signor_john - 3:59 pm on Nov 27, 2008 (gmt 0)

So basically, Google is laying off their entire staff of foreign "website quality reviewers"

Where did you get that information?

I was one of them once and I did not "work for Google" as a contractor. I worked for a contracting company (paid by the contracting company) and was given assignments through Google.

The Webguild story incorrectly refers to contractors as "employees," so you almost certainly would have been considered a "Google employee" in the context of the Webguild article.

It's hard to know for certain whether the Webguild writer was merely inept or was trying to make Google look bad. I'd guess the latter, to judge from statements such as "Google has hundreds of lawyers figuring out how not to get caught" and "By under-reporting actual employee headcount, Google looks good to Wall Street." Someone from outside the tech industry who reads the article might assume that Google is pulling a unique scam to fool the SEC and investors, when in fact Google is using contractors in the same way that other large tech companies do. Whether Google's use of permatemps is good or bad doesn't change the fact that the article would never get past an editor on a legitimate news site.