Weird News

[Lamplighter]

If you don't believe corporations (businesses) are trying to be people, here is one more....

Reddit's new anti-harassment rules anger some users
Zach Miners - IDG News Service - May 14, 2015

Upon learning of Reddit’s plan to change its rules to prohibit harassment and
make the site friendlier, some users reacted with resentment and confusion.

Reddit, known for the unconstrained nature of its discussions among people who post anonymously,
said on Thursday that it will also now let users contact Reddit employees to report abusive posts.
The changes were made to balance free expression with privacy and safety,
and improve the quality and range of discourse on the site, according to the company.

But in a discussion thread on Reddit, some users called the changes vague
because they didn’t clarify what constituted harassment.
Others said the changes would destroy free expression on the site,
or characterized them as a ploy to attract advertisers.
<snip>

Don't be surprised if this spreads through the corporate universe...
"It's my website. I own it. If you want to use it... obey my rules"

.

[Undertoad]

Look at LL's filter on the world. It's almost like if a corporation does something, anything, that is evidence of the corporate persona, and is Bad merely because a corporation did it.

In the 20th Century it would be "Looks like a negro did it"; now it's "Looks like a corporation did it."

They are all identical and all bad merely by having made the misfortunate act of having decided to exist. This time the crime is preventing people from harassing others on their site. Yeah don't do that, stupid dickhead corporation. It doesn't matter if it's the least "corporate" website ever. They did something. That's bad.

[Lamplighter]

UT, here is your friendly corporation looking out for your best interest.


Pink Slips at Disney. But First, Training Foreign Replacements.
NY Times - JULIA PRESTON - JUNE 3, 2015

ORLANDO, Fla. — The employees who kept the data systems humming in the vast Walt Disney fantasy fief
did not suspect trouble when they were suddenly summoned to meetings with their boss.
…
Instead, about 250 Disney employees were told in late October that they would be laid off.
Many of their jobs were transferred to immigrants on temporary visas for highly skilled technical workers,
who were brought in by an outsourcing firm based in India.

Over the next three months, some Disney employees were required to train their replacements to do the jobs they had lost.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Lamplighter

UT, here is your friendly corporation looking out for your best interest.

I was aware of the story last week, the Times is late to it

You could blame the Disney corporation for disrupting these 250 jobs; or you could blame the US Government's H1B Visa program which permitted it, and which has disrupted approximately 750,000 careers in this country, including mine.

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Lamplighter

UT, here is your friendly corporation looking out for your best interest.

FOLLOWUP: Apparently, Mickey didn't like the publicity he got! --

NY Times: In Turnabout, Disney Cancels Tech Worker Layoffs

Although the number of layoffs planned was small, the cancellation, which was first reported by Computerworld, a website covering the technology business, set off a hopeful buzz among tech employees in Disney’s empire. It came in the midst of a furor over layoffs in January of 250 tech workers at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla. People who lost jobs there said they had to sit with immigrants from India, some on temporary work visas known as H-1B, and teach them to perform their jobs as a condition for receiving severance.

[Lamplighter]

Maybe it wasn't just the publicity.
It's amazing how quickly the threat of a legal action puts ripples in the pond.

... from your link above:

The Labor Department said last week that it had opened an investigation into two outsourcing companies,
Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys, for work they did for Southern California Edison, a power utility.
It also referred complaints to the Justice Department for a separate inquiry.

Senator Bill Nelson, Democrat of Florida, has called for an investigation of the H-1B visa program.

Tech workers who lost jobs in Orlando said Cognizant was one of the firms importing Indian immigrants to replace them.

[DanaC]

In the 20th Century it would be "Looks like a negro did it"; now it's "Looks like a corporation did it."

These are in no way equivalent.


If you want a real comparison in attitudes, look at the attitude many on the right have towards unions. All bad, all the time.

Or the absolute mistrust of congress: all politicians are the same. All bad, all the time.

Lamplighter's attitude might call up a lot of things - but an equivalent to racism it is not.


I find it slightly baffling sometimes that a lot of people are so instantly hostile to one set of apparently self-serving, though unavoidably neccessary, powerful individuals and the system in which they operate - yet at the same time see any instant hostility to another set of apparently self-serving, though unavoidably necessary, powerful individuals and the system in which they operate as somehow heinous and anti-social.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by DanaC

These are in no way equivalent.

If you want a real comparison in attitudes, look at the attitude many on the right have towards unions. All bad, all the time.

You've got the parallel wrong. A union is a union, and hating all things unions do is indeed a bias. But pointing to something that, say, a Little League baseball team did, and using it as evidence that unions are bad, that's what's equivalent to blaming everything bad on the negro/boogeyman.

UT's point is Reddit is not a "corporation" in any common understanding of the word. But they did something that Lamplighter didn't like, and now Lamp is using it to reinforce his belief that corporations are bad.

[Undertoad]

It was clumsy. It's both those things; seeing whatever X does as "bad", and finding something "bad" and reaching to blame X for it. Both of those things happen in racism and in LL's version of anti-corporatism.


And, while Reddit is owned by a corporation, nothing in the events that have happened have anything to do with the "corporate persona".

[Gravdigr]

Little league baseball team = union...

[busterb]

I see no one has posted about the two cops killed in MS. last week.
Perhaps in another thread there's a link to assholes walking on flag.
Also about the past subway employe who posted a bunch of crap on FB, then wanted to sue newspaper the printed her post. Then she called the cops about all the people hating her, do something.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Instead of pissing in the wind, why don't you give us some links to theses stories I haven't heard of.

[busterb]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Instead of pissing in the wind, why don't you give us some links to theses stories I haven't heard of.

Well I though maybe Google just might have or help some of ya. I haven't looked. Heard on radio. This's one link http://news.yahoo.com/subway-employe...QDBHNlYwNzcg--

[xoxoxoBruce]

Yes Google might have helped but why the fuck should I have to go chasing rumors and hearsay.

OK, "two cops killed in MS" ~ 5,320,000 results. Which one?
"assholes walking on flag" ~ 564,000 results. A little easier but not much.
"past subway employe who posted a bunch of crap on FB" ~ 782,000 results

If you just want to drop by and see what people are saying about stuff, don't get pissy if they're not talking about what you want to hear.
Tell us what you read, where you read it, and what you think about it, then I'm sure these fine folks would be glad to discuss it.

[busterb]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Yes Google might have helped but why the fuck should I have to go chasing rumors and hearsay.

OK, "two cops killed in MS" ~ 5,320,000 results. Which one?
"assholes walking on flag" ~ 564,000 results. A little easier but not much.
"past subway employe who posted a bunch of crap on FB" ~ 782,000 results

If you just want to drop by and see what people are saying about stuff, don't get pissy if they're not talking about what you want to hear.
Tell us what you read, where you read it, and what you think about it, then I'm sure these fine folks would be glad to discuss it.

Bruce. Who put the bee in your bonnet?. Note from my post I said heard on radio.