
I thought I was being ‘blacklisted’, so I demanded to see colleagues’ emails - MyHypatia
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/university-blacklist-academic-phd-a9016186.html
======
motohagiography
Anecdotally, I met someone who stopped updating their linkedin profile because
he found out someone was making anonymous comments and allegations to his
employers. He didn't know what they were or who it was because it came second
hand from a colleague who told him that an exec had asked about him because of
an anonymous message.

Also, whisper networks in tech are very much a thing and they are full of just
the quality of people you would expect to find in them. When asked about
people I truly can't stand, I say I am sympathetic to the barriers they faced
to success and we didn't know each other well. It's not a code, it's the
truth. I don't give much weight to the opinions of people who are cruel or
have axes to grind either. This is a rare view.

Keep your public social networks well-pruned. Don't talk about plans, the
future, or uncertain opportunities, and if you work for crappy people, get out
as fast as you can before you give them an unlimited option on causing your
reputation harm for the rest of your career.

~~~
traderjane
Whisper networks just mean powerful people who talk among each other and do
their research. That will always be the case. In politics isn’t that just the
standard form of discourse?

~~~
sp332
Whisper networks are less-powerful people warning each other about more-
powerful people. People with power don't need to hide their communications so
much because they are less vulnerable.

~~~
jackhack
Have we learned nothing from Wikileaks? Quite the contrary! People with power
_rely_ on private/secret communications. And, without power, what is there to
communicate, for what you say likely has no _value_.

I am reminded of Napoleon's dictum: "the secret of war lies in the
communications". Sun Tzu would disagree as well, having well documented the
value of secrets and spies.

"(private) knowledge is power."

~~~
sp332
Sure but I've never heard one of those referred to as a whisper network.

------
BeetleB
I think people should keep a few things in mind.

First, we have only one side of the story. The claim is the advisor never
spoke to her about the problems he had with her, and we shouldn't simply
assume the claim is true. OTOH, I can easily believe it is, given my
experience in grad school. While some professors were quite fussy about
quality in the thesis, others accepted that most PhD's (in engineering) are
not targeting scientific research after the degree, and lower the standards to
allow them to graduate. But they absolutely will not support such people in
getting a research position at a university or a government lab. Some are open
about it: "If you're targeting research and want my recommendations for that
endeavor, this is what you need to do. If not, then all you need is X, Y and
Z." Unfortunately, not all advisors are as frank.

Also keep in mind that the person may well have been a very competent
researcher, while simultaneously being hard to work with. It's quite fair to
point it out when asked, and it's quite fair to disrecommend someone because
of it.

I don't think the article presents any evidence of _active_ blacklisting,
where one is going out of their way to tell everyone (without solicitation)
"Don't hire this person!"

Finally, the _real_ issue: What role should references play in the hiring
process? I personally would love a world where we never rely on letters of
recommendation and references - I think they are the weakest link in the
hiring process. However, if we do accept references/letters of recommendation,
then everything in the article is fair game. If you ever asked someone what
they thought of a candidate before hiring them, you are part of the same
culture that this person's advisor is.

------
Singletoned
As a fellow Aspy, I started reading this thinking, I bet he's a bit of a
difficult person. Maybe an Aspy.

> Where my personality was called into question perhaps my working-class
> background, my northern accent, and my Aspergers could be a reasonable
> explanation.

Ah! Yes, I can guess which one of those three is the reason people found you
difficult.

~~~
clavalle
I know plenty of people on the spectrum that are pleasant to be around and
work with.

Engaging differently socially, while difficult in some sense, isn't
necessarily unpleasant.

------
lordfoom
An interesting outcome of the GPDR! Does the author have any recourse? Can
they sue?

~~~
ceejayoz
For what? Someone's negative opinion of them?

~~~
jsty
The UK has famously strict libel laws, and notably the burden of proof is on
the defendant to prove the truth of their defamatory speech.

[https://www.burnetts.co.uk/publications/blogs/libel-and-
slan...](https://www.burnetts.co.uk/publications/blogs/libel-and-slander-laws)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_defamation_law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_defamation_law)

~~~
tomatocracy
I think there needs to be an act of publication for defamation law to be
engaged though. It might be rather hard to argue that private emails reach
that bar.

~~~
jsty
I'd note that the relevant definition of publish isn't the common-sense use
(i.e. make available publicly), but merely "the communication of the
defamatory matter to a third person" [0]. Indeed the first link in my prior
post specifically calls out defamation via private methods of communication
(texting) as something that may be actionable.

[0]
[http://www.hse.gov.uk/enforce/enforcementguide/court/reporti...](http://www.hse.gov.uk/enforce/enforcementguide/court/reporting-
defamation.htm)

~~~
ijpoijpoihpiuoh
It seems like the reform act of 2013 might make these comments in-bounds:

Honest opinion: It is a defence for defamation, to show the statement
complained of was a statement of opinion; that it indicated, in general or
specific terms, the basis of the opinion; that an honest person could have
held the opinion on any fact which existed when the statement was published,
including any fact in a privileged statement that was pre-published. The
defence is defeated if the claimant shows the defendant did not hold the
opinion.

------
harryh
You can generally do the same thing in the US for emails to/from public
university addresses with a FOIA request.

This seems kind of wild to me, but apparently it works.

~~~
dragonwriter
> You can generally do the same thing in the US for emails to/from public
> university addresses with a FOIA request

No, you can't, because FOIA applies to federal agencies only. Some official
communications of a public university might be subject to similar state
sunshine laws, but not all email to and from public university email addresses
(even some official communication would be protected by FERPA or other privacy
laws, and therefore not disclosable under a state open records law.)

~~~
harryh
OK, you're correct that it's not the federal FOIA law that is the issue, but
most states have similar state laws that have been used in the past for this
sort of thing.

See, for example: [https://www.acenet.edu/the-presidency/columns-and-
features/P...](https://www.acenet.edu/the-presidency/columns-and-
features/Pages/Legal-Watch-0112.aspx)

~~~
dragonwriter
> but most states have similar state laws

Which are addressed in the part of my post after the first sentence (which is
entirely consistent with your link): they don't generally apply to all email
from a public university address, or even (because of both express exceptions
in the state laws and superceding federal law) all university _employee_
communication using such addresses.

~~~
harryh
Heh, ok. I think we're agreeing then. :)

Definitely some variation from state to state. And definitely some
restrictions due to things like FERPA and other privacy laws.

But I think it's good for state university employees to know that this kind of
thing can happen at all. I think that many of them would be surprised to learn
that the general public can make any kind of request at all for copies of what
they consider private emails.

I know that my wife, who does some work in areas that can be politically
charged, was when she took a job at UNC and someone told her this.

------
ptaipale
> "I was able to ask my PhD college, and several other institutions, to see
> all emails in which my name appeared ..."

How are different people with the same name distinguished in these cases?

Name might be (almost) unambiguous for some people, but lots of us have many,
many namesakes. Is the institution required to reliably tell apart which of
the messages were meaning the person making the information request, and which
were talking about someone else? What are the penalties for leaking emails
that were discussing someone else who has the same name?

------
bryanrasmussen
I actually think I've been "blacklisted" at a government agency in my country,
or at least someone with hiring power must be working there who specifically
does not want to hire me.

Two reasons -

1\. some years ago there was a job listing at the agency for a programmer with
experience in a governmental specification that I was the technical guy in the
working group that made the specification, for heavy experience in some
technologies I am very good at, including some international standards in
which I am thanked as one of the contributors to the standard and when I
applied I got the standard reply some months later they went with someone more
qualified which is their choice however I can say with 99.9% certainty there
was only one other person in the country possibly more qualified than I am
(given the technologies involved and the time) and he wasn't applying.

2\. another time they put up a technical challenge and normally when I
complete a technical challenge of the particular sort I did the potential
employer likes to meet me (they put it online and said try to do this and see
if you would be someone we might like to hire). And they said they decided to
go with someone else but they did not have any comments on my technical
challenge.

So what I'm saying I would really like to get all details from any
communications regarding possibly hiring me from that ministry because it
might be interesting, but then again I am also of the kind of personality that
it just might infuriate me - and what good is that?

~~~
dahdum
You could be right, but "more qualified" doesn't have to mean "technical
expertise in this exact standard". They could easily be weighing factors such
as previous leadership experience, team/group experience, stated career goals,
stated interests, demeanor, or experience in other tangential technologies.

~~~
bryanrasmussen
there was nothing stated about anything like any of that in the announcement,
I mean it was such a close match to me that I was awfully tempted to send back
an email "what do you mean more experienced, who is the more experienced
person in the country for these things you say you want than I"

~~~
bryanrasmussen
The only thing that makes me think I'm wrong is the consideration that maybe
my CV at the time was too crowded, I later had someone improve my CV and after
that it started getting more uptake, but even so it was too weird, to make an
example here (and note to make the example mean anything I have to use someone
famous enough that people will understand it, I am not making any equivalence
between us), it would be equivalent to a job announcement saying:

You have a very strong background in Ruby on Rails, understanding of Instiki
Wiki, and the Basecamp project management software. You have developed at
least one open source project that is used by many people, and you should also
have developed at least one project management software. Over that it would be
nice if you know something about racing cars, and have won the "Hacker of the
Year" award at least once.

And then when David Heinemeier Hansson applies waiting months to send a reply
"we decided to go with someone more qualified" without even interviewing him.

Note: I hope I don't get any of those I you are really conceited to compare
yourself to Hansson comments, since that is not what I'm doing.

------
GordonS
> I was able to ask my PhD college, and several other institutions, to see all
> emails in which my name appeared in either the subject line or the body of
> the email

Hmm, I don't think I like this, and I don't understand how the GDPR allows you
to do this.

While I understand that stored emails that mention you are technically "data
about you", I wouldn't consider them "your data".

Emails are a form of personal communication, and are only really accessible by
the author and recipients. Furthermore, those emails would contain PI about
_other_ individuals - what of _their_ rights, or indeed the rights of the
email authors (regardless of the message content)?

I support the GDPR, but I don't think using it like this falls within it's
intent.

~~~
icebraining
The GDPR does say "the right to obtain a copy (...) shall not adversely affect
the rights and freedoms of others", but it doesn't spell out what that means.

Still, your work email account can be monitored by your employer (though in
the EU they have to provide notice of that monitoring), so you don't have the
same protection as in a private account.

OTOH, it could be a violation of privacy / data-protection for the author of
this piece to be divulging the contents of these emails, even if they have a
right to a copy.

~~~
zaarn
>though in the EU they have to provide notice of that monitoring

There is an interesting exception; if private usage of your work mail account
is banned, it should not contain private data and therefore, it's free to be
monitored. Same for internet usage. This is usually coded into your contract
when you sign.

~~~
GordonS
Work emails can easily contain private data too. I might send an email to my
manager asking for time off for deeply personal reasons, or informing them
about very personal circumstances (e.g. health). There are of course numerous
less impactful examples.

An employer monitoring Internet usage is a very different case - in almost all
cases it will be fully automated, and the logs only available to HR on
request; not just any employee can request your logs.

~~~
zaarn
Those are still work related mails, though they get a better set of protection
than normal work related mails.

------
crb002
Victim of nasty blacklisting myself. My advise is to be way nicer and make far
more friends in the industry than the blacklister. Especially if you are
autistic spectrum, you need a good support network.

~~~
silveroriole
In other words, the solution to someone thinking you’re unlikeable and hard to
work with is to become more likeable? Who could have guessed ;)

------
hycaria
>Where my personality was called into question perhaps my working-class
background, my northern accent, and my Aspergers could be a reasonable
explanation.

Easier to resort to such hypotheses than be self critical, I guess.

Do we really fall in the category where one student with apparently decent
thesis results gets ostarcized by her advisor AND the examiners, where no one
in the faculty or comittee would stand for her, even though successfull
students do bring a lot of prestige to their team, lab and advisor ? Would it
really be in their interest if they have no reason to ? She is doubtly their
first tutored PhD ever, and I guess have they seen enough to give feedback
that is relied on by other actors in the field ?

I mean, we're all old enough to have met people that despite competence are
hard to work (or be) with and would rather not have to deal with.

And considering she did a smart and unconventional GDPR request, and she's
legitimately pissed off about its results but goes as far as to publish in the
press about it...

~~~
black_puppydog
Doing this behind her back, and without recourse, refusing to talk about it to
the person in question, basically the whole way this happened, does _not_
shine a good light on the advisors here.

Plus, you may have noticed, she wrote under a non-identifiable name (outside
maybe people already in the know) and didn't name the people in question, nor
the institutions. So yeah, she's pissed, IMHO rightfully so, especially since
this is a career breaking thing and without recourse.

~~~
hycaria
So personal recommandations should be disclosed ? That kinda goes against the
point of trying to have an open discussion about a potential appliant. And
what would the recourse be anyways ?

What good would a talk do, since admittedly it's a person and not a work
problem ? Do any good come out of people explaining how they despise your
attitude, especially with high stakes, where no response will ever bring
closure ?

Yes, btw I hope the publisher has more insight than the reader and does a
background check.

Edit : though I agree that the team should've hold a discussion, as sterile as
it probably would've been, for it's own reputation.

~~~
jcranberry
If she knew that her academic career prospects were being sabotaged by her
advisor rather than having her mental health deteriorate while failing to
pursue an academic career in her field, she could have pivoted to industry or
a separate topic.

~~~
black_puppydog
In which case she might be able to burn bridges, and call out people, and just
tell her side of the story, if she... dunno... published it somewhere.

~~~
jcranberry
I doubt she views her current situation as better than the alternatives she
would've had if she had been told in the first place.

------
vectorEQ
i feel for this person. my mother got blacklisted in her teaching profession,
this stress triggered in her dormant traumas from her childhood, and she's
been on medication now for 20 years due to these people pushing her over the
edge with such behaviours.

no matter how good you feel about yourself, give others a chance, even if they
dont 'gel well with you'. don't feel 'threatened' by other people who are
talented, feel graced by their wits and try to grow from them instead of
kicking them down.

lack of respect and integrity at its worst, it's an epidemic in our society.

------
Grue3
>I was able to ask my PhD college, and several other institutions, to see all
emails in which my name appeared in either the subject line or the body of the
email.

The scariest part is that this is apparently possible in countries under the
jurisdiction of GDPR now (and possibly even outside of it). Your private
emails talking about a third party might be exposed at the request of the said
third party. Does no one else consider this _extremely_ concerning?

~~~
awinder
I'm pretty sure that this would only apply in the contexts of business
dealings -- anything you produce from a business you work for should not be
considered your private anything, it's work material you produced for that
employer, and the actions became the employer's actions after executed.

~~~
Grue3
Even in business context this can be weaponised. For example two executives in
a company discuss some sort of business strategy and mention the competitor's
CEO by name (also the competitor's company happens to be named after its CEO
so it's impossible to discuss it without saying his or her name). The
competitor's CEO GDPRs the emails and learns of the secret business plan as a
result.

~~~
Silhouette
_Even in business context this can be weaponised._

Indeed. Just imagine the fall-out if someone started a movement where everyone
who got turned down for a job they applied for then submitted a SAR for all of
the internal commentary and communications about them. Suddenly every business
that hires staff has an extra overhead, even small businesses need industrial-
scale HR/legal mechanics for the application process, and the number of
lawsuits for every conceivable type of discrimination skyrockets.

~~~
awinder
This is already a concern (not the absence of hiring documentation, but
extreme caution around what is captured into electronic long-term storage),
pre-and-post GDPR. "Pick up the phone" is a very real piece of advice around
hiring-related conversations and for good reasons. I think it's incredibly
contorted to believe the world falls apart here (in fact, the world would have
to be pretty broken in order for it to go down that way).

------
air7
> Where my personality was called into question perhaps my working-class
> background, my northern accent, and my Asperger's could be a reasonable
> explanation.

It's quite likely that ones background and developmental disorders shape one's
personality. However, it's still their personality. So what if it has a
reason?

This touches on the dark abyss of "free will". In some sense all we are is a
cellular-automata chugging along according to the laws of physics. In that
sense everything one does has a "reason". Yet we live our lives, and shape our
societies, with the idea that sane adults have an ability to chart their own
course, in some sense. (in contrast to children or "insane" people who are
considered more reactive/automatic hence not responsible for their actions).

What part of my actions are my responsibility (and therefor have consequences)
and what part is beyond my control (and should be forgiven, at least
partially)?

~~~
sysbin
Free will is an illusion and simply it doesn't exist.

You cannot make either a choice or decision that's truly your own. Simply, you
cannot without being effected by the system you're in.

People don't choose the life they're born into and why does anything that
comes after birth be assumed differently. The answer cultural conditioning and
from religious ideology that has rooted deeply into society. The belief that
god gave humanity free will.

No part of your actions are truly the responsibility of you as a person but
the fate of cause & effect and everything outside one's control. The system of
society with genetics & environment being imperfect makes bad people.
Otherwise we would just have 'people' in a system of perfect equality.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
Let's suppose you're right and non-determinism doesn't exist. (Quantum physics
apparently disagrees, but never mind that.)

It doesn't matter. Treating people as though they have agency is still
necessary, because how we treat them would affect their deterministic state
function.

If someone commits murder and we say it was only a product of their
environment and they have no agency, therefore we shouldn't punish them, well,
that's the sort of "choice" that, on a systemic level, causes more people to
commit murder. Even if they have no "choice" in the matter -- especially then
-- creating an environment in which murder has personal benefits outweighing
the personal costs is societally maladaptive.

And so it is with everything else. If we want people to give to charity and go
to college and not steal from others then we have to act as if they chose
whether or not to do those things and reward or punish them accordingly.

~~~
bena
Also, the paradox is that it doesn't matter one bit whether free will exists
or not.

Because either it does and we are making conscious choices and everything that
normally follows with that. Or it doesn't and _everything_ we say, do, and
think is predetermined.

However, if that's the case, then you are predetermined to be someone to be
swayed by certain arguments. You are predetermined to either believe or not in
free will. And you cannot change that. Because even if this convinces you one
way or the other, I had no choice in typing it, and you had no choice in
reading it. This was going to happen based on whatever determines things.

So free will not existing wouldn't change anything. Because some people are
predetermined to believe that regardless of the reason, murderers should be
punished.

~~~
sysbin
Well, I'm proclaiming free will doesn't exist. Neuroscience exhibits
supporting evidence that we don't have free will. There hasn't been anything
exhibiting that we have free will.

Your rhetoric that nothing matters could have been used when people assumed
the world was flat and others were challenging that popular assumption.
Nonetheless, the world gets better overtime and when people have a realistic
understanding of reality.

So change does happen but yes it's going to happen whether we like it to or
not. That's a thrilling thing to observe and to be aware of that nature of
reality is a good thing.

> murderers should be punished.

No, they should be rehabilitated and educated of the cause & effect for their
actions. Otherwise humanity is failing the unfortunate that didn't have any
real control.

~~~
icebraining
If there's no free will, the people punishing murderers have no choice to
rehabilitate instead. Choosing between punishing or rehabilitating requires
free will.

~~~
ericb
No, I think the point made above is that you can still choose punishment
because even with no free will involved, the future decision calculations need
to observe a strong penalty to deciding yes for murder. This doesn't require
free will any more than an if-then I write in code requires it.

~~~
bena
But your if-then exhibits no independent action. It just is. It can't
"choose", it just takes input and gives a predetermined output based on that
input.

If free will does not exist, you do not have a choice. It's disingenuous to
both argue that free will does not exist and to proclaim that we should do
anything. Or that we can make any sort of choice.

~~~
ericb
> It's disingenuous to both argue that free will does not exist and to
> proclaim that we should do anything.

Not at all.

Maybe you are a free-will-lacking if-then bot that takes whatever suggestions
someone says we should do and executes them, and maybe I am a free will
lacking robot that periodically burps out suggestions. No disenguity or "true
choice" required.

~~~
bena
But if free will does not exist and you believe that, then you would know that
whomever you're making the suggestion to is incapable of changing whatever
path they were going on in the first place.

By suggesting a course of action, you are implying there is an actor with
agency out there.

Now, while the actor itself may not actually have agency, that does not
absolve you. Any attempt to persuade is an implicit acknowledgement of free
will.

~~~
ericb
> Any attempt to persuade is an implicit acknowledgement of free will.

> But your if-then exhibits no independent action.

Attempts at persuasion don't imply free will, they just change the input to
the if-then in a downstream deterministic process.

If bash script A calls bash script B with a command line flag to make it
follow an alternate behavior, nothing is implied about the free will of either
bash script.

------
nkurz
_There are new EU-wide data regulations, known as the GDPR, that were
introduced in 2018. These regulations allow people to make a data request,
called a Subject Access Request, to any institution that holds any data on
them. The definition of data is pretty broad, and I was able to ask my PhD
college, and several other institutions, to see all emails in which my name
appeared in either the subject line or the body of the email._

While it may now be legal in the EU to request a copy of all emails that
mention you by name, socially it would be a terrible betrayal of trust.
Ironically, this seems like clear confirmatory evidence of the sort of red-
flag behavior that would cause an advisor to send private emails strongly
discouraging others from hiring you even if you were qualified on-paper for
the position.

~~~
sct202
That doesn't seem fair since the emails were sent long before the writer made
the requests. If she had never asked for the emails, the same things would be
said about her.

~~~
nkurz
Sure, I don't mean that it was evidence at the time, rather that suspicions
held by the advisor seem to have been proved true. I presume that advisor felt
justified in warning others that the author might be a problematic hire, and a
scandal like this is evidence that the suspicion was correct.

I think the right question to ask is whether an advisor is obligated to give
positive recommendations for an advisee if they come to regret having taken
them on. My sense is that the advisor was correct to notice that socially
something was "off" about the author, and correct that others might regret
hiring her, just as he(?) had come to regret choosing her as a student. I
don't know though whether it's legal under current EU law to act on these
observations and experiences.

