Plaintiff in Silicon Valley anti-poaching suit protests settlement, wants 'day in court'

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Comments

  • Reply 21 of 69
    spidy99spidy99 Posts: 6member

    Thats the whole point.You may not get offers from top companies and may settle with whatever minial job you have but talented folks would get job anywhere and they like to work with like minded people. In this case the smart ones wanted to leave Apple and work for Google vice versa but that was blocked by a corporate shady deal. Since you are not impacted you won't know why don't you take your advise else where 

  • Reply 22 of 69
    focherfocher Posts: 687member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by hill60 View Post



    If you wanted a job somewhere else, why didn't you look for it and apply for it just like the rest of us poor schmucks.



    You should get nothing you lazy whiner.

    Because these companies colluded with each other to refuse to hire each others' employees, which had the clear economic objective of depressing wages.

     

    If companies want to secure certain people due to high valued skills, they need to negotiate with those individuals and enter into employment contracts with them. Colluding with other companies to agree not to hire them is so anti-competitive, anti-free market, and scummy that I'm wondering how anyone can logically look at the situation and support the companies in this situation. Even the companies themselves knew they were doing wrong. Eric Schmidt had emails where he expressed discomfort with talking about it in emails due to fear of it coming out in litigation.

  • Reply 23 of 69
    tbelltbell Posts: 3,146member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by aussiepaul View Post



    Oh dear, you have no idea...

     

     

    Well I am only an attorney, but whatever. 

  • Reply 24 of 69
    tbelltbell Posts: 3,146member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by LordJohnWhorfin View Post



    I can't believe the stupidity of some of the comments. So you're all for the free market, except when it's inconvenient? The behavior of these companies is as monopolistic, anti-competitive and anti-American as it gets, they held back the salaries of the entire profession back during a period of explosive growth in order to maximize their profits, and they'd be getting away with barely a slap on the wrist! They need to be severely punished. Even a 2 billion fine would be NOTHING compared to how much money they fleeced programmers with their anti-competitive behavior.

     

     

    Yes, except you forget to tell us how the action is anti-competitive. At the time the agreement was made, the companies involved were essentially partners not competitors. They were all working together in some capacity. They made an agreement not to actively recruit each others employees. How is that anti-competitive? 

     

    Here is the key: They didn't prohibit each other from hiring one another's employees. How is it American to force partners to actively recruit each others employees? Perhaps, they should actively go after each others spouses as well?  

  • Reply 25 of 69
    tbelltbell Posts: 3,146member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by focher View Post

     

    Because these companies colluded with each other to refuse to hire each others' employees, which had the clear economic objective of depressing wages.


     

    It is not clear to me the objective was economic. What is clear to me is the various companies were involved in various joint products (e.g. Google working with Apple to bring Google Maps to iOS, Intel working with Apple to provide processors for its products, etc.). They didn't want recruiters actively going after each others employees. Paying recruiters to steal each other employees to undermine their joint efforts. It is disruptive to lose employees responsible for complicated projects. 

     

    Further, if the employees were free to apply for listed positions their wages were not depressed.

  • Reply 26 of 69
    aussiepaulaussiepaul Posts: 144member

    Replied to wrong post.  Moderator may delete.

  • Reply 27 of 69
    mdriftmeyermdriftmeyer Posts: 7,503member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Apple ][ View Post

     

    Workers have too many rights nowadays, and who's fault is it that the lawyers are making away with 75 million, while the plaintiffs only get a few thousand each?


    You lost me right there.

  • Reply 28 of 69
    mdriftmeyermdriftmeyer Posts: 7,503member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by nagromme View Post



    People who say that all the affected employees (not just this one representative) should just accept this because they are lucky to be alive and working at all... Why shouldn't the same logic apply to Apple, Google and the other companies who did wrong? Why automatically side with the corporations? Shouldn't they "just be grateful" they were able to have talented employees and mess with those employees' lives for so many years while profiting from their labors?



    The amount IS a meaningless slap on the wrist, clearly.

     

    I won't side with the corporations. Having seen the salaries top talent achieve they cannot complain. We're talking in the several hundred thousand dollars/year plus large stock options to boot that garners them millions.

     

    Those are the ones being head hunted. It has long been common knowledge that top talent job hops not because of new and challenging projects, but double to quadruple base salary increases and when you buy a Ferarri you just don't want to buy a Lexus.

     

    In reality, both Executives and top engineers are ludicrously compensated, while the ones who really do most of the work, get the shaft. Change that shaft structure and you won't hear anyone complain, other than the Executives whining they had to work for their money and the top talent being forced to sign NDA and contracts requiring 5 or 10 year agreements if they want those large paychecks. They'll both whine.

     

    At least the rest of the staff doing all the actual coding, testing and 80 hour work weeks will finally feel some vindication.

  • Reply 29 of 69
    ajbdtc826ajbdtc826 Posts: 190member
    So only $300M to limit a market for someone to be employed in? I know Apple's intentions here are to keep fiscal consistency no matter what the cost is but this whole "poaching" thing is what keeps workers paid their proper value.

    The right way to do it is to simply offer VIP employees a bonus to stay with the company for x amount of years to cash in. That way the choice is the worker's- NOT the company's.
  • Reply 30 of 69
    smallwheelssmallwheels Posts: 584member

    Read the letter the class representative sent to the judge. He explains how a similar situation between other companies proves that salaries went up 10% without such anti-poaching agreements. 

     

    How many attorneys always believe what the opposing council tells them? How many believe they are always given all of the facts? Just because the anti-poaching agreement specifically talks about recruiting it doesn't mean that the human resources personnel weren't also told to not hire people from specific companies. 

     

    Any agreement to not recruit employees from specific companies, no matter what the reasoning behind it, is an act of collusion to commit a crime. This type of crime held down pay during the time the agreement was being followed. This really needs to go to court with a trial. If the judge makes this settlement agreement stick it will seem fishy to me. 

     

    Wouldn't it be something if after a year or so Ms. Koh quits being a judge and becomes a legal consultant to Apple, Google, or any of the other defendants in this case. 

  • Reply 31 of 69
    jkichlinejkichline Posts: 1,369member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by nagromme View Post



    People who say that all the affected employees (not just this one representative) should just accept this because they are lucky to be alive and working at all... Why shouldn't the same logic apply to Apple, Google and the other companies who did wrong? Why automatically side with the corporations? Shouldn't they "just be grateful" they were able to have talented employees and mess with those employees' lives for so many years while profiting from their labors?



    The amount IS a meaningless slap on the wrist, clearly.

    The reason is this. If every company continued to headhunt, it would have created mass chaos with each company going after each other's throats for stealing other key employees. In addition, those employees would still be under NDA which would create even more chaos of who took what IP where, etc. Salaries would rise, but so would legal fees and time spent trying to sort all of this out. I think the net product would be some employees getting richer quicker, but at the cost of burning out, loss of productivity, or just the unsustainable turnover that would have crippled Silicon Valley.

     

    Currently there is an economic crisis in the Valley in that those with higher salaries (those that work at these big companies) are squeezing out those at lower economic levels. What would happen if there was no order to this? I think we would see grossly more divergent economic classes which again, may be great for the rich, but may not be great for society on a whole.

     

    I think that Steve Jobs proposed a way for the companies to work together and they all, collectively, changed the world in which we live.  It's not a matter of siding with this company or that company, or with siding with the corporations versus the employees.. it's siding with common sense and an organized society.  While these companies agreed to not headhunt employees, they didn't preclude those employees from applying to the other companies and, unless the employee signed a contract, there was nothing keeping them from leaving.  The employee knew full well what the employment contract was.

     

    I really believe these individuals are now looking at "what-ifs" now that they are unemployable, probably because they spent all their time trying to milk their employers instead of being passionate about what they do.

     

    Honestly, this guy deserves the ridicule from those who don't have what he has. He may have the right to ask for this money, but that doesn't mean hard-working people who don't have the opportunities he had can't call him on his demands.  That's the bed he made for himself so he should probably hire a PR firm with his future payout to deal with that.

  • Reply 32 of 69
    nolamacguynolamacguy Posts: 4,758member
    slurpy wrote: »
    Oh, shut the **** up you fucking whiner. This guy lives in a fantasy world where he imagines he would have gotten "poached" and became a millionaire if it wasnt for this agreement. Accept the settlement and move on with your life, do something useful, instead of being a gold-digging parasite.

    what an oddly personal reaction to the suit. you seem to have overlooked the fact that this is a class action suit, so his aim is not to profit himself (100k, big deal), but to make a bigger dent for the defendants. more power to him and them as plaintiffs. apple and google and the like were guilty.
  • Reply 33 of 69
    nolamacguynolamacguy Posts: 4,758member
    apple ][ wrote: »
    Workers have too many rights nowadays,

    wow. the fluoride in the water supply must be working. the workers have too many rights!? that's a gas.
  • Reply 34 of 69
    nolamacguynolamacguy Posts: 4,758member
    tbell wrote: »

    Yes, except you forget to tell us how the action is anti-competitive. At the time the agreement was made, the companies involved were essentially partners not competitors. They were all working together in some capacity. They made an agreement not to actively recruit each others employees. How is that anti-competitive? 

    Here is the key: They didn't prohibit each other from hiring one another's employees. How is it American to force partners to actively recruit each others employees? Perhaps, they should actively go after each others spouses as well?  

    oh my god, so much logic fail, my eyes hurt.

    if you really don't believe it's anti free market for employers to collude on not hiring market workers for a market price, there's no helping you. you've got the prettiest rose colored glasses I've ever seen!
  • Reply 35 of 69
    nolamacguynolamacguy Posts: 4,758member
    jkichline wrote: »
    The reason is this. If every company continued to headhunt, it would have created mass chaos with each company going after each other's throats for stealing other key employees.

    oh, you mean like in the rest of the marketplace/world? yet we're getting along fine.
  • Reply 36 of 69
    focher wrote: »
    Because these companies colluded with each other to refuse to hire each others' employees, which had the clear economic objective of depressing wages.

    Stop lying. There was no such agreement. They agreed not to poach. There was NEVER an agreement that they couldn't hire employees from each other.
  • Reply 37 of 69
    lorin schultzlorin schultz Posts: 2,771member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TBell View Post

     

    Why is it that partners can't strike an agreement not to actively solicit each others employees?


     

    With due respect to your local bar association, claiming that the defendants were de facto partners strikes me as utterly implausible, and Steve Jobs' own email makes it very clear the motivation was to control wages. Your contention that finding for the plaintiff somehow mandates compulsory poaching seems like an example of reducto ad absurdum, except that you say it more than once and it sounds like you're really trying to convince people that such an outcome could actually occur, which is obviously… well, absurd.

     

    I really don't see how there's any ambiguity in this case at all.

  • Reply 38 of 69
    lorin schultzlorin schultz Posts: 2,771member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jkichline View Post

     
    Currently there is an economic crisis in the Valley in that those with higher salaries (those that work at these big companies) are squeezing out those at lower economic levels. What would happen if there was no order to this? I think we would see grossly more divergent economic classes which again, may be great for the rich, but may not be great for society on a whole.


     

    Right then, communism it is.

     

    Please surrender your car to the man with the arm band. It is now going to be used to transport former software engineers to their new jobs tearing up airports to make room for soybean farms.

     

    ;)

  • Reply 39 of 69
    benjamin frostbenjamin frost Posts: 7,203member
    How many employees sue their employer for being overpaid?

    How many companies have overpaid their employees? Did Apple pay Angela too much, or might she sue them because $68 million is not enough for her to live on?
  • Reply 40 of 69
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TBell View Post

     

     

     

    Yes, except you forget to tell us how the action is anti-competitive. At the time the agreement was made, the companies involved were essentially partners not competitors. They were all working together in some capacity. They made an agreement not to actively recruit each others employees. How is that anti-competitive? 

     

    Here is the key: They didn't prohibit each other from hiring one another's employees. How is it American to force partners to actively recruit each others employees? Perhaps, they should actively go after each others spouses as well?  


     

     

    You are being ridiculous. These companies entered a secret agreement where they agreed to not poach each other's employees.

    Let me explain this to you in simple terms, since you seem to have a problem with the English language.

    I'm an engineer with Apple, with a certain skill level in a specific domain. I'm not looking for another job, but just like any other engineer in the valley my resume is on LinkedIn, because that's what we do. An Adobe recruiter is looking for someone with this exact skill set and they go to LinkedIn to find acceptable candidates. My name comes up, but is automatically rejected. That's not anti-competitive, anti-American behavior? It's specifically DESIGNED to prevent competition.

     

    Look, capitalism is all about supply and demand, but if you demand a free market it has to be fair and it works both ways. If I have to put up with salaries going down due to off-shore competition, you also have to allow me to benefit from a bidding war when my skills are in high demand.

     

    And what you call "partners", I believe anti-trust lawyers have a term for. It's called a cartel. Look it up.

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