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[...] I'm not disagreeing with this part. But, what does Apple do with the empty space? And not just Apple. All other companies? What happens to the service industry that has to go to work? They can't operate with so many fewer people going to offices. That affects them the most. Less people working in a city, means less cabs, Uber's, fast food, bars, restaurants and so on. A 10% hit in people not coming to work would be a hit to all those other businesses. And they can't work from home. [...]
"We must not change one because it causes change elsewhere" seems to be what you're saying. This is what leads to people in positions of privilege adhering aggressively to the status quo.

In the long run, dense population zones are bad for civilization and the planet's ecology. Humanity adapts (when given the chance, or when forced to). "Because people are employed in a fundamentally harmful socioeconomic model" is not a good reason to keep things the way they are.
 
It sounds like he moved and didn't expect them to cancel work from home. I'm sure the recruiters for Apple will find another willing individual to replace him. Maybe internal metrics showed a drop in work performance with the work from home protocol in place. The numbers won't lie and I haven't seen those shared anywhere.
 
We have been working from home since 2019. I would rather be in the office. There is a great deal missed by having such fragmentation of people, in my opinion. It works well for some but not for all.

Also living in a place where home prices have gone up nearly 40% in the last two years because of Bay Area people moving here for remote work at not-area-wages has caused a great deal of stress in the community.

A hybrid workweek seems very reasonable and it’s petulant and whiny to make a “stand” about it. Just move on without creating drama.
You were willing to admit yours is an opinion, and then say "it works well for some but not for all" in your first paragraph, but then you swung around to make a personal attack on those who prefer it in your last paragraph. ? People like you, attacking workers for articles they had no hand in writing, are the ones "creating drama".
 
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A mixture of remote and in-office work is reasonable. That is what my company is doing and I have no objection. There are pros and cons to both.

I also don’t think that having one of their senior people quitting over this is very helpful to working towards something that can be sustained and accepted by their workforce. He can afford to get on his high horse and quit over something like this. Most workers do not have that luxury.
Uh... Would you be supportive of this guy quitting over this if he DIDN'T have the luxury of doing it? Would his effort to choose the work-life balance best for him be not a "high horse" if he was paid less?

You seem to be attacking one kind of worker because they CAN exercise agency that another kind of worker OUGHT to be able to do but cannot. I don't think that dichotomy is helpful to workers in general.
 
The problem is Apple is not known for paying the best. Three days a week is still reasonable IMO. Anything more than that is unreasonable and would warrant finding another job. Imo is better to not overspend on office space. Only people who absolutely nerd to be in the office should be in the office on an as needed basis.
 
Isn't AI research in trouble these days? It seems like a good time to jump ship and go somewhere to hide from the fallout of hyping AI as a series of easy-to-monetize schemes.

We were hoping to see a lot more machine learning with AI but where is it? How about Siri, on iPadOS it currently breaks up Silicon Valley zip codes for weather into locations instead of the city they are suppose to represent. MacOS its fine.
"These days", "AI" is an abused term. It's merely a buzzword for anything & everything with an algorithm involved. If "AI research is in trouble", I haven't noticed, because ACTUAL AI doesn't exist.

Software development in general, however, is in trouble. Not financially; practically. Or, rather, WE are in trouble for relying on software, 24/7 because the majority of software does not reliably do what it's supposed to do. The industry and its tech geek adherents (and, more importantly, the executives making all the money) has succeeded in convincing almost everyone to accept special pleading to excuse a lack of warranty and expectation of reliability, and to consider "bugs" an unavoidable and normal aspect of all software. We now have so many interdependent piles of software that devices very often do NOT behave in a deterministic manner, and we regularly rely on this crap, as a society. Almost everyone thinks this is fine.

We are definitely in trouble.
 
Apple will lose top talent to competitors because of this.
The company I work for had similar plans as Apple, starting to go back to the office for a couple of days per week. However, partly to stay competitive when it comes to hiring, the company has been somewhat forced to now instead adopt a full time work from home/anywhere (in the country where you are employed) policy if you want.
 
Apple wants people to come in so they feel like they didn’t throw away all that money on that cool spaceship office.
 
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If you work for a product company, there’s no way to work from home in a long term. I don’t see why Apple should tolerate this kind of blackmailing, if people don’t want to work, they should be free to go.
Plenty of people who work for "product companies" do work from home, and have done so in the long term. Your statement of fact is actually a statement of subjective opinion.

Fascinating that you have decided to characterize this employee as "blackmailing" Apple. Are you granting the right of contract negotiation and freedom of association to employers but not to employees?

He tried to negotiate a preferable work model, Apple did not wish to grant it, and so he resigned. He literally IS free to go, and is LITERALLY GOING (though it wasn't because he didn't want to work; working from home is somehow not work, to you).
 
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It is clear there has been a huge productivity drop across so many sectors with working at home. It’s a tough trade off but most people will be returning to work because they are just not getting enough done.
 
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I just don’t know how viable a company like Apple can have certain departs work from home. Especially with all the secrecy that’s involved. Leaks are bad now, and trade secrets are being stolen. I don’t know what solution they can come up with.
Apple's secrecy works against its own goals. Trade secrets have always been stolen; covid19 and work-from-home is just another change in the world that employers will have to adapt to. Authoritarianism is not the solution to any of this.
 
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This guy has no respect for his employer. Must be nice to have the luxury to piss all over your employer and "protest". Good Luck finding a new job when your image is now, "My Feelings First". There are many more like him to choose from that would be more than happy to get back working as a team in person to get projects done. Unbelievable how entitled this culture thinks it is. Look at his picture, screams Entitled Woke Child 2.0. He made his choice, good luck finding a new job with your new reputation. Bozo.
Why does he need to respect his employer? This is about an exchange of labour.

Oh, and the woke slur. How predictable.
 
If the work is actually getting done on time who cares? Is Apple concerned that the next iPhone comes out in September or that Nancy went to pick up her kid from school for twenty minutes?
lol - in the UK it’s a legal requirement to take a ten minute screen break every hour. Our resident Fox News zealots are probably calling us snowflakes for not wanting image burn on our retinas.
 
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The cheapest developer we have in India on my team is paid over $100k. Sound more like your company is a developer sweatshop rather than teams of highly qualified engineers.
I cited statistics from a reputable source
maybe your company is paying 5 times above market price, but it doesn’t seems to be the norm
 


Apple's director of machine learning, Ian Goodfellow, has resigned from his role a little over four years after he joined the company after previously being one of Google's top AI employees, according to The Verge's Zoë Schiffer.

apple-park-at-night-1.jpg

Goodfellow reportedly broke the news to staff in an email, saying his resignation is in part due to Apple's plan to return to in-person work, which required employees to work from the office at least one day per week by April 11, at least two days per week by May 2, and at least three days per week by May 23. "I believe strongly that more flexibility would have been the best policy for my team," Goodfellow said in the email.

Apple employees began returning to Apple Park last month, with the three-day in-office work policy being enacted on May 23. Some employees have been unhappy about the plan to return to in-person work.

In a letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook during the summer, a group of employees said "Without the inclusivity that flexibility brings, many of us feel we have to choose between either a combination of our families, our well-being, and being empowered to do our best work, or being a part of Apple. This is a decision none of us take lightly, and a decision many would prefer not to have to make."

Article Link: Apple's Director of Machine Learning Resigns Due to Return to Office Work
These people make me laugh. We’ve had 2 years of people working from home and they’ve become lazy and spoiled. Before Covid no one even thought of it. Recess is over. Get up, get dressed, commute to work and do your job. Lunch is 45 mins with two 10 min breaks at 10 and 2:30. And no, you can’t watch judge Judy at your desk.
 
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It actually takes nothing to sue large corporations. If there is a wide reported complaint, then lawyers gang up and file a class action lawsuit. At the end, large corporations settle out of court to avoid PR problems, the lawyers take a big cut and the customers/employees who were the plaintiffs of the lawsuit get very little. The lawyers incur all costs and take most of the settlement money. This has happened several times against Apple, recently with the lawsuit for App Store 30% cut. Lawyers are constantly looking for this opportunity cause they make millions this way.

We are talking employee law here.
 
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I cited statistics from a reputable source
maybe your company is paying 5 times above market price, but it doesn’t seems to be the norm

This is actually a possibility because often the higher you go with some specific skill-set requirements the less relevant "market price" becomes. There are only so many experts with a given skill-set, especially when the skill-set requirements are cross-functional.

In general, outsourcing will hurt most employees with generic skill-sets which can be more easily replaced by outsourcing offers and IMHO those are going to have a though time no matter what.

Any professional should always consider competition and figure out how to out-compete other candidates. Hoping that remote-working induced competition will not come to your door might be a tenable strategy for a few years, but many have to consider decades of career in their future and I personally don't consider hoping that remote work will not be much more pervasive in the next decade to be a sensible strategy to remain competitive in the market.
 
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This guy has no respect for his employer. Must be nice to have the luxury to piss all over your employer and "protest". Good Luck finding a new job when your image is now, "My Feelings First". There are many more like him to choose from that would be more than happy to get back working as a team in person to get projects done. Unbelievable how entitled this culture thinks it is. Look at his picture, screams Entitled Woke Child 2.0. He made his choice, good luck finding a new job with your new reputation. Bozo.

You have no clue on the background of this guy and his options.
 
You're not a marriage counselor to work from home. You work at a company that builds products, some are life-changing products, products that require maximum focus, productivity, discipline, quality check, again and again. At-home productivity will never equal at-work productivity. At-home discipline will never equal at-school discipline.

Just like you'd never be comfortable with a home-schooled heart surgeon; or get on a rocket built by engineers who worked from home.

Anyway, that said, good riddance to him. There are no irreplaceable people.
If someone is underperforming that should be noticeable whether they work from the office, their home, the moon, or sat right next to the CEO. Makes no difference where they are, it’s what they do that counts.

Someone isn’t doing what’s expected can be dealt with. Plenty of people can, will, and do excel at working from home. For those who prefer an office to be productive you can just make it optional. For those that say they want to work from home but underperform, you can coach them, encourage them to work from the office, but it ultimately falls on them to perform and if they can’t there are other candidates who can.

Absolutely no need or benefit to enforce an office on everyone.
 
Mmmmm… this is only true for the pinnacle, but a senior developer in India is (at least) 5x cheaper than in Europe. And Europe can be up to 3x cheaper than US.
You get what you pay for man. Your typical "senior" developer that's 1/5 the price isn't doing the same quality of work as a typical actual senior developer. I've worked with firms that go bargain binning for extremely cheap "senior" offshore devs. Sometimes you get lucky and a guy is mid-level in practice. Usually they don't even know the basics.
 
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