Meta employees protest against mouse tracking tech at US offices

rexpop

Proud of them—it's scary to stand up to the boss, but we set the floor for eachother.

blinkbat

hopefully they push back successfully. even if the most nefarious use is "we're training computer use AI", they should shell out for dedicated labs, not piggyback off the employees. gross. sidebar but I've never aspired to work for faang and as the years go on it seems more and more like the right choice. vampire culture.

entropyie

Stunning hypocrisy.

rvz

I see... The employees were all fine with tracking the entire globe and surveilling on Meta's family of apps, but when that is used against them by tracking their own mouse movements and their computers, it is now all too much? Why are you still at Meta then? Clearly Zuckerberg does not care and can easily (and will) lay them off. Just leave.

AngryData

Why not protest the mouse tracking they do for the rest of the world? Oh wait because they only give a shit about themselves, that is why they still work for facebook.

pesus

This is really a "hoisted by your own petard" situation. I hope they don't think people are going to be sympathetic towards them when they're guilty of doing the same type of things (and far worse) to billions of people.

ai-x

Zuck should fire all of them. There are plenty who are smarter and willing to take their spot in this market

georgeburdell

The 5 Americans left at Meta have had enough

ironman1478

People here are making some warranted snarky comments. I ended working at Meta for a few quarters and quit. I will say many employees are so abstracted away that you sort of forget that you work for Facebook to some extent. I also noticed that people really believe that what Facebook works on is a net good. I don't agree and maybe we don't agree, but saying "haha now it's happening to you" isn't the gotcha you think it is to those people if those people believe the products are a net good. I disagree that the products are a net good, to be clear. But working there lots of people drink the koolaid

whyenot

Like most state employees, I am in a union and while there are MANY things I do not like about my union, from its high dues, to its constant forays into politics, to the supine pose it takes to contract negotiations, there is one thing that it does very well, and that is stands up against BS like this in a very meaningful way. Tech workers need a union or some union-like organization that stands up for basic worker rights.

greenchair

But these protesting employees were perfectly fine with mouse tracking their users for adtech purposes?

TitaRusell

American work culture is so damn toxic. If you hire someone you trust them. Otherwise don't. I fail to see how treating everyone like a miserable inmate at a Siberian gulag is going to help innovation.

booleandilemma

Oh poor Meta employees! So sad! If they were serious they would just walk out. They don't like the mouse tracking tech but I'll bet they like that sweet salary and cushy office job. How are the lunch options? I bet they're great. Oh what's that? You work from home? Must be nice.

nalekberov

When such technologies are used to track masses, Meta employees just shrug, when it’s used to track them, it’s unacceptable. “The ox does not mind the yoke until it is on his own neck.”

jacques_chester

I work at Meta (though after next Wednesday, maybe not). I signed the petition. Am I hypocrite? I think another version of me would think so. I signed up because nobody else would take me on by the time they offered me something. After having only 3 months of work out of 18 months, with savings depleted to zero, facing the prospect of losing health coverage and having to fall back on family, I took the deal. Hate me if you like. But I have a 40-odd year head start on hating me, so I doubt you'll make any kind of dent. ------ In any case, pushing back, anyhow, anywhere, is better than nothing. Let's not get stuck in HN's favorite argumentative shortcut, the Nirvana Fallacy.

mitaphane

Hey Meta Employees, Instead of signing petitions to enact change, which obviously won't happen because you're under a dictatorship, erode the company from the inside out. Your platforms are already enshittified, enshittify your workplace, make a game out of making your workplace America's #1 toxic workspace. Quiet Quit, Gaslight your superiors, have AI write all your code & workplace communications, hit accept on all, while sludging up communications & the codebase. Make everything harder to do work while claiming all the productivity gains. You'll be doing humanity a service. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_Sabotage_Field_Manual

TheChaplain

lol first I thought Meta had a rodent problem :) Anyways, there is a ton of mouse wigglers out there, notably on aliexpress.com, many external and not connected to your workstation.