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Comment by rmason | Hacker News Reader

Here's the blog post that goes along with that tweet stream:

https://ryancaldbeck.medium.com/transitions-fa7ce4af435

Holy cow that feedback. It’s both great and awful at the same time. Great in that it was written as objectively as possible and concrete. Awful as in it was too long and he clearly put too much time in to it relative to how much the other guy valued him. I think the real purpose was to process his feelings and list out all the wrongs - I just think he should’ve separated them. Spend hours processing, spend no more than 15 min giving this jack off feedback.

Also hindsight is 20/20 but if you work with an asshole it’s not your responsibility to shield him. Escalate to the other board members and have them deal with him. He clearly values their respect so one of them (or better all of them) needed to sit him down for a talk.

Sounds like a case of "rich kid playing VC" syndrome, or something like that, because it's hard to see any competence in making money there (except maybe by inheritance or extreme hubris/sucking up)

> but if you work with an asshole it’s not your responsibility to shield him.

This

Let them hang themselves

Adding the google cache. Looks like the medium is down.

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:-EgQnmp...

Simultaneously, we were forced to deal with a board member who was beyond counterproductive. After we bought him out fully in 2019, I sent this feedback email detailing the ways in which he had disrupted our board and company.

The former CEO should take down the feedback email, as he is exposing himself and others to legal liability.

He is not the only one who has had to deal with toxic investors who sit on startup boards. It's driven many good people away from companies they've founded. Sometimes the toxic board members are not newbies, either - they're supposed pros. Not sure what sort of due diligence can sniff these jerks out before they join the board, and maybe it's not even possible to turn them away if it's a condition of getting investment.

I'm thankful for that "feedback email", whoever that guy was, he either has a serious case of the Dunning–Kruger effect going on or he deliberately behaved that way to extract money out of a startup by being a total resource vampire for the group; like it was a strategy. Maybe that's how a certain number of VCs actually operate? They're just grifters all the way down.

I think it is of great public service that the email is out in public domain. It warns many first time CEO's of the dark side of raising money from naive VC's who never ran a company before becoming VC.

The email also adds context to Vinod Kosla's famous message: https://techcrunch.com/2013/09/11/vinod-khosla/

Seems like many of the other VCs were pretty decent though. Eg encouraging the author to take time off etc. That's definitely adding positive value in my book.

This is one of the most honest and cathartic emails I've read. I genuinely think he should keep it up.

Some people naively view investment as "just money". This is an honest warning showing the real consequences of that incorrect view.

What legal liability? A lot of people especially here in the US are always invoking liability. What series of legal events do you imagine being initiated by the posting of this email?

Serious ? No more or less than giving a dentist a bad review, impacting their income and reputation. They will say I am not a bad person to work with and this inaccurate statements have affected my reputation.

A dentist can only sue you for a bad review if the statements are untrue, and harm his reputation. The email doesn't include the name of the bad guy, and even if it did, if the statements are true, then there is no lawsuit to be had. Sure, you could be sued by someone claiming that they're false, but under Anti-SLAPP laws if you prove that it's frivolous you can yourself be awarded $25,000.

Overall it's just very hard in the US to sue someone for telling the truth about how awful you are.

I’ve fought off a frivolous defamation lawsuit against me so I couldn’t disagree more with

“A dentist can only sue you for a bad review if the statements are untrue” and

“Overall it's just very hard in the US to sue someone for telling the truth about how awful you are.”

Huh. I stand corrected. Was your lawsuit about a bad review?

I've read through the transcript of a court case in Australia where the defendant lost 50k for some really borderline comments. Specifically, a vet was "grumpy", and charged 3x markup for some medication, which apparently was true but hand waved away in the hearing with the excuse around delivery and overheads.

https://fclawyers.com.au/checking-facts-before-you-write-rev...

That’s messed up. IANAL but don’t think that the outcome in the US would have been the same.

The feedback is simply not attributable for outsiders. I don't think there is a legal argument here. And even if the VC was identified, if the writer didn't invent any of those stories (you wanted inaccuracy, right?), there is nothing he is liable for...

Or am I mistaken about US law? I think it is even worse over there, you can basically write what you want, as long as nobody can prove it outright wrong. Just imagine all the New York Post articles somebody would be sued for.

Most outright defamatory articles just end in a "Welp, sorry?"-situation and nothing ever happens, because "It could have been true, right?"

The VC isn't going to sue the author of an email that didn't name them that called out their bad behavior. That would be news and link them to it. Most VCs at that company would think it wasnt about them because they aren't so badly behaved.

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