Data Center Staff Will Sleep Among the Racks For London Olympics 210
1sockchuck writes "Staff at Interxion's London data center are ready to hunker down during the Olympic Games this summer, nestled in snug sleeping pods adjacent to the racks. The arrangement will ensure that the facility will be fully-staffed if London's transit system is taxed by the huge crowds expected for the Games. While staff in many industries might object to a plan that expects them to sleep in their office, data center firms have a primary calling of keeping their facilities operational at all times. Is this too much readiness, or just enough?"
Oh, that's bullshit! (Score:5, Funny)
IT people don't sleep.
Re:Oh, that's bullshit! (Score:5, Funny)
Sorry, is this company _asking_ people to be "asleep at the job"?
Re:Oh, that's bullshit! (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry, is this company _asking_ people to be "asleep at the job"?
No, they're merely resting their eyes during the hours that they are likely not being paid overtime for, that's all.
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Just be glad if they're not charged rent...
Re:Oh, that's bullshit! (Score:5, Funny)
Summer Olympics 2012
I survived Wake on LAN
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Sorry, is this company _asking_ people to be "asleep at the job"?
More like they are asking people to work in their sleep.
Re:Oh, that's bullshit! (Score:4, Insightful)
I for one, fully expect that rack mount rails will be the only thing that moves in East London during the olympics.
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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...just weep silently in their sleeping pods all night.
Looks a bit like a multi-tiered crematorium to me...
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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Depends on pay (Score:4, Insightful)
Are they getting paid to be on duty 24/7?
Re:Depends on pay (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes. In the US we call it being salaried.
Re:Depends on pay (Score:5, Funny)
Employment law is ever so slightly different in the EU.
True that. In the US, you are expected to sleep under your desk. Non of this 'pod' nonsense.
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True that. In the US, you are expected to sleep under your desk. Non of this 'pod' nonsense.
You call your desk what you want, I'll call my task and entertainment center what I want.
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Re:Depends on pay (Score:5, Funny)
"Readiness" is just a cover story that they've told management; really it's going to be a month-long LAN party.
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Are they getting paid to be on duty 24/7?
Show me a data center admin that's not "on call" 24/7 and I'll show you a data center with a nightly power-down procedure.
Being paid is another matter entirely.
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Or you work at an organization the treat people like human beings and staff accordingly.
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I'm lucky; I'm only on-call one week out of 7(ish). I have to wonder if all the staff will be on hand, or just the "on-call" folks.
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I'm a "tech" according to my title, but I'm effectively my companies admin for our servers. I'm also the only IT employee. Hourly to boot. On the negative side, even I am on unofficial 24/7 call. The overtime is nice, though they are starting to notice something is off now that we are on a 40 hour maximum lock down and I'm earning whole days off per pay period.
WHAT?!? (Score:3, Funny)
WHAT DID YOU SAY?!? I CAN'T HEAR YOU OVER ALL THIS FAN NOISE!
(Hey Filter, learn to take a joke. I'm trying to act like I'm YELLING.)
Sounds kind of fun, actually. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Sounds kind of fun, actually. (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, if they are the types who actually enjoy their jobs and get along with their coworkers this could be a lot of fun. It might get old towards the end, but I personally wouldn't have a problem with it. If nothing else you'd be much closer as a group after something like that, plus I bet they'll all have fun stories to tell when it's over. Not to mention that if they have a decent employer who knows what they're asking for there'll probably be free food for that time.
The only point of friction might be optimal sleeping spots. No one wants to sleep in the hot aisle, and you'd probably need earplugs.
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I'll take proper pay and buy my own food, thanks.
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I'll take proper pay and buy my own food, thanks.
They could have spent money on load testing and/or extra redundancy before hand to reduce the risk of issues. There are some things that can't be solved by throwing money at it, and this isn't one of them. It just so happened that taking advantage of IT staff was the cheapest solution. Sadly, it usually is.
The first solution would of had long lasting positive implications. What are they going to do during the next big event or even a crisis?... call in more IT staff again?
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If I were the employer and I was running this type of high-profile event, I might do both: Redundancy can fail, and load testing only proves what you've tested, after all. Having someone on hand to fix things immediately will prevent a crisis should something unexpected happen.
Of course, as the employee, I'd want extra pay, and other compensation (extended time off after? Extra vacation? An award plaque for sure would not be enough...) for this.
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Their stated reason is fear of breakdown in transport. Implying that on duty staff would be stuck there, off duty staff would be at home. Coincident with the only real maximum load they will ever see.
Setting up sleeping and washing facilities is unusually human for the employer. Most would throw you a package of wet wipes and tell you to bring your camping gear.
If transport continues to work I assume responsibilities will be handed off. Then again slackers will surely slack.
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The Olympics is on a far different scale than just about any other event on Earth, though...
Yes, the latest hypothesis in academic circles is "the Olympics" was the major contributing factor in the extinction of the dinosaurs.
You have over sold the Olympics as an earthly event.
Re:Sounds kind of fun, actually. (Score:4, Insightful)
Any work request made to an employee who doesn't have any force behind them is never truly voluntary.
People will remember you aren't a "team player". Of course those same people get to go home at night.
Re:Sounds kind of fun, actually. (Score:5, Interesting)
That's what I loved about my Japanese boss back when working for a Japanese company. He was there as long as I was. His rule was that he's the first in the office and the last one to go home. It may sound trivial considering that I didn't really need him for anything (me being technology, him being beancounting), but it is superior in morality to "ok, you stay here 'til midnight and finish that ... whatever, I'll be off for some golfing".
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That is what I liked about one of my former bosses, before he moved on. I'd get called in on the weekend to do something, or stayed late, and he was often here as well doing something on his own despite being salaried and able to go. There were times I was leaving on a weekend call-in and he'd be coming in. He lived an hour away.
Coincidentally, he did study management methods used by the Japanese.
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Except that he was often slumped over his desk in the afternoon, asleep; or in a trance state. Which he would deny.
I think it had something to do with the exceptionally poor business decisions he made too.
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His rule was that he's the first in the office and the last one to go home.
The whole "come early, leave late" thing is actually one of the shittiest parts of working in Japanese culture:
Arriving early for work is common in Japan and shows commitment to colleagues and seniors. It is therefore not uncommon for Japanese workers to arrive 30 to 60 minutes early for work. Additionally, leaving work late expresses the same sort of commitment. Usually, the first person to leave will show his/her apology by saying “Osakinishitsurei shimasu” which translates to “excuse me for going first”. Generally, it is considered bad practice to leave before the boss does.
Source: http://www.liveworkjapan.com/customs.shtml [liveworkjapan.com]
The practice is starting to wane, but do some Googling and find out how shitty it really is. Apparently, if you come to work on time and leave on time, you're "lazy" no matter how productive you are in the office.
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You also need to have enough facilities (showers, rest rooms, kitchen, fridge space) and it needs to be safe, considering that there might be more than the usual number of people in the building.
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agree, agree, and agree. Its not too different than being on-call. Getting paid to sleep, I would find that awesome. And if something does take a crap, mmmm I'd love to wake up to the smell of overtime pay :)
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"Voluntary, compensated and not a long-term thing" you say? So, then, not like this guy [livejournal.com] whose blog as a Katrina-stranded sysadmin was so absorbing...but possibly required reading for .uk admins who might get this gig.
Sure, it's reasonable (Score:5, Insightful)
If....
a) It's for a short time (check)
b) It's critical (check)
c) There's enough people on-staff to rotate who's doing this (not sure)
d) There's substantial reward/overtime/extra PTO/something for doing something like this (not sure)
So, it's 50% reasonable, maybe completely reasonable IN THIS CASE.
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Sorry, the established threshold is clearly 60%. Every time.
Sleep among the racks (Score:5, Funny)
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It's London, how much climate control is actually needed?
An umbrella?
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Well, not for cooling, but ACs can also dehumidify, and that's really needed there.
Re:Sleep among the racks (Score:4, Interesting)
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Where in the US do you live, and what's the x amount for a 1200 sq ft 3 bedroom apartment in NYC?
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What part of NYC? A lot of difference between the Village, the Upper East and West Sides, Washington Heights, different parts of Brooklyn, etc.
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Re:Sleep among the racks (Score:4, Informative)
What part of NYC? A lot of difference between the Village, the Upper East and West Sides, Washington Heights, different parts of Brooklyn, etc.
Then just give a few representative prices.
A 3 bedroom 1200 ft^2 apartment in San Francisco is way out of my price range. You can get a decent 2 bedroom 900 ft^2 apartment for $2200 - $2700/month.
If you want a luxury apartment in a new building, then you can spend $3000 - $5000 (or more)
Re:Sleep among the racks (Score:4, Informative)
$1200 in NYC will get you halfway to owning a one room the size of a closet.
... and up here just about ten miles outside of Scotland's largest and most important city, Glasgow (sorry Edinburgh, I know you've got the Scottish Parliament building and all), the equivalent of roughly $700US gets you a two-bedroom farm cottage with a half acre garden. As an added bonus, London is hundreds of miles away.
Re:Sleep among the racks (Score:5, Interesting)
And it gives the staff the opportunity to rent out their flat for a rather nice bonus. Game on (or perhaps games on).
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That's actually a good point. During the Olympics, accommodations will be able to fetch quite a bit.
Havn't they ever heard of shifts? (Score:3)
Re:Havn't they ever heard of shifts? (Score:5, Insightful)
From description...it sounds like the London transportation system may be overwhelmed and they simply may not be able to get replacement staff in the center in a timely manner.
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From description...it sounds like the London transportation system may be overwhelmed and they simply may not be able to get replacement staff in the center in a timely manner.
If these guys are "soooo" important then maybe they should get the appropriate "rock star" treatment.
I say fly them in by helicopter!
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if the entire idea is to be prepared for difficulty with mass-transit, then they have screwed up. I was in atlanta for the olympics when everyone panicked over transportation, and there were no problems, and Atlanta is a city that has all kinds of traffic problems when not inundated with foreigners! They may need to have staggered shifts and odd start times to avoid peak traffic, but otherwise this just sounds like panicked stupidity.
Re:Havn't they ever heard of shifts? (Score:5, Insightful)
Interxion have got their message about how seriously they take their customers uptime and how far they go to plan for eventualities out to readers of Data Center Knowledge (and now to Slashdot). I'd say money well spent, regardless of whether anyone will use the pods for more than publicity shots (or even if Interxion seriously expected them to).
That said, I'm not sure that Atlanta compares to London in terms of aging, and seriously creaking transport infrastructure. e.g. Atlanta has what is supposedly world's airport handling 90m travelers on its five runways; Heathrow handles 70m on just two runways both of which operate at over 98% capacity (plans to add a third were dropped when the current government was elected). The Victorian metro system is similarly overloaded having the distinction of being the oldest in the world while having to serve a population of almost 8 million.
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good, it looks like most of the guess work is done. Set your staggered shifts and odd start times to accomodate not being on transit in those giant red blocks. That shows no need to never leave the premises for the duration of the games.
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What experience have you had with London 'Transport' System?
FYI
http://bit.ly/GXCpJK [bit.ly] (from a googleusercontent.com/VeryLongUrl :( )
The population of London and Bangkok are similar at ~7M. That chart showed up to a 30minute wait in London! I don't ever remember waiting longer than 4 minutes to take transit in Bangkok, and they're considered a developing country.
Perhaps London isn't suitable for the Olympics, or living...
Re:Havn't they ever heard of shifts? (Score:5, Insightful)
This is simply risk management. There is a risk that staff might have trouble commuting, so they are mitigating that risk.
Re:Havn't they ever heard of shifts? (Score:5, Insightful)
So yeah, knowing the density of data centres in the area and how close they will be to the Olympics, this sounds like a pretty damn sensible idea, to me.
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The Olympics is certainly going to cause some problems for commuters in London. As the poster above noted, this seems like more of a situation where if you can't get home/are worried that you won't be able to get back in tomorrow due to the overload on the transportation network you could crash in one of these things. The other thing, of course, is that the company might be installing them just to get this kind of "look how much we care about your data" type of publicity...
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The other thing, of course, is that the company might be installing them just to get this kind of "look how much we care about your data" type of publicity...
This is exactly what they're after.
I worked in Salt Lake City during the Olympics and the local news was talking about how we should expect our commute times to triple, especially if travelling around the venues. My commute went through Salt Lake City and Park City, past a ton of the venues, and I was expecting a nightmare. I ended up leaving 2 hours early and arrived to work 2 hours early the first day. After that I just left at normal time, the nightmare transportation scenario didn't pan out at all..
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the company might be installing them just to get this kind of "look how much we care about your data" type of publicity
Do you think? Seeing as this has now made the BBC [bbc.co.uk] news, complete with image showing the interxion logo, I'd say the pods have paid for themselves already :-)
Hot Sex Pod (Score:3, Interesting)
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OMG, they're Pod people. Run Away!
It's the Olympics (Score:4, Insightful)
It's the preeminent world class sporting event that is only held every 4 years for which most of the entire world tunes in. And for which you'd be lucky to get a job at for only once in your lifetime. Wouldn't you expect people to go that little extra distance - If not for the money, but for the pride of saying you contributed?
Re:It's the Olympics (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a silly sporting event that happens every few years. It's not like they're landing on Mars for the first time or something.
We are landing on Mars! (Score:3)
It's a silly sporting event that happens every few years. It's not like they're landing on Mars for the first time or something.
Actually we are landing on Mars during the London Olympics!
The nuclear-powered Mars rover Curiosity should arrive there around August 6th, smack in the middle of the Olympics.
And I expect the coverage of that event to be WAAAAY more exciting than any of the Olympic events.
G.
P.S. Unless the new Rover ends up following the Simplified Planetary Landing Approach Trajectory that was so popular with some other Mars missions in the past.
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This isn't for Olympic staffers, just a data center company in London.
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This isn't for Olympic staffers, just a data center company in London.
Nowhere in London will be immune from the buzz generated by the olympics, and being a part of it (even if it is a small part) will garner pride. And if all goes well, the people working there will have access to see all the olympic media 24/7. And if the data centre crashes and burns, they'll have the knowledge that the whole world is depending on them.
And while I have never worked on such a high profile job, 2 years ago I designed and coded the HMI that is used for humidity monitoring on the USS [wikipedia.org]
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Why the hell are you even bothering to read and post then? Just move on to the next story, if you are that vehemently opposed to it. What is wrong with you? Let people who enjoy it, enjoy it. You don't enjoy it? Ignore it. Why do you (and many, many other socially disconnected trolls on /.) feel like you must disparage something that doesn't appeal to you? Just leave it alone.
Re:It's the Olympics (Score:4, Insightful)
It's great that you enjoy it, but different people like different things, and that's fine. It's fine as long as you don't expect *others* (who may not be interested in the least) to go that extra distance for it.
Personally I find it hard to see past the betrayal of every ideal the Olympic games ever stood for, the cheating in form of drug use, the abuse of children to push some nation's medal lists, the obscene waste of money to build an unnecessary sports infrastructure and the organized corruption which drives the selection of the location.
HP/MP restored! (Score:5, Funny)
But you're still hungry.
They're close (Score:3, Funny)
Obviously they need to lock an IT jockey in each server *CAGE* and they will be responsible for those racks 24/7. Food should be brought them in pellet form and water dispensed from a large water bottle that requires it be licked to release it's Dihydrogen oxide goodness. Replace the floors with screens so they don't need to install any sanitary facilities other than like a garden hose to hose it down every once and a while. Even make it into an attraction and charge fees to tourists to view.
IT jockey's arent people are they? If so this idea is wrong. Now if they were treated with some dignity at least then that's different. Also if you get paid for every hour you're on site or compensated accordingly then I probably wouldn't complain about making piles of money
cheap tubes (Score:2)
They could've at least given them something closer to Tokio capsule hotels. And I sincerely hope they have showers and such on-site.
Aside from that - sure, why not? You can do stuff like that for a short time in a once-in-a-lifetime situation.
Fire suppression (Score:2)
I hope they don't use carbon dioxide for fire suppression in the data center....
Air Con (Score:5, Funny)
The actual reason is that it is one or the few places guaranteed to have air con in the coming super hot English summer.
Why didn't they include sleeping quarters? (Score:3)
Considering the Olympics only runs for 2 weeks I can see where a condition of the job would be on call 24/7. Television never sleeps. So why didn't they build hotel rooms into the IT center? Why a bunch of stupid pods?
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1) The IT buildings were built before London got the Olympics?
2) What are you going to do with hotel rooms afterwards? Let random people sleep in your datacenter overnight?
3) It's cheaper.
4) It's only 4 weeks (figure week ramp up and cleanup).
Muttering something about `uptime' (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe they're not getting paid... (Score:4, Insightful)
But there's money to be made in subletting a flat during an event like the Olympics. I lived in Lake Placid for the 1980 games and my father's department head at the college rented his house for $30k for the two weeks.
'We go to the matresses' (Score:2)
That's what the Sonny said.
Would it be possible to order some of these 'Olympic' datacenter beds online?
Lights out (Score:2)
So, this is what they mean by "lights-out datacenter".
Do you really want to be next to a co-worker.... (Score:2)
Who is watching porn on the small screen, and potentially vibrating his pod which is next to your pod?
And, what if you find out he likes - ya know - THAT kind of porn? ICKY !!!!
I am so suggesting this to our IT folks! (Score:2)
On second thought, maybe not so much.... maybe not so wise...
Sleeping tubes? (Score:2)
For IT workers? Can't they just install some sort of automated system to try turning it off and then on again?
People Power The internet (Score:2)
If real is what you can feel, smell, taste and see, then 'real' is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain
The Fifth Element (Score:2)
Looks like the hibernation chambers on the shuttle.
Y2K all over again (Score:2)
This reminds me of how I spent 12/31/1999, sitting in a windowless conference room with a bunch of co-workers, watching the rest of the world have fun.
Meanwhile, because we had all done the legwork months ago, nothing bad happened. If the management has such low faith that their systems will work they should either pay up for the good stuff (hardware, code, etc) or get out of the business. I think you could even keep a Windows 95 machine running for a month.
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I think you could even keep a Windows 95 machine running for a month.
But certainly not 49.8 days!
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/216641 [microsoft.com]
Employees vs. The Firm (Score:5, Insightful)
While staff in many industries might object to a plan that expects them to sleep in their office, data center firms have a primary calling of keeping their facilities operational at all times
I love how the summary neatly dismisses the objections of the employees by citing the goal of the corporation. I can see this working well for a variety of other problems that the data center firms face, but let's just jump to the one the MBAs are salivating over:
While staff in many industries might object to working without pay or benefits, data center firms have a primary calling of keeping their costs low and profits high
Surely, no extra pay and... (Score:2)
Let's see, no extra pay, and now every other company that demands 100% uptime can cut the pay of every other IT employee that refuses to live in the datacenter 24/7. Hooray!
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Atlanta: Population (2010)
City 420,003
Density 3,190/sq mi (1,232/km2)
Urban 4,750,000
Urban density 2,420/sq mi (935/km2)
Metro 5,268,860 (9th)
Metro density 630/sq mi (243/km2)
London
Population (July 2010 est.)[2]
London 7,825,200
Density 4,978/km2 (12,892/sq mi)
Urban 8,278,251
Metro 13,709,000
Then take into account all the land around Atlanta... and all the land around London. Plus, it's totally fun to live at w
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" Plus, it's totally fun to live at work! If you've ever worked a campaign, you know this!"
No, no it isn't. It's called slavery. The fact they you 'get' to leave to get coffee once in a while doesn't change that.
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Have you ever been a sysadmin? It's not just throwing bodies at a problem. I think most would rather do the overnight thing for a couple weeks than deal with whatever messes a two-week temp would make.
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Or, you know, rent them a room in a nearby hotel?
You really think that there will be rooms to rent during the Olympics? Yeah maybe .. but for really big $$$.
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You really think that there will be rooms to rent during the Olympics? Yeah maybe .. but for really big $$$.
But in the previous thread you were going on and on about how people should go to any lengths because they should take "pride" in the Olympics. Guess that only applies to the little people, not to corporations that might actually have to shell out some money.
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Those extinguishers systems usually come with a warning system that a deaf person can hear (or at the very least feel), if you can sleep through THAT you ARE already dead.