SFist Tonight
Week Around the Ists
SFist Tonight
While we wait -- and wait and wait -- for Sergey Brin to call asking to meet him at the St. Regis lobby to "talk" over cocktails, some Googlers are bemoaning this year's awesome Christmas bonus, or lack thereof. See, normally, according to Valleywag, employees at the Googleplex get a yearly cash bonus, which could climb as high "as $20,000 or $30,000 per Googler." But this year they'll be getting the G1 phone that retails for about $180. The phone, we hear, is nothing short of a Christmas miracle. But, yeah, cash is always sweeter. Anyway, Owen Thomas has the canceled-bonus memo, which you should read, right here.
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"Dogfood" is a now a verb? Jesus, people!
i love my g1; however, i'm almost certain that when phones with the android (google) software are released on other carriers the phones will be sleeker, lighter. t-mobile always fails when it comes to physical design.
I wonder how many employers are using the "recession" excuse to be cheap bastards. And how many people are so afraid of losing their jobs that they'll accept any kind of shitty treatment? Not a comment on google, just a comment in general.
Call me a tinfoil hat wearer, but all these recession/depression stories churned out by corporate media seem to be a windfall to employers, who can now be as nasty as they want, what with the workforce completely paralyzed with fear.
As our holiday bonus, my work gave employees an extra 10% off of purchases for two days. But not on sale items. Seems like everyone is quick to jump on the "it's a recession, so you get crap for the holidays" bandwagon.
Tons of real people are losing real jobs. The Dow losing 40% of its value is not an invention of the corporate media. Nor are the stratospheric unemployment numbers released by the government and duly reported by the corporate media. If anything, the corporate media understates these numbers when it fails to note the changes which have been made to the counting which generates these numbers so as to make historical comparisons apples to oranges (and understate how bad actual unemployment really is). Oh, and Google has lost 60% of its market value over the past year.
That said, I feel a heck of a lot sorrier for those who work for employers who are cutting off matches to 401(k) as detailed in yesterday's NY Times than I do for Google employees who aren't getting some sort of cherry-on-top cash bonus.
At bottom, people now have the same options they've always had, which is to walk and find a better option. Employees have no excuse to be paralyzed by fear, the data is out there. At worst, employees will likely remember the generosity (or lack thereof) of their particular employer during these tough times. As it should be.
cutting off 401(k) matches? That's whack - cheap perk for employers as they don't have to pay SSID match on that money.