How Steve Jobs Fleeced Carly Fiorina with HP iPod | Hacker News Reader

How Steve Jobs Fleeced Carly Fiorina with HP iPod

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133 pointssteven45 comments

A lot of negative comments on the grounds that this story is political and hence unsuitable for HN. I disagree. It's only the context (Fiorina is running for President) that makes it political. The story itself is mainly a post-mortem of a bad business decision, and is therefore IMHO entirely appropriate for HN, and would be even if Fiorina were not running for President.

The general story of HP, iPods & her role may be apolitical, but this specific article about it definitely wasn't.

It clearly was written with a political axe to grind.

Oh my god the tone of the article is exasperating. We get it, you think she'd dumb or something, but you need to relax a bit.

Dumb, maybe, or maybe not, but she's definitely a lying sociopath, no history of successful leadership, doesn't answer questions, and yet thinks she can be President. I saw her on Meet the Press last week and I was genuinely afraid, creeped out even.

You equally apply that to Hilary.

> a lying sociopath, no history of successful leadership, doesn't answer questions, and yet thinks she can be President

1. Not everyone currently running for president is doing so because they believe they actually have a chance of becoming president.

2. I wonder what percentage of people in the US believe that they personally would be a capable president? It's got to be 90%+

> Not everyone currently running for president is doing so because they believe they actually have a chance of becoming president.

A lot of people seem to miss this key detail.

These people have advisors, analysts, and so on. They know that their chance of winning is extremely slim. However they don't care because the entire point may be:

- VP slot.

- Increase public image in general (for future runs for house seats, book deals, TV appearances, speaking opportunities, etc).

- Pushing a specific political agenda into the debates.

And that's okay? They make a mockery of the Office when they treat candidacy as a PR platform. We shouldn't just accept that.

Most politicians and high-level executives are sociopaths (CEOs, etc. are politicians in all but name)

So yeah, she is a lying sociopath, but so are most of the other candidates. Rather depressing.

In other words, a typical politician.

Yes, this is incidentally a hit piece on Carly Fiorina, but the business analysis is quite entertaining

Apple really took HP for a ride on the HP+iPod debacle. I didn't realize how badly. It's funny to look back.

This is an interesting anecdote from the Steve Jobs era. HN normally eats this stuff up. No need to flag it just because it concerns a current Republican candidate.

I'd have upvoted it if it weren't couched in politics. Even "How Ben Carson separated conjoined twins" is HN material. "How Ben Carson separated conjoined twins, and therefore he can separate Iran from their nukes" isn't.

My problem with it is that the author so clearly has an axe to grind about Fiorina that it makes me wonder whether the business analysis (which I agree is interesting) is the result of objective analysis or whether he went in looking to slam Fiorina as an idiot.

People have had axes to grind against Fiorina because of her tenure at HP long before she decided to get into politics.

The only reason I read through this piece was because its by Steven Levy. Not going to flag it, even though its highly political, because I'd never heard or known of the Apple/HP deal and it was still an interesting read.

this week's political activity, discrediting Carly. Brought to you by all left leaning news sites, blogs, and now, Hacker's News.

Really guys, the first three sentences should have made this tripe obvious. Expect submission after submission that are purely political hidden under techy click bait titles. We need a new flag, "political"

Are you suggesting she has any credibility at all to discredit?

I dislike Carly but I agree with you. Liberal hand-wringing doesn't belong on HN.

This is not liberal handwringing, its is an analysis of a SV exec about the work she did in while in SV as CEO of HP.

Setting aside all the political stuff, it's hard to see how this deal made any sense for HP. Apple got better distribution for their iPods, kept a competitor out of the market, and got their software installed on a ton of Windows computers. What did HP get other than a few bucks per iPod+HP sold?

If its any consolation to the HP folks, Apple did something similar with Motorola. The MOTO ROKR was intentionally crippled, and designed to fail. It was merely created to delay Motorola entering the media business on their own. Not that they would have been any more successful than HP had they tried on their own...

Rational people tend to be progressive and "left leaning" (by American standards; by world standards this country is a right-wing powder keg). The sheer idiocy of the American right is certainly relevant to hackers as an interesting and difficult problem, just like the housing situation in San Francisco or that malaria and Alzheimer's continue to exist.

> Rational people tend to be progressive and "left leaning"

Rational people tend to be rational. And rational people don't dismiss the views of others because they don't share them.

Rational people tend to be rational. And rational people don't dismiss the views of others because they don't share them.

Well, rational people can and should dismiss the views of others because they don't share them... if they've taken the time to investigate the validity of those views. Isn't that the point of being rational?

> Well, rational people can and should dismiss the views of others because they don't share them... if they've taken the time to investigate the validity of those views.

You can only make that kind of a conclusion assuming two things:

1. Perfect information. You are aware of everything there is to know which might be tangential to the matter at hand.

2. Identical environment. You share the same exact circumstances as everyone else.

Neither #1 nor #2 are ever true.

You never know everything there is to know. Frequently, we know very little and more important, what little we know doesn't overlap with the knowledge of others. So every person has a little bit, never the entire picture, and we all have very different little bits.

We also don't exist in the same environment. We have vastly different backgrounds, circumstances, motivations, etc. which lead to wildly diverging self-interests.

When you dismiss the views of others because you don't share them, you're not being rational ... you're just being stupid.

You can only make that kind of a conclusion assuming two things:

1. Perfect information. You are aware of everything there is to know which might be tangential to the matter at hand.

Perfect information is not at all necessary for rational thought. There's a whole field of research about probabilistic reasoning that helps with that.

2. Identical environment. You share the same exact circumstances as everyone else.

That's really just a special case of point 1.

When you dismiss the views of others because you don't share them, you're not being rational ... you're just being stupid.

That's not what I said, either. I explicitly talked about investigating those views.

Suppose my friend comes up to me and says "Blue cars are more reliable than red cars." I inquire further as to how he came up with that statement, and he gives me nothing useful. "Its just my opinion / feeling / premonition / whatever."

Is it rational for me to believe my friend's statement? No, because there is no evidence.

Now suppose that one of the workers in the car factory hates the color red. And he's been subtly sabotaging those, and taking extra time to make sure the blue ones are better. There's that perfect information you're talking about that I'm missing.

However, even in that case, should I be believing my friend's statement about blue cars? No, because I don't have evidence, and neither did he. Until someone collects at least some evidence, it isn't reasonable for me to believe that blue cars are more reliable, because I don't have any basis in theory (that the color blue can actually affect mechanical reliability) or in practice (the statistics for the cars)... even though my friend's statement is actually true.

Rationality is a tool we use to discern truth from falseness. But we still have to do the work.

Please read carefully , He/She didn't say "rational people dismiss other people's view" he said "liberalism has monopoly on rational people". Don't change the meaning of what he said.

> The sheer idiocy of the American right

Yes conservatives bad, progressives good. Except when it comes to tax policy, right? Because SV wouldn't exist at all if the investment returns were taxed at a 50%-80% rate. Then instead of looking for a 1000x unicorn, everyone would be hunting 5000x-10000x unicorns. Which are rarer still.

> Because SV wouldn't exist at all if the investment returns were taxed at a 50%-80% rate

I suggest looking up how long term capital gains work, and what top tax rates for cap gains have been in the past (hint: much higher than today—even under Reagan). No one has ever suggested taxing cap gains "at a 50%-80% rate".

I rarely take the time to comment on HN or submit content but I'm occasionally really tempted to earn enough karma that I can down-vote arrogant, condescending, asinine posts like this one. Neither side of the political spectrum has anything like a monopoly on "rational people" and "the sheer idiocy of [people who disagree with bitwize]" is not "relevant to hackers as an interesting and difficult problem."

Well... I am not agreeing that his comment was a bit cray. But isn't it common knowledge that generally more educated areas of the country are also more "progressive/left leaning"? Obviously there are exceptions, but even an intelligent man can cling to the wrong idea ;)

That is not true . At least in my experience . All the rational people I've ever met in my whole life was liberal and big chunk of them were disappointed in political system (which makes them out of spectrum in left side ). For example even Noam Chomsky (which is far left in today US definition) prefer Obama (despite he knows Obama is just another politician who work for wall street instead of people ,but at least he is not going to put country in danger) to some crazy person at the other hand. I was fairly disappointed when I saw that comment down voted in HN . And I am from other country , I can see (in compare to my country) how exactly Right wing using deceive people with its control over money/media.

About the monopoly maybe your left wing is Clinton ( which don't have any monopoly on rational people , because all know she is clown of wall street) , but true left wing (like Lessig Lawrence / Bernie Sanders / etc ) completely have monopoly on rational people in compare to right side , specially academic people in human science branches.

While it may be a hit piece, everyone at HN already thought that Carly Fiorina is a bad leader and that her tenure at HP should be hung like a millstone around her neck, not touted as her #1 qualification. Democrats can read this and feel smug about the Republican primary shitshow. Republicans can read this and feel consternation that such a bad candidate has been gaining credibility in the primary.

I don't think this article is political. It's just anti-Fiorina. It's not making fun of people for supporting her. It's ringing an alarm bell for people outside of the tech world that Fiorina's signature achievement was tanking one of America's finest technology companies.

Seriously, this. HP used to have such a sterling reputation of innovative engineering and high quality products. It's really sad what she did to it, and pathetic how defensive and delusional Republicans are about any criticism of her, no matter how valid and well substantiated by the facts.

But when a political party has systematically driven away so many qualified women and minorities, they have to make do with the bottom-of-the-barrel dregs of token candidates that they have left, and pretend their naked emperors wear beautiful clothes.

Republicans should spend their energy cleaning up their own act, rather than attacking people for criticizing it.

Ms.Fiorina not only acknowledges her association with Silicon Valley, but tauts it, while name dropping SVs and CEOs. So, if anyone discusses her CEO-ship under Microscope, it becomes a political hit piece? Of course, her current presidential run and doing good in polls is getting this kind of attention, but this is not a he said - she said. The body of work is already laid there and the article does narrate a sequence of events which demonstrates her last stint as an Executive.

More importantly than 'crushing their innovation brand' (which seems like a small consequence), he headed off a potential competitor who might enter the personal device ring. Well done.

The more I read about this woman, the worse it gets.

She is sales. Not an engineer. Not a designer. Not even a good leader.

The world needs salespeople for sure, but they are mostly sizzle and little steak.

She will get shredded on the national stage, I think she is worse than Palin. At least Palin was a governor.

No, Palin was a beauty contest winner that got elected Governor. She read People magazine when flying between political meetings. She had zero education/competence in the political arena. No policy education and no desire to learn. She was a zero with a big mouth.

I'd take Carly over Palin any day, though I dislike both. Carly would blunder around and be an ineffective president, but I was afraid Palin would start a war with Russia or something worse.

I still maintain the theory that iTunes for Windows enabled the explosive sales of the iPod and, by extension, the funds and momentum to develop the iPhone.

So continuing with that logic, Fiorina can claim that the iPhone was the result of her deal with Apple.

Wasn't this by design. They always wanted the ipod to be cross platform. The ipod then became advertisement for Apple's laptops and pc's. I'd argue ipod/itunes drove mac sells and by the time the iphone came around Apple was respected by consumers as a legitimate consumer electronics company.

I know I read or heard this from an apple source but I can't remember where.

I understand that foreseeing who will be a successful CEO is kind of holly grail of management theory, but how come so many incompetent managers keep ruining their companies for so long only to leave with golden parachutes?

> This was a highly strategic move to block HP/Compaq from installing Windows Media Store on their PCs.

Uhh what? I can understand them wanting to get iTunes on OEM PCs, but I don't recall there ever being a standalone "Windows Media Store," and at the time Microsoft was already bundling Windows Media Player (which did contain a link to a store via the in-built browser) with Windows that this deal didn't do anything to stop...

PS - That is a quote, but cannot source the quote, and no author is given either. May be fictional.

Wouldn't even know who she is weren't for this article : http://motherboard.vice.com/read/carly-fiorina-i-supplied-hp...

And a presidential candidate ? Wow.

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