Last year, internet “celebrity” Julia Allison posted an ad on her blog for an intern. Now, she has a new ad up, seeking someone to work for her this summer (I’m not posting the link – if you’re dying to work for her, I’m sure you can find it). Once again the ad is self-deprecating (in that phony “I’m not self-aware, but I’m aware enough to know I need to sound self-aware” sort of way, of course) and gives a lengthy summary of what the intern’s duties will be. That’s all well and good, but if you’re thinking about applying for this internship (or any job ever for that matter), there’s something you need to do first: Google.
If you were a potential Julia Allison intern who had fifteen minutes or so to conduct an internet search, you might come across the story of Charlsie, the student who snagged the “coveted” internship at NonSociety (Julia’s web “startup” … I have got to lay off the quotes) last fall. Charlsie, who was doing the internship for academic credit, kept a Tumblr blog about her experiences, which included items like this:
When I left though, Julia gave me the dress she wore to the Google Inauguration Ball to return and a whole bunch of electronics to send out to people.
and (later) this:
After I sat in on a 4-hour long TMI meeting, she asked me to come over to her apartment later that evening to work on the PR kit with her. My residence at the time was on the Upper East Side, and it took me about 40 minutes to get from my place to her apartment. We scheduled a meeting at 7:30 pm. I left early and when I got off the subway, Julia texted me saying: “Can we do 8pm?” I texted and said I was a block from her house, and she responded by telling me to wait downstairs in her lobby for five minutes. Thirty minutes went by and Julia’s lovely doorman called up, and she told him to keep me down there for just ten more minutes. An hour ended up passing, and Julia just texted me and said something came up and that I could go for the evening. No apology or anything. No explanation. She didn’t even have the decency to come down from her apartment to tell me this or to even call.
Poor Charlsie. I’d be happy to link you to her blog, but the blog disappeared mysteriously, perhaps because Julia is a close friend of Tumblr founder David Karp (not that I’m accusing anyone of anything, of course).
Whatever may or may not have happened to Charlsie’s blog, we know what happened to her. Remember, assistants – it pays to Google. If you can spend a couple of minutes online and figure out that someone is a giant jerk, but work for them anyway, you’ll have yourself to blame.
0 Responses to “tip of the week: trust the internet”