Comments on: HP in for hard time at hearing

With elections coming up, congressional subcommittee is likely to make an example of HP for spying.

[Sentinel]

Punish them!!

I've had enough of companies who think they can get away with such things. To have the gall to do something like this, it sounds like taken right out of a movie script. One can only hope those responsible may rot in jail. It's good to see that there is still justice left in this country.

[Dragon Forge]

As always .. back the train up a couple fo feet pls

In order to savor the marketing and spin, the down playing subterfuge and rhetoric, put a real Reality Check on the menu, let us just examine, once again what is being done and said.

Is Hurd really in for a rough time? or is it the school yard tittering at some one getting caught. Too often the objective powers having taken all 'this' in, psychologically, feel a need to re-iterate their position and establish their authority. Much as a teacher would reduce the upbraiding if a 'guilty'/'caught' child had been overly teased. "Indeed we must save our great business leaders and not be too hasty or punitive" - burning in the back of any public group's or committee's subconscious charged with examining this or dispensing justice.

Well Hurd is not a child, should have learned his lessons on how to control a company, and while there may be subjective slants at anything being said about the whole affair, the importance here is too make sure the facts get out to everyone - real business leaders that are making decisions about whether HP can be trusted with providing thier servers?, the average person on the street thinking about a purchase (wondering can hp be trusted not to rootkit spyware in the background on their pc, and is this a reasonable place to work - this should important.

You see we are only hearing about the one thing that HP did get caught at. Are you telling me this was just one little accident? To have taken steps like this HP surely had been ferreting out a lot more on their employees. The after hours snoop through employee belongings, the multitude of cameras and bugs, minute inspection of every little piece of personal information on record are impossibly deniable precursors to paying out big bucks for "investigations".

Deceit and malice aforethought, huberis and meglomaniacal propensities - this affair is not the accidental little mis-step that we will hear played over and over again - this is a vendetta acted out in the only way that HP knows how and the way they have always done things.

A leader, a man of intelligence and compassion, a soul of discretion and forthright clearsightedness are the barest of minimum requirements to be able to call yourself an executive. To captain a ship takes the unwavering, stalwart, true heart that Hurd never possessed, and I doubt, ever even been close to.

So much we have ventured and so little distance we have covered. Instead of the keelhauling, Hurd should have had the intestinal fortitude and courage to accept the mantle of responsibility and asked himself, "Why?". "Why is it that someone would feel the need to take steps to appear to be a little too forthcoming about our stratagies?". In reality, it should read more like, "Why do I want to persecute the people that I feel may have offended me?" As I have eluded to many times, this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Being "one of the largest technology companies in the world" should have very little sway with the exception of ensuring that employees are taken care. The duality means that; not only is corruption, excesses, ludicracy and malice not only more likely a temptation for those in power, but that it is harder to discover and harder to make accountable for. Just because you are big doesn't mean you are good.

Hurd's excuse is that the investigation was "overzealous". That is a very nice way to discount your responsibilities. Again another inconsistency in Hurd's behavior if it were true is that the efforts were not directed by HP.

But HP did not need an investigation, it was directed by Hurd in reality or virtually, and was not only encouraged but escalated.

Yes this will get hot for a few months and then die in some faint hearted legislation and backroom consulatory back patting.

If there is ever any wonder at why the rest of the world glances askance, just heap this on top of all the other typically American, "big business" political successes.

Gosh I feel proud.

[fred dunn]

HP!!! You got some 'spainin' to do...

Patricia Dunn indicates that she thought the records were be obtained legally... Oh that is such a stretch (I'm trying not to curse).
How did she think the records of people external to the company were going to be obtained legally?
Did she think that her investigators and/or legal counsel went to these people and obtained written consent..c'mon.
HP's legal counsel went along with this and even let it slide although with doubts. If they had doubts then WHY oh God WHY did they approve it?
They should not only be fired but be put in front of the Bar for suspension.
Now for the rest of the Board of Directors' involvement, why isn't anybody concerned that only one member of the board took this to the public? Where were their ethics? They should indicted as coconspiators since they just sat on their thumbs while this whole thing unfolded.
They are responsible to the shareholders for whom this could cost dearly, in company reputation, legal costs (which HP is picking up fully) and the almost full-time distraction of the company CEO.
Speaking of CEO, Mark you said that you didn't read the completed investigation report so you were "unaware". So then are we to take it then that this is the norm for your office to just not keep up with the internal workings of the company and specifically the Board of Directors, the very board that put you in the chair you sit in today? BUNK!
I hope the hearings today go well for you since I think they are going to open the eyes of many americans both about "The HP Way" and the privacy of americans which by any standard is an oxymoron.

[Too Old For IT]

Poor HP

1) They can't compete in the marketplace with Dell on price.

2) They can't compete with IBM/Lenovo on quality.

3) They can't compete with Alienware (Dell) on "Gee Whiz".

4) They can't compete with the NSA / FBI / CIA in depriving Americans of their privacy.

5) The Gambino Crime Family runs a better beoardroom.