I’d call my friend Willy Chaplin a “character” if it weren’t subtly demeaning.
That wouldn’t be appropriate for a guy who, in addition to “getting” the Web before most of the rest of us (“The thirteen commandments of the World Wide Web,” Keep the Joint Running, 6/9/2008), has been at one time or another in his life a weapons designer, spy, programmer (if you enjoy backgammon, his on-line version is a must), commune-founding hippy, consensual bigamist, fugitive, jailbird, parent and grandparent.
This would be funny if it was funny.
A satirical piece I published in InfoWorld (“10 sure-fire ways to kill telecommuting,” 3/30/2009) mentioned that some promised savings would not materialize. In particular, reductions in office space lease costs often won’t materialize for years, because once you’ve signed a lease you pay until it expires.
The column also “recommended” pushing all home office costs onto remote employees as a great way to encourage ergonomically unsound furnishings, rely on consumer-grade networks, and cause employee resentment.
The timing was perfect: The following, provided by a KJR subscriber, is paraphrased from an internal memo posted on a well-known company’s intranet just last week:
