Google: A Megathread of Alphabet News

[Bear Ribs]

Google Fired Exec For Not Being ‘Inclusive’ By Favoring High Performers, Lawsuit Alleges | The Daily Wire

www.dailywire.com

 

[Cherico]

Google Fired Exec For Not Being ‘Inclusive’ By Favoring High Performers, Lawsuit Alleges | The Daily Wire

www.dailywire.com

when companies fire people for doing their jobs you know said company is not too far away from fincial disaster.

 

[Husky_Khan]

A lawsuit filed in US District Court contends that Google has been 'wiretapping' tax return websites like HR Block, TaxAct and TaxSlayer etc with analytic code that gathered personal data from people who accessed those websites for tax preparation purposes.

"These tax preparation companies sent private tax return information to Google through Google Analytics and its embedded tracking pixel," the lawsuit continued, "which was installed on their websites. These pixels sent massive amounts of user data to Google to improve its ad business and enhance its other business tools."

Doing so is illegal, the complaint contended, because under American law tax-return information cannot be disclosed to unauthorized parties without consent from the payer. It will be interesting to see if the courts rule that Analytics actually vacuums up tax-return info.

Google Analytics can collect as many as 200 different metrics, according to the complaint, which says that while the ad giant maintains such information is not associated with individuals, "a Stanford and Princeton study [PDF] found that Google's tracking software is able to 'successfully carry out de-anonymization' through a simple process that leverages a user's web browsing history collected by Google's tracking tools."

There's been an uptick of litigation facing tech giants including Facebook/Meta over similar use of analytics. Google is currently also facing numerous lawsuits in regards to the use of Google Analytics on health care and hospital websites.

Google sued for 'wiretapping' tax websites with trackers

And this wiretap, is it in the room with us right now?

www.theregister.com

 

[Jormungandr]

>YouTube Music team unionized and went to city council to demand better pay, support, and job security
>YouTube/Google saw this and waited for them to go live
>Terminated them all in one fell swoop

Holy fuck, this was hilariously savage.

Edit: Direct video of it.

 

[Robovski]

YouTube music staff were all let go with this move and I can't say I'm sad to see any of those go.

 

[Husky_Khan]

Huh I wonder what the Labor Laws are in regard to this. I assume Alphabet has a pretty well paid and professional legal team to feel confident in pulling off this stunt, or maybe they feel insulated enough to pull this off regardless of any legal quibbles that might arise out of this.

If they're working for a third party contract company I guess that would complicate things unless what they were babbling about in regards to the National Relations Labor Board wasn't all blowing smoke.

 

[The Whispering Monk]

Texas is a Right to Work state. You can fire anyone at any time.

If the former employee can prove you did it for illegitimate reasons (pick an 'ism') the company is potentially liable.

That's about it.

 

[Husky_Khan]

Yeah I get that. But Right to Work, as is my understanding, is basically at-will employment (ie no 'ism') which most states have but the addition that you don't have to join a Union to work somewhere. But can a company in the state of Texas fire you for attempting to organize a Union which is clearly not an 'ism' as you mention?

The ex-employees in the video keep referencing the National Labor Relations Board which I assume would be who they would file a complaint with and thus dealt with by Federal Courts, but I have no idea if there is any room for any actual legal action in this case for unfair labor law. That's what I'm curious about.

 

[The Whispering Monk]

Yeah I get that. But Right to Work, as is my understanding, is basically at-will employment (ie no 'ism') which most states have but the addition that you don't have to join a Union to work somewhere. But can a company in the state of Texas fire you for attempting to organize a Union which is clearly not an 'ism' as you mention?

The ex-employees in the video keep referencing the National Labor Relations Board which I assume would be who they would file a complaint with and thus dealt with by Federal Courts, but I have no idea if there is any room for any actual legal action in this case for unfair labor law. That's what I'm curious about.

Company just says they're releasing a bunch of people or closing a department. Everybody goes. Cost saving measure is the cover.

 

[Cherico]

So I think its now very possible that the unions go over to the republicans over crap like this because Google is a democrat ally and major donor so the only ally you have is their enemies.

 

[Husky_Khan]

So I think its now very possible that the unions go over to the republicans over crap like this because Google is a democrat ally and major donor so the only ally you have is their enemies.

It'd have to be private sector Unions hopefully.

Because gutting and destroying most government Public Sector Unions like the AFSCME, SEIU, AFGE and AFT would be an overall public good for the country.

 

[The Whispering Monk]

So I think its now very possible that the unions go over to the republicans over crap like this because Google is a democrat ally and major donor so the only ally you have is their enemies.

Totally not going to happen over this. Most of the conservatives I know are chuckling at this.
You don't want to go to work?
OK, wish granted, you don't have to anymore.