commit: b4fe49b2e057c40af8ca7b7ad84cdccb5ce1790f
parent bbf46e9c0fe2aae6b44f5dbde71dd1e1775288e4
Author: Drew DeVault <sir@cmpwn.com>
Date: Fri, 1 Jan 2021 18:38:36 -0500
Add clarification to megacorps article
Diffstat:
2 files changed, 17 insertions(+), 12 deletions(-)
diff --git a/content/blog/Megacorps-are-not-your-dream-job.gmi b/content/blog/Megacorps-are-not-your-dream-job.gmi
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-Megacorporations do not care about you. You’re worth nothing to them. Google made $66 billion in 2014 — even if you made an exorbitant $500K salary, you only cost them .00075% of that revenue. They are not invested in you. Why should you invest in them? Why should you give a company that isn’t invested in you 40+ hours of your week, half your waking life, the only life you get?
+Megacorporations¹ do not care about you. You’re worth nothing to them. Google made $66 billion in 2014 — even if you made an exorbitant $500K salary, you only cost them .00075% of that revenue. They are not invested in you. Why should you invest in them? Why should you give a company that isn’t invested in you 40+ hours of your week, half your waking life, the only life you get?
You will have little to no meaningful autonomy, impact, or influence. Your manager’s manager’s manager’s manager (1) will exist, and (2) will not know your name, and probably not your manager’s name either. The company will be good at advertising their jobs, especially to fresh grads, and you will no doubt have dozens of cool project in mind that you’re itching to get involved with. You won’t be assigned any of them — all vacancies are already filled by tenured staff and nepotism. You’re more likely to work on a product you have hardly ever heard of or used, doing work that doesn’t interest you or meaningfully impact anyone you know.
@@ -12,6 +12,8 @@ They won’t care about you. They won’t be invested in you. They won’t give
Megacorps are, in fact, in the minority. There are tens of thousands of other tech companies that could use your help. Tech workers are in high demand — you have choices! You will probably be much happier at a small to mid-size company. The “dream job” megacorps have sold you on is just good marketing.
-¹ Political side thought: Amazon’s revenue in 2019 alone exceeds the GDP of 150 sovereign nations. Is undemocratic ownership of resources and power on that scale just?
+¹ EDIT @ 23:37 UTC: It bears clarifying that I'm referring to extremely large companies, at or near the scale of FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google). Hundreds of billions of dollars or more in market cap.
-² Quick reminder that HR’s job is to protect the company, not you. This applies to any company, not just megacorps. If you have a problem that you need to bring to HR, you should have a lawyer draft that letter, and you should polish up your resume first.
+² Political side thought: Amazon’s revenue in 2019 alone exceeds the GDP of 150 sovereign nations. Is undemocratic ownership of resources and power on that scale just?
+
+³ Quick reminder that HR’s job is to protect the company, not you. This applies to any company, not just megacorps. If you have a problem that you need to bring to HR, you should have a lawyer draft that letter, and you should polish up your resume first.
diff --git a/content/blog/Megacorps-are-not-your-dream-job.md b/content/blog/Megacorps-are-not-your-dream-job.md
@@ -4,11 +4,14 @@ date: 2021-01-01
outputs: [html, gemtext]
---
-Megacorporations *do not* care about you. You're worth nothing to them. Google
-made $66 billion in 2014 — even if you made an exorbitant $500K salary,
-you only cost them .00075% of that revenue. They are not invested in you. Why
-should you invest in them? Why should you give a company that isn't invested in
-you 40+ hours of your week, half your waking life, the *only* life you get?
+Megacorporations[^1] *do not* care about you. You're worth nothing to them.
+Google made $66 billion in 2014 — even if you made an exorbitant $500K
+salary, you only cost them .00075% of that revenue. They are not invested in
+you. Why should you invest in them? Why should you give a company that isn't
+invested in you 40+ hours of your week, half your waking life, the *only* life
+you get?
+
+[^1]: EDIT @ 23:37 UTC: It bears clarifying that I'm referring to extremely large companies, at or near the scale of FAANG (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google). Hundreds of billions of dollars or more in market cap.
You will have little to no meaningful autonomy, impact, or influence. Your
manager's manager's manager's manager (1) will exist, and (2) will not know your
@@ -30,12 +33,12 @@ the other way. They acquire and dismantle competitors. They hire H1B's and
subject them to payroll fraud and workplace abuse, confident that they can't
quit without risking their visa. Megacorps are a faceless machine which is
interested only in making as much money as possible with any resources at their
-disposal, among those being a budget which exceeds most national GDPs.[^1]
+disposal, among those being a budget which exceeds most national GDPs.[^2]
-[^1]: Political side thought: Amazon's revenue in 2019 alone exceeds the GDP of 150 sovereign nations. Is undemocratic ownership of resources and power on that scale just?
+[^2]: Political side thought: Amazon's revenue in 2019 alone exceeds the GDP of 150 sovereign nations. Is undemocratic ownership of resources and power on that scale just?
If anything goes wrong in this heartless environment, you're going to be in a
-very weak position. If you go to HR[^2] for almost any dispute, they are
+very weak position. If you go to HR[^3] for almost any dispute, they are
unlikely to help. If you quit, remember that they will have forced you to sign
an NDA and a non-compete. You're rolling the dice on whether or not they'll
decide that you've overstepped (and they can *decide* that — the terms are
@@ -44,7 +47,7 @@ took home? They could easily spend 100x that on lawyers without breaking a
sweat, and money is justice in the United States. You will likely have no
recourse if they wrong you.
-[^2]: Quick reminder that HR's job is to protect the company, not you. This applies to any company, not just megacorps. If you have a problem that you need to bring to HR, you should have a lawyer draft that letter, and you should polish up your resume first.
+[^3]: Quick reminder that HR's job is to protect the company, not you. This applies to any company, not just megacorps. If you have a problem that you need to bring to HR, you should have a lawyer draft that letter, and you should polish up your resume first.
They may hurt you, but even worse, they will make you hurt others. You will be
complicit in their ruthlessness. Privacy dragnets, union busting, monopolistic
