IBM To Kernel Maintainer: "You Are An IBM Employee 100% Of The Time"

[AmericanLocomotive]

I bet what it comes down to is that one of the developer's official duties as part of his job is to work on the VNIC driver. Since part of his job is to work on that driver, he should be using his IBM email address to work on it. I'm sure he's allowed to contribute elsewhere to the Kernel using his personal email address, but any official-IBM project requires him to use his IBM email address.

On the other hand, the tone of the email is not appropriate. The manager is terrible at actually addressing people. There are a billion ways to rephrase that email in a much kinder and less abrasive way while still getting the same message across. But this kind of language is pretty par-for-the-course in the open source community, from what I've seen.

[chuckula]

Funny part: I'm sure the IBM political types were pushing all those agendas to remove "master" and "slave" from anywhere in the kernel, git, etc. Because some words used in a technical context were totally the only problem that exists in the world.

But after they got their way, they have no problem reminding us that they own their own employees like a lord owns serfs.

[irkilk]

Disclosure: I have in the past worked at IBM.

Edit:

An IBM employee was listed as one of the maintainers to the IBM Power SR-IOV Virtual NIC driver for the upstream Linux kernel alongside several other IBM engineers. Except in this case the employee was listed as a maintainer with his Gmail address.

I enjoy Phoronix reporting and at the same time I think something was missed here. Just three days prior the dev in question removed their IBM e-mail and added their personal e-mail:
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux...593ba41d2dd8ec

This presents an issue with the statement above, which omits that detail and suggests that they had used their Gmail address all along, which wasn't the case.

Another way this "You are an IBM employee 100% of the time" could be taken is that the idea of being an employee of any company doesn't stop because the clock does. You are still employed by your employer during non-work hours.

This swapping out of their work e-mail for their private e-mail could cause a breach of contract somewhere by, for example, improperly disclosing who a contributor works for.

Anecdotally and with the grain of salt that culture can vary wildly between teams, unless things have shifted dramatically in the past few years, IBM is pretty open-source friendly.

[skeevy420]

So... do non-compete agreements in the US provide you with compensation like in most European countries?

It's up to the employee and employer upon signing the contract. So, no, not by default. Some states, like California, have laws and protections in place, but they aren't universal. You'll have to Google the specifics because I don't know them or how enforced they are. Perhaps someone will chime in since I'm sure at least one Phoronix user has to be a California tech worker who as dealt with NDAs before or is friends with one.

Basically, if you sign one and screw yourself over it's on you. Your protection from society is people will look at you, laugh, and blame you for not catching section c of amendment 37 on page 213 of your NDA so you'll be shamed into not doing that again. Blame and shame.

[lejeczek]

I must admit it quite surprises how many commenting here lack not just simple understanding of how a company (for profit) works, of how good company should work, but also those lack just basic imagination in order to envision all possible ramifications an consequences of those not really complex situations such as this IBM's mentioned here.

Take for example Michael here, of Phoronix - fix IBM into this context - Micheal every once in while would share with the rest of us how, and how much various companies contribute to various Open Source projects, let it be the Kernel, or Mesa, or etc. Micheal does in best possible way - concrete numbers(but check how he does it).
That is fantastic a) for Michael does it in first place. b) if one takes a moment to properly digest that knowledge then one realizes how serious that is! I mean, it's obious right in your face - you can see how devoted and serious a given company is about what most of us and many around the world, care.

All those moaners and whiners lamenting about how bad is what IBM says - if you have not failed already and you would try to start up and manage your _own_ company (for profits again! it's very! different when you don't give a toss) - I say: I do _not_ have high hopes for you.
There would more examples necessary to lay down in order for those "individuals" to understand fundamentals of mostly, but not exclusively, tech companies business, but best! try - I suggest - try it yourself, start a company, see if you can compete on that free market(of ideas too) and how fantastic and divine "individual" you can be in pursuit of commercial success - you have no foggiest clue.

Lots love, xx.

[melkore]

As an ex-IBMer that was in the fine print when we were acqui-hired from our dying startup. They took our competing product that actually worked and moth balled it so we could try to fix their monstrosity.

Any idea you had was IBM's first. No moon lighting, no contributing to FOSS unless explicitly given permission. So we just didn't have ideas until our year contracts were up for our sign on bonuses and all left. I talked with people that had 6+ month stretches of having no real work because that was cheaper than hiring when there was a demand for that skillset. IBM, at least the division I was in, felt like a place to disappear and collect a check.

[Sonadow]

I see so many people reading too much into a simple email, and Michael is no better for feeding the 'IBM bad' hype.

IBM officially works on and maintains the POWER SR-IOV VNIC driver in the kernel. Lijun is most likely employed by IBM to work on that driver in his capacity as an IBM employee. Heck, he is even listed as a maintainer.

Obviously IBM will want all and any work he puts in on VNIC to be tagged and signed off in his capacity as an IBM employee, regardless of whether he is on the clock or not. If not, what the hell is he employed at IBM for?

[edwaleni]

So in context of the ongoing lawsuit between SCO and IBM......how does a lawyer from SCO know that code written by an IBM employee "on his own time, with his personal email account" then doesn't turn around and write the same code for an IBM internal project using his own IBM email account. How does one make the distinction between code written for commercial purposes and one written for FOSS purposes? All based on ones email account?

The ongoing battle between corporate USA and their employees with regards to what is called "work-life balance" is fraught with hazards and mis-statements. A company has no qualms demanding work-life balance on the front end and yet tell their staff that you are an employee 100% of your time. Forked tongue comes to mind.

If one wants to contribute something to their favorite charity, whether it be the poor, the homeless or the Pi Foundation, that is a personal choice, not a corporate one. Whether it is money, heavy lifting of boxes or writing code, it is still a contribution. Your employer can't say you can't give money to the poor because it comes from us. They can't say you can't help move boxes for a homeless shelter, because you work for us 100%. Therefore you should be able to make a commit to some component of the Pi OS because it comes from you personally.

[edwaleni]

I must admit it quite surprises how many commenting here lack not just simple understanding of how a company (for profit) works, of how good company should work, but also those lack just basic imagination in order to envision all possible ramifications an consequences of those not really complex situations such as this IBM's mentioned here.

Take for example Michael here, of Phoronix - fix IBM into this context - Micheal every once in while would share with the rest of us how, and how much various companies contribute to various Open Source projects, let it be the Kernel, or Mesa, or etc. Micheal does in best possible way - concrete numbers(but check how he does it).
That is fantastic a) for Michael does it in first place. b) if one takes a moment to properly digest that knowledge then one realizes how serious that is! I mean, it's obious right in your face - you can see how devoted and serious a given company is about what most of us and many around the world, care.

All those moaners and whiners lamenting about how bad is what IBM says - if you have not failed already and you would try to start up and manage your _own_ company (for profits again! it's very! different when you don't give a toss) - I say: I do _not_ have high hopes for you.
There would more examples necessary to lay down in order for those "individuals" to understand fundamentals of mostly, but not exclusively, tech companies business, but best! try - I suggest - try it yourself, start a company, see if you can compete on that free market(of ideas too) and how fantastic and divine "individual" you can be in pursuit of commercial success - you have no foggiest clue.

Lots love, xx.

The new "profit" is to start a foundation, place your work there. Submit for grants and donations and pay yourself handsomely when the dough rolls in.

Less regulatory hassle. No corporate taxes. A compliant mutually beneficial board. Just submit your paperwork to the charities board for reporting.

[pal666]

redhat employees aren't necessarily ibm employees