The sequel...
Mar. 23rd, 2004 12:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhialtoToday my employer already discovered that I had removed my personal pages from the company webserver (which is actually as they wanted) and replaced them with a redirect to the page at my own server (quite obviously a different server, and the bottom of the page additionally emphasised that there was no association) that explained why they were removed. They were not amused(tm). They (in the person of director D. was present; T. is on a business trip) accused me of personally attacking the boss and the company, and did I know how much damage I had done?
Now let's look at that for a moment. Did I personally attack somebody? I don't think so. I mentioned some facts. I mentioned something positive about T. And some opinions that are clearly recognisable as such. That I mention the place where I work, is just factual information, and seems quite relevant to me. Yet in the "conversation" we had this morning they put a lot of emphasis on that. I think that's not quite justified. I changed the explaining page somewhat, and the way it is now seems much more likely for people will see it as a topic for a bit of Googling, instead of thinking "yeah, right". But the name is removed.
I also mentioned a name, that of director T. This however was fairly late in the text, after the main description of events. Or rather I didn't even mention it directly, only indirectly. I made a small mistake there however by mixing up who took the initiative for the decision. Apparently, it was D who proposed the home page ban. I must have misremembered, because I was quite upset at the time about what was happening. (Not that anybody cared about that, of course). This is however only a small matter: the decision was made jointly by both directors in a very short time.
Then about "damaging". If the truth is damaging, whose fault is that? Mine, for pointing it out? I don't think so. My opinions are clearly indicated, and nobody is forced to accept them. There was some muttering about "lots of factual errors" but the only one that was concretely mentioned, I corrected.
And who would see my rant anyway? The impression that D made this morning was that everybody in the whole world would have seen it by now. That's not quite a realistic idea of how the WWW works, I would say. Only people who would see the original banned pages would see it, and that's only when they search for something that happens to be in there. Since D. was apparently unaware of the existence of personal pages, this only strengthens my argument that people who look for company information are not going to find the personal pages, simply because there are no links from the one to the other. And now even the redirection is gone, so people getting Google results do see the domain name but not the content. It's what the directors wanted (but if it is "better"?)
Anyway, the situation now is that I have been suspended, at least until director T. returns from that business trip. I do think they are overreacting and practicing "panic football".
Now let's look at that for a moment. Did I personally attack somebody? I don't think so. I mentioned some facts. I mentioned something positive about T. And some opinions that are clearly recognisable as such. That I mention the place where I work, is just factual information, and seems quite relevant to me. Yet in the "conversation" we had this morning they put a lot of emphasis on that. I think that's not quite justified. I changed the explaining page somewhat, and the way it is now seems much more likely for people will see it as a topic for a bit of Googling, instead of thinking "yeah, right". But the name is removed.
I also mentioned a name, that of director T. This however was fairly late in the text, after the main description of events. Or rather I didn't even mention it directly, only indirectly. I made a small mistake there however by mixing up who took the initiative for the decision. Apparently, it was D who proposed the home page ban. I must have misremembered, because I was quite upset at the time about what was happening. (Not that anybody cared about that, of course). This is however only a small matter: the decision was made jointly by both directors in a very short time.
Then about "damaging". If the truth is damaging, whose fault is that? Mine, for pointing it out? I don't think so. My opinions are clearly indicated, and nobody is forced to accept them. There was some muttering about "lots of factual errors" but the only one that was concretely mentioned, I corrected.
And who would see my rant anyway? The impression that D made this morning was that everybody in the whole world would have seen it by now. That's not quite a realistic idea of how the WWW works, I would say. Only people who would see the original banned pages would see it, and that's only when they search for something that happens to be in there. Since D. was apparently unaware of the existence of personal pages, this only strengthens my argument that people who look for company information are not going to find the personal pages, simply because there are no links from the one to the other. And now even the redirection is gone, so people getting Google results do see the domain name but not the content. It's what the directors wanted (but if it is "better"?)
Anyway, the situation now is that I have been suspended, at least until director T. returns from that business trip. I do think they are overreacting and practicing "panic football".
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
I was afraid this would happen ...
Date: 2004-03-23 02:11 am (UTC)They could argue an automatic redirect is also indicating that the URL followed to by the redirect is also a company URL! Joe Average User never even looks at the address bar after they typed the URL. However, this means the company name in the original URL in the google result won't have registered with J.A. User either, more or less supporting your point.
Also, they can only assume possible damage until they have proven that customers have seen this discussion and they their opinions have changed negatively towards the company.
I think maybe you should talk to a lawyer ASAP.