Now this is something that's worthy of being dismissed (involuntarily, if
necessary) from the WMF board. This individual clearly does not meet our
community values of transparency and honesty, or at least such is in
serious question.
Is the Board considering doing so, or reading this at all? It's really time
to open up, not close the ranks.
On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 3:17 PM, Kevin Gorman <kgorman(a)gmail.com> wrote:
You'll find the allegations to be true, Dariusz.
Although the link
provided was just to Pando, the internal email from Arnnon was released by
court order - and the entire anti-solicitation fiasco has been fairly
widely covered in the US tech news. I knew I recognized Arnnon's name from
somewhere, I just didn't remember where immediately. It recently resulted
in a $435 million settlement for employees of the the companies involved
due to lost competitive wages. There's also an ongoing shareholder lawsuit
about it still. Besides the news coverage, really, the damning thing is
just the direct emails. They were unsealed by the judge and a copy is
hosted here:
https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/1019489/google-email-chain.pdf
-
although you can also get a copy from PACER if you want a 100% verified
one.
They show in Arnnon's own words that (a) he's willing to participate in an
illegal anti-solicitation agreement, and (b) he's willing to
instantaneously fire any employee who violates that illegal
anti-solicitation agreement. I know WMF has benefited from it's
relationship with Google historically... but in terms of board members, I
really think we need people who are not just talented but who uphold the
values of the movement - and I don't think Arnnon's behavior as covered in
the media and in the case filings do that. Also, since we're appointing a
fiduciary, it seems like it might not be the best idea to appoint a
fiduciary whose actions at another company were part of a chain of actions
that resulted in a $435 million settlement. That's a lot of Jimmyeyes from
the corner of my screen.
I'm additionally kind of worried because... this really should have come up
in background vetting of potential board members. Since there's
information explicitly about it within the first couple pages of any search
engine, this suggests that the process involved in vetting potential board
members didn't involve digging deep in to their backgrounds at all. Hiring
for pretty much *any* position should normally involve at least a cursory
scan of the internet to see if they are, say, a wanted fugitive, or
participated in illegal anti-competitive behavior like this in the past to
the point that it resulted in a settlement that large (and that is just for
the employees of the companies involved, several shareholder lawsuits are
ongoing.)
Here's a recent lawsuit from shareholders related to it. Keep in mind that
these are just allegations by the shareholders, but they're pretty well
supported by the court-ordered released emails -
http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Googpoach.pdf - and
a
class action by employees of the companies involved recently settled for
$435 million in lost competitive wages due to the illegal anti-solicitation
agreement.
"Defendant Arnnon Geshuri (“Geshuri”) has served as Google’s Director of
Recruiting at all times relevant to this lawsuit. Defendant Geshuri was
involved in developing and perpetuating the illegal collusive scheme
alleged herein. Defendant Geshuri knowingly, recklessly, or with gross
negligence: (i) oversaw the creation of the protocols governing
anticompetitive hiring agreements between Google and other companies; (ii)
caused or allowed Google to enter into such illegal anticompetitive
agreements; (iii) allowed Defendants Page, Brin, and Schmidt to dominate
and control the Google Board of Directors with little or no effective
oversight; and (iv) failed to implement adequate internal controls to
ensure that Google complied with federal laws and regulations"
Even though those are allegations from an unsettled shareholder lawsuit,
since the employee class action was settled for $435m and there are
extensive details of what went on in the settement documents, I'd give that
paragraph a bit more credence than I would a paragraph from an average
unsettled lawsuit. I'm sure that Arnnon is personally skilled, I just
really don't feel that his behavior as described in the settled class
action/documents related to it/the general news media is in line with the
values of the Wikimedia movement.
Best,
Kevin Gorman
On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 12:43 PM, Dariusz Jemielniak <darekj(a)alk.edu.pl>
wrote:
On Fri, Jan 8, 2016 at 3:16 PM, Pine W
<wiki.pine(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Dariusz, you said in your statement that was
published in the Wikimedia
Blog that WMF "considered dozens of candidates from all over the world,
with not-for-profit and technology experience, and the highest
professional
standards.” I would be interested to hear how you
reconcile "highest
professional standards" with the prior actions of Arnnon,
I have read about these allegations today, and I am going to follow up on
that. I don't have an opinion formed, as jumping to conclusions is
definitely not just to people. I can assure you that in the whole process
Arnnon's expertise, professionalism, as well as technological connection
were clearly outstanding (but obviously we have not discussed this case).
best,
dariusz
--
__________________________
prof. dr hab. Dariusz Jemielniak
kierownik katedry Zarządzania Międzynarodowego
i grupy badawczej NeRDS
Akademia Leona Koźmińskiego
http://n <http://www.crow.alk.edu.pl/>wrds.kozminski.edu.pl
członek Akademii Młodych Uczonych Polskiej Akademii Nauk
członek Komitetu Polityki Naukowej MNiSW
Wyszła pierwsza na świecie etnografia Wikipedii "Common Knowledge? An
Ethnography of Wikipedia" (2014, Stanford University Press) mojego
autorstwa
http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?id=24010
Recenzje
Forbes:
http://www.forbes.com/fdc/welcome_mjx.shtml
Pacific Standard:
http://www.psmag.com/navigation/books-and-culture/killed-wikipedia-93777/
Motherboard:
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/an-ethnography-of-wikipedia
The Wikipedian:
http://thewikipedian.net/2014/10/10/dariusz-jemielniak-common-knowledge
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