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... they turn out to be doing something like this. Ick.
Summary: Google, Apple and a bunch of other tech firms appear to have been running secret hands-off deals in which they not only wouldn't poach each others' employees, in some cases they would actively refuse to hire people who had worked at the other firms. It's basically an unusually blatant and illegal wage-fixing scheme.
The article is correct in pointing out that this is basically a first-world problem -- the people affected are not, by and large, poor and oppressed. But still, the companies' attitude towards their employees has a real tinge of serfdom to it, in a more precise and literal way than usual: the great lords were basically negotiating amongst themselves to tie their employees to the "lands" they worked, to keep them from demanding too much. This is, notably, one of the aspects of the Middle Ages that the SCA chooses not to re-create -- it's sad to see that high-tech has done so instead...
Summary: Google, Apple and a bunch of other tech firms appear to have been running secret hands-off deals in which they not only wouldn't poach each others' employees, in some cases they would actively refuse to hire people who had worked at the other firms. It's basically an unusually blatant and illegal wage-fixing scheme.
The article is correct in pointing out that this is basically a first-world problem -- the people affected are not, by and large, poor and oppressed. But still, the companies' attitude towards their employees has a real tinge of serfdom to it, in a more precise and literal way than usual: the great lords were basically negotiating amongst themselves to tie their employees to the "lands" they worked, to keep them from demanding too much. This is, notably, one of the aspects of the Middle Ages that the SCA chooses not to re-create -- it's sad to see that high-tech has done so instead...