I'm generally perceived as a pretty funny guy, I joke around with both my reports and those I report to, and, yes, even with customers all the time. I've found that I don't need to diminish others to do this, there's plenty of other crap to joke about, like the quality of our products, how long it takes to get stuff done, the UX of the tools we share, dumb programming trends. It's easy to laugh without it being at the expense of others.

It's fine to laugh at things. But circulating a list with customer's real names that you think is funny is very unprofessional. I'm sure my coworkers and I have had a laugh now and then about a name that is strange to us. But we wouldn't post it up somewhere and keep making fun on a long term basis. That's a different level.

It's very easy to find jokes material without making fun of other people.

You just have to have that mindset. Make fun of yourself instead of others, for instance.

They were laughing at people, not things.