Jason is a bully. I've heard plenty of horror stories of people who have worked for him. I'm not surprised in the least and I'm extremely glad to see people standing up to him.
There are plenty of situations where flat out lying is not just acceptable, but expected as a bargaining tactic, along with other behavior that would be unacceptable in other situations.
Just thinking about the different ways I buy things at flea markets, the grocery store, and an auto dealership shows 3 very different behaviors.
Assholes are manipulative, it's how they get away with it.
The problem is silicon valley is self-reinforcing with positive feedback, nobody rocks the boat and speaks ill (the subject of Jason's abuse above would never come out and say it) of others.
It is 100x harder to give a negative public view of someone than it is to give a positive.
Investors have more power than most of your employees and they will freely speak about you, associate with you in good times, many will run away in bad.
You should run extensive due diligence across all of them, and with people who worked with them - not the type of Silicon Valley 'good friends' that involve spending 5 minutes in a conference hallway with someone 3 times a year, or having dinner twice a year.
Yes, Jason probably had some brutally honest feedback about the presentation and how to make it better. But in my experience, his feedback is always spot on.
I've personally been on the receiving end of such feedback, and it can feel harsh at times. But this is one of Jason's greatest strengths: he has the ability to listen to a pitch once and then make it way stronger by improving a few key things. This is why almost all of the pitches at Launch are exceptional.
2. Founders have asked for the brutal truth of the 'red pill 'every single time. No founder has ever asked for the blissful illusion of the blue pill. Not once!
3. I've coached 700 startups for TC50, LAUNCH Festival and the LAUNCH Incubator (27 and growing!)... never had a complaint. Not one. That includes Dropbox, Yammer, FitBit, CafeX, Clicker, Brilliant.org and hundreds more.
[ background: The person making these claims is close friends with my former partner on TC50 -- that partner was accused of some very nasty things. ]
It was then up to them to do the spec work or not.
However, when I was able to afford to pay folks, I was like "well, if I pay three people $500 or $1,000 to do a project and pick the winner as my eventually designer, that's a good use of $1,500!"
Thanks for taking the time to share this story. I'm far from perfect, but I work really hard every day to help as many people I can.... because so many people helped me get to the top of the mountain!
Additionally after I left his employ, he was our first investor in a new venture, and relentlessly supported us along the way. Jason is the best possible investor you can have on your side.