Comments on: The National S(mut)cience Foundation

By: Jeff Darcy

Jeff Darcy — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 10:53:32 +0000

…or maybe they’ll figure out that the biggest w***ers of all are tax-cheating wife-beating libertarian ideologues who are so plentiful on the net (but not in any actual workplace).

By: Andrew

Andrew — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 08:40:12 +0000

Next thing you know, they’ll discover that government employees are less productive than the rest of us.

By: Flaming Pope

Flaming Pope — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 04:01:44 +0000

20% huh? Don’t make me laugh, you also have to account on how he used the 20% of porn time.

Personally this would be a great experiment as they have obviously shown that they know what type of porn. So…:
1) Set 7 super porn fetishes up as your homepage
2) Write an auto bot to constantly shuffle between porn websites, at exactly 7.77 second intervals
3) Get your wife to pose the number 7 as a background image
4) Set the welcome music when you log into the computer to some romantic song featuring the number 7
5) Set up AIM bot to message to yourself “Fooled you 777″
6) Think of two other things featuring 7 to befuddle the traffic monitors.

By: Neal J. King

Neal J. King — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 15:25:34 +0000

Entertaining though this thread is, my reaction to the original posting is:

This is a personnel issue – not an NSF program issue.

By: Ellie

Ellie — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 11:47:14 +0000

Anyway what’s a worse use of stimulus package resources: spending 20% of my work time on porn, or paying myself a million dollar bonus? Let’s just say that 20% of my salary is a whole lot less than a million dollars. You may say “ick” to porn, but I say a much bigger “ick” to those obscene bonuses. What’s more obscene: a million dollar bonus, or images of people having sex? Discuss.

By: Andy

Andy — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 07:08:14 +0000

I think the only newsworthy part of the the story is that the NSF employee got caught in the act. Even if it is illegal, many will think it’s no big deal and just feel sorry for the guy for being caught and losing his job.

Legally speaking, an employer can always enforce a code of conduct. But if the employees view porn on their personal laptops and in the privacy of their office, then enforcing it would require snooping or spying on the employee which would be illegal.

By: Ellie

Ellie — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 06:45:36 +0000

@Dave B: I don’t think having sex in the office contravenes most employment contracts either. It certainly doesn’t contravene mine – I’m a law-abiding citizen, so did check before having sex in my office.

By: Ellie

Ellie — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 06:43:59 +0000

What does everyone think about taking porn magazines into the office? This avoids the issue of specific rules governing use of the office computer. What about sitting in your office viewing porn that is saved on your personal laptop (downloaded at home therefore not using the office internet)? It is probably less time-consuming than, say, reading this blog.

By: jesus

jesus — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 05:24:43 +0000

I found the story in the post to be incredibly tame. Were any of you around during the Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky affair? If *this* story makes you’ll go “oh my” and “ick”, I wonder how any of you survived the Clinton/Lewinsky affair.

By: ellie

ellie — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 04:54:15 +0000

It is naive of the moderators to allow a post about porn, and then object when people post responses about sex.

By: Dave B

Dave B — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 04:38:26 +0000

I don’t think I can say, Joe. My thoughts are that there are two issues here: (1) using computers at work for porn, and (2) masturbating at work. Those who have a reaction of “ick” or “that’s unprofessional” to (1) probably have it to (2), too. But they’re then on shakier ground, because they can’t argue that (2) contravenes your employment contract (right…?). Of course, (2) takes time (as does having a coffee break), and Ellie pointed out, colourfully, that if she was permitted to do (1) then (2) could be accomplished more speedily.

I think that’s what managers call “best practise”.

By: daisyrose

daisyrose — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 23:26:16 +0000

In as much as a orgasm is – a temporary loss of reason – could this possibly have a influence on the grants that have been given out?

By: Andy

Andy — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:53:22 +0000

Joe- may be a more realistic goal is a “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” policy. At least as a first step. lol.

By: Joe

Joe — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:48:27 +0000

I think horny people with strong sex drives should start a civil rights movement to allow wanking at work. For just a few dollars a day, you will help create a brighter future people like Ellie who can’t work without an orgasm. It’s time the oppression of low-sex-drive people on horny people comes to an end!

By: Sidney

Sidney — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 19:19:54 +0000

Dave B- that was one of the funniest things I’ve seen! I wonder if such a discussion is going on at the NSF right now. “you take away our coffee machine, and now we cant wank at work. What’s next?” priceless!

By: Dave B

Dave B — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 19:11:11 +0000

An NSF employee filmed his supervisor warning his team about this: http://youtube.com/watch?v=zn6Z9djh8eA

By: chemicalscum

chemicalscum — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 11:59:14 +0000

Remember way back when the precursor of ArXiv at LANL had the URL of xxx.lanl.gov. This was at the time xxx was being promoted as a voluntary identifier for porn sites. I wonder how many scientists hit problems with porn filters because of that. I gues it must have been the sense of humour of someone at LANL.

Hey I just tried it and it still puts me through to arXiv!

By: Peter Coles

Peter Coles — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 10:14:31 +0000

I don’t know about it being a lot. Some people I know 20% of their work hours might be about 10 minutes a day..

By: Eugene

Eugene — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 09:26:46 +0000

20% of his work hours watching porn?

Man, that’s a lot of porn.

By: Andy

Andy — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 19:36:02 +0000

Ellie- couldn’t have said it better myself! lol.