Google Fires Blogger? 628
Thomas Hawk writes "CNET is reporting that Mark Jen, a blogger whose candid comments about life on the job at Google sparked controversy last month, has left the company. CNET reports that it is not clear if he resigned or was fired but references a post at Google Blogoscoped where it was suggested that he may have been fired over his blog Ninetyninezeros. Given Google's push into the blogging space with their recent acquisition of Blogger it might be interesting to see how this shakes out."
Re:Mark my words... (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree. I read all the links and transcripts. I couldn't point to any thing the should have resulted in a firing.
Thank god it isn't even certain that Google fired him for this reason... fud fud fud
dumb editor comments, again (Score:5, Insightful)
Why? What does that have to do with anything?
If a blogger gets sacked... (Score:3, Insightful)
Not employing bloggers at all seems a fair enough policy to me. Why pay someone to sit all day and think of "witty" things to write to other wasters?
TWW
Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Employer fires man.
This is fascinating
He had a chance, he apparently blew it. (Score:5, Insightful)
I was only there 6 months when the layoffs came up and she got the slip and I didn't. She flew off the handle that I should have went before she did. She didn't appreciate it when I mentioned she probably shouldn't have been so vocal about how she didn't like her job.
hi everyone, sorry my site has been down for the past day or so. i goofed and put some stuff up on my blog that's not supposed to be there. nothing serious and they didn't ask me to take anything down (even the stuff where i'm critical about the company). i'm learning that google is understandably careful about disclosing sensitive information, even vague financial-related things. the quickest way for me to fix the situation at the time was to take it all down. now i'm back up. just so you know, google was pretty cool about all this. thanks for and sorry for the frenzy of speculation.
It's obvious that Google had been aware of this guy's blog and while they didn't ask him to take anything down and they didn't ask him to stop he should have seen the writing on the wall and kept it down. He had a choice and he decided to bring it back up, but I am not about to speculate what would have happened if he hadn't.
Keep your opinions about work to yourself. If you don't like your job don't work there anymore. If you can't find a new job keep your mouth shut (to the Internet as well especially when you work for a firm full of Internet connected people that run THE search engine) until you do.
Just do your job and go home. Personally, I don't want to hear about anyone's work life outside of work and I certainly wouldn't want to describe mine to anyone else in my free time. Free time is exactly that. Time away from work!
One of the inconveniences.... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's kind of like a family member airing all you dirty laundry. Do they have a right to be upset about your idiosynchrosies? Maybe, probably. Should they be telling the whole world about it? No... I think loyalty should be a driving factor here.
That said, I would have hoped that Google would be more lenient than this (assuming he was fired). But now they have public investors to think of, and they have to act more like a corporation than perhaps they have in the past. Sometimes that means tough love for employees who forget their first task is to make money for the company.
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:If a blogger gets sacked... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Mark my words... (Score:5, Insightful)
I tend to agree, though apparently this guy a) had more than 400 complaints from within the company to Google's HR department asking that he be removed, and b) was obviously a complete idiot in the things he posted about in his blog.
Just because we all have the ability to post anything we want anywhere we want doesn't mean we should. You're free to say whatever you want in the United States but a company is not obligated to keep you under hire if you become a disruptive influence or publicly reveal trade secrets. It has nothing to do with whether he signed an NDA or not; it comes down to common sense.
I don't know exactly why he was fired but it should not be a surprise to anybody, including him. And I don't think this is a free speech issue; this is more of a lesson in learning when and where it is and isn't appropriate to say certain things, which is something that has been lost on the internet generation. Nobody can put you in jail for complaining about your company, but your company is not obliged to keep paying you for the privilege.
Re:Blog link (Score:4, Insightful)
Said user only started at Google on 17 Jan 05. Under a month and out the door. Just thought I would point it out. Jump to your own conclusions.
"Good" "Bad" "Moron" (Score:5, Insightful)
I've got some Karma to burn so I'm going to say this anyway.
For all the muppets who will respond about Google being a "bad" company, and how they were "good". FIRING PEOPLE HAPPENS, and sometimes ITS THE RIGHT THING TO DO. If one person is dragging down the morale of everyone else, should that be allowed to continue ? If one person is damaging the companies reputation, should that be allowed to continue ?
Firing people is something that happens. And it doesn't make companies "bad" or "good". In fact companies ARE NEVER bad or good its the PEOPLE in them that make bad or good decisions. Reference Microsoft, it was the will of a group of people to act as a monopoly and abuse that position.
For anyone who thinks about "Good" and "Bad" in a George Bush style way when looking at any part of the world, whether business or politics. GET OUTSIDE and see the shades, subscribe to the economist, read the Wall Street Journal, become a member of Green Peace and Amnesty International, but don't wear Rose Tinted specs and moan because ONE person got fired.
Google has ALWAYS been protective, and ALWAYS done some "odd" things. There is no tipping point of bad to good, the world is not as simple as "Whitehouse Politics 101".
Problem with time perspective... (Score:5, Insightful)
They bought Pyra in 2003. It's now 2005. This guy worked there for one month. I think your sense of perspective is a little out of whack.
Re:Mark my words... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Employer fires man.
This is fascinating
Because the masses expect freedom of speech and opinion, but the people in power don't like to grant it.
To a lot of people, this is like an alarm going off. But to a lot of cynics, this is just run-of-the-mill stuff that's expected to happen regularly.
This is why anything related to work (Score:4, Insightful)
it's the last word syndrome... (Score:3, Insightful)
journalists commanded much power (and editors, even more so) because printed articles are a one-way message. writers always got the last word. then came the online forums and even there, arguments turn into flamewars where every post is a repeat, but people keep on posting because they want to be the last one to put their point of view in.
blog is a hybrid. you post and others can comment, but those comments are not as visible. if you have a blog with decent audience, you do get to put out the "last words" for the most part, while allowing some feedback.
i can understand why management wouldn't like this. it's uncensored and they feel powerless because they don't have the control and they don't get to reply in the same way.
however, i don't understand the mentality of a new hire doing the best he can to appear "pompous, inconsiderate, disloyal" employee (to the management) by complaining openly to the world (but not directly to those at the company) via his blog. it's almost as if he wanted to challenge his perceived "right" to post about google on his blog...
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hmmm (Score:2, Insightful)
In this instance, they're free to say, "You're fired."
(Assuming that this guy was fired, but this example applies in more situations than this).
a googol minus one (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Mark my words... (Score:1, Insightful)
I have to agree that you're correct. If google fired him for reason other than bloging then we cant say anything about it.
However, you don't fire anyone after a month or two just because you don't like them. You fire someone that brings a gun to work immediately or someone that divulges corporate secrets get the boot today. I have to think that the blogging is the culprit - I just want to read what was so bad; which I couldn't read anything bad other than he was keeping his chin up adapting to stress from a new job.
Re:"Good" "Bad" "Moron" (Score:5, Insightful)
The ability to get rid of troublemakers and deadbeats is an indication that management is in control and willing to make things happen.
Re:Mark my words... (Score:1, Insightful)
What evil? (Score:0, Insightful)
Re:Whatever? (Score:3, Insightful)
Be More Careful (Score:5, Insightful)
This guy first ditches microsoft, because they don't want to code with extreme programming methods (laughs), and then gets himself fired from Google. I'm sorry, but what a dumbass. He doesn't know how lucky he is..
Re:He had a chance, he apparently blew it. (Score:5, Insightful)
You know what happens if people shut up and just do their work and never tell to the outside what is going on? Especially in large companies it eventually creates an atmosphere of repression, and the feeling in the back of your head that you need to be carefull with what you say.
It also creates a sense of false truths, as the cnet article says, a microsoft employee taking pictures of apple computers being unloaded is fired, creating the impression that at microsoft only windows is used.
Eventually the company will have lost touch with reality, because the employees don't speak their mouth, creating for example a company like microsoft. I know speaking to the outside world is something different, but it's the beginning.
And like a fellow slashdotter once said, google is just a company, primarily aimed at making profit, that it's primary objective. All the "cool" google things are invented because they make a very nice profit.
Blog-martyrdom (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Maybe he deserved it... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:How ironic... (Score:3, Insightful)
Googol = 1 followed by 100 zeros.
1 followed by 99 zeros would be 1 googol DIVIDED by 10 (basic maths, really)
NOT 1 googol MINUS 1 (which would be 100 NINES in a row...)
ninety nine zeros on its own, is not even a number (unless a really badly written 0), but a bitfield, and a null one at that
Fired for being unhappy? why not quit? (Score:3, Insightful)
If this guy's boss even noticed the negative stuff on the blog and talked with him about it, it may have only served to bring into focus how unhappy he was working there, helping him decide to quit.
Re:Mark my words... (Score:5, Insightful)
Big^brother (Score:4, Insightful)
Google got everyone all happy with their "don't be evil" pre-IPO hype. Now they've got all the info, all the metadata, all the money, and no accountability. Ignorance is strength!
Re:In an ideal world (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If a blogger gets sacked... (Score:2, Insightful)
You mean like what a marketing department does?
No big deal really (Score:3, Insightful)
Just about every other company has similar clauses in employment contracts, I would presume Google does too.
If the guy has been sacked then its his fault. This ain't a good-or-evil company issue, its simply a case of someone breaching his terms of employment, simple as that. I can't see what Google has done wrong here.
Re:dumb editor comments, again (Score:2, Insightful)
They are free to (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm free to say "you're fucked", but if I act on it, that's naughty.
Re:Mark my words... (Score:3, Insightful)
The times of the posts are all after work except for two and they could conceivably be in his lunch hour. (One was noon, one was two, and they were both short.)
Re:Be More Careful (Score:4, Insightful)
Take your pick...
Re:Free drinks and he left ? - whaaat ? (Score:2, Insightful)
Right. We'd much rather that they stick around so that we can send gossip down the corporate grapevine about how he drove home after having 3 drinks in 2 hours.
Damn party p00pers
Damn yuppies.
Re:dumb editor comments, again (Score:5, Insightful)
They're setting a very public precedent about the dangers to blogging on the one hand and trying to break into the business on the other.
Re:Mark my words... (Score:2, Insightful)
What? Did you even read his blog? Or are you just spreading FUD, hoping no one will actually look at the facts? Stop being a blindless google supporter. A snippet from Mark Jen's blob, and the 'idiotic' and supposed inflammatory things he said:
So lots of people have been asking me what my job actually is. contrary to some people's beliefs, my job is not to blog about google; that's what i do in my free time. i'm actually an associate product manager on adsense. that means i'm sandwiched in between being the customer advocate and harnessing all the cool stuff happening through engineers' 20% time. in my opinion, this is the best job in the industry, especially given that i'm a google customer too. so basically, i spend the bulk of my time thinking of new features or products that customers would want (read: stuff that i want) and then i organize people to build it. it's great!
Re:If a blogger gets sacked... (Score:4, Insightful)
Why, exactly? (given that we aren't talking about sharing confidential company information - you did use the unqualified term, "bloggers") If we (ostensibly) have enough respect for free speech to write it into the Constitution of the country, why does it make sense not to allow free speech in a commercial setting as a matter of course?
liability (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:More about the subject (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If a blogger gets sacked... (Score:3, Insightful)
Free speech in the Constitution is primarily about protecting political speech. Commercial free speech has been ruled by the Supreme Court to be bound by more restriction.
We routinely and voluntarily surrender certain free speech rights all the time. For example, in order to recieve the benefit of running Microsoft SQL server, its users agree not to publish any benchmarks. If SQL Server users publish any benchmark information without written approval from Microsoft, then they can expect to be sued, and they can expect to lose. Oracle and other competitors have similar licensing agreements too.
Example 2: non-disclosure agreement. In a high-tech environment employees enjoy the benefit of a paycheck and hopefully interesting and fulfilling work in exchange for giving up the right to speak about company plans, products, release dates, and anything else that may be of value to a partner or customer or competitor.
Conclusion: We have free speech, which is good. We are free to relinguish certain free speech rights in exchange for certain benefits, which is good. (The converse is also true - we are also free to choose not to relinquish certain free speech rights by opting out of the percieved benefit, which is good.)
Do we need additional legistlation to allow free speech in a commercial setting as a matter of course? I respectfully submit the answer is no.
Pretty standard corporate behavior (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Mark my words... (Score:3, Insightful)
And depending on what he actually posted, Google would have had the right to have certain things removed and it wouldn't be considered censorship. Ex. The SEC doesn't like folks giving out insider information, companies are allowed to keep trade secret information private, etc.
Re:Dumb ass = fired (Score:2, Insightful)
That's just the sort of stuff that the State Supreme Courts and the Federal Supreme Court should strike down. My employer has no moral right (laws are a different story) to keep me from perusing the open market by discussing the terms of my current employment.
If we extrapolate, soon Target will have a shopper non-disclosure agreement on the front door so that you can't go price-shopping at Wal-Mart.
Re:Mark my words... (Score:2, Insightful)
This is the clique/frat mentality that says (pph),"We can ridicule and intimidate anyone as long and as brutally as we want--no one forced them to be here."
I can't believe there are human beings still plying this argument. What's even more surprising is that the courts happily follow along with it wherever employment is concerned.
If you agree to abid by a contract, don't, and get fired. Don't be shocked or upset
The contract sucked. All contracts suck.
My first experience with a contract was at age 6. My mother had my allowance fixed at $0.35 for 5 years until I finally got a paper route, at which point my allowance went to zero because now I was making my own money.
I reiterate. Contracts suck.
Re:This is why anything related to work (Score:2, Insightful)
It's all life. People talk about life. That's life. Why can't companies cope with reality?
It's not exactly the same as talking about work with a couple of pals. It's out there on the net for everyone to see for a long time. And if you share something that you are not supposed to, then you deserve to be smacked. I know that my company routinely monitors what's being said about itself and our competitors, and they are doing the same.
>> I think bloggers will learn, and some are learning the hard way, to keep work stuff out of personal forums
In Stalinist Russia?
Nope, in corporate america. It's about image. When I'm at work I represent my company. When I'm off the clock and talking about work I still consider myself a representative of my company. Can you see how it's not the brightest idea to have one post on my blog about what's going on at work and the next post about my wild night last friday?
>> I would never mention my worklpace in my blog unless I felt comfortable seeing my entire personal blog hanging in the break room
If companies aren't doing anything wrong then they have nothing to be worried about.
I'm not talking about airing a company's dirty laundry. I'm talking about drawing a line between sharing work stuff and personal stuff at the same place as well as inadvertantly talking about work things that are internal, not for public consumption.
Re:Quote (Score:3, Insightful)
Non-evil? A company who censors its employees and fires people, destroying their livelihoods, for daring to criticise them? A company that buys out decent services and ruins them (i.e. deja news)? I don't see why people still think google is not 'evil', they're as bad as any other large corporation. Take off the blinkers.
Re:Hmmm (Score:3, Insightful)
However, the principle is the same. He was punished for his speech. In our society, "freedom of speech" has a broader meaning, not strictly limited to government. We expect to be able to speak our minds and voice our opinions without having to constantly look over our shoulder to see who might be listening. The practice of employers firing their employees for speaking publically about work will have a chilling effect just the same as if the government were doing it.
Was Google's action legal? Absolutely. Was it right? Was it consistent with their motto of "Do no evil"? That's debatable. In my opinion, it was not.