rrwhite

It seems that smartphone ownership (which is steadily increasing) is more of a factor of age than income (though both are a factor): http://www.nielsen.com/content/dam/corporate/us/en/newswire/...

And how does your request play out?

We halt any technological improvements which would result in lost jobs. Is there any historical precedence for such a thing?

You may not but the NY MTA does: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automation_of_the_New_York_City...

Exactly. Customer service jobs are actually increasing in pay and sophistication because there's less overall work to be done but what's left behind after automation is more complex.

You're spot on with that thesis. Automation is inevitable. How we react to it is what's going to matter. I tried to encapsulate that here: http://rrwhite.com/on-the-inevitability-of-automation

Which is why I talked about the concept of basic income. I don't know the answer but people are arguing about whether automation is good or bad which is irrelevant. These jobs will be automated whether you like it or not. If we play our cards right then perhaps more people can pursue their passions. If we don't... well I'd rather focus on making the former happen.

Wow. I hadn't seen that at all. That's simply reflective of the enterprise-focused path they've been on for the last few years. Micro-ISVs and SMBs don't pay real money for community software only the big guys do.

Yeah I could do a whole other article on how we shifted from minimizing friction on the sign up form to actually increasing it. If it's too easy to sign up for your service it's hard to tell if your marketing actually worked and you have qualified leads or if you just have a bunch of people that "clicked here".

Contacted them about fixing the images. In the meantime here's a PDF version with them:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/28/UnSexy-PricingforConv...

My assertion is that you should provide severance in all cases. I chose to attack the most contentious case (poor performance) where one might think not to provide it to prove that point.

I didn't mean this to imply that it's a regular issue I have to deal with :)

PS Priority #1 post any firing is a careful review of the hiring process that got you there.

I did not mean to imply that all firings are the result of employee incompetence or poor performance. Because that's clearly not true. There are often other factors that lead to a bad "fit".

And yes, the first thing you should do post-firing is examine your hiring process to see if it could have been foreseen and prevented. But in some cases it does come down to someone just not having the experience, the talent or the work ethic to meet the performance required. It's those cases, especially with tech workers, where founders are apt to ask "do I really need to provide severance to HIM (or her)". Writing at $20K check to someone to walk out the door is never an easy thing to do especially at a startup where that $20K could go a long way. That's what I was addressing here.

In this context the original discussion revolved around someone being fired for cause (extremely poor performance). That someone was a knowledge worker and fairly well compensated. There was also little reason to believe that person wouldn't have a new job by the time they walked out the door (job market being what it is).

Thus my goal was to argue for a reason why you should always pay severance even when none of those conditions you mentioned apply. Otherwise I agree with everything you wrote.

Quick question: Do you live here (SF)?

Are the including Studios in this or just 1BR? I ask because a 1 BR is a luxury apartment for a single inhabitant. Most folks living by themselves would have a studio. SF is expensive but it's not that expensive.