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posted by cmn32480 on Monday March 12 2018, @09:08AM   Printer-friendly
from the violating-federal-law dept.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports

A San Francisco technology company laid off a group of software engineers as they were trying to join a labor union, according to a complaint filed with the National Labor Relations Board.

The Communications Workers of America [CWA] claims Lanetix, which makes cloud-based software for transportation and logistics companies, violated federal labor laws by cutting 14 software engineers in January in San Francisco and Arlington, Va.

Most of the engineers were fired [January 26], about 10 days after they filed a petition seeking union representation, according to the complaint filed by the CWA's Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild. A hearing to determine a date to hold the union vote was scheduled for [February 1].

[...] While unions have made inroads in representing Silicon Valley bus drivers, security officers, food service workers, and custodians, the Lanetix case could break new ground because union activity is still unusual for software engineers, who are generally highly paid and in short supply, labor lawyers said.

[...] there are [reasons other than gripes about pay, whereby] unions can attract higher-paid tech workers, including "if you feel mistreated by the company or if you feel there's favoritism going on or lack of job security", said labor law attorney Steve Hirschfeld, founding partner of Hirschfeld Kraemer of San Francisco.

"There's a myth that if you're a highly paid employee, you either can't join a union or wouldn't be interested", Hirschfeld said.

The Lanetix case is "significant because it is a tech company and they're well-paid engineers", he said. "That's still a rarity today for that group of employees to be organized. (But) the feeling among many tech workers is that they're viewed as being expendable."

[...] The Lanetix engineers signed union cards to join the CWA's Washington-Baltimore News Guild. (The Pacific Media Workers Guild, which represents some San Francisco Chronicle employees, is also affiliated with the CWA.) According to the complaint filed with the board, the union said Lanetix began "threatening and coercing employees" for engaging in union activities starting in November. The complaint said one engineer was fired for participating in group discussions on Slack, an internal messaging service.

The union filed a petition with the board on Jan. 16 to represent the workers. The company terminated "all engineers and senior engineers in retaliation for demanding recognition", the complaint said.

The engineers were called into a meeting and told of layoffs due to the company's lackluster fourth quarter performance, CWA organizer Melinda Fiedler told Bloomberg Law.

"By the time they left that meeting, their computers were gone", Fiedler said.

Cet Parks, executive director of the Washington-Baltimore News Guild, said the workers were told the company was moving engineering offices to Europe.

Previous: The CPU [Computer Professional Union]
Public University Lays Off 79 IT Workers After They Train Outsourced Replacements
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  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 13 2018, @03:28AM (2 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday March 13 2018, @03:28AM (#651660) Journal

    Bushfire in Australia: understanding ‘hell on Earth’ [csiro.au]

    The noise of an approaching fire, generated by the rapid cellular decomposition of vegetative matter and shockwaves associated with the gas phase combustion of the released volatiles, can be most frightening, particularly when the fire itself cannot be seen due to smoke and topography. It is often compared to the sound of a steam train at full tilt or the roar of a jet engine.

    If a cold front arrives during a bushfire, it generally brings with it gusty winds that change the direction of the prevailing winds and can turn the long downwind flank of a bushfire into a raging head fire. In most cases, the area burnt by a bushfire after the arrival of a cold front is much greater than the area burnt before the wind change.

    Inside the turbulent diffusion flames of a bushfire, the temperature of the reaction zone, where the volatile gases released from the thermally degrading vegetation mix with oxygen in the air and combust, can be in the order of 1600°C. The temperature of the flames themselves, however, is less than this adiabatic value, with the maximum temperature at the base of tall flames reaching approximately 1100°C due to mixing with ambient temperature air. The tips of flames are around 600°C.

    The radiant heat flux from a thick bushfire flame can reach 100 kW/m2. By comparison, the average radiant heat flux from the sun at midday on a summer’s day is about 1 kW/m2. The pain threshold for most people is about 2 kW/m2 and at this rate bare skin will undergo a partial thickness (2nd degree) burn in about 40 seconds. In the midst of a high-intensity head fire, radiant heat fluxes in excess of 150 kW/m2 have been measured.

    The convective energy released by a major bushfire provides enough buoyancy to lift the smoke many thousands of metres above the fire (sometimes greater than 10 km), often breaking through the tropopause and into the stratosphere, carrying the smoke around the world. The condensation of water from the combustion products can form pyro-cumulus clouds that can form rain and lightning, starting new fires downwind of the main fire.

    For comparison purposes: most of the steel melt at and below 1450C [wikipedia.org].

    In spite of that, I'm not going to relocate in US.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 13 2018, @06:30AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 13 2018, @06:30AM (#651708)

    All 3 plants I listed feature thick and juicy leaves. They are a bit like cactus, but without the sharp parts.

    The bush fire stops when it hits your garden. Make your garden as large as required. If you have neighbors, enlist them in your garden project. Other options include concrete, pools, and ponds.

    • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Tuesday March 13 2018, @06:45AM

      by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday March 13 2018, @06:45AM (#651709) Journal

      Australia - gotta love it, be it only for the sheer number of way it tries to kill you.
      Among them - flash flooding [google.com.au]; can happen in the same areas as bush fires** - you imagine what a flood will do to your succulents garden or concrete or ponds.

      ** well, sometime it doesn't; but if there's noone to live through a bushfire or a flash flood, does it really happen?

      --
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford