(Just to throat clear ahead of time... I obviously find what Apple is doing super shitty. I just want to find some reason besides "Apple bad" for why they would do this.)
Could they be doing this title change, at least in theory, as an information security measure? Competitors and journalists could potentially corroborate (or have an easier time corroborating) leaks if they can verify that a former employee is the position/level they claim to be.
I worked briefly at Apple as contractor doing some professional services integration type stuff in the datacenter space, and one thing that struck me was how secrecy seemed to ooze it's way into super unexpected places. This was to the point that I wondered if an infosec team had a hand in designing some of the systems I was working with that were way closer to the power lines than they were to the products they were designing. This was also around the time that I was reading about Apple's "Worldwide Loyalty Team" and how they would plan operations to catch people leaking.
As an aside, does anyone know how accurate the reporting was/is on the "Worldwide Loyalty Team"? Looking back it seems absurd, to the point where it makes more sense to me as a myth than fact.
This was my first thought. Apple is notoriously secretive, even internally. They likely see this as a way to prevent folks from reverse engineering through job titles what former employees were working on. (Agreed that it's super shitty and likely overkill, but I think this is a better explanation than outright trying to screw former employees.)
In this case, though, why not replace the job title with "Employee"?
>In this case, though, why not replace the job title with "Employee"?
One (non-tech) company I worked at had a pretty stringent policy of always referring to "associates" rather than "employees". I don't exactly know why; maybe some kind of branding or psychological thing, like "you're part of the family" instead of "you're working for us". It admittedly does sound a little more pleasant.
Using "associate" or something along those lines is extremely common. It does seem a bit more pleasant and it also steers clear of employee vs. contractor legal distinctions.
I've worked in a couple of different industries, and from what I've seen an associate is generally a title for junior staff. After a few years, most graduate some type of specialist or project management job title.
This wasn't the case for the company I worked at. It applied to everyone of every rank. Not as a title, but just a general descriptor used in place of "employee" or "personnel".
I'm not going to make a judgment call on why but it does seem feasible that their system could have a drop-down for title, there is nothing generic in that list, so someone decided to use "Associate".
>As an aside, does anyone know how accurate the reporting was/is on the "Worldwide Loyalty Team"? Looking back it seems absurd, to the point where it makes more sense to me as a myth than fact.
It's not credible from a fact-checking analysis. For reference, the publication that broke the news was Gizmodo [0]. The major issues are:
i) The source of the information is not identified on the record, and is just listed as "Tom" (no last name).
ii) There is only one anonymous interview for the article, and no supporting documentation referenced in the article to justify the claims.
iii) No other publication appears to verify the information independently, such as Apple Insider [1], for such a major story. This includes newspapers that maintain a reputation for fact-checking and responsibility (e.g. The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal), where it should should be feasible to verify if this was widely known within Apple.
Exactly this has happened. People have long inferred various things about long-term Apple projects, such as self-driving cars (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_electric_car_project), based on the hires they've made (including acquihires). Coupled with Apple's noted paranoia, I can well see this being the reason why they would refuse to disclose someone's team, or even their specialism or seniority.
If it is for secrecy then why not delete the information and inform those who ask they do not hold such information? The issue was the discrepancy when a third party tried to verify, and I'm sure third parties would quickly learn to work around the fact?
Instead making everyone associates is like an error propagating far from it's call site until an exception (this article) is raised.
less about screwing the competition, more about hindering their ability to learn about development through trawling resumes. The more I try and describe it, the weaker it sounds in my head, but the idea is you could get some info on what Apple is doing by looking at resumes referencing Apple, then corroborate what you saw by checking former position with those firms.
Could they be doing this title change, at least in theory, as an information security measure? Competitors and journalists could potentially corroborate (or have an easier time corroborating) leaks if they can verify that a former employee is the position/level they claim to be.
I worked briefly at Apple as contractor doing some professional services integration type stuff in the datacenter space, and one thing that struck me was how secrecy seemed to ooze it's way into super unexpected places. This was to the point that I wondered if an infosec team had a hand in designing some of the systems I was working with that were way closer to the power lines than they were to the products they were designing. This was also around the time that I was reading about Apple's "Worldwide Loyalty Team" and how they would plan operations to catch people leaking.
As an aside, does anyone know how accurate the reporting was/is on the "Worldwide Loyalty Team"? Looking back it seems absurd, to the point where it makes more sense to me as a myth than fact.