pram posted:

not even a disclosure lol

quote:

Ballmer and Bezos opposing income tax initiative I-1098
Posted by Andrew Garber
Two of the state's richest men, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, have each contributed $100,000 to the Defeat I-1098 campaign.

Initiative 1098 would create a 5 percent tax rate on annual income exceeding $200,000 for individuals and $400,000 for couples, and a 9 percent tax rate on income that tops $500,000 for individuals and $1 million for couples. It also would cut state property taxes by 20 percent and newly exempt 118,000 businesses from the state business and occupation tax.

minivanmegafun posted:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/amazonians-response-inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-nick-ciubotariu

bump_fn posted:

seriosu q someone suggest a better place to buy toilet paper &c online

Laserjet 4P posted:

Gazpacho posted:

These desks are
- a two-inch solid wood top with sealed laminate on the top and sides
- four dry unpressed 4x4 legs, edges rounded, usually with visible splits
- four joining brackets and four triangular supports, all 1/16 in steel.
- several large wood screws

they're cheap as gently caress, and they're assembled by the managers in team building exercises

Valeyard posted:

id use amazon to get a work visa and then start looking elsewhere

slush posted:

Are you sure about the 2 year thing? If I quit after my first year I have to pay back my signing bonus and relocation benefit (prorated to the day). In the second year it's paid out monthly instead of up-front. Definitely don't need to stay for 2 years - just 1.

Janitor Prime posted:

ding ding ding, but gotta stay for two year or else I have to pay back the signing and relocation bonuses (just one year for relo but that signing bonus is sweet and totally worth a second year). Luckily I might even get my green card by then.

I've been here 7 months and it's been alright, I can see myself growing professionally here and then moving on. The work is neat and my team seems decent, but I really don't feel valued as an employee.

When I joined the team I was hired on (team A) needed a huge feature developed but there was already another team (B) in the company that did it but didn't have the bandwidth to develop all the changes it required. At amazon they do this thing where they will loan a dev to another team for a few weeks/months to develop the feature they want on the other teams platform. The dev will move to sit with the other team and interact with them and generally be a part of the team.

I launched that huge project on time while ramping up on all the Amazon internal tools and that early success was seen by upper-upper management. Using that same tool my coworkers on team B gave me praise and I was given an award at an all hands meeting in front of lots of senior people. Luckily this project launched right before my son was born, and per Amazon's policy on paternity leave and not having accrued enough PTO to even take 2 weeks off I felt trapped. Luckily both managers were chill and I just told manager B I'd be working from home while wrapping up that project. I was basically on call for those two weeks and dealt with little things that came up post launch here and there but it was fine and nothing that really took time away from helping my wife with baby. In retrospect I really needed a month off since we were alone up here and had no help from friends or family.

After that project was over I was supposed to go back to team A, but manager B didn't want to lose me so they had this internal tug of war where hey kept delaying me from returning by saying I need to wrap up more stuff from the original project and my original manager from team A wouldn't really say poo poo about when I would come back. I got stuck writing automation tests and didn't really have any new projects assigned since I was going to leave at any moment. I was in limbo for like two months and I felt a lot of anxiety not knowing what was happening but on the plus side it was a nice break since I was being paid a poo poo load to write simple tests and under no deadlines or expectations to perform.

Eventually both managers asked me if I had a preference for staying on one team or another and I told them I'd rather stay on team B. From what I'd seen of team A it had way to many programming divas and the work they were doing just wasn't as interesting to me. Also I had already worked with Team B for 6 months and the guys liked me so it seemed like a better fit.

Anyways that's my story so far, looking back I can't really complain (except for the lack of toilets, that shits inexcusable and pisses me off everyday, the worst was whenI had to go down 7 floors). I like Seattle and I feel that my family is doing great here, but my wife has noticed that I'm drinking a lot more now. I'm still convinced it's a fun new hobby trying all these exotic micro brews! this is Stockholm syndrome right? send help

Janitor Prime posted:

ding ding ding, but gotta stay for two year or else I have to pay back the signing and relocation bonuses (just one year for relo but that signing bonus is sweet and totally worth a second year). Luckily I might even get my green card by then.

I've been here 7 months and it's been alright, I can see myself growing professionally here and then moving on. The work is neat and my team seems decent, but I really don't feel valued as an employee.

When I joined the team I was hired on (team A) needed a huge feature developed but there was already another team (B) in the company that did it but didn't have the bandwidth to develop all the changes it required. At amazon they do this thing where they will loan a dev to another team for a few weeks/months to develop the feature they want on the other teams platform. The dev will move to sit with the other team and interact with them and generally be a part of the team.

I launched that huge project on time while ramping up on all the Amazon internal tools and that early success was seen by upper-upper management. Using that same tool my coworkers on team B gave me praise and I was given an award at an all hands meeting in front of lots of senior people. Luckily this project launched right before my son was born, and per Amazon's policy on paternity leave and not having accrued enough PTO to even take 2 weeks off I felt trapped. Luckily both managers were chill and I just told manager B I'd be working from home while wrapping up that project. I was basically on call for those two weeks and dealt with little things that came up post launch here and there but it was fine and nothing that really took time away from helping my wife with baby. In retrospect I really needed a month off since we were alone up here and had no help from friends or family.

After that project was over I was supposed to go back to team A, but manager B didn't want to lose me so they had this internal tug of war where hey kept delaying me from returning by saying I need to wrap up more stuff from the original project and my original manager from team A wouldn't really say poo poo about when I would come back. I got stuck writing automation tests and didn't really have any new projects assigned since I was going to leave at any moment. I was in limbo for like two months and I felt a lot of anxiety not knowing what was happening but on the plus side it was a nice break since I was being paid a poo poo load to write simple tests and under no deadlines or expectations to perform.

Eventually both managers asked me if I had a preference for staying on one team or another and I told them I'd rather stay on team B. From what I'd seen of team A it had way to many programming divas and the work they were doing just wasn't as interesting to me. Also I had already worked with Team B for 6 months and the guys liked me so it seemed like a better fit.

Anyways that's my story so far, looking back I can't really complain (except for the lack of toilets, that shits inexcusable and pisses me off everyday, the worst was whenI had to go down 7 floors). I like Seattle and I feel that my family is doing great here, but my wife has noticed that I'm drinking a lot more now. I'm still convinced it's a fun new hobby trying all these exotic micro brews! this is Stockholm syndrome right? send help

pram posted:

imagine sitting on the same toilet hundreds of others did that very same day. the amazon employee experience

Janitor Prime posted:

ding ding ding, but gotta stay for two year or else I have to pay back the signing and relocation bonuses (just one year for relo but that signing bonus is sweet and totally worth a second year). Luckily I might even get my green card by then.

I've been here 7 months and it's been alright, I can see myself growing professionally here and then moving on. The work is neat and my team seems decent, but I really don't feel valued as an employee.

When I joined the team I was hired on (team A) needed a huge feature developed but there was already another team (B) in the company that did it but didn't have the bandwidth to develop all the changes it required. At amazon they do this thing where they will loan a dev to another team for a few weeks/months to develop the feature they want on the other teams platform. The dev will move to sit with the other team and interact with them and generally be a part of the team.

I launched that huge project on time while ramping up on all the Amazon internal tools and that early success was seen by upper-upper management. Using that same tool my coworkers on team B gave me praise and I was given an award at an all hands meeting in front of lots of senior people. Luckily this project launched right before my son was born, and per Amazon's policy on paternity leave and not having accrued enough PTO to even take 2 weeks off I felt trapped. Luckily both managers were chill and I just told manager B I'd be working from home while wrapping up that project. I was basically on call for those two weeks and dealt with little things that came up post launch here and there but it was fine and nothing that really took time away from helping my wife with baby. In retrospect I really needed a month off since we were alone up here and had no help from friends or family.

After that project was over I was supposed to go back to team A, but manager B didn't want to lose me so they had this internal tug of war where hey kept delaying me from returning by saying I need to wrap up more stuff from the original project and my original manager from team A wouldn't really say poo poo about when I would come back. I got stuck writing automation tests and didn't really have any new projects assigned since I was going to leave at any moment. I was in limbo for like two months and I felt a lot of anxiety not knowing what was happening but on the plus side it was a nice break since I was being paid a poo poo load to write simple tests and under no deadlines or expectations to perform.

Eventually both managers asked me if I had a preference for staying on one team or another and I told them I'd rather stay on team B. From what I'd seen of team A it had way to many programming divas and the work they were doing just wasn't as interesting to me. Also I had already worked with Team B for 6 months and the guys liked me so it seemed like a better fit.

Anyways that's my story so far, looking back I can't really complain (except for the lack of toilets, that shits inexcusable and pisses me off everyday, the worst was whenI had to go down 7 floors). I like Seattle and I feel that my family is doing great here, but my wife has noticed that I'm drinking a lot more now. I'm still convinced it's a fun new hobby trying all these exotic micro brews! this is Stockholm syndrome right? send help

The Management posted:

so the NY Times has a piece on how the white collar side of Amazon is run. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html

highlights include:
Amazon gives no (none, zero) paternity leave.
Attacking others in meetings is expected
There is a feedback system where people are encouraged to snitch on their colleagues. if you take sick time, expect to get negative feedback.
woman that had a miscarriage forced to work the next day
woman taking care of dad with cancer put on notice for lack of performance
if you're not on call always you are accused of not caring about your job
taking vacations is discouraged and you are expected to work during
Amazon is cheap as gently caress and spends nothing on employees
those that won't leave admit to hating it but being addicted to it
Jeff bozos has convinced all of these nerds that this is a good thing and what it takes to be successful, and they take this abuse.




surprisingly, they have a huge retention problem.


bonus, I learned about the term Amholes for former Amazon employees that bring their toxic culture with them.

Valeyard posted:

drink beers while you work, piss in the bottles and then put them in the fridge

Fuzzy Mammal posted:

reminder bezos is a libertarian and the wa state supreme court has found the legislature in contempt for failing to fund schools
http://old.seattletimes.com/html/politicsnorthwest/2012948586_ballmer_and_bezos_opposing_inc.html

PleasureKevin posted:

buy butt wipes from the local drug store. experience a new kind of clean and also they aren't as big to carry home or whatever.