Solitaire Game Gets NYC Worker Fired

[notoriousformula]

Office assistant Edward Greenwood IX was going over some papers at his desk as Bloomberg made the rounds with his photographer, greeting workers and posing for pictures. When the mayor reached him, Greenwood stood, they shook hands and the photographer snapped a photo.

But the eagle-eyed mayor — a billionaire former businessman with a certain idea of how offices should be run — noticed Greenwood's game of solitaire glowing on his screen. He said nothing about it to Greenwood but later told an aide to give him the ax.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060210/ap_on_re_us/mayor_game_over_1

[Synthohol]

ok, i wasnt going to touch this one but i cant help it, im in a dennis miller mood.
first off the IT manager who is responsible for the PC's should have never installed solitair or any game for that matter on a work PC.
second, if you are a 39-year-old father of a toddler only making 27,000 a year after six years with a company you are either an idiot or you found a way to embezzle cash over the top.
third, "There's nothing wrong with taking a break, but during the business day, at your desk, that's not appropriate behavior." thats major bullshit, either you dont (as a company owner) provide your employees a break area away fom their desk so they are forced to sit there and probably answer the phone while on their break or lunch at their desk. you should commend an employees commitment instead.

city/state employees usually have such a high stress job and smoking pot on your break is a big-time no-no unfortunatly, a little solitair should be mandatory and since The mayor's office said its records show that in 2004 Greenwood reviewed the policy that prohibits "inappropriate" use of city computers. i bring you back to the IT department, how about removing the software for the games? if inappropriate use is solitaire then dont provide your employees with it goddammit!! the company obviously made no attempt to enforce the policy until he got cought with his pants down.
eat me.

given my rant on this i still have a problem with the guy working for six years at a company, a city job none the less for less than 30k a year and 39 years old with a kid.
dude, grow up and do something with your life that will benifit your kid, not just survive.
knowing the policy and breaking it anyway is a self induced godsend. now get a real job.


sidenote, many many years ago i got fired from Midas after 6 years for setting 15 bic lighters on fire in the shop after taping them together, it was after hours and i was bored with work, bored with the job and basically unhappy so subconciously i was asking to get canned and im glad i did, the change alone made me happier, i made more money at a gas station garadge the following week so i know what im talking about when it comes to policy and breaking it anyway. he asked for it conciously or subconciously so i hope he gets his shit together.
good luck dude.

[Mortaldragon]

I agree with synth but i have one message to say to the guy that got fired..........OWNED!!!!!! lol

[Nut]

I too just don't get the 27K a year job either. Making that much in NYC would only be enough to pay your taxes. Heck, garbage men in the city make 50-60K.

While I agree with Synth that the games should have been removed if that was the policy of no games, its just as easy to say, "Well they left IE on my computer so why are they mad I was looking at teen porn on my break?" LOL!

[DAVE185]

his wife could have been the money maker in the family

as for firing someone for solitare thats bull

I'm sure the mayor works all the time and never takes any breaks to relax:rolleyes: :rolleyes:

what im confused about the article is if its in Albany why can the mayor of NY fire him??

[WackyComputer]

:fart:

[illmatik]

I work in this business, and a lot of ppl (myself included) take crap base salaries for bonus potential. Even tho this guy was making 27k, he probably got a 20k bonus the past few years (couple of my friends making low salaries @ BBerg in the newsroom typing up the news bits make 30-40 but got 90% bouns) that come in in addition to a good amount of quickly vesting stock. Chances are he has this job for the benefits and his wife has another job that 'pays the bills'.

That being said, that was a dumb move. No matter how locked down your environment is you should know how to make a windows key panic button ;)

Heck!! Theyre built in!! WindowsKey + D is the Boss is Coming button!

http://www.helpwithpcs.com/tipsandtricks/keyboard_shortcuts_windows_xp.htm

[Player0]

That looks a bit obvious tho :)

[Synthohol]

http://download.microsoft.com/download/whistler/Install/2/WXP/EN-US/DeskmanPowertoySetup.exe
nice to have 4 desktops at your fingertips, its like 4 monitors, i love it!!
the blue dots in the taskbar are 4 different desktops, you can even assign diff wallpapers.
one click of the dot and it brings up the chosen desktop or the view all 4 as shown here!

[notoriousformula]

http://download.microsoft.com/download/whistler/Install/2/WXP/EN-US/DeskmanPowertoySetup.exe
nice to have 4 desktops at your fingertips, its like 4 monitors, i love it!!
the blue dots in the taskbar are 4 different desktops, you can even assign diff wallpapers.
one click of the dot and it brings up the chosen desktop or the view all 4 as shown here!
Thats an excellent powertoy for windows XP.. i have been using it on my 12" Laptop..increases desktop space x 4 and you can have four diff wallpapers too :D

[illmatik]

Yeah thats basically what the Common Desktop Environment windowing system for unix (Solaris AIX HPUX) works. You have 4 desktops easily accessible buy your main toolbar at the bottom of your screen.


Hafta admit if he hit windows-d chances are bloomberg wouldnt have seen solitaire in his taskbar without a serious stare at the photo.