Inconceivable: TikToker Who Made Paint Mixing Very, Very Cool... Is Fired From Sherwin-Williams For Doing So

from the mix-it-up dept

TikTok remains a somewhat fascinating service to me, as different people experiment with using it to express all sorts of things in ways that are unexpected and often delightful. A couple months ago I discovered that there appears to be an entire genre of TikTokers creating videos about... mixing paint colors. I know... I know. At first that sounds insane. Who could possibly want to watch that? But some of them are truly amazing, as first noted by reporter Rebecca Jennings who tweeted about her discovery of Christian Hull, an Australian TikToker whose videos of him watching paint mixing videos and trying to guess what color the eventual mix will be is just so insanely joyful and addicting.

Some people argued that the viral attention towards these paint mixing videos was due to people getting cabin fever from the never-ending pandemic, but I'd say it's just one of those amazing internet oddities that have always gone viral on the internet since its earliest days. The ability to see this kind of actual, unfettered joy at something that seems so mundane, and which most people didn't even think was exciting -- only to discover that it's very, very exciting.

Anyway, Hull wasn't the only paint mixing TikToker out there. Another account, Tonester Paints (the user name of Tony Piloseno) worked at a Sherwin-Williams paint store in Ohio. He made a ton of paint mixing videos, including taking requests, and showing people how to make certain colors (with paints he purchased himself, which he then donates to Habitat for Humanity)). Again, the videos are surprisingly mesmerizing. (I tried to use TikTok's native embed code in this post, but it seemed to fuck up everything and was causing all sorts of problems, so I've now tweeted the Tiktoks from my Twitter account and are embedding those tweets instead).

Piloseno says as his TikTok (and YouTube and Instagram) paint mixing videos got more and more attention, he thought that perhaps Sherwin-Williams would be interested in having him actually represent the brand in doing his paint mixing. He approached executives at the company's headquarters (with the approval of his own manager) with a presentation about how to better use social media to gain attention. He never got the meeting, but instead the company fired him for "gross misconduct" in response to people calling the company in response to his videos.

He showed Buzzfeed his termination papers, which also said he was accused of "wasting properties [and] facilities" and "seriously embarass[ing] the Company or its products." The company also provided a bizarre quote to Buzzfeed saying he was fired due to a customer complaint:

According to termination papers Piloseno provided to BuzzFeed News, the official offense the company handed down to him was "gross misconduct," which included the offenses of "wasting properties [and] facilities," and "seriously embarrass[ing] the Company or its products."

Shortly after this story was published, the company spokesperson told BuzzFeed News that it was due to a "customer complaint" about Piloseno's TikToks that it had terminated his employment.

Piloseno told BuzzFeed News he did admit to filming TikToks while he was already mixing paints for customers when he first started posting to his channel in December 2019. But, as his page grew, he committed to purchasing cans of paint with his employee discount.

"They first accused me of stealing — I told them I purchased all my paint," he said. "They made me answer a bunch of questions like when I was doing this, where, if there was anyone in the store while I was doing [filming]. There was never anyone with me while I doing it."

So, you could see how, at first, the company might be upset that some of his early videos involved filming the paint he was mixing for customers... but... also... why? He wasn't revealing any private information of the customers. He was just filming the paint mixing process (which is, again, fascinating).

The Buzzfeed article notes that one reason why customers had called the company was in response to this video in which Piloseno mixed actual blueberries into paint to to color it blue:

That's amazing. And I say that as someone who once got out of being fined for significant room damage to a college dorm by buying some white paint and mixing in nutmeg and cinnamon in varying amounts until it matched the dull beige of the existing paint job (it also smelled amazing).

The whole thing seems bizarre. Sherwin-Williams incredibly corporate response to all of this is just silly:

The company told BuzzFeed News on Wednesday that a "customer's concerns" is what launched its investigation, and what ultimately led to its decision to let him go "due to multiple company policy violations."

"While we don’t discuss the details of employee matters publicly, what I can tell you is that we were made aware of the TikTok videos produced by Anthony Piloseno through a customer complaint," said Julie Young, the vice president of global corporate communications. "We take all complaints seriously and thoroughly investigated the customer’s concerns. Following the investigation, Mr. Piloseno was let go in July 2020 due to multiple Company policy violations."

Piloseno is still making his paint mixing videos now. He's just doing them in a friend's basement where he's built a studio, according to his recently launched GoFundMe campaign. Oh, and he told Buzzfeed that he's not buying paints from Sherwin-Williams:

"I bought myself a light box. I bought some empty gallons at Lowe's — I basically started shopping at Lowe's afterward," he added.

Not surprisingly, this is not reflecting at all well on Sherwin-Williams. In the responses to his TikTok explaining all of this (which shows a brief screenshot of the marketing presentation he made for the corporate execs) people seem quite reasonably ticked off at Sherwin-Williams for firing a guy who was actually making their paint cool. The comments in response to the video about Sherwin-Williams corporate (again, his own manager and the people at the store supported him), suggest that they not only screwed up a huge opportunity, but they've now actively turned people off of the brand:

There are nearly 20,000 comments on that video... and pretty much all of them are saying some variation of how badly Sherwin-Williams fucked this up, and how the company execs should be fired instead.

This is going to be a case study in how not to handle social media and going viral for big companies.

Update: And just this morning Piloseno has posted about how he's gotten a new job because of all of this. A company called Florida Paints heard about his story, flew him to Orlando and has hired him to help promote their paint products.

Filed Under: fired, paint, paint mixing, social media, tonester paints, tony piloseno
Companies: sherwin-williams, tiktok

Trump Fires US Cybersecurity Director Chris Krebs After Krebs Debunks Trump's Claims Of Election Systems Fraud

from the mad-king-tantrum dept

As we noted last week, it was widely expected that sooner or later Donald Trump would turn his post-election temper tantrum towards Chris Krebs, the widely respected director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). Krebs had been standing firm in reporting that there was no evidence to support the widespread conspiracy theories about hacked voting machines. CISA had been proactively debunking these claims.

On Tuesday morning, Krebs tweeted about how election security experts all agreed that there was no evidence of manipulated elections -- directly contradicting the ongoing unsubstantiated claims of the President and his enablers:

In response, a few hours later, Trump tweeted that Krebs was fired:

If you can't read that, it's the President saying:

The recent statement by Chris Krebs on the security of the 2020 Election was highly inaccurate, in that there were massive improprieties and fraud - including dead people voting, Poll Watchers not allowed into polling locations, “glitches” in the voting machines which changed... votes from Trump to Biden, late voting, and many more. Therefore, effective immediately, Chris Krebs has been terminated as Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

There is no evidence that any of that actually happened. None. Zero. Zilch. Every single one of those stories has been debunked (and most of them have literally nothing to do with Krebs' job). The only thing truthful in those tweets is that Trump was firing Krebs. This is a disgusting abuse of power, supporting completely bullshit conspiracy theory nonsense, in order to remove a public servant who actually did his job well in protecting against such election manipulation.

Moments later, on his personal Twitter account, Krebs tweeted with class:

This is the kind of grace and class that Trump and his enablers will never understand.

As professor Steve Vladeck notes, "we're worse off as a country" because of "this temper tantrum" by the President.

Filed Under: chris krebs, cisa, dhs, donald trump, election security, fired, tempter tantrum

Trump Fires FBI Director Comey

from the you're-fired dept

So... not quite sure what to make of this yet, but according to the NY Times, just a little while ago, Donald Trump fired FBI Director James Comey (of course, just after our podcast came out talking about how Comey seemed to be hopeful the Trump administration would approve his encryption backdoor plans).

“While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the bureau,” Mr. Trump said in a letter dated Tuesday to Mr. Comey.

“It is essential that we find new leadership for the F.B.I. that restores public trust and confidence in its vital law enforcement mission,” Mr. Trump wrote.

The full letter is... even more crazy:

If you can't read that, it says:

Dear Director Comey:

I have received the attached letters from the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General of the United States recommending your dismissal as the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I have accepted their recommendation and you are hereby terminated and removed from office, effective immediately.

While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgement of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the Bureau.

It is essential that we find new leadership for the FBI that restores public trust and confidence in its vital law enforcement mission.

I wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors.

Donald J. Trump

I'm not sure why it even bothers to mention that Trump himself is not a target of an investigation (or that Comey told him that three times). It's already known that the wider administration is subject to an investigation, and even if you don't believe that such an investigation will turn up anything, it's still happening. At the very least, this should call into question whether or not there can effectively be any investigation into the administration that won't involve meddling by the administration. That alone should be a big concern.

I don't think we've ever said anything particularly supportive of Comey, who we've disagreed with on a large range of issues, but it's difficult to see how this is going to be a good thing. It's already been admitted that the FBI was investigating potential ties between Russia and the administration. Whether or not that investigation had anything at all to do with the firing, there's no way to spin this that looks good.

Yes, the President has the power to fire the head of the FBI... but when that FBI was conducting an independent investigation of the President, any such firing is clearly going to be seen as politically motivated. And, yes, it's important to note that this is NOT entirely unprecedented. President Clinton fired FBI director William Sessions soon after taking office as well, though there wasn't the stench of an FBI investigation into the President going around at the time. If anything, the comparison that seems slightly more apt that people are making is to Archibald Cox, the independent special prosecutor that Richard Nixon fired, leading to the resignations of the Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General (contrast that to today's news, where it was those two roles who recommended this firing...).

Comey was not a particularly good FBI director, and we've covered numerous problems with his leadership. But that doesn't mean that whoever replaces him won't be even worse.

Filed Under: doj, donald trump, fbi, fired, investigation, james comey, jeff sessions

Chicago Sandwich Shop Emails Employees On Dec. 23rd To Say Merry Christmas And You're All Fired

from the open-faced-club-scroogewich dept

Let me let you in on a little secret: I don't really like Christmas. Through some combination of those horrible lights, that torture referred to as Christmas music, my disliking of receiving gifts and the proximity to the far superior holiday known as Thanksgiving, December 25th just never gets my trousers off, so to speak. It's led to some of my friends joking that I'm a modern-day Scrooge, which my bank account confirms I am, in fact, not. Besides, it turns out the Chicago area has a much better approximation for Scrooge than I in whoever owns Snarf's Sandwiches on the near North Side.

See, Snarf's thought it would be fun to wait until a couple of days before Christmas to let their employees at their sandwich shop know that, suprise, you're fired. Oh, and because assbaggery prefers its interactions impersonal, they informed their staff of this via a warm and fuzzy email.

1. Due to increased competition and losses, ownership has decided to consider remodeling and reconcepting the store at 600 West Chicago Ave.
2. The store is closing, effective tomorrow, December 23, 2013 for an unknown period of time for this remodeling and reconcepting.
3. All staff is terminated, effective Monday, December 23, 2013.
4. All staff may apply for unemployment, if eligible.
5. Return any keys and Company property to Will Ravert at 600 West Chicago Avenue on Monday, December 23, 2014 during normal business hours.
6. Payroll will be processed as usual this week and paid on Friday, December 27, 2013.
7. Keep an eye out for the grand opening of the new store.
8. Ownership appreciates your service and wish you well in your new endeavors.

Doug Besant Director of Operations

Bullet point number seven is by far my favorite. Nothing makes a Christmas firing more satisfying than telling the folks fired they should totally come check out the new sandwich shop staffed with all the folks that took their jobs once it reopens. Now, it's interesting that the firing comes just a few days after the staff joined other fast food workers in striking for higher wages, but Snarf's spokeswoman Jill Preston says that's just a happy coincidence.

“During the Christmas holiday we’re pretty slow,” she says. “The restaurant’s usually three quarters closed. This does happen to coincide, but this is something we’ve had planned for awhile.”

So Snarf's has been planning this for some time, huh? In that case, I guess it was just sadism and a hatred for the working stiff that led to management emailing everyone with one day's notice of their termination? At Christmas? Classy. And breaking up with your employees via email? Well that's just the dingle berry on top of the poop sundae for your workers.

“Three days before Christmas and not even a call,” [Employee] Rojas says. “It’s not fair that management and the corporation is treating [employees] this way.”

It looks like Scrooge is alive and well and running a small sandwich shop in Chicago. And somewhere, Tiny Tim just kicked the bucket out of sheer dispair. Happy holidays.

Filed Under: chicago, email, fired

Art Institute Instructor Fired For Protesting Mandatory E-Textbook Policy Takes School To Court

from the tossing-aside-great-instructors-in-order-to-cash-in-on-shady-policies dept

A few months back, we covered the story of Mike Tracy, a highly regarded animator with over a decade of teaching experience at the Art Institute of California. Tracy protested his school's mandatory ebook policy, one that saddled students with one-time use ebooks (via access codes) at a cost of $50-75 each. The push behind this policy came from the Education Management Corporation (EDMC), which manages several for-profit universities as well as operating its own e-textbook publishing company, Digital Bookshelf.

Mike Tracy refused to enforce the questionable policy and spoke out openly against EDMC's mandatory e-book policy, calling the forced inclusion of these textbooks "arbitrary, inappropriate and completely motivated by profit." In response, the Art Institute fired Tracy for "insubordination." It may be wishing it had simply made a few exceptions or reconsidered its textbook policies, as it is now being sued, along with EDMC, for lost wages and benefits, along with punitive damages for retaliation, wrongful termination and emotional distress.

Tracy, who had taught for 11-1/2 years at the Art Institute without requiring his students purchase a textbook, was informed by administration in 2010 that he would need to select a textbook from the list provided by EDMC, something that had never been required before this point.

"Plaintiff was concerned by this notification that his course had been selected for compulsory participation in defendants' e-book program," the complaint states.

"Plaintiff had taught the course for more than a decade without the use of an officially published textbook. Plaintiff had never previously designated a textbook for the course because, in the rapidly and ever-evolving field of digital animation, which increasingly relied on cutting-edge technical developments in the larger field of computers and computer science, no published textbook adequately addressed the subject matter of the course. Available published textbooks often suffered from a lack of comprehensive teaching of the subject matter; a failure to remain relevant, containing out-of-date materials, techniques, or approaches, due to rapid and continuous developments in the field; or a failure to provide practical and/or theoretical educational content that would adequately prepare students for careers in the field. Thus, in plaintiff's professional and academic opinion, none of the available published textbooks for the course were productive, useful, or appropriate for the students."

That's the trouble with policies: they can often override knowledge and/or common sense. Seeing as Tracy had more than 11 years experience at that point (and was respected by his students, who collected more than 4,700 signatures on a petition to get him reinstated), one would think the school would value his opinion over a list compiled by a management corporation more interested in turning students into mandatory "customers" than actually providing quality education. Tracy's concern about this new policy led him to do some research, which uncovered some more mercenary ugliness on EDMC's part.

Tracy says he found that students taking courses requiring an e-book were charged $50 for an "electronic resources fee," and $75 if the course required two e-books.

"Students were not allowed to opt out of the automatic fee, which was charged to their tuition accounts without further notice," the complaint states.

Tracy claims this policy prevents students from buying their books elsewhere, a right guaranteed in the student handbook.

"Moreover, the policy effectively eliminated all other potential ways that students traditionally saved money on text purchases, such as buying used texts or trading texts after completing a course, because access to the mandatory e-books was limited to the particular student charged, in a single-use only basis."

Mandatory fees plus elimination of used books sales. It's a nice racket if you can get in on it. Tracy claims most students were unaware they were being charged these mandatory fees and that other instructors felt the e-textbooks were unsuitable for their classes and never used the "provided" texts which, oddly, worked out perfectly for EDMC and the Art Institute.

"More disconcerting still, plaintiff discovered that if the student never logged on and activated the e-book account for the course, defendants retained a higher percentage of the profit from the sale of the e-book under the terms of their contract with the e-book publisher than if the student had actually activated and made use of the e-book account," the complaint states.

That's just bizarre. As a digital product, prices shouldn't fluctuate depending on actual "use" of the texts. If this is true, it's as though the intention was to push as many useless and needlessly expensive e-textbooks on students as possible in hopes of a greater "return" of "unused" textbooks. Beyond some minor account maintenance, it's hard to see many expenses being incurred by the use of e-textbooks, which makes the higher profit margin on unused "books" inexplicable.

Tracy filed complaints with several government agencies, including the Department of Education. On August 10, 2010, Tracy was threatened with firing unless he complied with the new policy.

"During the meeting, plaintiff, again, reiterated his concerns about defendants' e-book policy, including explaining his belief that it resulted in falsely or fraudulently utilizing federal and state funds (by way of the government-provided grants and loans to the students) through an unfair pricing scheme for the e-books, from which students were unable to opt out. Plaintiff stated that he believed the letter threatening his termination was a retaliatory attempt by defendants to silence his opposition to the e-book policy and to deter other faculty from coming forward and voicing opposition to the same. Plaintiff also believed the termination threat was a signal to him and his colleagues that defendants would not tolerate any type of questioning of their policies, without regard for whether these policies were in violation of the law and fair and ethical business practices," the complaint states.

Tracy suggested alternatives to the new policy but they were rejected. Believing that his firing was imminent, he posted a message on his personal Facebook account regarding the situation, thanking his students and colleagues for the time they spent together during his career. This apparently was too much for the Art Institute to take.

Four days after the meeting, the Art Institute fired him, "mischaracterizing his continued opposition to their e-book policy on the grounds that it was unlawful, unfair, and unethical as 'insubordination,'" Tracy says in the complaint.

He claims the school retaliated against him for objecting to its unlawful e-book program, refusing to participate in the program, and reporting the program to the government.

While we wait for this to play out, there are a couple of issues to keep an eye on. Considering EDMC's past legal issues (it's currently being sued by the Department of Justice for illegal recruiting and false claims) and it's possible violation of the Higher Education Opportunity Act (which states that textbook publishers must unbundle their core educational content from optional add-ons like study guides, homework systems and, possibly, mandatory electronic versions of textbooks), Mike Tracy could end up with a rather swift settlement should EDMC wish to remain out of the judicial limelight.

While this lawsuit is not directly about textbook publishing or for-profit schools, it does serve the purpose of shining some sunlight on the intertwined workings of businesses like EDMC, which both owns and supplies textbooks to its colleges. This limitation of options, and the reliance on accounts, passwords and one-time use e-textbooks, prevents students and instructors from choosing anything but the most profitable (for the management and administration) path.

Exposing EDMC's "policies" for what they are -- the building blocks of closed ecosystem -- will hopefully help steer future students away from post-secondary for-profit schools run by the corporation. As for Tracy, hopefully the suit goes his way and, at the very least, he ends up at a school that appreciates his talents.

Filed Under: ebooks, fired, mandatory, mike tracy, teacher, textbooks

Animation Instructor Fights Unnecessary Textbook Purchases And Gets Fired For His Trouble

from the school-motto:-'Punire-Omni-Benefacto' dept

Endlessly mounting tuition isn't the only factor turning a college degree into a lifetime of student loan payments. Textbook prices are keeping pace with tuition, both of which are charging far ahead of inflation and wages.

There's no monopoly on the textbook market, but over 80% of it is controlled by the top four publishers (Pearson, Cengage, Wiley and McGraw-Hill). This control gives them enough leverage to maintain a 65% gross margin on their offerings.

The newest faces in the textbook world aren't making anything better. EDMC (Education Management Corporation), which operates several for-profit post-secondary schools (Argosy, The Art Institutes, Brown Mackie College) has its own e-textbook publishing arm, Digital Bookshelf, which handles all of its e-book offerings. As recently as last year, some were hoping the move to digital books would bring these prices down. Instead, digital offerings are arriving locked down, requiring students to purchase access codes which prevent the sharing of books and eliminates the resale market.

Here's what happens when a well-respected instructor attempts to push back against EDMC:

It's a common scenario and most college students appreciate a teacher who's looking for ways to deliver a quality education without requiring them to make unnecessary book purchases. Unfortunately, in the case of Mike Tracy, a highly-regarded animator who'd been teaching at the Art Institute of California-Orange County for the past 11 years, refusing to make students buy an e-book they don't need may have cost him his job.

Tracy posted on his Facebook page that he's "been in a dispute" with the school for several months "over their policy of mandatory e-textbooks in classes where their inclusion seems arbitrary, inappropriate and completely motivated by profit.

This isn't just Tracy's opinion. The post also cites EDMC's own Faculty Federation as being opposed to the strong-arm tactics being deployed:

EDMC continues to insist on e-books only and wants sole discretion over what e-books are used, compromising faculty independence and expertise in choosing best resources for class.

Not only are instructors not allowed to opt-out of this "service," students are forced to pay extra for versions they may not even need.

Art Institute requires students to pay a $50-$75 fee to download a temporary copy of the e-textbook from the Digital Bookshelf. Even if they want to buy a hard copy of the text, they still have to fork over the money for a digital version.

Note that this is a temporary copy, so there's no passing it on to another classmate who might be taking the course in the next semester. This also prevents any sort of resale/trading taking from taking place. One of the slim advantages of purchasing physical copies was the ability to resell the books to help offset the costs of the next set of curriculum. The textbook publishers have turned that into a complete farce by adding minor revisions to their line of books as often as possible, changing a few homework problems or pushing text back and forth to force re-pagination. Many books are outdated before the next year of schooling even starts, turning a $150 investment into a doorstop. Going electronic-only, tied to pass codes and non-refundable fees eliminates any further recoupment for the students.

Beyond the ugliness of these mercenary tactics is the fact that what EDMC is doing is, if not actually illegal, certainly operating in a very gray area. The Higher Education Opportunity Act (passed in 2008) states that textbook publishers must "unbundle" their core educational content from optional add-ons like study guides or homework systems. It could be argued that an electronic version of the same textbook is not an "optional add-on," but one could also certainly argue that the option to buy either/or when it comes to digital and physical books should still be left to the students' or instructors' preference, rather than subjecting students to mandatory, non-refundable fees.

EDMC should be a bit more careful about operating at the fringes of federal law. It's currently being sued by the Department of Justice for illegal recruiting and false claims:

The government's complaint says the company, which offers classes online and at 105 locations in 32 states and Canada, repeatedly made false statements to conceal its practices and receive $11 billion in federal and state financial aid – nearly all of the company's revenue. The complaint alleges that student enrollment was the sole focus of its compensation system, and the company instructed recruiters to use high-pressure sales techniques like playing on an applicant's psychological vulnerabilities and inflating claims of career placement opportunities to enroll students regardless of their qualifications.

Beyond the resale blockage and rent-seeking is the outrageous idea that somehow courses should have mandatory textbooks, thus forcing instructors to teach their classes in whatever direction the curriculum provider steers them, rather than being able to impart knowledge in a way that caters to the instructor and the students.

There's no way that locking your faculty and students into purchasing and utilizing textbooks from a single provider is ever going to work for the benefit of anyone but the company being favored and the administration members who made this exclusive contract a reality. EDMC can have it both ways for the moment, operating both a set of schools and providing its own exclusive conduit for instructional material.

As for Mike Tracy, his students have banded together to get him reinstated. They've also started a petition over at change.org, asking for the Art Institute to amend its textbook policy to put curriculum selection back in the hands of the instructors. It currently has over 3,500 signatures.

Filed Under: fired, pricing, teachers, textbooks

NBC Fires Guy Who Posted The Bryant Gumbel/Katie Couric 'What Is Internet' Video

from the what-is-nbc dept

Like a bunch of sites, we posted about the amusing video that had been posted to YouTube, that showed Katie Couric and Bryant Gumbel, back in 1994, very confused about the internet. The video itself went viral pretty quickly. It was just sort of cute. I don't think anyone posting the video was doing it in a mean way -- it was just funny, and served as a good reminder of just how quickly things have changed. Just about the time that we posted the video, the original video was pulled down from YouTube by the guy who posted it. What quickly came out, via Rob Pegoraro, was that the guy who posted it worked at NBC, but was fired for posting the video. The guy doesn't want to talk about it beyond that, and NBC doesn't appear too keen on commenting on the whole situation, but, really NBC? Is that company so ridiculously thin-skinned that it can't laugh at itself? Nothing about the use of the video was mean-spirited or harmful to NBC. The video went viral because it's a human interest sort of thing -- a reminder of how quickly the internet went from something people didn't understand at all, to something that's central to so many people's lives. We all forget what it was like when we first discovered the internet (at least those of us who grew up without the internet), and the video sort of brought all that back. I'd argue that NBC firing the guy for posting this video to YouTube suggests an organization even more confused about the internet than either Couric or Gumbel in this clip (which, yes, is still widely available): This whole thing reminds of the PR debacle by Best Buy last year when it decided to fire the guy who had made some (quite funny) satirical videos about dealing with customers at a store like Best Buy. After loud public outcry, Best Buy was eventually forced to back down, but it was really too late.

Update: Even more ridiculous: as noted in the comments, the folks on The Today Show actually played this video and laughed about it the other day, so now I'll embed it below directly from NBC:

Filed Under: bryant gumbel, fired, katie couric, nbc, today show
Companies: nbc universal

Best Buy Says Creator Of iPhone/Evo Video Can Keep His Job; Guy Says He'd Rather Not

from the backtracking dept

Last week you probably saw the story of how the guy, Brian Maupin, who created this hilarious iPhone vs. HTC Evo video was suspended by Best Buy and told he was going to get fired: Given the massive backlash against Best Buy for this move, it appears the company is backtracking quickly. Best Buy's CEO did a blog post saying the company had "completed its investigation" and Brian was being offered his job back. The CEO also points out -- as people did in the comments, that some of the original concern wasn't so much about the famed iPhone/Evo video (which doesn't mention Best Buy), but other videos he had done that had mentioned the company (which have since been taken down).

Reader Jupiter points out that Maupin is now saying he's not sure he really wants to go back to working at Best Buy, and noting that the CEO's backtracking is very different than what he was told by the company last week:

"(The company statement) is a 180 from what they were saying Thursday, but I guess me they either made peace with the videos I left up or decided the others weren't so bad. Here's a statement I'm issuing as well:

"Right now I'm planning on taking a leave of absence so I may survey my current career plans and the future. I'm not sure if it would be comfortable returning to Best Buy considering the circumstances, but I will definitely consider all options."

Filed Under: evo, fired, iphone, video, viral video
Companies: best buy

School Tech Guy Fired For Running SETI@Home?

from the not-quite dept

SETI@Home, one of the earlier and (still) largest distributed computing projects was launched more than 10 years ago, and it's still pretty common for lots of folks (geeks and non-geeks alike) to run the screensavers and work through the mounds of SETI data. That's why it's a bit surprising to find a News.com writeup by Chris Matyszczyk, about a guy fired for running the software written up as if SETI@Home were some sort of wacky new project by UFO enthusiasts. Basically, it sounds like the guy installed the SETI@Home software on a bunch of computers at the school, and that upset school officials. This isn't the first time we've seen this sort of thing. Five years ago, we wrote about a similar firing of an employee by the state of Ohio.

Still, if you look at the details of this particular firing the situation seems a lot different than the News.com report suggests (or than even the article from AZCentral suggests). There's actually a criminal investigation going on, but the bigger issue (even though it's downplayed in the article) is the fact that the school district claims the guy stole 18 computers from the district and had them in his home (turned up by a warrant). That seems a lot more understandable as an offense leading to termination. Separately, it appears he did not complete his job duties -- such as installing firewall software that never showed up (oddly, the article never actually defines the guy's job title, but it sounds like some sort of IT job). The whole SETI@Home stuff just seems exaggerated. This includes the claim, made in the article, that the guy's actions cost the school district between $1.2 million and $1.6 million. While some of this may be tied to the missing computers, the article implies that much of it is from running SETI@Home, which the school claims was a burden on the computer systems. While he probably shouldn't have been running the software on those machines without permission, that alone is hardly that big of a deal. It seems like most people at the school district and the writers of the articles linked above don't understand how SETI@Home works, which seems to create an awful lot of confusion.

Filed Under: distributed computing, fired, seti@home

Employee Of French TV Station Fired For Criticizing Three Strikes Plan

from the yikes dept

I always thought that French labor laws made it quite difficult to get fired. I guess that's until you express your opinion that a "three strikes" law that would kick people off the internet is a bad idea. Yann brings to our attention a story about a guy who worked on the web side of giant French TV network TF1 and wrote his parliamentary representative an email from his personal gmail account, explaining why he thought a "three strikes" law was a bad idea. His rep, Francoise de Panafieu, who supports Sarkozy (members of the same party) apparently forwarded the letter to the French minister of culture (who is a major backer of the law), Christine Albanel, who then sent it back to the legal department at TF1... causing the guy to get fired (link in French, here's the Google translation). TF1 supposedly claimed that the reason for the dismissal was that it fully supported the law (though it had never made that position public, and as a news organization, was supposed to be impartial to the bill), claiming that it was in its own economic best interests to support "three strikes."

Filed Under: fired, france, three strikes
Companies: tf1