Ethical lapses at some of the tech industry’s biggest companies

The examples here don't make anything close to sense.

Yes: Uber is a case study for ethical lapses in tech companies. Nobody could disagree with that.

But holding your developer conference while a killer who used your product is on the loose isn't an "ethical lapse". Facebook has no culpability whatsoever in the murder of Robert Godwin. It's actually creepily instrumentalist of Vanity Fair to exploit that murder to make this point.

And Juicebro is less a story about ethical lapses at tech companies than it is a story about the lack of judgement in tech investors. Juicebro does what it says it will do. It just happens that the thing it says it will do is also something you can do with a Capri Sun bag. Whatever it is they themselves did wrong, it doesn't come close to Uber.

Ah, you mean the entirety of Windows 10, and just... all of Google and Facebook?

> Uber

Oh.

> Then there was Facebook

Ah, here we go.

> The company doesn’t distort reality—but it often seems to lack the ability to recognize it.

Wait, but... they do though. Among many other evils. You're just upset they said something tone-deaf at a press conference?

> Juicero [...] After Bloomberg News discovered that you didn’t even need the $700 $400 juicer to make juice (there are, apparently, these things called hands)

Crappy, stupid products and founders who can't turn off Always Be Closing even when it makes them sound kinda dumb? That's sort-of bad I guess, but who really cares?

This misses the point. Some specific scandals and dumb, wanky marketing-speak are the least of tech's problem. Spy-vertising is the heart of most of the big players, and it's rotten to the core.

Nick Bilton doesn't mention it but the one story of Travis Kalanick ethics that always sticks in my mind was his handling of employee tax withholdings in Red Swoosh (2001). Excerpt from BI[1]:

>Kalanick and Todd had different opinions about how to keep the company afloat, which blossomed into serious disagreements. They began cutting corners to get by, in some cases pushing the ethical and legal boundaries.

>For instance, at one point, the company stopped withholding income taxes from employees’ paychecks — a criminal offense.

>Kalanick insists that Todd made this move without his knowledge, publicly blaming his co-founder for the infraction. Todd insists the decision was made jointly.

>As Kalanick has recounted the story: "We owed $110,000 to the IRS in un-withheld income taxes, which is a white-collar crime that pierces the corporate shell, and it doesn't matter whether you knew or not. If you're an officer of the company you're going to jail."

>"Travis is a very smart guy but he and I clearly have different memories on this 13-year-old detail," Todd says. And an email sent by Kalanick at the time and obtained by Business Insider appears to demonstrate his participation in the tax plan.

By my count, Travis didn't just commit one but two sins in ethics. (1) was not paying the IRS. The (2) was shifting all blame to his business partner and claiming ignorance.

For some, I suppose that his paying back the IRS resets the sin odometer to zero and therefore's he's redeemed. However, I personally wouldn't invest in Uber at all while he is running the company. I believe his earlier behavior is indicative of an inherent personality trait and I would be afraid of new "skeletons" from Uber's closet that were of Travis' making.

Maybe Travis is a nice guy to have beers with but I'd be wary of doing business with him.

[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/uber-travis-kalanick-bio-2014...

The main point in this article seems to be that Silicon Valley companies like Uber and Theranos skirt responsibility for their actions when compared to other non-SV companies who have undergone serious disciplinary action (such as United, Wells Fargo, Fox, Volkswagon).

But the author is comparing public and private companies and stating that the main difference between the two is their zip code. This feels like apples to oranges.

I'd rather see a comparison of how ethical issues are handled between SV and non-SV privately-held companies.

Theranos and Elizabeth Holmes should be a huge indictment of Tech Journalism as well. Many critics were right about her, but smeared as misogynists. I know I bought the hype, and called some friends sexists.

At least the Wall Street Journal is still doing investigative journalism, who knows what a nightmare situation Theranos would have caused it they didn't get caught.

I hope someone there is doing some investigation on Uber and Lyft as well.

> ... creating more tone deaf people than any other ecosystem in the history of the world.

Okay, the Juicero "$400 Capri Sun squeezer" may be funny (and they're even suing a rival juice packet squeezer for stealing their IP), but SV is hardly unique. Whenever you give buckets of money to people who provide nothing of real value in exchange, you create and/or attract entitled and oblivious leeches like Marie Antoinette, Leona Helmsley, and Larry Page: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/googles-ceo-rules-and-taxes-are-... .

As a tech observer the bios and company names were worth the read.

"(I can’t believe I just wrote the words “mayonnaise-disruption”)."

I can't believe it either.