Google fires 28 employees after sit-in protest over Israel cloud contract
www.theverge.com
The employees were protesting against “Project Nimbus.”

Google fired 28 employees in connection with sit-in protests at two of its offices this week, according to an internal memo obtained by The Verge. The firings come after 9 employees were suspended and then arrested in New York and California on Tuesday.

In a memo sent to all employees on Wednesday, Chris Rackow, Google’s head of global security, said that “behavior like this has no place in our workplace and we will not tolerate it.”

He also warned that the company would take more action if needed: “The overwhelming majority of our employees do the right thing. If you’re one of the few who are tempted to think we’re going to overlook conduct that violates our policies, think again. The company takes this extremely seriously, and we will continue to apply our longstanding policies to take action against disruptive behavior — up to and including termination.”

  • Cowbee@lemmy.mlEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    “How dare you protest genocide. The majority of our employees shut the fuck up about us supporting genocide, get in line or get cut.”

    • jonne@infosec.pubEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      They dropped that one quietly a couple of years ago. I guess around the time they started doing contracts for Israel?

      Edit: just Googled what this project nimbus is all about, and it sounds like basically building data centres in Israel, which is fair enough, but it ends with this titbit:

      The terms Israel set for the project contractually forbid Amazon and Google from halting services due to boycott pressure.[7][8] The tech companies are also forbidden from denying service to any particular government entities.[8]

      That’s not something you put in your contract unless you’re planning on doing something that’ll attract boycotts

      • vinyl@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        I decided to try out Kagi, I appreciate duckduckgo for privacy but jeez does it suck at being a search engine. Kagi is trying to be a 1:1 google search but without ads and tracking, you may ask how they operate? They charge 10 bucks a month which is a downside I’m willing to take.

  • Kyoyeou (Ki jəʊ juː)@slrpnk.netEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    Their behavior was unacceptable, extremely disruptive, and made coworkers feel threatened

    Maybe… because they feel threatened for themselves and their families?

  • bitwolf@lemmy.oneEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    Every employee is bound by the Software Engineering code of ethics.

    So does this mean Google has abandoned this.

  • Jamil@lemm.eeEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    Looking for more ideas how to boycott Google.

    No longer using Chrome No longer using google search.

    Somehow get off Gmail? Android gapps? Delete reviews?

    • Vik@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      There’s FOSS apps from fdroid, fairemail or protonmail or something of the sort, CalyxOS or GrapheneOS (ironically targets the Pixel series primarily, though they sometimes sell these at a loss around the holiday season).

    • Gluten6970@lemm.eeEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      The Proton suite of apps have 1:1 replacements for the entire Gsuite. Some things are locked behind a subscription (email is fully free), so if you’re not into that there’s NextCloud if you can/want to self-host. Tuta is also a decent Gmail replacement. As for Gapps, there isn’t really any good replacements; MicroG breaks a lot of things and sandboxed google play services is the only other alternative (which is only available on GrapheneOS afaik).

      • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        The Proton suite of apps have 1:1 replacements for the entire Gsuite

        That’s just not true, they don’t have office applications or video chat. I wish they did though. Also, their storage is pretty expensive.

        Their email is pretty good though, and they have a decent VPN service as well.

        • Gluten6970@lemm.eeEnglish
          0·
          3 months ago

          they don’t have office applications or video chat

          Oh right, true. I forget Google has those.

          • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            0·
            3 months ago

            Google Sheets is the last thing really holding my back from abandoning Google. It’s just so convenient, and I’m more comfortable with it than LibreOffice. I like that I can edit things on my phone, which I haven’t found an alternative for.

    • Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      Unpopular opinion but boycotting Google doesn’t work.

      Instead, get real inside the house.

      • Be such a great Contributor to Google Maps.

      • Be a manager of a team.

      • Work on critical systems.

      Then casually start breaking shit. Woops, didn’t mean to add all this spam to Google maps. Didn’t mean to cancel another service. Didn’t mean to make search shittyer.

      And if you do it correctly, you’ll get paid AND nobody will be the wiser since they’re already doing all those things.

      • mlg@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        Poor dude doesn’t know google already did this themselves by killing their project teams and bringing a team of summer interns every year to decrease the cloud cost of each app.

        They don’t have to worry because they already own the market on all these apps so any competitor can be bought out or is doomed to fail.

        That way they can spend all their allocated budget on new ventures like Gemini.

        For example Google Maps has sucked total ******* **** for a whole ass decade now, and the people who made Android Auto have a special place for them in FOSS hell.

  • DaCrazyJamez@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    Not that I am a fan of google, but those people signed a contract that prohibits certain behavior, so I cant really blame the company this time.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldBEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:

    Some of them occupied the office of Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian until they were forcibly removed by law enforcement.

    Last month, Google fired another employee for protesting the contract during a company presentation in Israel.

    In a memo sent to all employees on Wednesday, Chris Rackow, Google’s head of global security, said that “behavior like this has no place in our workplace and we will not tolerate it.” You can read the full memo at the bottom of this story.

    He also warned that the company would take more action if needed: “The overwhelming majority of our employees do the right thing.

    In a response statement, the “No Tech for Apartheid” group behind the protests called Google’s firings a “flagrant act of retaliation.”

    “In the three years that we have been organizing against Project Nimbus, we have yet to hear from a single executive about our concerns,” the group wrote in a post on Medium.

    The original article contains 303 words, the summary contains 156 words. Saved 49%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!