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Microsoft Fires Mac Fan For Blog Photo
christor writes "Microsoft has fired a full-time temp employee after it discovered that the employee posted in his blog a photo and story concerning Microsoft's purchase of what looks to be around 18 G5s.
Check out the blog entry, Even Microsoft wants G5s, and the one that follows it. Microsoft fired the blogger, despite an offer to take the posting down. Note that this is not a free speech issue, even though the blog was hosted on a non-company server, because Microsoft is not, yet, the government. But it does present several other interesting issues, including that of the trade-off between the bad publicity that comes from the firing and whatever bad results follow when employees feel free to post such things."
I bet they were going to Windows Longhorn R&D-department. :)
I sure hope he's got unmetered bandwidth on that site.
First he gets fired and now Slashdot posts 3 links to his server? Poor guy!
Microsoft fired the blogger, despite an offer to take the posting down
And if he doesn't want to take it down, damn it we'll take it down FOR him.
Never confuse volume with power.
I'm pretty sure that if I posted confidential information about my company, they would fire me too. All I have to say to this person is, duh.
Even Microsoft wants G5s
October 23, 2003 @ 10:34 PM | Macintosh
It looks like somebody over in Microsoft land is getting some new toys...
I took this shot on the way into work on the loading dock (MSCopy, the print shop I work in, is in the same building as MS's shipping and receiving). Three palettes of Dual 2.0Ghz G5's on their way in to somewhere deep in the bowels of Redmond. Hopefully they're all in good condition when they arrive -- the boxes are slick enough that a few of them took a bit of a tumble (you can see them back in the truck)!
October 27, 2003 03:08 PM
And that simply, as of about 2pm today, I once again joined the ranks of the unemployed. more
The day started like any other day -- get up, dink around for a bit, bus into work, and start working through the stack of jobs. Just shy of an hour after I got in, my manager came in and asked me to step into his office when I had a chance. Sure, no biggie, and I headed over as soon as I finished the job I was setting up.
"Okay, here's the first question. Is this page," and here he turned his monitor towards me, letting me see my "Even Microsoft wants G5s" post from last Thursday, "hosted on any Microsoft computer? Or is it on your own?"
"It's on mine. Well, it's on a hosted site that I pay for, but no, it's not on anything of Microsoft's."
"Good. That means that as it's your site on your own server, you have the right to say anything you want. Unfortunately, Microsoft has the right to decide that because of what you said, you're no longer welcome on the Microsoft campus."
And that simply, as of about 2pm today, I once again joined the ranks of the unemployed.
It seems that my post is seen by Microsoft Security as being a security violation. The picture itself might have been permissible, but because I also mentioned that I worked at the MSCopy print shop, and which building it was in, it pushed me over the line. Merely removing the post was also not an option -- I offered, and my manager said that he had asked the same thing -- but the only option afforded me was to collect any personal belongings I had at my workstation and be escorted out the door. They were at least kind enough to let me be escorted out by one of my co-workers, rather than sending security over to usher me out, but the end result is the same.
More frustrating for me is that, having read stories here and there on the 'net about people who had for one reason or another lost their jobs due to something on their weblogs, I thought that I had done what I could to avoid that possibility. To my mind, it's an innocuous post. The presence of Macs on the Microsoft campus isn't a secret (for everything from graphic design work to the Mac Business Unit), and when I took the picture, I made sure to stand with my back to the building so that nothing other than the computers and the truck would be shown -- no building features, no security measures, and no Microsoft personnel. However, it obviously wasn't enough.
So, I'm unemployed. I am somewhat lucky in that I'm not technically unemployed -- I am still on the roster for my temp agency, who has been very good to me so far (and hopefully will continue to be), but as their ability to place me anywhere does depend on the current job market, it's not a foolproof guarantee of employment coming in quickly. I've put a call into them and let them know of the situation and that I'm available and willing for whatever can be found, so with any luck, they'll be able to find a placement for me. However, it appears that it's also time for me to start hitting the streets and shopping my resume around again.
Wish me luck.
"Technology.....the knack of so arranging the world that we don't have to experience it." Max Firsch
For as valid as your point is, its kinda of unrelated to the topic of a company terminating an employee for iReason. The posting is suggesting that the employee was fired for.... what? Saying Microsoft was buying Macs? I don't think so. I would imagine it had more to do with taking images from the Redmond campus (unapproved images from his digital camera), off campus and making them available online. There are many business campus' that have very specific rules (that you agree to as part of employment) about what can and can't happen on campus. Understanding the images were captured in a loading dock, but they could have been pictures of code (screen captures or documents) or other MS IP. Since the guy was a temp, he prolly wasn't afforded a detailed explanation, just a seizure of non-personal items an personal escort the edge of the property.
Microsoft Security doesn't want anyone to know that somewhere on their sprawling campus, they have a loading dock for the purposes of shipping and receiving goods from the outside world?
Yes, I can see how the disclosure of this confidential information will cause the destruction of the company. As we speak, hordes of Linux-loving commandos are probably filing into semi trailers purporting to be carrying cases of Jolt Cola or some such, in a classic "trojan horse" maneuver.
~Philly
Well sure, if ya'll want me to lay it out. When I interviewed for an internship with MS's Mac Office group in 2001, there were big turquoise G4s sitting right on people's desks and a big lab full of just about every Mac PowerPC model ever released. Shocking! And you know what? The developers were even using a non-MS IDE. Astonishing!
Who do you get to be an expert to tell you something's not obvious? The least insightful person you can find? -J Roberts
It didn't take me long to realize that the company (or a contractor) had some spiders out there looking for websites with key words (company name, nuclear, etc) and probably found my blog. So, the easiest way to defeat them and still have my blog was to put up a simple login/password to my site. Only my friends/family view it anyways, and I just create one login account for everybody.
Since then, I've had 2 other friends (A teacher and a programmer) go through almost the same thing, and they've all put passwords on their sites. I would recommend ALL bloggers to do that if they decide to post anything about work, co-workers, etc if they value their jobs. If this guy did that, I bet he would still have his job.
Let's look at this from an ethics standpoint. If the guy had posted a picture of himself dressed as Mary Poppins frolicking in his yard, then it's not an issue for his work. If he published pictures of his personally owned Windows PC blue-screening and bitched about it in his blog, that's not cause for Microsoft to take action against him, either.
It's when you cross that line between home and work that it gets ugly. The guy took digital photos of his employer's non-public building areas while there as an employee. He identified himself as a Microsoft employee, in what department he worked, and in what building. He used poor judgement and he knows it. Microsoft didn't commit some horrible atrocity against the Mac community by firing the guy. They did not quelch his free speech rights. They fired some loose cannon who was wandering around the campus taking digital photos and posting them on his own web page. The whole story is just sensationalistic: Microsoft Fires Mac Fan For Blog Photo. It had nothing to do with his being a "Mac Fan." What's next?
Come on folks.
So what? It's not a bank, a nuclear research facility, the changing rooms of Moulin Rouge; it's an office building.
Was he hired to take digital photos of company property? It's not his office building. It's theirs. If they don't want photos of it floating around the net, that's their call.
Think about the questions that go through the minds of the security people: Today it was the loading dock but what will it be tomorrow? The new X-Box, our development lab? Photos of company-proprietary memos? Why is the guy wandering around the campus taking pictures with a digital camera?
You also don't seem to understand how industrial espionage works. They might be just Macs to you. Someone else might have other information that they are able to put together with that in order to ascertain something that Microsoft wishes to keep secret.
And in all the places I've worked, no one has ever cared what snaps anyone took or what they did with them.
Where have you worked? JC Penney and Walmart? Most engineering firms are very guarded and don't want pictures of their facilities distributed over the Internet.