Google, Apple Settle Justice Dept. Hiring Probe

Ponca City, We Love You writes "The LA Times reports that under a proposed settlement with the Justice Department, six major Silicon Valley firms — Google, Apple, Intel, Adobe, Intuit and Pixar — would be barred from pledging not to 'cold call' one another's employees. Federal officials have been scrutinizing such agreements for more than a year, concerned that they restrained competition for skilled workers and kept an artificial cap on wages by avoiding expensive bidding wars. If the court fight had proceeded, it could have helped decide the legality of such accords, not just in the high-tech sector but across all industries. But the fight had risks for each side. To win, the Justice Department would have had to convince a court that workers had suffered significant harm. A loss for the companies would have opened the door to a rush of lawsuits."

Comments

Cold Call

[phantomfive]

I really hate these articles because they make me feel like an incompetent programmer. I have never had a cold call from any of these companies. They really do that?? What am I doing wrong???

Re:Cold Call

[DMiax]

I really hate these articles because they make me feel like an incompetent programmer. I have never had a cold call from any of these companies. They really do that?? What am I doing wrong???

Reading Slashdot too much? Just guessing: I was never called either.

Re:Chris O'Brien summed it up best:

[iamhassi]

"5. Those who do think they got the shaft may sue. And because this is an antitrust finding, the settlement will allow anyone who wins in federal court to "recover three times the damages the person has suffered." Say goodbye to whatever measly amounts the companies saved through these agreements. Dumb."

I don't think you read the article. No one got "shafted", they had "special agreements not to solicit" and "instructed employees not to directly cold-call Google's employees." This has nothing to do with employees who applied and were turned away like the previous article suggested, they simply agreed not to stalk and actively harass each other's employees attempting to steal them.

Imagine you were dating a woman... I know, /., it's a stretch, but pretend... actually, let's say you were dating a Elven Princess on WoW, that's closer to probably closer to reality. Your buddy is dating a... um... Elven Sorceress (sure why not). Your buddy starts harassing your princess trying to get her to be with him. You tell your buddy to lay off or you're going to go after his sorceress. You both agree not to harass each other's WoW girlfriends. That's what happened here, they agreed not to harass each other's employees. That's probably a good thing, both for your WoW dates and for you and your buddy. Course now the WoW masters said you're not allowed to do that, so if you want to harass each other's dates or anyone else you're permitted. See how the DOJ just mucked this all up?