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As Christmas Bonus, Google Hands Out "Dogfood"
theodp writes "You know times are tough when the best place to work in America replaces holiday bonuses with a request for unpaid labor. Blaming the economic crisis, Google management has canceled the traditional cash holiday bonus — reportedly as much as $20K-$30K per Googler — and substituted an unlocked Google Android cell phone, retail price $400. An accompanying email calls for employees to celebrate the 'chance for us to once again dogfood a product and make it even better!'" Update: 12/23 01:09 GMT by KD : A reader pointed out that comments to the article note a couple of inaccuracies: the Android phone being offered is an unlocked dev model, which goes for $400; and the reporter may have confused holiday bonuses with performance bonuses. The former have traditionally been in the range of $1,000, according to two comments.
and substituted an unlocked Google Android cell phone, retail price $180.
Everywhere I have seen Google's unlocked Android phone it was for $399. Not $180 which is the price of one that is locked to T-Mobile's network and a 2 year contract. http://www.engadget.com/2008/12/05/sim-hardware-unlocked-android-dev-phone-1-surfaces-for-399/ http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/Google-Releases-SIMunlocked-Android-Phone-For-399/ http://code.google.com/android/dev-devices.html all give the $399 price point.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Information Week has an internal email sent by Google management:
Q: Can I resell my phone?
Googlers should not resell any item given to them by Google. Please review our Personal Transactions policy [removed].
A *lot* of companies used the media mass hysteria as cover to take such actions, long before many of them had felt any measurable impact at all. I.e. companies that still reported profit still said the economy impact was such they simply had to take drastic measures.
Of course, it's all a negative feedback loop. It was bad enough as was, but with the media saying "great depression" over and over again, consumer confidence took a dive and companies started either panicking or taking advantage, which certainly doesn't help matters.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
This year however, times are tough. No Christmas dinner/party, and no bonus--which isn't a big deal, because they owe me nothing in exchange for my work except a paycheck.
Unfortunately, there's a whole bunch of us who work for companies that DO owe us something in exchange for work called a year-end bonus. It's calculated as part of compensation on top of base, and some of us take a cut in base compensation on the promise of that bonus. It's part of your negotiated overall compensation package. Getting screwed out of it can be a really big hit for some of us.