Is she delusional? The report doesn't substantiate her claim of sexism AT ALL. They couldn't even find the malicious code removals by "the guy who she wouldn't let fuck her" that was one of her central claims.
It doesn't insubstantiate them either. TPW acted "inappropriately", which may or may not have been because Julie was a female. I believe that the stress of the CEO (and his wife) on Julie may have contributed to her experience in the workplace overall. I've been under that kind of stress before (not gender-based) and I know that it colored the future dealings I had at that job.
Harassment doesn't happen in a vacuum and they shouldn't be considered isolated incidents. Harassment affects us all differently and what some people may be able to brush off, others get affected by, deeply.
I almost want to address you calling Julie delusional, but I'm afraid it would only lend credence to you calling her that...
1. They only have the git repo history to go on.
2. It's been long enough that errant objects have been garbage collected.
It's possible that the code she committed removed via a push that removed it from history entirely (e.g. `git push +old-master:master`). If this push was never reverted, then the commit object would become an orphan that was up for removal at the next garbage collection interval. After that, the incident would absolutely just be 'he said, she said,' and a lack of evidence would not be proof that she was lying.
Not saying it's impossible, but it seems like it'd have generated some documentation if it happened, probably in the form of people sending out "WTF? Who's pushing history-changes???" emails.
Edited to add: Also, the article says they reviewed git push logs, which I imagine would catch this.
Is it really only possible for a revert to happen 'within a few seconds' to not cause issues? That's a strong statement to make based on little information. It might be true, but the repository in question could also have little traffic, or this could have happened over a weekend.
> Also, the article says they reviewed git push logs, which I imagine would catch this.
I see. I guess overlooked that (probably just read it as 'commit logs').
In general, I don't understand why they didn't just ask her about the commits in question. If it did happen, she would likely be able to point them in the right direction and at least narrow their search (e.g. 'the revert happened in repository X around these dates'). If she couldn't, then they are no better off, but no worse off either.
That's a fair point. It'd depend a great deal on how github has their repos set up, and I can't remember seeing anyone talk about that.
The nature of the commit/revert.
Hey guys,
I had a branch `foo` in my repository `bar` a year or
so ago. I deleted the branch (which had no references)
and don't have any backups of it. Do you think that
you guys could restore it for me?Also, they said they looked at both the push log and the commit history.
I mean if you bought the whole bullshit about a lead reverting code (highly visible thing to do) because she would not put out and not because code was.. gasp broken then you are pretty delusional your self.
I was super sympathetic, too, and excited that there was such a good example of a woman fighting for her rights, until I saw her complaining about some guy deleting her code because he wanted to f* her. That's not what GH's investigation has found, and it's much more about the Preston-Werner's wrongs now.
If her allegations are found to have merit, then a lawsuit is what she would file next with this as the only evidence she needs to confirm what she's been saying.
Now that the results are in and they found nothing to support her allegations, it looks like GitHub has a strong defamation case to bring against her.
If I was her, I'd be looking for a good attorney to represent me. Since she never filed a lawsuit, this makes her look like what most people on the GitHub side have been saying all along. That she's indignant, bitter and feels entitled. Not to mention the whole time she's been feeding GitHub plenty of ammunition via social media.
Litigation is very slow. They want this to go away, not drag it out for months or years. Also, her lawyers would subpoena Github for years of chat logs, emails, and texts. Even if there is no smoking gun, they could probably dredge up something embarassing and make it public.
2. Github suing her for defamation would be SO counter-productive, as it would make them look awful. Also, did you see the part where they apologized to her?
Are you sure you actually read the OP?
Clearly, their FIRST public announcement was written on the advice of lawyers or PR people, where they admitted as little as possible, in part not to give her 'ammunition' in court. But it made them look bad and weasely. So this is the one they released _even though_ it gives her some ammunition.
1. TPW and her spouse acted inappropriately
2. There was no evidence of sexist behavior at GitHub (related to this instance, at least).
Horvath's claims included allegations of both 1 & 2. It's clear that her allegations did irreparable damage to GitHub, since a lot of people won't bother to follow this story in detail and will remember it a "sexist" place where your code may get deleted if you don't put out.
As you say GitHub will not be able to bring defamation charges against Horvath due to PR reasons, this is an unfortunate and sad state of affairs (and one of the very few times I long for the strong defamation laws in Europe).
I kind of don't want to cross any of their paths. Too much drama, might have been some sordid stuff but there was definitely a lot of drama. I'll keep my code elsewhere and I'll be wary of all involved.
She knew very well that an investigation was being conducted; it just wasn't an investigation to her liking.
Deleted comment
No, those were two different people, @tnm and @Holman.
http://valleywag.gawker.com/ims-and-email-support-allegation...
> "That blog post has nothing to do with my job, the quality of my work, or what kind of coworker I was. People reading that should wonder why any of those things are relevant to me being harassed and HR sitting idly by. Would this happen to a man in the same situation? No."
Addressing the distraction: if a man said a woman reverted his code because he wouldn't sleep with her, and withheld they were in a relationship, then yes, that would be relevant and should be raised.
Unlike what ValleyWag claims though, that's not actually a denial.
In particular -- if she's going to level tacit, but just the same highly public and career-damaging accusations of sexual harassment or other misconduct against other GitHub employees -- which, going by the language of her recent j'accuse tweet ("Don't do business with ...") would pretty much have to be what she's implying (even though she won't say it directly)[1,2] -- then she had better be prepared to back up what she's saying with reality-based specifics.
Being as, going by her "uneven", to say the least, track record on veracity thus far, we just don't have much reason to give her the benefit of the doubt.
[1] https://twitter.com/nrrrdcore/status/459358875213238272 [2] also http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/24/horvath-names-names/, since deleted.
I sincerely hope you see the irony in this.
Also you mischaracterized what I said. I asked if she was delusional for claiming the github blog post (which we can all read right in front of us) substantiates her claims. Not the initial claims of sexism themselves.
Also, you ignored the part about them not being able to find anything in the commit history to support her most concrete charge of sexism (having her code reverted by a male who wanted to have sex with her).
Though I'd assume they did more in depth investigations than just looking at the commit history, what with being a company that literally makes a living out of git.
A force push will still show up in the log. Issues and PRs aren't deletable, so that lends a bit of credibility to this. Sure, said engineer probably has access to erase the push log and delete the issues or PRs directly from the database, but parties involved would likely still have email notifications related to it.