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The company we know as Facebook on Tuesday, employees will hereinafter be known as “Metamats”. apparently this a nautical reference? And he was a cognitive scientist who didn’t use social media. suggested this nicknamein postscript to an email.
It’s all weird. Then again, “Facebookers” was pretty weird too.
The problem isn’t that Facebook/Meta/anybody chose a weird name to refer to their employees. The problem is, companies in tech like to use special names for their employees. This is not normal.
The thing is, technology is normal now. There was a time when the tech industry was new and different, and so was their corporate culture. But technology is now so ingrained in our lives that many of the company quirks that were cute in 2000 now seem artificial.
I humbly recommend that tech companies try to act like the corporate leaders they are. Maybe they can start by rethinking these names.
Google employers are called Google employees. Newly hired Google employees noogler. Former Google employees Xooglers. There is employee on Pinterest. Twilions Work for Twilio. Dashers Deliver burritos for DoorDash. toasters trouble for a company that makes new model cash registers.
boxers They’re in the corner at the software company Box and Dropboxers on the similarly named Dropbox. Splunk calls its employees splunkers. It’s a shame. Cave explorer term Spelunkers right there. HubSpots HubSpotters and Amazon amazons Like rival teams in the Canadian Football League.
There is also Silicon Valley puritans (Pure Storage employees), Palantirians (Palantir) and … wait… coins Bitcoin bank at Coinbase. (“Bae” is an affectionate term for someone special.)
Maybe you find it stale or cute. Both! and if lots of bread word games make people feel more connected to their colleagues, then let me in. OK, that was bad. Sorry.
Naming employees is mostly a technical thing, not exclusively. As far as I know, JPMorgan Chase bank tellers are not regularly referred to as “Followers.” The New York Times staff aren’t called the “Grey Ladies” like the paper’s old nickname—and if you call me the Gray Lady, I’ll hit you in the nose with a thick Sunday newspaper. (Or I would if I hadn’t gone completely digital.)
I can’t help feeling that these naming conventions for tech workers are an enduring artifact of the age of technology as a strange species in the world’s zoo.
Believe it or not, there was a time when technology was an edge industry desperate for attention. Steve Jobs used to call reporters from their homes to persuade them to pay more attention to what Apple was doing. Technology companies have embraced the status of foreign and oppressed. It was nice to be different and unwelcome.
This is no longer true. Technology won, and everything and everywhere. Human communication is inseparable from technology; so do money, entertainment, agriculture, transportation, our interactions with government, and the way we learn and work. Tech companies and executives are among the richest and most powerful forces on the planet. Could be Elon Musk move the stock markets with tweets from the toilet
Maybe I’m just a joyless killing spree. (I am.) But the more important and ubiquitous technology becomes, the more unfounded it feels for tech companies to act weird.
Some technical quirks are pretty cool. Who can argue free markets for employees and table chairs that double as works of art? And tech people don’t have to be soulless drones. But there must be a happy medium between the boring corporate executives and Palantir’s billionaire co-founder who sold the company’s stock while he was selling it. roller skis and wearing exercise clothes and glasses.
As with so many things related to technology, these specific names for company employees may need to be rethought. Coinbase can hold Coinbaes. Really A+.
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