Apple Relocating Siri Evaluation Team in San Diego to Austin

[dharushan411]

lol Texas, how depressing

I'm from the UK, so genuine question! - what's bad about Texas?

(Only visited NYC and Boston so yeah lol)

 

[BC2009]

This is not some secret R&D team working on a top secret project. This team could telecommute or easily be located in two offices using zoom and slack for communication. In this day and age companies restricting teams to a geo location is kinda ridiculous. This is nothing more than a thinly veiled lay off.

 

[randolorian]

Those who choose to relocate will regret their decision when summer rolls around.

 

[Ho Tai]

Brutal culture shock for those poor souls.

 

[iPay]

And then you move and still get fired. Happened to my Uncle in a C-Leven position once 😵‍💫

That's for the ones who really didn't get the message. But then, Thank God for Mississippi.

 

[YoItsTonyMorgan]

Austin LOL...what a hell hole.

 

[spinedoc77]

condolences to the demoted employees moving to austin.

Tell me about it, San Diego being one of the most beautiful places and climate of the world... ouch Texas. Maybe this will spur them to actually make Siri useful.

 

[PsykX]

120 employees ? What are these people doing ? Siri hasn't evolved a lot in the last years...

I hope they're working aggressively on having a GPT-equivalent engine, making a whole new Siri experience, and renaming Siri to scrap the brand while we're at it because it doesn't have a good aura anymore.

 

[CaptainBlue]

Thoughts and prayers for having to move from San Diego to Austin.

 

[Sciomar]

Dear Apple, Texas does not want more of the kind of people that come out of that state, we have enough bad drivers as it is!

I'm from the UK, so genuine question! - what's bad about Texas?

(Only visited NYC and Boston so yeah lol)

Nothing, they're jealous our burritos are better.

 

[bigheaddoug]

At least the music scene is supposed to be good, I guess.

 

[Vasilioskn]

Oh I would be livid if I had to leave San Diego for Austin. What a downgrade.

 

[lkrupp]

Texas is starting to suffer a massive brain drain. CA is not. Population can increase but if it’s just lower skilled people does not help as much in tech.

Not true as shown by Apple’s move in this article.

 

[ChrisA]

Every time a company does this the same thing happens
1) The best employees immediately find a new job, quit and never move.
2) The second-best employees say "yes" to the move but keep looking for a new job near where they used to live and do eventually find one and then quit and move back.
3) Some employees can't find comparable work and stay.

What you are left with is the people that other companies don't want.

This is not just in the tech industry. Aerospace and car makers tried it too. They ended up having to partially reverse the decision. For example, Nisan had to keep their design team and marketing people in California but was able to move the telephone answering people who did customer support to TX.

 

[leicaman]

Boy, I wish they'd come just a bit north to Carlsbad, and buy EV maker Aptera motors. They have an EV almost ready for production that can go 1,000 miles on a charge. Just saw a neighbor drive one into his garage. He must work at the factory several miles from here. THAT would make a great Apple car.

 

[SFjohn]

Perhaps Siri will end up with a drawl… 😉😂

 

[Chuckeee]

Well, if you have to moved to Texas, Austin is about as best as you can do. Much better than Houston, DFW, El Paso, San Antonio, Plano, Arlington, Corpus Christi, etc.

 

[teeoh717]

"Improving" Siri? Well THERE'S yer praablem. Just light a match and watch that hot garbage burn.

 

[Verified Whiskey]

That "voluntary quitting" is more like an ultimatum. Uproot you (and your family's) life for a chance to keep your job.

Sure but that’s still not termination.

 

[actripxl]

As a person who sincerely likes Austin, and even prefers it to San Diego: I would absolutely lose my **** if I were given an ultimatum like this.

The real estate market in Austin is utterly insane. The school system is crap, and telling your kids they have to lose all their friends is borderline traumatic.

Not cool, at all. Also 4 weeks severance, even with the "extra week for every year of employment," is insulting. Google is handing out 6 months paid to their laid off drones.

It's difficult for me to imagine this action not being partially motivated as a way of thinning some ranks without generating bad headlines (as @andrewxgx suggested)… I'm usually optimistic about Apple and give them the benefit of the doubt, but this is really awful.

1. The real estate market is still better than California.

2. Public school systems in both states aren't great, but the slight nod goes to California.

3. Who cares, they don't have a vote in the matter since they aren't the one's paying the bills, mortgage, food, college, and saving for retirement.

I currently live in Texas, but I'm looking to move to Vegas so I can be as close as possible to California and not deal with the mess they have there.

 

[d-klumpp]

Siri is terrible. They need to completely scrap it and start over

Maybe I'm the only one to notice, but Siri is slowly improving in important ways. I've noticed improved conversation (e.g., "thank you" and "no problem") and that she actually reads answers to questions, rather than merely asking you check your phone for the web search results. Still a long way to go, particularly understanding which device receives priority, but I feel there's a lot happening under the hood and that Siri's future may be brighter than readers here will admit, where Siri is everyone's fav punching bag.