Novell to Release 20% of Their Employees?

sicariusdracus writes to tell us that Ron Hovsepian, the new president and COO of Novell may have his hands full in the near future. Ron has been tasked with getting the troubled business back on track which many have speculated could result in more than 20% of the 5,800 man workforce getting a pink slip (although Hovsepian suggests that may be an over exaggeration). Part of the restructuring will be announced with Novell's fourth-quarter financial results.

Act I

[Anonymous Coward]

Smithers: Mr. Hovsepian there's some solicitors at your door to see you.
Hovsepian: Release the employees.

fly my prettys, fly

[hector_uk]

i just got a mental picture of evil novel monkeys with wings being released......

Release?

[Anonymous Coward]

It makes it sound like they're in prison!

released

[specialkp]

I sure hope they're released under the GPL... It's good to see companies like this releasing human resources though. I'm going to download some today! Anyone got a torrent?

release... oh good, finally released...

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait a minute, are you saying we're FIRED?

I have such a hard time with this Newspeak.

Released...

[ch-chuck]

Lets just say they've been "open sourced". 1160 people liberated, people want to be free.

But not me, I'm expensive.

Re:"Over exaggeration"?

[bcmm]

In this context, it doesn't mean "not very". It's like saying "Windows 3.1 isn't really an OS". Maybe it only makes sense in en_GB. I don't know.

Re:WHAT ABOUT MIGUEL AND NAT

[geomon]

MIGUEL and NAT are the only two main Novell engineers.

Just ask them! They'll tell you.

So It Is True!

[Comatose51]

20% of the 5,800 man workforce getting a pink slip

So it is true! There really are no women in IT!

I kid, I kid.

Simpsons Quote

[kai.chan]

Burns to Homer: You can considered yourself DOWNSIZED.
Homer : What does that mean??
Smithers: I think it means you're dismissed, Homer.
Homer: Oh, good! Phew! Can I go back to work now?

Re:Stocks?

[tonyr60]

SGI's are even cheaper....

Not true, not true!

[mister_llah]

It's just that Novell wants to cut down on the number of long bearded, frighteningly overweight men in IT... and increase the ratio of long bearded, frighteningly overweight women in IT... :D

===

Stereotypes are fun!

Re:release... oh good, finally released...

[idlake]

Actuall, we programmers try to think of it as "allocation", "freeing", and "releasing". So, no, they haven't been "fired", they have been "freed".

Re:release... oh good, finally released...

[Otter]

I suppose it beats working at Sun and getting "garbage collected"...

They're object oriented

[vadim_t]

foreach NovellWorker Worker in CurrentlyHired {
        if( Worker.TooOld || Worker.EarnsTooMuch || Worker.HatedByBobInAccounting ) {
              Worker.Release();
              Worker.Dispose();
        }
}

Re:release... oh good, finally released...

[TheSpoom]

I've always thought that when I own a business, I'm going to have a plank out the second floor window into a dumpster for firing people. I'd use a sword and have pirate music and everything.

That, and an extremely good legal team.