Meta Employees Absolutely Hate Mark Zuckerberg’s Plan for a Companywide AI Hackathon

Meta 员工极其反感马克·扎克伯格的全公司 AI 黑客马拉松计划

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s internal announcement on Friday about a “large” companywide AI hackathon next month quickly sparked frustration and disbelief among employees. Meta 首席执行官马克·扎克伯格周五在内部宣布，下个月将举办一场“大型”全公司范围的 AI 黑客马拉松，此举迅速在员工中引发了沮丧和质疑。

In internal messages seen by WIRED, some workers wrote that added responsibilities in the wake of recent mass layoffs at the tech giant had left them with little time to join such ancillary activities. Others said they felt discouraged from participating because of what they viewed as low morale and declining trust in management across the company. 根据《连线》（WIRED）看到的内部消息，一些员工写道，在这家科技巨头近期大规模裁员后，他们承担了更多职责，几乎没有时间参加此类辅助性活动。另一些员工则表示，由于公司内部士气低落且对管理层的信任度下降，他们对参与活动感到意兴阑珊。

“I’m literally preoccupied with keeping the lights on for my team,” one employee wrote on Friday. “I have no incentive to participate, let alone have the time to do so.” “我简直忙于维持团队的日常运转，”一名员工周五写道。“我没有任何动力去参加，更别提有时间去参加了。”

In a post shared to Meta’s roughly 70,000 employees, Zuckerberg framed the hackathon as a way for staff to build camaraderie at a time of widespread internal unrest. Ime Archibong, a vice president of product management at Meta, later shared additional details about the event, which he said would take place from July 14 to July 16 and focus “exclusively on AI Innovation.” 在发给 Meta 约 7 万名员工的帖子中，扎克伯格将此次黑客马拉松描述为在公司内部普遍动荡时期，员工建立情谊的一种方式。Meta 产品管理副总裁 Ime Archibong 随后分享了活动的更多细节，称活动将于 7 月 14 日至 16 日举行，并将“专注于 AI 创新”。

Archibong’s post drew swift pushback from several employees, who responded with angry messages and sarcastic memes. “I’m not sure that this company supports a hackathon culture anymore,” one employee wrote in a comment that drew more than 200 thumbs-up and heart reactions. “People are being asked to cover more work with less support while their colleagues get laid off, while also trying to avoid the risk of causing SEV1s [serious technical errors] with incautious AI use.” Archibong 的帖子遭到了多名员工的迅速抵制，他们以愤怒的留言和讽刺的表情包作为回应。“我不确定这家公司是否还支持黑客马拉松文化，”一名员工在评论中写道，该评论获得了超过 200 个点赞和爱心回应。“人们被要求在缺乏支持的情况下承担更多工作，同时还要面对同事被裁员的现实，还要努力避免因不谨慎使用 AI 而导致 SEV1（严重技术错误）的风险。”

The same employee alleged that hackathon efforts would not count toward performance evaluations, fueling frustration among the workers about the prospect of setting aside other projects to participate. 同一名员工还声称，黑客马拉松的成果不会计入绩效评估，这加剧了员工对于为了参加活动而搁置其他项目的挫败感。

Dozens of people also reacted with laughs and thumbs-up to a meme inspired by the comedy film We’re the Millers, stating, “You all have the time for a hackathon?” 数十人还对一张受喜剧电影《冒牌家庭》（We’re the Millers）启发的表情包表示赞同和好笑，上面写着：“你们大家都有时间参加黑客马拉松吗？”

“I honestly don’t have the time to focus on this, and I’m expected to be 100% devoted” to regular work, another employee wrote. “I’ve participated in previous hackathons but this no longer feels like an option alongside pod sprints in my corner of the company.” “我真的没有时间专注于此，而且我被要求 100% 投入”到日常工作中，另一名员工写道。“我以前参加过黑客马拉松，但在我所在的部门，在繁重的冲刺任务面前，这似乎不再是一个可选项了。”

A third staffer called out what they described as “a disappointing change in culture” because “I don’t believe there is sufficient feeling of safety to spend time on hackathon innovations.” 第三名员工指出了他们所描述的“令人失望的文化转变”，因为“我不认为现在有足够的安全感来花时间进行黑客马拉松创新。”

Meta declined to comment for this story. Meta 拒绝就此报道置评。

Meta has long hosted internal hackathons, but two sources tell WIRED this is the first companywide one to take place since 8,000 people were laid off last month. Meta 长期以来一直举办内部黑客马拉松，但两名消息人士告诉《连线》，这是自上个月裁员 8,000 人以来，公司首次举办全公司范围的此类活动。

A Meta software engineering veteran responded to some of the employee complaints by saying that everyone is encouraged to participate. But the message still didn’t quite land. “Every org I know has super aggressive goals, with efficiency gains expected and significantly less staffing,” an employee commented back. “There’s less time for focusing on other axis.” 一位 Meta 的资深软件工程师回应了部分员工的抱怨，称鼓励大家参与。但这条信息并没有起到预期的效果。“我所知道的每个部门都有极其激进的目标，在人员大幅减少的情况下，还被要求提高效率，”一名员工反驳道。“我们已经没有时间去关注其他领域了。”

The hackathon was one of several initiatives Zuckerberg laid out on Friday to reenergize his workforce and address internal criticism about the recent layoffs and other concerns. He said budgets for team offsites would increase and that the concept of hot desking, or workers only in the office part of the time having to share desks, would be done away with in some offices. 此次黑客马拉松是扎克伯格周五提出的多项举措之一，旨在重振员工士气，并回应内部对近期裁员及其他问题的批评。他表示，团队团建预算将会增加，并且在某些办公室将取消“热桌办公”（hot desking）概念，即部分时间在办公室工作的员工必须共享办公桌的制度。

Last year, some workers banded together to survey colleagues about the removal of their desks and the chaos and lost productivity they believe it caused, according to a person familiar with the efforts who sought anonymity to describe sensitive discussions. The group urged management to return to every employee having their own space. The layoffs appear to have opened up room, while leaving less time to hack. 据一位熟悉此事并要求匿名以描述敏感讨论的人士透露，去年，一些员工联合起来调查同事对撤除办公桌的看法，他们认为这导致了混乱并降低了生产力。该团体敦促管理层恢复每位员工拥有独立空间的制度。裁员似乎腾出了空间，却让员工们更没有时间去进行黑客马拉松了。