel) and most of the history of the iPhone. Kinda makes one wonder what else you've missed. Such as, basically everything. "De facto" is not hyphenated, btw, nor did you use it correctly.

* Pebble: Shipped January 2013

* Android Wear OS: Released June 2014

* Pebble Time (color): February 24, 2015

* Apple Watch 1: April 24, 2015

I wouldn't say they "invented" the category.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#92

Post by Bud »

reustle wrote: post #91
Bud wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you missed Apple Watch (which basically invented its category and leads it by a wide margin), and AirPods (also leads its category by a wide margin), and the M1 (instantly made a joke out of Intel) and most of the history of the iPhone. Kinda makes one wonder what else you've missed. Such as, basically everything. "De facto" is not hyphenated, btw, nor did you use it correctly.

* Pebble: Shipped January 2013 * Android Wear OS: Released June 2014 * Pebble Time (color): February 24, 2015 * Apple Watch 1: April 24, 2015 I wouldn't say they "invented" the category.

That's because you can't assess how much better an Apple Watch is than any of those defunct joke-competitors. Others can, though, like those who actually buy smartwatches.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#93

Post by Waterluvian »

majormajor wrote: post #19
madrox wrote: post #10

I don't believe Apple or secrecy is the story here. I think the real story is how the pandemic + slack has changed corporate politics. It used to be that most corporate concerns were raised through HR or the management chain, and power ultimately rested with the executive. Now, Slack means it's much easier to put anyone on blast, and it's much harder to control the narrative. Combined with the pandemic, where all soc…

I don't see it. The most disgruntled people I worked with in the past kept most of their griping off of slack or IM or email because they suspected it was logged. Is constant complaining over lunch really less effective than constant complaining in DMs? Or, if it's large channels with lots of participants - what stopped those channels from happening before? Is the idea that people who would've whined over lunch to a…

I’m pretty sure it is logged.

Perhaps someone can confirm but can a sufficiently privileged user (not a Slack employee) read contents of private channels? DMs?

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#94

Post by Waterluvian »

ALittleLight wrote: post #51

"she had left Apple after spending several years fighting a decision to reassign her to a role that she said had involved more work for less pay. She said Apple had begun trying to reassign her after she complained that the company’s work on the minerals was not, in some cases, leading to meaningful change in some war-torn countries" I'm impressed that Apple let her spend "several years" fighting a reassignment. I'm…

A job is a job. You just quit and find another one if your employer no longer wants you or wants you to do something you don’t care for.

Is this attitude possibly because these companies hire based on the entire emotion that you’re special and elite and we’re all going to link arms and save the planet?

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#95

Post by emodendroket »

imgabe wrote: post #8

> Richard Dahan, who is deaf, said he had struggled at his former job at an Apple Store in Maryland for six years because his manager refused to provide a sign-language interpreter for him to communicate with customers, which federal law requires under some circumstances. This just doesn't seem like a reasonable accommodation for a retail job. Your whole job is to communicate with the customers. If you need to hire a…

Does the interpreter know a whole lot about computers? I wouldn't say the employee is useless here.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#96

Post by r00fus »

Waterluvian wrote: post #93
majormajor wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see it. The most disgruntled people I worked with in the past kept most of their griping off of slack or IM or email because they suspected it was logged. Is constant complaining over lunch really less effective than constant complaining in DMs? Or, if it's large channels with lots of participants - what stopped those channels from happening before? Is the idea that people who would've whined over lunch to a…

I’m pretty sure it is logged. Perhaps someone can confirm but can a sufficiently privileged user (not a Slack employee) read contents of private channels? DMs?

Enterprise Slack allows full logging of even 1:1 DMs. DMs are not E2E encrypted.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#97

Post by krrrh »

throwawaylinux wrote: post #89
krrrh wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> may one ask what definition of "welfare state" has applied to the USA since its founding? I’m going to assume that this is a serious question and try to quickly answer it in good faith. A quick search finds these figures [0] from the Congressional Research Service. “CRS identified 83 overlapping federal welfare programs that together represented the single largest budget item in 2011—more than the nation spends on…

> I’m going to assume that this is a serious question and try to quickly answer it in good faith. It is a serious question and I was hoping for something closer to the late 1700s vintage. I'm well aware there is a vast welfare system in place today.

Sorry I misread thinking you meant since it’s founding (until now), when has it been a welfare state.

I was caught in a weak moment I guess.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#98

Post by rectangleboy »

wolverine876 wrote: post #85
dstaley wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When was the last time they created a new category? Almost every current Apple product (save the HomePod) is the category defining product of it's class. The iPhone, the iPad, the M1 MacBooks, the Apple Watch, the AirPods, the Apple TV, the iMac, and the AirTags are all essentially best-in-class, and the standards-bearer for the category.

I mean, what new product categories has Apple created (or defined) like they did with the iPhone? Phones, tablets, laptops, wearables, etc. are old news. AirTags are pretty cool, but a small category.

The Tile existed before the AirTags.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#99

Post by slenk »

Bud wrote: post #65

The leader of this small group of "unrest" folks, Cher Scarlett, apparently got hired in April and has worked for 8 other tech companies, according to this story. Color me unimpressed. She starts agitating after a few months of working entirely from home at a highly-paid gig? Did she even have time to get a clue about whether Apple's doing bad things or not? Or does she just kinda flit around from gig to gig looking…

She got hired in April of 2020.

Because someone has had jobs at 8 tech companies that makes them a bad employee? The only way I have ever gotten a meaningful raise is by changing companies; it feels like the norm to be at a company for a lot less now-a-days.

Personally, I was loyal to a company for 10 years and as soon as I left and my experience vanished off their record, I was approached for the price my new company was giving me. Screw that noise.

Re: Tim Cook Faces Surprising Employee Unrest at Apple

#100

Post by Apocryphon »

Waterluvian wrote: post #94
ALittleLight wrote: post #51

"she had left Apple after spending several years fighting a decision to reassign her to a role that she said had involved more work for less pay. She said Apple had begun trying to reassign her after she complained that the company’s work on the minerals was not, in some cases, leading to meaningful change in some war-torn countries" I'm impressed that Apple let her spend "several years" fighting a reassignment. I'm…

A job is a job. You just quit and find another one if your employer no longer wants you or wants you to do something you don’t care for. Is this attitude possibly because these companies hire based on the entire emotion that you’re special and elite and we’re all going to link arms and save the planet?

That’s my thesis. This has been the m.o. of tech for a while now:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27242405

Maybe even longer, given the semi-Messianic hippie-adjacent attitudes surrounding the birth of modern PCs in Silicon Valley. Some of which was cultivated by Steve Jobs himself. Apple sowed their own seeds.

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