It sounds like you're happy with the work environment, which is not something that should be taken for granted. Stay on board and continue to put in your best effort.
I'd far rather be an early, perhaps too early leaver, than stick around for six months to not job-hop only to find the Corp blew up. Now there's 3,000 Uber engineers on the market, and quite possibly a lot more bad press.
So for OP, consider carefully, including your insider perspective, before deciding either way! (I'd probably lean towards an exit as the bad PR does seem to have reached critical mass).
Right now, Uber is subsidizing each ride and their marginal cost is high compared to their marginal profit. The only way they can become profitable is either cut drivers pay, increase the cost per ride or both.
If they cut driver's pay, will the drivers stay with Uber? The other side of the coin is how elastic is the demand?
Unless he is a high level executive, I don't see why anyone would tar him with the ethical lapses of Uber
On the other hand, someone mentioned Yahoo. I would definitely ask someone technical why they stick with Yahoo.
How can this be true? I thought Uber takes a cut on each ride. Are you suggesting that they actually pay the driver extra money on top of what the riders are paying?
People like to compare Uber to Amazon and how long it took Amazon to become profitable. The differences are:
That Amazon was putting money into expansion and could turn a profit anytime it needed to.
AWS is their most profitable division - a category with high fixed costs and high marginal profit.
They are already using a lot of automation for their warehouses. It will be decades before driverless cars are ubiquitous.
I think most also got picked up by Metro.co.uk and the Daily Mail etc - like the CEO argument - so reporting is well outside SV. Not forgetting the whole #deleteuber thing. A couple of months back the only mention of Uber outside of HN, Tech Crunch et al was reports of the driver self-employment case or expectation of driverless cars.
What I can't guess is how influenced non-techies are from current events. It does feel like they've hit a certain mass that those negative events are now being widely reported in the mainstream.
I'm the wrong side of the Alantic to be well up on the SV jobs market, but as I say, were it me I'd be concerned by the apparent change in mood. I'd have been equally concerned by the change in mood, and endless bad press, just after Ratners CEO called one of their products "cheap crap" as a joke [0] - 12 months later Britain's largest jewellery chain was no more.
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/aug/22/gerald-ratn...
Many HN comments on articles about Uber share the same opinion. Several of these commenters were founders of software companies.
So because Uber made some mistakes it is OK to blame random workers board failings? Fuck logic.
Google, FB, $INSERTWHATVER here can also make a mistake, as a worker you should not be punished because of that.
Discriminate someone because their employer probably discriminated someone - so tolerant...
Would you really want to work at a company where a CEO is so prejudicial? I know I wouldn't (and I find the publicized culture of Uber incredibly repugnant).
If you're happy at your current position and aren't complicit in the abuse that's going on (seeing abuse but not doing anything about it) then stay. If you're concerned that in a subsequent interview that your position will color you, volunteer for a noble cause:
-Encouraging young women to pursue STEM education / careers
-Domestic Abuse NGO etc
Of course it could also be based on direct empirical observation, or just liking to hear the sounds of one's own tweets. On the other hand, the would-you-want-to-work-at-a-company-where position probably falls flat in the case of Uber...it already ate the cake.
Fact: If you're a male Uber employee, you're somewhat tainted by this association. Maybe just a little, or maybe more.
Conclusion: If you're competing against another candidate who is identical in all other respects except they don't have this association, you're at a disadvantage.
It's not fair to you, but that's the inescapable conclusion.
The bigger question is, do you believe that Uber is ultimately a force for good?
In addition to your salary and benefits, is it important to you that your efforts contribute to making the world a little bit better?
How many hiring managers actually care about this? I know it's PC to say that you care, but I doubt it would affect the actual decisions of many managers.
Things change quickly. Uber has had some hiccups lately, but reports of its death are greatly exaggerated. There is a strong chance that "sexual harassment" and "toxic managers" will not be attributes people think of when they think of Uber in a year from now, assuming the company works to resolve those internal issues in an effective manner.
If a CEO is going to classify all male Uber employees as male chauvinists and not hire them I would see that as stereotyping and discrimination of a class. The world is not black and white and I would definitely not want to work for that CEO.
That being said, I see issues with Uber long term. Not just Travis issues but also in the business model. Eventually all car manufacturers will have level 5 autonomy. At that point the car manufacturers will be Uber. They will be able to produce the car at cost and watch it drive away from the car manufacturing plant to be rented out wherever it's destination state/country is.
Uber doesn't have a chance in the long term.
Regarding brand popularity, there's a quote from Gladiator that I love: "The mob is fickle brother". We're living in an age of the mobile phone app and there's no such thing as brand loyalty anymore. We as consumers and contractors can UNinstall an app such as Uber or SnapChat in 5 seconds. The only thing preventing that with Uber is likely the same thing that keeps Walmart in business: $$$.
1. "A successful startup" is one company. Fortunately there are thousands of companies who could employ you and the vast majority of them will not care.
2. CEOs don't typically make hiring decisions for engineers at any company that is "successful" because they have more important things to worry about. I would argue that you should avoid working any where the CEO is engaged in this sort of micromanagerial moral preening.
> Many HN comments
HN is a bubble. That bubble tends to be a bit more... umm... extreme... in more than one way, than the rest of the software industry or the world.
I've observed that companies make quick judgments about hires based on where they have worked all the time. That there are favorable and unfavorable companies to have on one's resume is among the premises of career management. Keyword search bakes that premise into the hiring process.
It is worth looking at a case where it is known that working for specific companies excluded candidates from consideration: Silicon Valley's no-poaching cabal. If those companies used key-word search to exclude candidates there was nothing illegal in and of itself in that act (it was the collusion among companies that was illegal). It is as easy as flipping a bit to divert a resume with 'Uber' to the bit bucket as to the advance buffer.
If we flip it I do see companies hiring developers because their former employer is "popular". But I do agree with rest of your opinion.