Not in my state! We are an “at will” work state. Most states around me too
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Good luck enforcing that ANYWHERE.
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I would assert it is not about enforcement but more about intimidation. The average American is too dumb to know what is enforceable versus not. A perfect example is the sheer number of people thinking they need to give permission to be photographed in public.
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I may not be a geography buff, but don’t you mean “both” when in Florida? That little strip of Alabama kind of blocks you off from Mississippi. 
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I an’t no floridian, eww, I feel dirty now thanks!
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Sorry. I must have confused your location with Tony.
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And these two plaintiffs and their representation either believe that the laws in Washington are written to screw the big guys or don’t know what the law says. Or assume that the big guy will settle because they can’t afford the negative publicity.
Since I have no first hand knowledge of Washington, I can’t opine on whether they are stupid or simply cynical. (I do not trust news coverage of government, law or civic matters in Washington State. Everyone one reporting has an axe to grind.)
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Unenforceable noncompetes are not a “both sides” issue. They are clearly meant by Goliath to intimidate David into not even trying for certain jobs or certain industries, as well as to intimidate David’s next boss. For every one ex-employee or next-employer who fights it, there are hundreds if not thousands who are simply unable to do so.
And the real sting? You know Amazon wouldn’t be so stringent about it, if they weren’t first plundering the industrial and/or former-employer-specific knowledge bases of all of their own new hires.
Goliath is mad about it because he did it first, when he hired David in the first place, and now he uses unscrupulous tricks to hamstring all of his enemies (competitors) whom he assumes are as unscrupulous as he is.
Not to mix metaphors (or intentional puns), but Amazon uses Tonya Harding’s ex-husband to take out the Nancy Kerrigans. It doesn’t have to worm every time. Just enough times.
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Well… The winter I guess.
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Being fired by an email, how nice of them
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Your David and Goliath analogy has a fatal flaw. David could read it is not guaranteed that these defendants can, or if they can whether they understand.
You cannot intimidate those who do not know you are intimidating them.
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Tapas Roy, vice president of device software and services, emailed the organization saying the company cut roles within its OS & Services team and asked remaining workers to “lean in on AI.”
More poorly programmed AI…what could possibly go wrong?
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non-compete:
If I, the laid off, am capable of competing, then why did you feel I wasn’t valuable enough to keep?
One man’s “garbage” is other’s “treasure”.
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Maybe the next employer isn’t as interested in “leaning in on AI” as Amazon says they are 
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Because what you know about Amazon could be worth far more than what you contribute to Amazon.
Laying off some employees is usually a good way of protecting the jobs of the rest of the employees, it need no solely be a way of increasing shareholder profits or maintaining over priced top management jobs.
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So what? Again, if what I might know is so “secretive” or “valuable” that one would need to threaten inability to look for similar employment then I’m too “valuable” to let go or live with the consequences of no longer employing me. Maybe next time don’t overestimate your needs and hire and teach way too many people the “secret sauce”.
I specifically chose not to remain with a “conglomerate” engineering firm that had purchased the local company I worked for because they were going to make everyone sign non-compete. I chose to go to another locally owned small company rather than become just a number that could be laid off en masse if the parent company decided it needed to drop some engineers to make their numbers look better to Wall Street.
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Amazon’s official rationale is that AI is “enabling companies to innovate much faster than ever before.” Because of that, an HR executive explained, the company needs to be “organized more leanly, with fewer layers and more ownership, to move as quickly as possible.” That sounds a little different from “AI’s taking 10% of our jobs,” but I think it’s effectively the same thing. Even though tech has long mythologized the benefits of lean teams, large businesses still needed armies of people to keep everything running; deep cuts risked stretching the remaining staff too thin. With AI’s growing capabilities, executives don’t seem worried about that anymore.
More companies are sure to follow Amazon
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My God that’s a lotta corporate buzzwords in there, and complete crud.
We all know Amazon does not and can not move quickly. I don’t care how many people are eliminated.
And no one takes ownership of ANYTHING within Amazon. Never will.
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It’s going to be fun to watch these companies fail. It won’t be immediate, but when there is no one left that really knows how the things they do work even AI won’t be able to fix what breaks. 
If AI is truly able to do REAL WORK, then it should be able to do the BS that most of the world’s CEOs do. Companies could be reporting millions more in immediate profits if they’d axe the “leadership”. 
How is that HR executive not already replaced?
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