Charlie, Tribeless is a Kiwi :)

Other than that though, the fact this occurred in the UK doesn't change any of the principles espoused in my initial email. The fact you may not be operating in a competitive environment is a different issue, although I would say that if it is considered that capitalism is the economic system of freedom, then that would be further evidence to be railing against the government, not private enterprise. The employer in this scenario had every right to retaliate against Joe; as much right, indeed, as Joe had to slander them in a public forum (if that is what happened). I agree though, their response has been unfortunate, and I feel sorry for Joe, but they had every right to sack him.

Blogging is great, but bloggers must remember that in a free country they are responsible for themselves, and what they say, and thus they must take the sometimes bad medicine arising from their actions. Nothing wrong with that. Joe exercised 'choice' in choosing what to write in his blog: his employer then responded via choices they were entitled to exercise in turn.

if it is considered that capitalism is the economic system of freedom ...

(FX: Charlie coughing tea all over his laptop.)

Going off on a tangent here, freedom (at least, some degree of economic freedom) is a necessary precondition for capitalism. Capitalism, however, is not a necessary or sufficient precondition for freedom. Some relationships are not commutative.

I think that even if you are self-employeed you have to "be careful what you say" these days. There are a bunch of views on my web log that might not go down well with companies that might hire me. For example I think that torture is bad, killing others is not justified in most cases and that George W. Bush is a bad president who is using people who are CINOs (Christians in Name Only)to enact a government that enriches the rich and punishes the poor. Those wild views are why I publish under a pseudonym. Those views are dangerous in America today. On the other hand a friend brought up the point that some companies might actually hire me BECAUSE of my views. Unfortunately I can't be sure who those companies are.

Did you know that there is a practice in PR firms where they go around and look for people who say or write bad things about a company? When they find them I'm not sure of what they do (sue? kill?) but they know that any form of speech that doesn't support the company must be addressed and probably suppressed.

Maybe that PR company was hired by HMV and found Joe's blog. Google is very powerful, if I wrote something 2 years ago in a fit of anger, it can hang around for the rest of time to haunt me. It is your new "permanent Record" and is available to anyone, not just teachers and the police.

Charlie! It is indisputable that laissez faire capitalism is the bedrock of a free society: there is simply no alternative. Every communist economy has failed, or is failing. China's only path for survival is to 'free up' (note the importance of that word) their controlled economy and move toward a bastardised capitalism.

Indeed, I thought that at least the Left had figured that out, and realising the economic battle has been lost are now moving the battle for freedom onto other fronts ... which is why I can no longer smoke at my local pub, and why every year I have an exorbitant of money stolen from me by New Zealands corrupt government to basically to bring up everybody else's children, and pay for every politician's whim - all at the expense of individual choice and individual freedom.

Indeed, I feel like weeping (except I'm a rugged individualist bloke, so I won't) when I see my country turned into a socialist slum. Where I've just built everything is controlled about my house by local government commissars right down to its very colour. Appalling.

Some principles are "to die for" but they, of course, have to take a back seat to commercial law and economic interests. Contract law is the ultimate defence, only by upholding the corporation's right to make money above all else can we be truly free.

If only George Orwell had lived to see the other Big Brother in action.

Charlie,

We could consider whether capitalism is required for "freedom" but I think you'd agree that free speech is.

And in a truly free society the evil companies (which are really just groups of people) would have free speech rights too. The rest of us (the good and the bad) would have the right to boycott the companies we don't agree with -- for whatever their beliefs may be.

But I think Joe would have avenues to pursue in the US as well. We're not really the free society we'd like to think we are. (Less, in fact.)

Charlie,

Is there a Borders in Edinburgh? As I tend to avoid the place like the plague (I far prefer Glasgow or Newcastle) its over two years since I last walked up Princes Street.

Either way at least I now have an excuse not to spend money in HMV or Waterstones. Looks like my Amazon bill will be rising a bit tho.

Tribeless, I don't think this is the place to get into the old arguments, but I think you'll find that many people will disagree wildly that laissez faire capitalism produces freedom. And that Charlie is most definitely among them, as are many in Scotland (which is more left-wing than the rest of the UK, which is more left-wing than the US).

There is a Borders in Edinburgh at the Kinnaird Retail Park. I wouldn't shop at Borders if they were the last bookstore on Earth though. Their policies towards their staff make Waterstones look like paragons of enlightenment.

Tribeless seems to be arguing that capitalism can never be regulated. He looks to be excluding the vast reaches of the middle ground.

Pretty much, it sounds, like the current Waterstones management.

Edited by author 01-11-2005 07:01 AM
Tribeless seems to be confusing free-lunch freedom with free-speech freedom. And his freedom to smoke at his local pub is about as useful to me as my freedom to piss in his swimming pool is to him.

Next thing, I expect him to start quoting Margaret Thatcher ("there's no such thing as society" and all).

I would advise Edinburgh natives that, in addition to there being numerous branches of Waterstones and a Borders out at Kinnaird Park, there's also a very good specialist SF bookshop (Transreal, on the Grass Market), and another book chain: Ottakars bought out most of the former James Thin stores when Thin's went bankrupt a couple of years ago, and they seem to be doing well by them.

So perhaps Tribeless feels that we should never moan that we've had a hard day at work? In case the company appears to the outside world to be a group of slave driving facists? Or we should never complain that our local council doesn't do enough - as they might 'rightly' choose to ask us to leave their constituency.

If I were to type a message, giving out company confidential info and directly slagging off the work and/or actions of my company - I'd expect a kick in the arse. But to satirically mock my employers? Or to laughingly refer to the "Escape group" (several of my colleagues jokingly refer to an 'escape plan') and then find myself up on disciplinary charges is a joke.

Perhaps your neighbourhood group (or whatever it is) could ask you to leave Tribeless, for moaning over the pre-destined house colours <g>.

This man did not sit in the middle of the store throwing a spat. Indeed - from all understanding he helped the company make a few thou' by promoting authors and lesser known imprints! Gosh...he almost sounds like a Knight of Capitalism.

Having read the entry on your friend Joe, and having been a blogger in the clear for nearly two years now that regularly grouses about my current job (not at a bookstore, thank God, I'm not personable at all), I've got only one thing to say.

I'm fucked.

Oh well. I knew that when I started the blog.

My employer, along with the last semester's batch of creative writing students (I was a fellow student, the local colleges do not let conservatives teach) have been through my blog so I should not be surprised if I get bent over the same rail someday.

The difference, in my case, is that when it happens, I intend to write a version of Nickel and Dimed covering the U.S. post 09-11-01 private security industry.

Might take me a few years (breaking into SF is a priority still) but I will write that book.

You think the stereotypes about security are bad? Whew, folks, you've got no idea.

Respects,
Steve
Riding High in the Saddle in Flyover Country, U.S.A.

I'm lucky - I've got a free speech clause written into my contract. Ain't trade unionism grand?

Waterstones, on the other hand, are are not lucky - they've just lost all my custom, which was worth about two hundred quid a year gross to them. Multiply that out by a thousand sf fans, and their payout for this will be twice what the tribunal will cost them.

Waterstones always threatened to go this way: the old Waterstones had a very devolved management structure, and the booksellers had a lot of power in buying decisions. Then it merged with Dillons, which was corporate cockdom writ large. Looks like the Dillons meme has triumphed, alas.

Vodkapundit has a link to a related piece:
http://vodkapundit.com/archives/007242.php

Re: "Blogging is great, but bloggers must remember that in a free country they are responsible for themselves, and what they say, and thus they must take the sometimes bad medicine arising from their actions. Nothing wrong with that. Joe exercised 'choice' in choosing what to write in his blog: his employer then responded via choices they were entitled to exercise in turn."

I don't think Waterstone's right to admonish their employee for doing something that they'd rather he didn't is the main issue here. It's more a case of the bitterness of the medicine being so wildly disproportionate to the scale of the original offence that's caused the uproar.

Yes, Joe was a bit daft - he's not denying that - but there was surely no need for Waterstone's to do anything more than politely ask him to 'cease and desist' on pain of further action - which he would have done - and the whole thing would have been quietly swept under the carpet and forgotten about; the offending material removed from the public forum.

[Aside: And it was, as Joe has pointed out, a limited circle-of-friends forum, at least to begin with. I host Joe's Woolamaloo site and have the traffic logs on file - before this blew up he was averaging around 20 or so visitors a day. When the story first broke, that increased to 200 or so. Yesterday, following the exposure on Boing Boing and other sites, it shot up to 4,600+ and today (with a story on The Register and a mention on The Times Online) judging by the size of the log file so far, he might be looking at double or treble that number. I'll send Joe the figures once I've had chance to process them and I'm sure he'll post them on Woolamaloo.]

So why did they take such extreme action unless, as Charlie suggests, Joe was the victim of a corporate witch-hunt to remove him from a branch where his old-school notions of bookselling (get to know your customers, understand their preferences and peccadilloes, sell them books they never knew existed as a result) were clearly no longer required?

And as for the whole sorry chain of events as a demonstration of corporate stupidity, coupled with an extreme ignorance of the very nature of the online media medium, what can you say? Waterstone's must be hopelessly out of touch.

It will be very interesting indeed to see what their Head Office eventually has to say about all this, or whether they just stick their heads in the sand and hope it will all blow over...