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>>The employer derives no immediate advantage from the intern;

If the intern is doing work for free that the employer would have to have a paid employee perform, they are gaining an advantage and therefore are violating the law.

Can you honestly give an example of an unpaid internship where the employer is not gaining an advantage? If so, then it is fine to not pay them. But those are very, very rare. My opinion, obviously, but I can't think of a non-contrived example.

I'm reminded of the statement from the Netflix culture slides circulating around the net (paraphrasing): a company's culture is evident in who gets promotions and praise, not what is in a values statement.

Your management is willing to ignore childish behavior because it helps their bottom line. The path is clear - decide if you want to work in an organization that exhibits those values. If not, move on.

Cool Hand Luke Easy Rider Fight Club The Matrix 13 Assassins

What legitimate reason can there be to deny homosexual people the same liberty that heterosexual people enjoy?

I've never understood how people can be ok with denying liberty to some class of folks. Don't folks realize that there could come a time when they themselves will be in the minority on something? And that they could have their liberty restricted?

We're not talking about forcing the catholic church to marry gay couples. They have the right of free association as far as I understand it and freedom of religion. We are talking about legal marriages. Yes, the "M" word.

Liberty is a basic right.

So you are saying that even if no money goes to amazon, they book revenue?

I read an example on the net once that might clarify the "no immediate advantage" thing.

The guy was talking about working at a rail yard. At the end of the day, train cars were driven back into the yard for maintenance and/or storage. Interns were not allowed to do that, since it benefited the company. So the cars had to be moved back into the yard, then one or two were taking back out so interns could drive them back.

Kind of odd, I know.

Good point. I have a meeting with my manager this week to talk about various things, and I hope to bring up the subject.

As for the people - we spend a considerable amount of time in the workplace, and for me, respecting my coworkers is important to me. So I'm not sure I can totally focus on the tech side of things. On the other hand, if the people were great, but I was stuck doing vb6 development, I'd also be looking to leave. Then again, maybe it is me and not my coworkers. I don't know.

Hopefully I will be posting some links on HN in the future to some apps I built!

Thanks for the advice. My plan is to stay with my current position at the moment and try to open up avenues on the side. Like you said, the economy isn't the greatest right now.

Again, apologies for the long post folks.

Someone who doesn't give up. +1

Thanks for the links!

Where do you get this figure?