I know this is a joke, but this is why my coworkers and I were muted during the meeting we were laid off.
I received a meeting invite the night before for 9am with two HR people and some middle manager above me that I never met. It was obvious what the meeting was going to be.
__MatrixMan__ 6 minutes ago [-]
You can always get together, cleanse the code of any IP entanglements, and compete with the company that just laid you off. Calls like this one are a good time to suggest it--even if only to make them squirm.
classified 4 minutes ago [-]
I hope this was made up. But it could actually be real. Satire has a hard time these days reaching the absurdity of reality, let alone surpass it.
tombert 50 minutes ago [-]
One time when I was in one of these calls. It was pretty obvious it was coming, the company wasn't doing great and there were plenty of whispers.
Still, I was pretty upset I was laid off, because it's just not a fun feeling. After the HR person explained the severance and COBRA stuff, I said something to the CTO like "I wish you all the best in trying to save this company, and for the sake of this conversation, let's just pretend I'm not lying". Then I hung up.
I wish I could feel guilty over that, but ultimately they were cutting off my livelihood, they can deal with momentary hurt feelings.
Waterluvian 33 minutes ago [-]
It's their job to endure the discomfort of having to do the job they're paid to do. It's not your job to make it comfortable for them. That's not to say that there aren't personal or professional consequences for how you conduct yourself. Burning bridges and all that. But I feel that's completely up to you.
marcosdumay 23 minutes ago [-]
It takes a special kind of company for counting it as a burnt bridge for somebody that said "I hope you all fail" and gone away after being fired.
01284a7e 13 minutes ago [-]
You should have been straightforward and told them to go fuck themselves. Laying people off by a brief call is for cowards.
donbox 53 minutes ago [-]
Are cherry09 and steve_ AI agents?
nancyminusone 40 minutes ago [-]
I thought they were real people, in a near future where everyone is so dependent on AI that not even a company so callous as to fire by video call would even think of depriving another human the tokens they need to get by.
idle_zealot 46 minutes ago [-]
I think the joke is they all are. It's an autonomous company replicating what it was trained on.
Retr0id 41 minutes ago [-]
Oh, I'm dense. I thought it portrayed a scenario in which tokens were unaffordable to individuals, yet necessary for survival. Kinda like US health insurance.
jaggederest 31 minutes ago [-]
The best satire works at more than one level, I think
jihadjihad 1 hours ago [-]
“What about health insurance?”
“Your enrollment will end on the last day of this month, and we will be providing every affected employee with information about extending their coverage through COBRA.”
“The last day of the month, so, today?”
“Yes, that is correct. On the other hand, our OpenAI and Anthropic accounts are paid quarterly, so you will retain access to your chats and may continue using these tools until the end of September.”
JakeStone 14 minutes ago [-]
During an exit interview as I was going to a new job, they let me know my coverage was good until the end of the month.
Me, never able to not say something stupid, "Got it. Don't get hit by a bus on the 1st."
Dead silence. HR playing ping-pong with their eyes. They eventually told me something like that had happened to a person who'd just left a few months prior to this.
One of these days, I'll learn, yeah?
nkg 1 hours ago [-]
I fell for it!
Animats 1 hours ago [-]
"Is assisted suicide covered by the severance terms?"
donbox 60 minutes ago [-]
"Absolutely. It's covered through the end of the month, per our generous benefits policy.
"
jiaosdjf 1 hours ago [-]
[flagged]
tom_ 53 minutes ago [-]
I dunno, man. I just... dunno.
gitpusher 57 minutes ago [-]
Corporate culture sucks but, as with most things, comparing it to the Holocaust is both wildly unfunny and incorrect.
kevin_thibedeau 55 minutes ago [-]
> it is legally forbidden to have any morals that get in the way of shareholder profit.
That isn't true. It's just the favored solution chosen by sociopaths who climb to the top. Maximizing value does not require minimizing overhead to the detriment of future value creation.
Rendered at 20:35:06 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
I received a meeting invite the night before for 9am with two HR people and some middle manager above me that I never met. It was obvious what the meeting was going to be.
Still, I was pretty upset I was laid off, because it's just not a fun feeling. After the HR person explained the severance and COBRA stuff, I said something to the CTO like "I wish you all the best in trying to save this company, and for the sake of this conversation, let's just pretend I'm not lying". Then I hung up.
I wish I could feel guilty over that, but ultimately they were cutting off my livelihood, they can deal with momentary hurt feelings.
“Your enrollment will end on the last day of this month, and we will be providing every affected employee with information about extending their coverage through COBRA.”
“The last day of the month, so, today?”
“Yes, that is correct. On the other hand, our OpenAI and Anthropic accounts are paid quarterly, so you will retain access to your chats and may continue using these tools until the end of September.”
Me, never able to not say something stupid, "Got it. Don't get hit by a bus on the 1st."
Dead silence. HR playing ping-pong with their eyes. They eventually told me something like that had happened to a person who'd just left a few months prior to this.
One of these days, I'll learn, yeah?
That isn't true. It's just the favored solution chosen by sociopaths who climb to the top. Maximizing value does not require minimizing overhead to the detriment of future value creation.