Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft, Ask.com, Oracle Latest To Be Sued Over No-Poach Deal
itwbennett (1594911) writes Oracle, Microsoft and Ask.com are facing suits alleging that they conspired to restrict hiring of staff. The suits appear to refer to a memo that names a large number of companies that allegedly had special arrangements with Google to prevent poaching of staff and was filed as an exhibit on May 17, 2013 in another class action suit over hiring practices. The former employees filing lawsuits against Microsoft, Ask.com and Oracle have asked that the cases be assigned to Judge Koh as there were similarities with the case against Google, Apple and others — and it maybe doesn't hurt that Judge Koh thought the $324.5 million settlement in that case was too low.
Ask.com still exists?
When they signed their contract they missed that checkbox that said "change my employment preference to lock to this company". There was so much legalese to scroll through.
The memo only talks about executives and product managers. Engineers (at ANY level) are explicitly excluded from the agreement (that is, they can be recruited at will), as well as any product "contributors".
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
This is why I'm opposed to all those "learn to code" programs Zuck and friends keep hyping. The people at the top of the tech industry are not content with their billions. They want your thousands, too. There is a concerted effort under way to push your wages down, take that money and throw it onto their own already huge piles. No poaching deals. H1B visas. "STEM shortage," "coder shortage" bullshit. It's all part of the same offensive. It is class warfare and their class is winning.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
The settlement offer the lawyers wanted to take was WAY too low. After the agreement collapsed Google alone had to give their entire staff a $10k year raise, and they think less than $5k per person for multiple years is sufficient? Everyone should be getting $10k per year minimum. Lawyer fees should be capped and be above and beyond payment to the class holders. Only if these companies have to give every employee affected by this $50 or $100K in damages will this set a precedent that will prevent future abuses.
The class should be expanded to cover everyone in the profession not just employees of the companies. Many more people were damaged by this illegal conspiracy because these companies were in large part influencing the setting of wages for the industry. By illegally restraining trade they illegally depressed salaries for the entire market.