Four Years in Startups | Hacker News Reader

Four Years in Startups

newyorker.com

191 pointspdog82 comments

The text really captured my attention. I've recently been struggling with whether or not tech and the modern internet are a force for good. I always enjoyed tinkering with hardware and software, and have been working in related jobs because it pays well and there are always interesting challenges to solve. But the societal shifts ongoing in Europe, the filter bubbles and breaking down of discourse, the xenophobia and the growing divide between large parts of society as well as the erosion of (local) media and the crisis of mental well-being among both adults and adolescents, which I feel are at least partly attributable to technological changes in the past ten years, have led me to think that maybe the most important thing for people right now may be spaces without technology, without personalization and just being confronted with the community of others. This does not seem like a problem solvable by the means of technology and makes me wonder whether I've spent my life learning about technology only to abandon it at some point.

Are there any good resources about what I call my "tech hangover" to navigate how to move on, maybe convert this education into something of societal value beyond screens? Or am I being too cynical about everything and in reality it's all much better than I'm seeing it? Open for anything here really, but struggling with the status quo.

It feels to me that overall people are quitting their corporate jobs and searching for meaningful and impactful things to do professionally. There are some movements which are trying to do something like AI for good, but it seems like generally people know that "something is not right"

>whether or not tech and the modern internet are a force for good

People. Only people are a force for good or evil.

Tech is true neutral ... or maybe Chaotic Neutral.

I don't have any good advice, but just wanted to say you're definitely not alone. I left the tech industry due to these feelings and observations.

Mind if I asked what you got into instead and how you transitioned to it?

Sure, although I'm not sure how helpful the answer will be as I'm still trying to figure things out myself :)

After I quit my job in 2017, I floundered for a bit while living off of my savings. Later that year, the big crypto bull run happened and I was introduced to trading. After the bubble popped, I learned how to trade options through TastyTrade [1] and have been doing that since. TastyTrade CEO Tom Sosnoff [2] has a refreshing attitude toward finance that totally spits in the face of Wall Street. I think the way he's addressed and dealt with Wall Street has some clues for how we can similarly criticize the excesses of tech.

For now, getting myself back on my feet has just been the start. I still feel unsatisfied with where I am in life and how I'm interacting with my community and what I can do for others. I have some vague ideas about how to use the money I've raised to bring more awareness to these issues in tech and to support those who are building organizations that address these issues from day one. I don't have anything concrete yet, but I've been trying to network and learn more.

[1] https://tastytrade.com/

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Sosnoff

My tech hangover started in 1989. Reading Psychology of Everyday Things and Technolopy helped me articulate my dissatisfaction, transmuted me from a technophile into a humanist.

I started some study groups (for geeks), started volunteering (tree hugger stuff, cancer survivor groups), got very activist / political. (Now experiencing a citizenship hangover. Oof.)

Hanging out with different cohorts is invigorating. Highly recommended.

A beautifully written piece that brings to mind Alan Kay's statement that a change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points. The world would be much better off if tech could see itself from her vantagepoint.

Appearing on HN on a remarkable day in a remarkable era when notable women are forcing historic change with strength, courage, and a different perspective- it is likely this piece will just be a footnote. I hope it becomes more.

Tech can see itself from her vantage point. It just refuses to acknowledge that it's looking at itself.

Yep. Everyone is gonna start to see tech the way tech sees finance and military contractors

I share a very similar experience to the author, though somehow even a little more extreme, including working in an entry level role for a certain tech mafia, living through maybe half of the events detailed in the new Uber book, working for the family of the president’s son in law, and then working at an absolute dumpster fire of a crypto company.

Should probably write a book about it one day!

You can write a blog. I think people would take interest in those kinds of stories.

There's nothing quite like being lied to!

Great write up! I really enjoy hearing this perspective. I think it's so easy to get wrapped up a big dream that we lose perspective into what's important. Treating people with respect and doing the right thing for the employees, customer, and owners. A lot of these mistakes can be tied to inexperience, and I wouldn't be surprised if the average age of VC invested founders goes up when money thins out!

Couldn't have written it better myself, however the toxic element is when all these naive/entitled people make the same mistakes over and over and lead to people lives getting destroyed over and over again

The most incompetent founder/CEO I worked for had the most experience and was the oldest...

It's interesting you call out the three entities of employee, customer, and owner. I was just listening to a podcast about the failures of meritocracy[0], which mentions these discrete roles and how we've continued to neglect employees and their economic wellbeing.

[0] https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/the-ezra-klein-show/e/64086...

I don’t understand why all these from-the-inside vignettes overplay all the stereotypes so much. I guess it has to do with making it more exciting and exotic for your readers

I have a feeling they don't overplay it. Writers of the HBO comedy series 'Silicon Valley' shared they don't use all real life examples because they were 'too hacky'.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/how-silicon-v...

I've sent this article around to my friends because it's one of the most accurate portrayals I've seen in mainstream media about the experiences I had working in tech. If you haven't encountered these types of personalities, consider yourself fortunate.

Eh, the "stereotypes" seemed pretty close to my experiences. Maybe we've just been working at the goofier startups.

I'd attribute that to storytelling, there's not much interesting about expanding on the technical details, but there's plenty to embellish from the interactive moments.

The Mixpanel (if that is the company being referred to, seems pretty obvious) CEO's callous firing of someone who asked for a raise, then threatening anyone who disagreed with this decision with termination is horrendous (if true).

Yea that scene was bonkers. Is that even legal, to demand resignation of an employee if they admit to disagreeing with a decision of yours? I hope I would have the courage to speak truth if I were ever put in that situation.

You can’t demand someone to resign, but you can terminate someone for no reason.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment

Resignation is an employee choosing to leave a job, and results in becoming ineligible to receive unemployment benefits, which results in the employer’s unemployment insurance premiums to be lower.

That's not limited to start-ups. My experience so far is that most superiors can't stand employees that disagree. And not all are self aware of it. But it usually is a good indicator whether or not a manager looks for yes-men or not.

"The employees tried to be the C.E.O’s friends, but we were not his friends. He shut down our ideas and belittled us in private meetings; he dangled responsibility and prestige, only to retract them inexplicably. We regularly brought him customer feedback, like dogs mouthing tennis balls, and he regularly ignored us. He was expensive to work for: at least two of my co-workers met with therapists to talk through their relationship with him."

This is Suhail Doshi, the former CEO of Mixpanel https://twitter.com/Suhail

This article is accurate but barely scratches the surface of how cruel he was to his employees.

Now, Suhail is starting another company, Mighty [1][2], a cloud-based browser.

I had a quick exchange with him about a potential position, but his arrogance and inflated ego left me uninterested. He shared very few details about the company, talking with a tone that assumed I was automatically convinced I would want to join just because he has founded Mixpanel. Hiring is a two-way street buddy.

[1] https://mightyapp.com [2] https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/19/all-84-startups-from-y-com...

> a cloud-based browser

I cringed reading that. Assuming I might have misunderstood the product I looked at the linked pages and cringed even more. There is definitely too much money available to startups in SV nowadays.

As Mighty are looking into spreading their business model to other software types I suggest they cover the video player market next.

What part of the quote identifies him? From my reading it sounds generic enough that it could apply to a number of abusive CEOs.

Other users have identified the company as Mixpanel, so I'm curious about what specific hints I had overlooked.

A little bit before this in the article the company is described in enough detail that someone familiar with it would recognize it: "I read puff pieces about the analytics startup’s co-founders, now twenty-four and twenty-five, with one Silicon Valley internship between them ... the C.E.O. and the technical co-founder left their college in the Southwest to join. The startup had twelve million dollars in venture funding, thousands of customers, and seventeen employees."

Thanks for the followup, it fits in retrospect but on my initial read I didn't peg it.

Also the author previously listed the specific company on Linkedin or other bios.

Any chance you can elaborate on the cruelness, either publicly or privately?

A lot of it is in older reviews on Glassdoor: https://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Mixpanel-Reviews-E406910.h...

(This doesn't represent the current CEO or company.)

There is a lot there about the CEO's arrogance, bullying, ego, micromanagement. I've worked with early startup founders, the part that bothered me the most was his wanton cruelty.

Belittling employees or their work. Watching people leave (with families) pressuring them to stay late. Making employees cry (regularly), firing without cause and showing no emotional reaction. Calling people and their ideas dumb in front of others. Telling an engineer about an idea then declaring "if i thought of that, what am i paying you for?"

Here are a couple excerpts from glassdoor:

"-CEO is a dictator. -Fire as quickly as they hire. -Work/Life balance is a joke. -Culture is arrogant, stifling."

"One of my worst experiences ever. After someone was fired, management would send out emails to the entire company explaining why that person was let go (sometimes, for very superficial and even somewhat spurious reasons). While I'm all for keeping people in the loop, this sends a really poor message to current employees. What kind of email will be written about me when I leave or am let go? If I'm struggling with my own performance, should I expect the entire company to eventually hear about it?

It's a pretty well-known fact that Mixpanel treats their new employees terribly. I suggest anyone looking for employment at this company to keep searching or get a second opinion."

"This place is a revolving door. Every month the CEO has let someone great go.

Heartless management."

"- Horrible leadership: yes, he's young and relatively inexperienced, but the CEO also just treats people pretty badly"

Any CEO would be ousted out by board if he/she receives such negative reviews.

And was!

It took years because the CEO owned a majority share of the company.

> management would send out emails to the entire company explaining why that person was let go

a few months back we had a meeting for people to ask questions after someone was fired. Didn't leave me feeling any better.

Let's not dox the poor bastard

If he had ever made any attempt, written directly or otherwise, to apologize for his behavior firing, mistreating, and belittling close to 100 people, I would not feel compelled to name him.

Compared to those he mistreated, it seems he got away with it pretty nicely.

Actually I'm all for roasting people on skewers but I felt i ought to be the voice of temperance for once -- bring out the pitchforks!

> A popular narrative about trolls was that they were just a bunch of lonely men in their parents’ basements, but this looked like a coördinated effort. The repository included e-mail templates and phone-call scripts. It was, my teammates agreed, unusual to see them so organized.

4chain raids provided automated software to assist in highly coordinated trolls - an email template seems like child's play compared to what the "best" trolls can pull. I experienced a raid running a business affiliated with Carson Daly, who made the "honest" mistake of appropriating a 4chan meme on his talk show. Had to shutdown the website and restore the database to the night before to get rid of all the child porn they were uploading to forums we hosted. Thanks for the memory, 4chan.

This is some mean shit on so many levels.

Rarely do I get the uncanny feeling of someone else describing my experience or taking the words out of my mouth, but this one did it so, so well. Somewhere in between The Circle and Silicon Valley (the show).

I often think about walking away and working as a baker.

The companies, locations, and people referenced in this article are so thinly veiled I don't understand why they'd try to keep them anonymous at all?

I don't think they're claiming to actually anonymize them. Seems like it's just a stylistic choice to not affirmatively identify them.

And avoiding a potential libel suit.

It's only libel if it isn't true.

To save the rest of you some trouble, the startups are Oyster ("e-books"), Mixpanel ("big data"), and Github ("open source").

While it was probably a legal decision, I actually liked how it worked on an artistic level. As a reader I was trying to piece it together myself. And it also left a feeling of, 'well, this is a specific company she is talking about, but at the same time could easily apply to dozens of others in the industry.'

So they can't sue back.

Ah yes, the technicalities of our wonderful justice system.

> On the train home, I leaned into Ian and recounted the interaction. What sexists, I said. How dare they be so dismissive, just because I was a woman—just because I did customer support and was considered nontechnical. Ian cringed and pulled me closer. “You’re not going to like this,” he said. “But you were trying to talk shit about self-driving cars with some of the first engineers ever to build one.”

I wonder who are these engineers who claimed to have built a self-driving car in 2013. Because we're in 2019 and self-driving cars still require two drivers to operate them.

Limited-capability self-driving cars have existed for quite some time, like in the DARPA Grand Challenge[0]. One could definitely see the people who competed there as "some of the first people to ever build a self-driving car".

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DARPA_Grand_Challenge

With the benefit of hindsight the shit talk was pretty spot on?

Presumably early waymo. Ian probably worked for bot & dolly which was bought by Google.

agile methodology -- first build a skateboard, then a scooter, then a bicycle then a Tesla -- they were probably building an MVP

ref: https://m.dotdev.co/the-agile-bicycle-829a83b18e7

I'm being sarcastic by the way -- that shit doesn't work

Wow, this author actually wrote well enough for me to read the whole article. I usually drop out 1-2 paragraphs into these types of longer form stories. Good job and looking forward to reading more.

I think the key difference is that the headline doesn't bait and switch you with the promise of some deeply-buried lede. You're reading it in the first place because you're interested in the author's firsthand experience.

I normally detest long-form because I go into it wanting to discover a tricky horse-betting scheme, but then I have to sit through pages of what some guy's suit looked like and how he held his cigar as he sat down for lunch. This author has her priorities aligned and doesn't abuse or mislead the reader.

TLDR: Founders are arrogant, self-serving assholes, spending other people's money; techies are ass-licking, ignorant avocado munchers. $$$ is being spent and harm is being done, while non-tech people struggle to make a living, but have a real life. Get out of the bubble.

This is an accurate summary of the article.

However, in my personal experience, it is not an accurate summary of the Bay Area. The startup scene may be truly this toxic, but I think such toxicity plagues any small, homogeneous group of people. It is hardly a tech problem. Indeed, mom-and-pop shop in small towns can be very abusive too.

To offer a counter anecdote, my experience with FAANG has been very positive. My workplace is the most meritocratic, efficient, and transparent organization that I've been in. (And I did spend 6 years on the East coast doing things unrelated to tech.)

I'm certain that the author's experience is true. I also want to caution against generalizing these issues to all of tech in the Bay.

A Facebook engineer just committed suicide last week due (allegedly) to workplace bullying made possible in part by his immigration status. Something like 45 women from Google just came forward claiming they were retaliated against for bringing up sexual harassment claims to HR this week.

You can’t generalize the claim that things are different at FAANGs either.

Don’t Facebook and Google each have over 100K employees just in their Bay Area offices? This is like FoxConn[1]. You can be doing substantially better than average and still have constant bad news by virtue of your size alone.

[1] The suicide rate among their employees was below the general population’s.

> The suicide rate among their employees was below the general population’s.

Was their suicide rate lower or higher then that of employees with a similar socioeconomic status?

No...Google has 100k employees worldwide. Facebook is something like 30k worldwide.

I'm not sure how your logic works: "most meritocratic, efficient, and transparent" does not mean flawless.

not all of us like avocados.

edit: i mean, I do.... but not everyone does.

Absolutely, I mean, I never met one in person, but they definitely exist out there. I'm almost sure.

My college roommate didn't (and still doesn't)!

Don't know why you are being downvoted but you your TLDR is pretty much spot on.

I would suggest to any techie who finds this not true to leave the bay area for a couple months then come back. It is amazing how entitled everyone is over here.

This. I feel like the article is a little bit too negative, but I've been something pretty much similar. I moved to SF, worked for about 4 years, loved it, but then moved back to Europe and realised "oh wow, it IS a bubble".

Now I'm excited to eventually go back to the bay, but it was very valuable to take a step back, go away and think about it!

I'm in the exact same situation as you. Worked here for a couple years then left the bay area for a couple months in between jobs and came back.

Taking a step back allowed me to see how most people live outside of the bay area and how big our bubble is. As you I'm excited to be here but I take everything with a grain of salt.

Everything's a bubble, and that's ok. Wouldn't want every city / region to be the same

When I leave for any length of time, what really strikes me is the entitled impatience. It's always a bit of a shock.

What entitlement do you see?

Lack of self-awareness. Attributing outcomes to merit when such things are often pseudo-randomly distributed. Lots and lots of arrogance, whether overt or subtle.

mistreatment of service workers is absolutely rampant in my experience

In the current era, who are the non-tech people?

Almost everyone uses a smartphone and a computing device. I have never been able to understand this "non tech" part all too well.

One who could operate a phone and open a browser and search well is all one needs to be called 'technical' , thanks to the power of fast search and cheap Internet.

Reading this beautifully written piece brings to mind the recent book about Elizabeth Holmes - Bad Blood. Some of the completely unacceptable behavior by tech CEOs and "higher ups" definitely rings a bell; some startups like Theranos were doing exactly that and ended up getting a lot of negative attention.

I read it as 12 year a slave.

I listened to the article, and yes, the startup environment has a LOT of problems.

But the pretentious tone removes a lot of it's legitimacy for me, mostly because it sinks as low as some of these startups to get engagement and reactions to the article, to the point of becoming hypocritical.

We need proper journalism uncovering these malpractices, not sensationalist or tech gossip pieces that can be discredited as such.

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