Reporter's Fake Job Irks Real Dot-Com

[William Knowles <wk () C4I ORG>]

http://www.thestandard.com/article/display/0,1151,20534,00.html?nl=dnh

By Richard Martin
December 1, 2000, 9:11 AM PST

A New Yorker piece by an Internet impostor is the talk of Silicon
Alley, but Luminant isn't laughing.

New York's Silicon Alley was in a tizzy last week after the New Yorker
ran a hilarious piece called "My Fake Job," in which former Letterman
writer Rodney Rothman recounted his days of masquerading as an
employee at an unnamed Manhattan dot-com consultancy. After walking
into the company's offices, claiming a desk and securing a phone
extension under a phony name, Rothman spent three weeks noshing on
free snacks, enjoying company-provided massages and carrying on
imaginary business calls from his cubicle.

The identity of the company was not revealed. But it didn't take long
for employees of Luminant Worldwide , an Internet consultant and Web
design company that recently laid off about 25 percent of its
workforce, to recognize the reporter's descriptions of their
workplace. (The most telling clue was a T-shirt mentioned by Rothman
that read "May the e-force be with you." Luminant distributed the
shirts to employees this year.)

Repercussions quickly ensued. CEO Jim Corey sent out a company-wide
e-mail (later posted on a message board on the job site thevault.com)
in which he said "there are descriptions in the story that strongly
suggest he was writing about Luminant" and that the company has
"reason to believe it could have happened." Corey went on to list a
series of beefed-up security procedures, including "Introduce yourself
to unfamiliar people" ("Hey, it is also a great way to make some
friends") and "Don't allow unfamiliar people to follow you through
doors with secure access."

Corey's message also hinted at possible lawsuits: "The author of the
story was clearly deceptive in posing as an employee, and worked to
gain access to the building by following persons with key cards and
providing vague and false information to employees. We will be seeking
the advice of our legal counsel on how, if at all, we should respond
to this incident. If it turns out that the company was Luminant, I'd
like to know if he took anything from our offices, interfered with our
work in any way or harassed any of our employees."

Luminant had no official comment. Rothman could not be reached for
comment.



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