All posts tagged: employee

Flock reportedly tries to shrink workforce with employee buyouts

Flock reportedly tries to shrink workforce with employee buyouts

Published by skeptic

Embattled surveillance technology company Flock Safety unveiled a “generous” severance package for voluntary employee departures on Friday, according to a report in Wired. Flock reportedly expects a significant portion of its 1,500-person workforce to express interest in the buyouts, and said it will grant them to a majority of those who are interested. The company’s internal announcement described these packages as the “most generous” it has ever offered. By letting employees depart voluntarily, Flock can say goodbye to team members demoralized by the ongoing backlash over the company’s license plate recognition technology. Wired also reports that without buyouts, the company would “almost certainly” need to lay off some staff. In August, The Washington Post identified 46 cases where police officers have been accused of misusing Flock technology, including cases where they allegedly stalked their wives, girlfriends, or exes. Florida and Texas both said they will stop using the startup’s technology, and an anti-surveillance advocacy group identified 90 cities that dropped Flock in August alone — a fourfold increase from the previous month. TechCrunch has reached …

Employee fired by GTA developer Rockstar believes workers were put on ‘watch list’ | UK News

Employee fired by GTA developer Rockstar believes workers were put on ‘watch list’ | UK News

Published by Daniella Wilson

A worker fired by the developer of Grand Theft Auto has told an employment tribunal they believe staff were placed on a “watch list” after signing a petition about remote working. They also admitted that discussions in a Discord chat room at the centre of the row could sometimes get “a bit out of hand”. A group of former employees of Edinburgh-based Rockstar North are claiming they were unfairly dismissed for trade union activities. Some 34 people in the UK and Canada are believed to have been dismissed in October 2025 and 23 are taking part in the tribunal. They are being represented by the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB). Image: The Rockstar North building in Edinburgh. Pic: PA Rockstar North is a studio of Rockstar Games, which is owned by New York-based software company, Take-Two Interactive. The company has said it will “vigorously” contest the allegations and accused the ex-employees of breaching the company’s confidentiality rules by discussing sensitive information on a Discord server. The tribunal in Glasgow heard on Friday that …

Former ABC News employee drops CBS correspondent Matt Gutman’s name from lawsuit

Former ABC News employee drops CBS correspondent Matt Gutman’s name from lawsuit

Published by Sam Flores

A former ABC News employee is asking a court to drop CBS News chief correspondent Matt Gutman’s name from her wrongful termination lawsuit, which claimed she was sexually harassed by him when they were colleagues. Samira Said, a field producer for ABC News for four years, included the claims related to Gutman in a wrongful termination lawsuit filed Aug. 14 in Los Angeles County Superior Court against her former employer and its parent The Walt Disney Co. Said’s lawyers filed a request with the court Friday to drop Gutman as a defendant, Lawyers for Said did not respond to an email asking why the request was made. ABC and Disney remain defendants in the suit, and the allegations against Gutman and former ABC News Los Angeles Bureau Chief Dave Herndon still stand. The suit cited two incidents where Said claimed Gutman created a hostile work environment by making inappropriate sexual comments while on the job. Gutman declined comment on the matter through a CBS News representative. Said alleges she was wrongfully terminated from ABC News …

Apple shares ‘shocking evidence’ against former employee accused of stealing company data for OpenAI

Apple shares ‘shocking evidence’ against former employee accused of stealing company data for OpenAI

Published by skeptic

In its lawsuit against OpenAI, Apple filed what it calls “shocking evidence” to bolster its allegations that former employees stole trade secrets for OpenAI’s benefit. These new details emerged after the legal counsel for former Apple employee Chang Liu — who now works at OpenAI — handed over Liu’s old Apple work laptop for investigation earlier this month. Apple now alleges that Liu used a confidential Apple circuit schematic in his work at OpenAI, as well as a tool that shares a name with an internal Apple engineering application. The company claims that OpenAI was “well-aware” of Liu’s access to Apple data, and that Liu enlisted OpenAI colleague Yu-Ting Peng to help destroy evidence in June when he learned that Apple was investigating him. “The MacBook represents the very limited information Defendants provided so far (and only after weeks of delay), and shows Apple is not conducting ‘fishing expeditions’ but that its trade secrets are being used and evidence is being destroyed,” the filing reads. While this new evidence is redacted from public view, past …

The problem with bosses who overshare – being open doesn’t make you a good leader

The problem with bosses who overshare – being open doesn’t make you a good leader

Published by Sam Flores

Admitting uncertainty does not automatically undermine authority. What is often more damaging is pretending to have all the answers when one clearly does not. Employees can accept that a leader is worried, disappointed or unsure. What they need is confidence that he can still exercise judgment. A leader can say, “I do not know yet, but here is how we will decide”. He can admit, “I handled that badly, and this is what I will do differently”.  Such vulnerability does not diminish authority. Instead, a leader can gain trust by combining honesty with responsibility. What undermines authority when sharing your views or emotions is not humanity, but a lack of containment, such that employees feel they must manage the leader’s emotions, absorb their manager’s anxiety or provide the stability their boss is supposed to offer them. Leadership does not require invulnerability, but it does require steadiness. THINK BEFORE YOU SHARE So when it comes to how much an employer should share with an employee, the answer is not complete openness or complete privacy. It is …

Kanye West asks to delay trial over employee allegedly fired for refusing to cut dreads

Kanye West asks to delay trial over employee allegedly fired for refusing to cut dreads

Published by Daniella Wilson

Get the inside track from Roisin O’Connor with our free weekly music newsletter Now Hear This Get our free music newsletter Now Hear This Get our free music newsletter Now Hear This Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, is seeking to postpone a trial in a lawsuit filed by a former security guard at his Donda Academy, asking a judge to move the start from this fall to next spring over claims the plaintiff has stalled on giving a deposition. Benjamin Deshon Provo filed the suit in Los Angeles Superior Court against the rapper in April 2024. Provo alleges that Ye, now 49, reprimanded him over his dreadlocks, worn in observance of his Muslim faith. Provo worked at Donda Academy and for Yeezy, Ye’s apparel company. Provo worked at Donda Academy and for Yeezy, Ye’s apparel company (Ian West/PA) “Kanye and members of his management team subjected Provo and other Black employees to less favorable treatment than their white counterparts,” according to the suit, which further alleges that Ye often screamed at the …

OpenAI reportedly completed a billion employee tender offer

OpenAI reportedly completed a $7 billion employee tender offer

Published by skeptic

OpenAI has bought back $7 billion worth of shares from employees at the privately held frontier AI lab as part of an effort to provide liquidity to its workforce. The deal, reported by Bloomberg, valued OpenAI at $852 billion, the same as its most recent fundraising round in March, which added $122 billion to the company’s war chest. The company also filed confidentially with the Securities and Exchange Commission in June to prepare for a potential IPO later this year. However, a tender offer suggests that an IPO may not be forthcoming soon. With many tech companies remaining private longer than previous generations of startups, private tenders have proven a useful way for firms to allow employees to realize the value of their stock compensation without the difficulties that come with a public offering. OpenAI did not respond to a request for comment by publication time. Last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wrote that “we did not have our best 12 months ever, which is mostly my fault, but we are about to have our …

After Rippling blew millions on AI in months, it built an employee ROI tool

After Rippling blew millions on AI in months, it built an employee ROI tool

Published by skeptic

HR software provider Rippling this week unveiled AI Spend Console, an anti-tokenmaxxing product that helps a company track and contain its AI spending. One of the most interesting features is that it maps how much individual employees, teams, and roles are spending and if they are genuinely more productive, or generally producing more AI slop. The company promises the tool will show “which engineers have high AI spend whose peers frequently ask them to redo work in code reviews,” the company says in its blog post. The tool was born after Rippling went all in on tokenmaxxing at the start of the year — as so many did — only to discover employees were wildly burning cash. Chief Product Officer Matt MacInnis still recalls the executive team meeting in March when CFO Adam Swiecicki presented a number that shocked them. Rippling was on track to burn 40% of its R&D headcount budget on AI tokens, meaning it was spending as much on tokens as 40% of all the compensation it paid employees in that unit. …

Build a Local AI Employee: Beginner Setup Guide 2026

Build a Local AI Employee: Beginner Setup Guide 2026

Published by skeptic

Building a 24/7 “AI employee” involves creating a system capable of performing tasks autonomously around the clock. Corbin highlights the importance of selecting appropriate hardware, such as the Nvidia Spark or Mac Studio, which are well-suited for resource-intensive AI operations. A minimum of 64GB of RAM and SSD storage is recommended to ensure smooth performance. This approach focuses on running local AI models, offering benefits like enhanced privacy, reduced reliance on cloud services and better control over costs. Explore how to configure your AI system for continuous operation, including setting up a dedicated worker and making sure stable connectivity with direct Ethernet connections. Learn how to implement local AI models for tasks such as content generation or image recognition. Additionally, gain insight into expanding your system’s functionality through advanced automation workflows, allowing you to build a versatile and efficient AI setup. Why Build a Local AI System? TL;DR Key Takeaways : Local AI systems provide enhanced privacy, cost efficiency, independence from cloud services and customizability, making them ideal for automating workflows and improving efficiency. Choosing …

Clover Health says employee accounts accessed in cyber incident

Clover Health says employee accounts accessed in cyber incident

Published by Sam Flores

July 17 : Clover Health Investments said in a regulatory filing on Friday that it detected unusual login activity on some of its information systems on July 4 and later found a hacker had gained access to three employee accounts through social engineering. • The health insurer said the affected accounts belonged to non-managerial health plan employees who handled member visit scheduling and broker-facing sales work. • These accounts could access some personal and protected health information, according to the company, but not corporate financial or claims systems. • Clover began an investigation with external cybersecurity experts, took steps to contain the activity and notified law enforcement, it said. • The investigation is ongoing and the company is still reviewing what information may have been accessed or taken. Clover believes its response curbed and ended the unauthorized access. • It also said it does not believe the incident has had, or is likely to have, a material impact on its business, financial condition or results of operations. • Clover is reviewing legal and regulatory requirements …