On the Mark

I’ve heard recently from a couple of ex-Zantaz employees. It seems there is a fair amount of unrest and turnover at Zantaz following the recent Autonomy mind-meld. Unhappy campers, to say the least.

Furthermore an anonymous source adds “Zantaz had a couple more layoffs this year across multiple departments such as QA, engineering and services. People also have been leaving voluntarily at all levels from Boston and Pleasanton office. More people will leave, especially from the Boston office as they have been overworked and some are “forced” to work over 80+ hrs a week without additional compensation. Annual performance review has been eliminated, some say to ensure that employees will not receive compensation adjustments.”

As noted by Ferris:

• The recent acquisition of Zantaz by Autonomy is proving painful for many people.
• There appears to be a culture conflict between Autonomy and Zantaz.
• Zantaz developed quite a strong channel. Autonomy appears to have little interest in this.

As with any acquisition, there’s bound to be overlap and areas of employee redundancy that need to be addressed. And that’s to be expected. However, layoffs in key departments in a market that is white hot, doesn’t make much sense.  I know a few people over there and they’re all legacy Zantaz folks.  Professionally strong, technically strong, people who built a good business. It’s a shame when this type of situation happens because no one likes to see an implosion in the making and no one like to see good folks in a not-so-good situation. 

On the Mark

New York State Judges are now planning to sue for a raise since they haven’t had one in a decade.

What seems to be getting the Judges hot under the robe is the fact that the State budget proposal is 6 Billion dollars higher than last year and not one red cent of that 6 Billion is being slotted toward those who handle the legal mess the state generates.

Jeremy Peters of the NY Times wrote an interesting piece on this today and given the fact that NY State just thumbed it’s budgetary nose at $345 million in Federal Transit Aid by killing the congestion pricing legislation, nerves are pretty frazzled all the way around in the Empire state. 

I’m not sure if this will be a class action suit against the state but I’m always curious at lawsuits and the discovery that can arise. In the case of Judges, Legislators and Ex-Governors, this may be a pretty interesting story developing.  We’ll keep our eyes peeled for the complaint filing or other public ink.

On the Mark 

I’m watching Perez Hilton on CNN being interviewed about the recent NY Times article in which they go into the rise of blogger deaths due to heart attacks and poor health. Perez, a pretty funny guy, starts by saying he is now on a campaign to loose weight due to all he’s gained since he started blogging. He’s even getting his meals brought in so he doesn’t have to push away from the keyboard! Hehehehe… at least I don’t have Avril L. yelling at me.

The NY Times article was interesting. You should take a couple of minutes and take a peak - You can see it here (click).

While it seems like a fluff piece on the surface, I can confess that like others mentioned, I’ve gained some pounds around the middle, just like the rest. Unlike the others, I’m not being pressed to crank out a blog entry several times a day. I’m not being paid by the piece and the blog is not one that generates income. Now the article was not written about our smaller “e-disco” blogospher rather it was about the more general world of blogging for politics and entertainment. However, after reading the article I started a very unscientific scan of my memory banks about some of the others in this legal blogosphere and without naming names, I’m not alone in the weight gain category! All you guys relax.

There is one glaringly obvious criteria where On the Mark differs from Perez Hilton’s blog. He has approximately 8 million visitors to his blog per day!

I don’t.

Not even close.

In the matter of PharMerica Inc. v. Healthprime Inc., 1:07-cv-0207. , U.S. District Judge Julie E. Carnes recently found that three health care providers “clearly and blatantly failed to meet their discovery obligations” in their ongoing litigation.

I’ll tell you what strikes this writer is the noticeably sharp and pointedly harsh wording of this order issued on March 19th.

“The recalcitrance, gamesmanship, and bad faith of Healthprime, HCC, and Hanover have caused unnecessary expense for plaintiff and unnecessary work for this Court,” Carnes wrote.

Note to readers, in the times following the changes to the FRCP back in 2006 and then again in 2007, it should be glaringly obvious that the judiciary is no longer interested in entertaining needless and unnecessary adversarial tactics in discovery. It’s the whole point of the 26(f) meet and confer process that encourages parties to work it out and not bring this type of problem to the court.

The Judge further blisters the defendants in pointing out that while they’ve expended “little energy in responding to plaintiff’s discovery requests, they have mustered up enough initiative to file a Motion for Summary Judgment with the Court”

For the Defendants’ the next stop is Sanction-ville.

“Should defendants continue to be uncooperative, the Court will consider striking defendants’ answers and then entering a default against them.”

Ouch.

For a little more in-depth coverage, check out the Law.com article which ran yesterday.

On a sad note, On the Mark would like to illuminate the life and passing of Dith Pran. Dith was the NY Times photographer who’s life and strength were memorialized in movie The Killing Fields.

I suggest you take a moment and explore the NY Times Obituary for Dith Pran here