Comment by watwut
12 hours ago
Accidentally taking down production should not lead to firing. It should lead to improved process
Making up quotes for article, with technology or not, should lead to firing.
12 hours ago
Accidentally taking down production should not lead to firing. It should lead to improved process
Making up quotes for article, with technology or not, should lead to firing.
"should lead to firing..."
... and, also, improved processes. There should be no way an individual writer can damage the brand to this extent with absolutely no checks or oversight. This was just an error, but a bad actor could've put something far, far worse out there.
Even an automated quote-checker might have helped in this case.
Fact checking is a vital part of the editorial process and clearly that process failed here. Tech people often have a double standard when it comes to journalism--rules for thee but not for me. However the structure is fairly analogous, in that both professions ship under lots of time pressure where mistakes can be costly. I'm not sure, honestly, who is most at fault here or why only the reporter was terminated. But my comment above was to highlight that there shouldn't be a double standard--if you think a journalist should be fired for this kind of error it would be inconsistent to believe a software engineer shouldn't.