They scan books, page by page, for Google Book Search. The workers wearing yellow badges are not allowed any of the privileges that I was allowed – ride the Google bikes, take the Google luxury limo shuttles home, eat free gourmet Google meals, attend Authors@Google talks and receive free, signed copies of the author’s books, or set foot anywhere else on campus except for the building they work in. They also are not given backpacks, mobile devices, thumb drives, or any chance for social interaction with any other Google employees. Most Google employees don’t know about the yellow badge class.Hacker News responds.
♪♪♪ It's A Turf War On A Global Scale I'd Rather Hear Both Sides Of The Tale See, It's Not About Races Just Places Faces Where Your Blood Comes From Is Where Your Space Is I've Seen The Bright Get Duller I'm Not Gonna Spend My Life Being A Color ♪♪♪
10 Take out classified ad announcing a Google Job Fair: "Excellent pay, excellent benefits, excellent perks! No computer skills or experience required."That's how you run a business, Google! Oh, what's that? My code isn't up to spec? That's because, unlike you, I live off my wits, not my programming prowess. Now get to work on letting me include punctuation in my searches. It's the 2011s, for Christ's sake.
20 At the "Job Fair," explain the details of the well-paying Google Book Scanner position. Talk a whole lot about how great the job is; talk a little about the actual responsibilities of the job, like how to scan a book.
30 Explain that, to ensure employee competence, all applicants must pass a short fun "audition," where they'll scan three books.
40 Conduct "auditions." Keep book scans. Dispose of applications.
50 IF applicant emails about the status of their application, PRINT "I'm sorry, but at this time all positions have been filled. We've kept your application on file, and if a position open up we'll get in touch. There is no need to respond to this message."
60 IF there are still books to scan, GOTO 10
70 IF all the books in the world have been scanned, END
The workers wearing yellow badges are not allowed any of the privileges that I was allowed – ride the Google bikes, take the Google luxury limo shuttles home, eat free gourmet Google meals,attend Authors@Google talks and receive free, signed copies of the author’s books, or set foot anywhere else on campus except for the building they work in. They also are not given backpacks, mobile devices, thumb drives, or any chance for social interaction with any other Google employees.Emphasis mine.
But if you should investigate conditions where you workFunny, they seem to have left that verse out of the IWW Songbook.
Or ask why yellow-badge employees don't get any perks,
We hope that you get fired, 'cause it shows that you're a jerk.
For the union makes us strong!
On the drive over I told him that losing my job right now isn’t all that bad, as I was planning to quit in two months to prepare for grad school. He said that everything happens for a reason, and that he was glad I was being “philosophical” about it. I told him that that’s not really philosophy and he didn’t have much to say after that.At which point I assume they rehired him so they could fire him again for being a preposterously pedantic asshole.
The whole point of Google's employment policy is to squeeze as much work out of a highly educated and highly skilled labor pool as possible--hence all the on-campus amenities. Why should they offer those amenities to people who are essentially being paid to turn pages? I mean, obviously low-wage employment sucks, but turning pages at Google isn't any different from tossing packages in trucks at a FedEx Quicksort or any number of non-automated unskilled menial tasks. I don't really see what the issue is.Well, the issue is that it made him uncomfortable, I guess. Maybe he thinks everyone should get the same perks at work? I think if he did "Michael Moore" Google no one would care.
Puh-lease. Perhaps they've discovered that you can't make it in Corporate America without just a wee bit of evil, but I'll take a company that at least tries over the majority any day.Or more likely you can't make it as one of the most powerful companies in the world, or whatever. There are lots of smaller companies that produce good value that don't need to do this kind of thing.
A US employer can fire you for any other reason. Overheard admitting you voted Democrat? See ya. Prefer dogs to cats when the boss hates dogs? Have a nice life. Refusing to do the boss' laundry (while working as an engineer)? Gone daddy gone.That's not true, it depends on the state, not federal law. California may have different rules about who can be fired and why.
Under the auspices of what study was he conducting his "research"? In what research journal was it to be published?Feh, if you want to do social research, going through official channels will lead you to little, usually to a bunch of prepackaged data by the press office, or at best being allowed to submit a questionnarie to somebody, who will screen it for offending material or for something that could be constructed so as to negatively affect the company's image (that is, anything).
Satisfying your own personal curiosity, using company equipment, on company property does not become "social research" simply by claiming it is in the course of covering your own ass.
Eventually I asked a superior on my team if I could borrow a camera to go out in the parking lot and videotape the yellow-badged workers leaving the 3.14159~ factory.
Having signed Google NDAs via a couple agencies - and once for a direct contract - I can tell you that the STFU clauses are strict. They really mean it, they make it clear that poking about into other teams is nearly certain to get you terminated.Whoa! What kind of nuclear research is it going on at Google, that most of people are prevented from talking about their jobs? Usually people who have to keep a secret know exactly what not to talk about, and can easily respond (and are instructed to respond) with a "no comment" or with useless generalities leading to exactly nothing: not that a serious spy would ever consider just trying without a backup plan, like seducing relevant personnel slowly exctracting information from them. It has been done for years, will be done for years, and no amount of paranoia security will ever stop that. Yet, very few people in an organization are that important, even if many like believing their job is precious and irreplaceable.
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posted by fireoyster at 3:52 PM on April 30, 2011 [3 favorites]