Mark Jen worked at Google for a few weeks, and started a blog on his first day. He posted some mildly critical material. Some of it might have violated non-disclosure agreements. (That is pure speculation on my part, and nothing I've read indicates such violation.) word of his departure was not related to the blog at first, but now the news is confirmed: Mark Jen joins the growing list of employees fired for speaking publicly about their office environment or colleagues or contract conditions. (Here's the Mark Jen timeline.) The fact that it happened at Google, a young (and young-at-heart) company that operates a popular blogging service might seem startling, but blogging isn't the point. Speaking publicly to a potentially global audience is. Nobody would be surprised if an employee were fired after going on Letterman and ragging on her company or co-workers. It's the insular blogging attitude that must grow up, not the corporate mindset.
Google Employee Fired Over Blog
Reader Comments
(Page 1)2. All confidentiality agreements should be respected and observed. At any time, if an employee is hired on the basis of a promise to abide by the confidentiality agreements, put in place to protect the work environment and afford the management with control over news and public relationsh, the employee's breach of said agreements should be a firing offense, no questions asked.
For whatever reason, people continue to push the line when it comes to what they can and can't get away with. In this case, I think the employee was probably too imature to have experience the results and potential damage cause by breach of confidentiality.
It can kill.
-G.C.Pick
3. You would have to question this guy's intelligence. Blogs are a very public method of getting your message out there and getting noticed. He may as well just sent an email out to all Google employees. Additionally, I would not want to have anyone work for me who would go public with criticism. Instead of publicly criticizing how about taking some ownership and try to help "your" company fix the issue. Too many complainers and not enough do'ers.
http://trustedadvisor.typepad.com/revolutionary_marketing_a/
http://trustedadvisor.typepad.com/transparent_globalization/
http://trustedadvisor.typepad.com/prospect_intelligence/
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Scott Jones
4. Your previous 'blog-comms' seem a bit out of touch. Mr. G.C. Pick seems unable to excape the 'cold war' mind set with his weird observation; e.g.; "...and potential damage cause by breach of confidentiality. It can kill." And Mr. S. Jones thinks we aught to take better care of OUR respective companies. I suspect Mr. Jones is a company owner. He aught to see what MY company looks like to me- The little guy. Personally I give to MY company what it gives to ME- which is not a hell of a lot.
What the internet is doing to us is the subject of my Blog, "The Internest's Egress". The world has become that which Washington has long been; i.e. one giant glass house! No more secrets kids! Looks like we are in the process of separating the wheat from the chaff.
Robert Warlov
Poetzzz@yahoo.com
Blog- "The Internest's Egress"
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Robert Warlov
5. Unfortunately, Mr. Warlov's content doesn't seem to have significant relevance to the topic and digresses into a simple sale pitch for his own blog. Our topic is the issue of the Google Employee's loss of his job for violating company guidelines.
It seems clear to me but less clear to others that, if you can't respect the privacy of others and are not in touch with the group...... people don't give you "a hell of a lot". (and you might even get FIRED).
G.C.P.
7. Google did the right thing. No one employee has the right to air workplace conditions in a public setting, especially a blog. What happens in the workplace should remain in the workplace unless all parties involved are asked for opinions. Also rather than start a blog on company time to become some sort of hero/public figure leave and 'work' somewhere else.
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Steve Cosman
8. I'd still like to hear how Mr. Pick thinks Mark Jen's blog about the Google work place could cause the loss of human life?
His contention that my message contains no "significant relevance" to the topic misses the challenge therein to the notion that the employer would be master today, controlling our lives, our ideas and communications.
Most companies today offer little more than a pay check at the end of the week. Things like team-spirit and loyalty went out with the death of unions, which those very companies brought about.
Is it irrelevant to suggest that companies that give so little should expect little in return? Google got hit, because like so many others, it couldn't see the raw power of the Internet. That they fired Mr. Jen proves they still don't That act hurt them.
My message notes the similarity between the internal workings of American corporations to the activities in Washington, vis a vie the new transparency brought about by the exponential expansion of communicability the Internet has created. THAT, I think, is relevant. It goes directly to the subject.
That my blog seeks to delve into just this kind of subject in not an attempt to sell anything, but to inform others of a "hub" to discuss it and other relevant events.
The idea that people can be harmed by the explicate workings of a minuscule part of such a large corporation, is the equivalent of shouting "fire" in a crowded theater, because Mr. Jen's blog could never have hurt Google the way his firing has. It was the proverbial "tempest in a teapot". They overreacted just as Mr. Pick has.
The greater challenger, I submit, is to use our imaginations to extrapolate how our lives might be changed by the coming world transparency I eluded to before. The firing and even the jailing of bloggers was news only to those who didn't see this coming. Some of us did see it.
Mr. Pick might benefit from thinking about the larger concepts some messages carry and not be so quick to cynically condemn what he does not readily perceive.
Robert Warlov
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Roert Warlov
9. it would not surprise me, i used to sing googles praise, no more basically they i imagine are CIA tools, and being in Latin America for 30 years, well we know what idiot peices of crap are the CIA, bunch of Yale fools(bring it on) and today with the report of knowledge of al queda's threat on airline safety, haha
so now, i am PURE YAHOO!! million times better
anyway, google and their search engine sux, i know, with many web sites i am mastering for, i know
their popularity is once again evidence of american's people ignorance and arrogance
we get what we deserve,obesity, bad health,low educational levels,etc. we are 5% of this planet
but i need to stop saying WE,
back south not soon enough
VIVA COLOMBIA!
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Michael W. Johnson {Senor Pescado}
10. All confidentiality agreements should be respected and observed. At any time, if an employee is hired on the basis of a promise to abide by the confidentiality agreements, put in place to protect the work environment and afford the management with control over news and public relationsh, the employee's breach of said agreements should be a firing offense, no questions asked.
For whatever reason, people continue to push the line when it comes to what they can and can't get away with. In this case, I think the employee was probably too imature to have experience the results and potential damage cause by breach of confidentiality.
It can kill.
-G.C.Pick
11. You would have to question this guy's intelligence. Blogs are a very public method of getting your message out there and getting noticed. He may as well just sent an email out to all Google employees. Additionally, I would not want to have anyone work for me who would go public with criticism. Instead of publicly criticizing how about taking some ownership and try to help "your" company fix the issue. Too many complainers and not enough do'ers.
http://trustedadvisor.typepad.com/revolutionary_marketing_a/
http://trustedadvisor.typepad.com/transparent_globalization/
http://trustedadvisor.typepad.com/prospect_intelligence/
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Scott Jones
12. Your previous 'blog-comms' seem a bit out of touch. Mr. G.C. Pick seems unable to excape the 'cold war' mind set with his weird observation; e.g.; "...and potential damage cause by breach of confidentiality. It can kill." And Mr. S. Jones thinks we aught to take better care of OUR respective companies. I suspect Mr. Jones is a company owner. He aught to see what MY company looks like to me- The little guy. Personally I give to MY company what it gives to ME- which is not a hell of a lot.
What the internet is doing to us is the subject of my Blog, "The Internest's Egress". The world has become that which Washington has long been; i.e. one giant glass house! No more secrets kids! Looks like we are in the process of separating the wheat from the chaff.
Robert Warlov
Poetzzz@yahoo.com
Blog- "The Internest's Egress"
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Robert Warlov
13. Unfortunately, Mr. Warlov's content doesn't seem to have significant relevance to the topic and digresses into a simple sale pitch for his own blog. Our topic is the issue of the Google Employee's loss of his job for violating company guidelines.
It seems clear to me but less clear to others that, if you can't respect the privacy of others and are not in touch with the group...... people don't give you "a hell of a lot". (and you might even get FIRED).
G.C.P.
15. Google did the right thing. No one employee has the right to air workplace conditions in a public setting, especially a blog. What happens in the workplace should remain in the workplace unless all parties involved are asked for opinions. Also rather than start a blog on company time to become some sort of hero/public figure leave and 'work' somewhere else.
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Steve Cosman
16. I'd still like to hear how Mr. Pick thinks Mark Jen's blog about the Google work place could cause the loss of human life?
His contention that my message contains no "significant relevance" to the topic misses the challenge therein to the notion that the employer would be master today, controlling our lives, our ideas and communications.
Most companies today offer little more than a pay check at the end of the week. Things like team-spirit and loyalty went out with the death of unions, which those very companies brought about.
Is it irrelevant to suggest that companies that give so little should expect little in return? Google got hit, because like so many others, it couldn't see the raw power of the Internet. That they fired Mr. Jen proves they still don't That act hurt them.
My message notes the similarity between the internal workings of American corporations to the activities in Washington, vis a vie the new transparency brought about by the exponential expansion of communicability the Internet has created. THAT, I think, is relevant. It goes directly to the subject.
That my blog seeks to delve into just this kind of subject in not an attempt to sell anything, but to inform others of a "hub" to discuss it and other relevant events.
The idea that people can be harmed by the explicate workings of a minuscule part of such a large corporation, is the equivalent of shouting "fire" in a crowded theater, because Mr. Jen's blog could never have hurt Google the way his firing has. It was the proverbial "tempest in a teapot". They overreacted just as Mr. Pick has.
The greater challenger, I submit, is to use our imaginations to extrapolate how our lives might be changed by the coming world transparency I eluded to before. The firing and even the jailing of bloggers was news only to those who didn't see this coming. Some of us did see it.
Mr. Pick might benefit from thinking about the larger concepts some messages carry and not be so quick to cynically condemn what he does not readily perceive.
Robert Warlov
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Roert Warlov
1. it would not surprise me, i used to sing googles praise, no more basically they i imagine are CIA tools, and being in Latin America for 30 years, well we know what idiot peices of crap are the CIA, bunch of Yale fools(bring it on) and today with the report of knowledge of al queda's threat on airline safety, haha
so now, i am PURE YAHOO!! million times better
anyway, google and their search engine sux, i know, with many web sites i am mastering for, i know
their popularity is once again evidence of american's people ignorance and arrogance
we get what we deserve,obesity, bad health,low educational levels,etc. we are 5% of this planet
but i need to stop saying WE,
back south not soon enough
VIVA COLOMBIA!
Posted at 4:46AM on Dec 19th 2005 by Michael W. Johnson {Senor Pescado}