Need an Amnesty on Electronics Forums

[Faringdon]

Hi,
EEVBLOG is an excellent forum...
So why would loads and loads of engineers want to actively delete their account on a permanent basis?
eg...
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/news/how-to-delete-my-account-401706/
There are loads of people who send this kind of post to EEVBLOG and all other Electronics forums.

Well...the reason is because seniors at companies where these engineers work, hawkwatch the forums, and proove that their juniors are using forums, and , for whatever reason,  influence management to force the junior to remove their forum account permanently.

This is pointless. It does not help the companies concerned. The electronics discussed is mostly "out there" anyway. It will do no harm to the company whatsoever.
So can we have an amnesty on forum use?

Can we influence the managers that forum use really is no harm to them. Electronics is just mostly well trodden over, and not anything new. (apart from a few things but they are exceptions)
Maybe we need a section called "Electronics is not a secret anymore" to make the managers realise that its pointless to stop their juniors from using forums.

If you want to make a product...you do not copy it anyway...to copy it..you need the full design skill of it anyway...and if you have that...then why not just make it to the required spec and not copy it...where you may copy the warts and all.

I have  had people disallowing contractors from working on simple linear regulators in case they "run away with the company's secrets".
Its all nonsense.

These managers companys are being harmed and its time to get a reality check on this.
Bring on the Amnesty?

Floobydust kindly tells a story where he knew of a company that got ripped off and copied by its staff...but that is the exception..and in all truth, it was likely the customer company that got fed up with order delays and so payed the workers to bring the company under their wing so they could make the products quicker. In any case...you still wouldnt need to copy anything...just do it from fresh...another point, is that any western electronics company can have any of its products copied and sold at half price by a Chinese competitior at any time. The Chinese have a huge quantity of the best EEs in the world now.

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/chat/general-analog-electronics-companies-must-stop-killing-themselves/

https://www.eevblog.com/forum/renewable-energy/intelligent-product-of-switch-mode-power-supplies/

[Ian.M]

A little common sense goes a long way - simply don't mix your work life and personal life online!

Unless you live and work in a totalitarian state, for personal use simply register with a nym, not your full real name^*,  never mention your employer or any of their products, or post photos from work, and never post here from a company device (or any device running company apps) or from the company WiFi, and you will never need to delete your account to please your current or prospective employer.  If they attempt to link you to your personal nym, you can tell your manager or HR department to go to hell in a handbasket, and if they don't back off, threaten to sue for cyber harassment and promoting a hostile work environment.   

If you need to ask questions about your company's product here, CYA, and get written permission from your manager specifying what product details you are permitted to disclose, do so only from a company device, at work, on a second account here e.g. <company_name>_tech123 (but ask permission from our moderators before creating a second account).   Never link personal social media, or reply to your own nym from the company nym or visa versa.  If you use a personal device to take photos to post for the company online, strip the metadata before sending the images to a company device!

* Anyone who registers with their email address as their user name is an IT security risk.  If their email address also contains their full name, they are probably too high a risk to remain employed!   

[Faringdon]

never mention your employer or any of their products, or post photos from work

Thanks, thats a good idea, but even if one does all that, after a while , it becomes obvious that a poster is a known employee of whichever  company.
Just from the details of the post.....they have to be reasonably relevant to the work and situation being undertaken.
Remember that these senior engineers really hawkwatch the forums. They will find out if the company has a forum user.

I totally believe that companys are actually totally helped by forum use concerning their product developments. In reality.

[SiliconWizard]

People may not be asked to delete their account / stop writing on some forum.
They may do this on their own after noticing that their boss realized it, and they may just not want their boss to "spy" on their online activities, whether this has a direct link to their job or not.
That is a general problem. Of course this has relatively little chance of happening if you don't appear under your real name and don't mention your company, or give enough clues about it.

[coppercone2]

I feel that unless its a small start up with very optimistic people posting any corporate stuff online is a recipe for trouble*. The guidelines for corporate were made when the worst you can do is talk about something in a bar to people that don't understand you. Obviously the reprecutions were obvious to someone that thought "lets put this in a magazine".

When I worked in a design role, frequently things came up that the forum would probobly assist with. But I never post that stuff because they pay you to learn it, chances are it will be unrealistically fast progress (weird time table errors), and chances are that people would be upset if they figured out their actually answering questions for a corporate entity. And they don't pay you enough so why would you go outside of your role?


Plus, you don't wanna follow rules of thumb and crowd advice in a job, the reason why your job exists is likely because its nuanced.


*And if its really a good idea, it really can get stolen. Everyone needs to be in complete agreement.

[Faringdon]

Thanks
The reason for forum hawkwatching and "catching red handed on the forum", is that in UK (and other countrys),
the electronics industry is well stagnated and small. Most electronics is outsourced to China. So there really is very little
chance of technical progression, and not likely to be another electronics company within commutable distance, where an engineer
can go to , in order to expand their technical career.
...This leads to a situation in UK electronics companys where seniors desperately want
to hold on to their knowledge, and be "top technical dog". The thought of a junior coming in and scooping off knowledge on
a forum is unbearable.
As such, the ploy is to hawkwatch for forum use by juniors in the company...
then to manipulate and convince the manager or owner that its detrimental to the company
, and get the junior forum user to ditch the forum permanently.

As well as getting them "well snitched up" as being a "cheat" and  "useless toerag" that cheats by using forums  to try and get knowledge  and thus disguise
what a useless engineer they are.

I guess in UK, the opportunties to shine technically are few and far between...so the next best thing is to concentrate into looking into getting those around you to look technically rubbish...so that oneself shines out as being "the best". Catching them out on a forum, and blowing this up out of proportion is a great way to do this. "dirty cheating useless forum user".

However, its not generally detrimental at all to  any company.

[coppercone2]

I disagree, it just makes the company make aggregate decisions based on popular data. You might find a new idea online, but you won't develop something new there.


Treez, with your questions, I often feel that I should be paid per answer because their awfully specific and you don't learn much from them. I feel like I am doing legwork not giving you a general map to information. They are boring ass questions about mass produced infrastructure that mainly deal with business compromises.... clearly because you have way too much on your plate.. and everyone has a political backstory 


Maybe the retired and unemployed don't find it as distasteful as me, but my feeling is "where is my money for this"


I personally want the english street light industry to collapse. clearly its working on exploitation if anything you say is true, so stop feeding the fire. It sounds like its on the verge of imploding. Then you might get something interesting like someone putting up a emergency job posting for a real salary. Maybe give it a rest for 6 months and someone might call you as a highly paid consultant, when they totally get into bed with china and get regulated by whoever is in charge there. Basically its hanging on to a bad position. And more then likely you are living in a echo chamber of industry specific bullshit, so if you switch industries after brushing up you will find better pay. If enough of those lights fail then politicians will be forced to act (scandal), they are afraid of the dark. If you step away a while you might really notice 1) better solutions 2) your bosses are insanely greedy and they get you into a ultra tunnel vision mindset about engineering.


I get the feeling that you work for a industry that considers a 16 cent power diode to be a lynch pin and threatens to go out of business if the cost rises anywhere above 19 cents, and the truth is that you can build the product with $50 extra in BOM and business would be just fine.

[Ian.M]

If you aren't a blabber-mouth, sanitize your metadata, and don't log in as your personal nym on company time or using company facilities your management 'hawks' have no way to pick out your personal nym from the other 65K users here!

OTOH if you historically have bad-mouthed your employer and/or their products here as an identifiable individual, or leak company owned intellectual property that only you or a limited number of others could access, you *will* be flagged as a risk to the company and are unlikely to remain employed, (and if in a totalitarian state, may be selected for 're-education')!

Lastly, if you regret your presence here, don't emulate a certain cyanic cranium ex-user^*, its enough to simply delete any PII (and only your PII) from your posts,  sanitize posted media, and walk away . . . 

* Who AFAIK threw a hissy fit, took his ball, and went home.  The admins know more but they ain't talking and never will.

--
I am not an EEVblog 'staffer', nor do I play one on TV!

[SiliconWizard]

Unless this is explicitely allowed by your company, using online forums during your work time is often against the rules. Now the line is fuzzy, as companies can't usually prevent you from using the Internet as a tool, but anything considered "social networks", even if it can be seen as a tool for your job, is always borderline.

But from Faringdon's story, as usual, it's not exactly that. It's usually all about manipulating employees with a link to China's domination.

Whatever the underlying reason, which obviously is either fantasized here, or possibly partly real, as soon as you as an employee realize that your company is manipulating you in a negative way, it's time to go. It rarely ends well.

[floobydust]

Asking a tech question on component manufacturer forums i.e. TI or ADI or Power Integrations etc. during the workday is sometimes essential.
So I think it's OK to ask for work-related help here as long as any product information or IP divulged is ordinary, commonplace. That there is no danger to "the corporation". Almost everyone masks the true application, withholds details in their thread and we are all used to that.

I had a bad boss, micromanager extreme that constantly watched what I was doing with my computer, remote viewing feature IT had. I laughed, his day off and he phoned me from home to give me shit I wasn't working on what he wanted. Some managers are fucked in the head. I see others doing their online banking at work, social media, youtube, eBay shopping etc. - not work related, and they seem to not get in any trouble.

OP, you did give away your identity once, not that I really care at all or would do anything against a person here. I get pissed off but leave it at that. I don't foresee us having a pint, you are a long ways away. So there is some  personal danger I guess posting on the forums.

[Andy Chee]

never mention your employer or any of their products, or post photos from work

Thanks, thats a good idea, but even if one does all that, after a while , it becomes obvious that a poster is a known employee of whichever  company.

What may be obvious to the employer, may not be obvious to a court hearing an unfair dismissal case brought by the employee against their former employer.

(unless the employee is completely careless in revealing commercial-in-confidence information that only the company could possibly know)

[Xena E]

Here. EEV blog forum was the third mandated forum by my company for 'interpersonal improvement'.

The rule was not to identify the company, any specific project, or customer.

Possibly, everything is read,  most is compiled in work time lulls, some sent during personal time.

I dont/won't do "normal" soc.med. At least coming here it's a reasonably entertaining (to me), and partly educational experience.

To the OP...
In the event you whine about your employers ethics, policies, projects, and also identify yourself as well, rightly or wrongly you're gonna get canned.

BTW congratulations are in order: it was post five before China was mentioned.

X, (yes, it is Xena).

[Xena E]

Beg everyone's pardon didn't read the OP properly

He mentioned China in the very first post.

 

[Halcyon]

So why would loads and loads of engineers want to actively delete their account on a permanent basis?

They don't. You made this up. A small minority do for various reasons (I was one of them under a previous pseudonym several years ago.)

Well...the reason is because seniors at companies where these engineers work, hawkwatch the forums, and proove that their juniors are using forums, and , for whatever reason,  influence management to force the junior to remove their forum account permanently.

That sounds like a "you" problem. Many companies have social media policies and confidentiality agreements, yet, you will always get a few idiots breaching those policies. Everyone else is free to speak their minds. Even on a professional level. This forum is highly respected. We intend to keep it that way.

another point, is that any western electronics company can have any of its products copied and sold at half price by a Chinese competitior at any time. The Chinese have a huge quantity of the best EEs in the world now.

You've said this before. I disagree. China (as in the CCP) have a lot of sway in the market when it comes to Chinese technology companies (by law). Do they have the best EE's? Hell no! Not by a long shot. Their technology is untrusted. It's ridiculed. It's transparent. Wake up to yourself.

[Halcyon]

You know what Faringdon? You've been banned from this forum before, and you're banned again.

At best, you contribute nothing meaningful.  At worst, you're a CCP shill.

The educated world doesn't have time for your crap anymore.

[tggzzz]

Now I won't be thanked so often. (Good thing too )

I'll also miss out on the "fun" of looking at the "recent unread topics" page, reading the topic headers, and quickly guessing that it is a Faringdon/Treez/Ocset topic.

On the plus side, the forum's signal-to-noise ratio will be noticeably improved

[watchmaker]

Now I get why people use pen names here.  Never thought about the companies that deal with sensitive issues.

OTOH, when my daughter was 10, I showed her the log on our home router.  I told her I would never look at the data, but she needed to be aware that everything is recorded.

I have always been offended by those who use company resources to conduct personal business.  It is no different from the sales clerk using company time to chat with a friend while a customer is waiting.

Even had an ebayer using an account from US Architect of the Capitol account try to screw me.  That did not go well for him.

In one of my professional jobs, in the 1990s, a young researcher was fired for using association resources (internet) for personal business.

Anyone who does not understand the requirement to separate personal use from business use (including personal accounts on company infrastructure) is asking to be fired.

[Postal2]

I imagined Keller writing something on a forum in the middle of a cpu development and AMD firing him. Or Elon Musk writing something and being kicked out to South Africa.

[Nominal Animal]

You know what Faringdon? You've been banned from this forum before, and you're banned again.

At best, you contribute nothing meaningful.

As someone who has tried to help Faringdon and tried to take their questions at face value, I took a hard look at their posts (a couple of hundred most recent ones), plus because it started to get pretty repetitive, the ones thanked by others over the last couple of years.

I cannot agree to "nothing meaningful", but the signal-to-noise ratio is horribly low, reminding me of Albert Bernstein's Emotional Vampires in an online interaction scenario; a variant of the used-car salesmen type, or perhaps "you need to do my homework for me because I've got better more important things to do", who never remembers a previously given advice after the moment it was applied has passed.

I am not a psychologist, but having had to learn social skills the hard way myself, I don't think they are intentionally so, but definitely in need of adjusting the way they communicate.  A proper mutually beneficial interaction is a give-and-take –– not so much between exact pairs of individuals, but an individual and the community.  When someone just takes and takes and asks questions rarely really engaging in the ensuing discussion, just reading the responses, and even more rarely trying to help others in turn, they do become a burden on the community.  (This is what I fear myself; being useful is what brings me joy here, but I have my own set of faults causing friction here.)

The solution exists: one needs to adjust the way they communicate with others.  It is unreasonable to expect everyone else conform to your needs.  If one understands feedback mechanisms and basic scientific principles, they can experiment and find what changes in their communication style they can do and maintain that will yield positive results.  And there are books and therapists specialized in this kind of thing, too.  Unfortunately, I do not see any such effort on Faringdon's part.

Now I get why people use pen names here.  Never thought about the companies that deal with sensitive issues.

For me, it is a tool, reminding me that others do not respond to my person, but to my output and output style.  My output I can change; my person I cannot.

In that sense, it is not really Faringdon the human person that is banned; it is the member Faringdon due to their difficult communications patterns and styles that the moderators just cannot reasonably sustain/allow on this forum.  In the past, Dave and the moderators have allowed such "reformed" members back in under new pseudonyms – including in Faringdon's own case before! –, exactly because it really is that and not anything personal per se.  I find it important to understand this, and not consider the situation from an emotional perspective.

[magic]

Sad. Faringdon was good for an occasional laugh.
Like, how could anyone think this guy actually likes China or wants CCP to be seen in good light?

[MK14]

Sad. Faringdon was good for an occasional laugh.
Like, how could anyone think this guy actually likes China or wants CCP to be seen in good light?

If you miss him.  They seem to still be active here:

Code: [Select]

[url]https://www.edaboard.com/search/3701502/?c[users]=cupoftea&o=date[/url]
E.g. Their latest, Common mode chokes are a hoax for SMPS? thread:
https://www.edaboard.com/threads/common-mode-chokes-are-a-hoax-for-smps.411942/post-1778232

[magic]

It's not just him but the interactions with other users here, including a few groupies who always show up in those threads

[MK14]

It's not just him but the interactions with other users here, including a few groupies who always show up in those threads

In my opinion, I think they were tending to drag the forum down, in various respects.

How on earth a user can create so many different accounts, to (presumably) try and deceive both the user base here, and the moderator/administrator teams.  Then not get immediately permanently banned (all accounts), from doing that.

They habitually cross-post stuff, and seem to intentionally create (trolling) stories.

They don't seem to really care about users who take the time and effort, to reply to their threads.

If you compare their posts on here, to other forum(s).  They do seem to be intentionally, creating simplistic/beginner like threads here, yet attempt to appear, all professional/experienced, on other forum(s).

So, there always seemed to be something very seriously wrong, with their posting style(s).

[jonpaul]

Hello: FTTS Farrington Treeze Time Sink:

I hearby grant you Amnesty, universal and unlimited,  ....You are hearby absolved from all  sins you have committed .....
You are now deemed immune to all these issues.

You can finally retire, cease these posts and take a vacation.....preferably to a location with no internet acess....

 Invoice for services rendered:  Complete  Amnesty...and Absolution from Sins   EU 5,000 (special low price)

Master Card/Visa/AmEx gladly accepted.

Have an absolutely Fantastic Day!

Jon

[tooki]

What I found noteworthy, aside from the general lunacy of the questions themselves, is the ratio of questions/new threads to replies. For the sake of argument, let’s pretend people only start threads to ask for help, not to proactively share anything.

I looked at the top 25 non-admin/moderator forum members (by post count) and calculated the ratio of posts to threads started. The range spans from 26:1 to 2075:1, with most being between 100-300, with an average of 456:1. (I’m right at 302:1.) Even given the fact that some of the posts will be replies in their own threads, there is a clear trend: responding to others far more than asking for help.

And again, this is under the assumption that every thread started is a request for help. If we discounted threads offering proactive information, the ratios would go even higher.

Then we look at Faringdon (just that account, not including any alternative ones), and we find a ratio of just 2.9:1. That’s a ratio one might expect of a brand new member with exactly one thread they just started the day before. (The original treez account, currently renamed to “ocset” and not yet banned, has an only slightly better ratio at 3.6:1.)

Unfortunately, there’s no easy way to see a count of threads a member has participated in (regardless of thread starter), so no easy way to see how many threads Faringdon responded to that he didn’t start himself. But an unscientific skimming of his post history suggests that he responded to a few threads by others a few years ago, but really focused solely on his own threads in later years. Even if we generously guess he responded to 20 threads by others (I suspect it’s half that), that’s peanuts compared to the 730 threads he started. That would suggest a help-offered to help-sought ratio of just 0.03:1, or 36 requests for help for every one offer to help someone else.

The upshot? Typical top forum members primarily reply to threads started by others, suggesting they are trying to help others more than they are seeking help themselves. And then we have Faringdon, who seeks tons of help but rarely, if ever, tries to help others. In other words, a freeloader. We expect that from actual newbies (both to electronics and to the forum) who sign up to ask a question. But not from members with thousands of posts.

Even if we assume positive intent (no malice), this kind of user is a drag. One could even accept that a user who knows nothing but asks good questions that prompt interesting, enlightening discussions is adding value to the forum. But his questions (“don’t you agree that [insert loony nonsequitur here]…”) only rarely prompted truly productive discussions, and he clearly never actually took to heart anything anyone said, which is frustrating to those who took the time to reply. It could easily be interpreted as disrespect for others.

If we do assume malice (deliberate trolling) then it becomes way worse.

What’s the solution? I dunno. In a way I’ll miss the “oh jesus wtf” moments prompted by his unhinged theories, or his beginner questions that a supposedly experienced working engineer should have known the answers to inside and out.