That being said I didn't notice anything particularly offensive about this letter. He describes the accomplishments under his watch, expresses gratitude for employees, and expresses confidence in his successor.
I'd rather listen to someone who is straightforward than Sundar Pichai speaking entirely in corporate-speak while saying absolutely nothing of value or substance. Completely uninspiring.
All corporate speak is rather an invention of the 80's and 90's. Listen to corporate leaders from any other time before that.
Musk isn't so much "speaking the truth", he's more "selling things, his way".
Corporate speak, definition:
- to say what's in the best interest of the corporation, no matter what the circumstance
- to not tell the truth, unless it's something that can become a huge PR success for the corporation
- to not tell a lie, unless it's something that can become a huge PR success for the corporation
For the "Musk speak" definition, simply replace "the corporation" with "Musk".
systemvoltage made no comparison between impact of Musk & impact of GitHub
Edit: lol, this will be the most downvotes on a char count basis I've ever received. I thought it was generally accepted that for better or worse, he does not mince words.
Musk is equally if not more pompous with his nuggets of wisdom, and offers no value or substance either.
The framing on this as a demonstration of deep misogyny in tech is just way, way too morbidly absurd.
I mean, if we can excuse Musk's behavior as "So what? His companies have been incredibly successful," then, fine, but why can't we say the same for other CEOs? Other CEOs at least have a good sense of keeping their personal feuds out of twitter.
I dont think it is this letter in particular. So may be it is not fair to criticise it. But my guess is that the accumulation of these cooperate speaks, PR, and the past 10 years of main stream media riding along these PR to new height, just happen to tricker OP this time around.
And it doesn't seems to be an American things either, I read a lot of Fortune 500 post, somehow these over the top PR speak are mostly related to tech only.
However, I still think Github and Nat deserve a lot of praise for what they have done. Lots of changes and improvement happened after the acquisition. And not only credit to Nat but also to Microsoft.
that question mark at the end of a non-question. Nothing personal, just critique on a larger trend, but IMO upspeak and vocal fry are more annoying than corporate speak.
But I agree about these exit letter being more delicate. The more intimate notes are fine internally.
Being authentic as a leader is impossible. Your thoughts, desires, core beliefs, etc are going to be offensive to someone -- even if those disagreeable things made agreeable outcomes for people mad at your words. I mean offensive in the broadest possible definition here; more plainly, they'll be perceived negatively by someone with enough motivation to be nasty and often it's not worth the trouble of dealing with someone who woke up feeling nasty. We live in a world where people think it's okay to read into the words (and lives) of others, try to derive deep meaning out of simple actions (even if there is none), and where people believe you're lying by default (as a leader). The fact is, as time has gone on confirmation of these things in various people and businesses builds, so they're hard assuations to just toss aside. Therefore, it is most safe to type a paragraph giving direction, listing accomplishments, and thanking entities that helped you along the way in the most taste-free way one can, while saying absolutely nothing at all.
I offer a contrary point of view: why does it bother you so much? Simply do not read it.
It belongs to Microsoft, doesn't it?
Instagram is worth hundreds of billions now. Bought for $1B. It is an actual unicorn situation of being incredibly rare.
There’s no point bringing up something so rare.
For example, the only other [tech?] acquisition that I can think of even sniffing IG is Priceline (now Bookings Holdings) acquiring Bookings.com for a couple hundred million. Now being the core of the business.
—
Beyond that. Just to be geeky about this stuff. The only other general financial deals in this ballpark are SoftBank, Yahoo, and Naspers investments. Copy pasting previous comment:
SoftBank and Yahoo bought around 40% stakes each in Alibaba. SoftBank spent $20M in 1999, the year Alibaba was founded. Alibaba owned 34% as of the mid 2010s. Now own 26%. Yahoo, because of Jerry Yang, invested $1B in 2005.
Naspers invested $32M for almost 50% of Tencent in 2001. Probably the best investment ever. Naspers split into two companies. Prosus owns the remaining close to 30% stake now. Though Naspers and Prosus both own around one half of one another.
All three investing companies have had issues with their own valuations. They’ve all had their own market caps be undervalued. Their one investment alone usually was close to or even exceeded the entire market cap of the company. Still the case for SoftBank and Prosus.
It'd be reasonable to peg GitHub as being worth $40-$50 billion.
That's a serious asset for Microsoft shareholders - even if the parent is worth $2t - and they will want to see it flourish. Which goes in line with what the parent comment noted about presenting the correct impression, not only to shareholders but also to anyone interested in working at GitHub for Microsoft. Potential employees will want to know that the context is healthy.
In part because even the title is clickbait. Even the tl;dr manages to inject some platitudes before getting to the point.
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And you're arguing a strawman. The comment you replied to never implied he shouldn't say farewell. They're complaining about how utterly insincere it comes across being blasted full of every trite corporate saying in existence
If anything they're arguing for more of a farewell than this, and it would have taken less effort too.
I wonder why it upsets you that someone would complain about this though, do you have a personal attachment to Nat?
Please point to where I implied I was at all upset.
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But this is HN where inferring tone is apparently a step too far in terms of speculation, so here.
Have an ML model tell you how upset you sound: https://i.imgur.com/nztQgdY.jpg
You can't make up this stuff up.
To the reply:
> would not be acceptable in any social setting otherwise
You're close to getting it!
In a normal social setting if someone says "If you don't like X don't interact with it!" that can reasonably understood as a negative statement.
Going "show me where I said I'm upset!!" instead of just clarifying is not acceptable in a social setting. Busting out an ML model is just holding up the mirror.
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> I am not responsible for how the voice in your head portrays what you read.
I'm not responsible for teaching people how basic social interactions work, yet here we are...
I believe using a sentiment analysis tool you googled for to back up an assumption you made about me and my character would not be acceptable in any social setting otherwise. Just pointing this out. My original comment was made with an informative/inquisitive tone.
I am not responsible for how the voice in your head portrays what you read.
(sorry, couldn't help myself. I think you're all great simply for being here and applying your intellects!)
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And I am upset, I hate working in one of the few industries where people wear social ineptitude like a badge:
Like someone says something when they're clearly upset, you ask why they're upset, then suddenly they derail the conversation because
"how dare you imply I am some descendant of a caveman capable of being shudder upset"
Like holy shit, real people get upset! Wowie what a concept!
Dude was upset someone insulted his rockstar idol that everyone in SV knows and got called out.
I jokingly tell him even a computer can see he's upset and now there's literally another reply to me by this "peter" person picking a fight with the computer!
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Maybe you're all stuck in this weird passive aggressive bubble of timidity (maybe that's the "everyone") where you're not allowed to express emotion but I'm not going to coddle you, not here or in real life
This person was upset. They didn't need to present it as some passive aggressive "informative", like the guy they replied to didn't know they couldn't read it.
They're just not used to having to deal with emotions directly instead of being as biting as possible while seeming... "informative"
Except they didn't say that, did they? What they said verbatim was "simply do not read it" which is a much more reasonable tone than how you seemingly interpreted it.
Whether it's negative or not also depends on the context which in this case is a proposed solution to literally the most negative and upset-sounding post in this chain: the one that started it. What does your ML model think of "I'm gonna throw up on my keyboard"?
third person shows up to pick a fight with the computer.
Never chance y'all.
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And for the record, if someone complains about a piece of writing, and you tell them "simply not to read it"
You are being a passive aggressive joke, and you are clearly upset with their critique.
People are allowed to dislike things, and gasp even hate things, you don't need to get all max passive aggression over that.
Not everyone lives in an echo chamber of timidity where all emotions must be moderate some of you put yourselves in.
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The person I replied to had no answer to the actual point I made, so they tried to derail the conversation to "how dare you claim I'm upset!" which was a complete aside in my comment as it was in theres.
Yet now I am talking to a guy who wants to argue with an ML model so I guess well played?
Are you suggesting ML models are infallible? You might want to sit down before I tell you the news...
My comment said something a social skill as simple as inferring tone is too far above you.
Now here you are, still trying argue about the ML model that was used to compare your social skills to that of a text analysis model.
Hint: It was never about the ML model.
Like at first it was funny, now it's just sad. It's too on the nose.
Why not just tell it like it is then? Dear shareholders, I'm leaving because I'm rich / bored with Github and not because there was a falling-out.
>why does it bother you so much? Simply do not read it.
So you're suggesting people should just not read or listen to anything that they don't like? And just keep quiet?
Because what you suggested is extremely impersonal, arrogant, harsh, cold, and dismissive of the work of all the employees working under you.
This case has more than 50% likelihood.
We're confident that intelligent audience members, like yourself OP, can appreciate the large amounts of money and diverse political sensitivities that our communication must be careful to navigate. And while we respectfully regret any discomfort you might have experienced, we hope that you find joy in our future communications.
...which was riddled with phrases like:
"With all that we’ve accomplished in mind, and more than five great years at Microsoft under my belt, I’ve decided it’s time for me to go back to my startup roots. What drives me is enabling builders to create the future.
Not even Clark Kent could be this braggadocios.
If you start from the assumption that it is a genuine attempt to put messy feelings into concise words, then it is a bit lacks vividness but is nonetheless heartfelt.
When you choose not to trust someone, you make them untrustworthy.
The fun exercise here is not that this is yet another vapid post on HN, but that people are defending it.
It's quite plausible that the simple truth of the matter is that some people commenting here, defending the post, may feel that HN shouldn't be so very frequently cynical, negative, mean, quick to jump to assuming the worst about intentions, and so on. The Guidelines - for good reason - even go out of the way to try to drive users away from behaving that way.
Because “If people would assume the worst about someone as competent at communication as $leader, then how much more likely are they to mistrust me when I try to communicate sincerely?” is the story I tell myself. Spending time in low-trust environments does bad things to the psyche.
OP: "Look the guy probably had some success and met some great people. So why in the hell can't you say that in your own words?"
My comment: "Not even Clark Kent could be this braggadocios."
There are better way of expressing one's (dis)satisfaction in the workplace. Starting with, perhaps, whittling down one's pride in accomplishing what tens of thousands already have...
I think all these comments are incredibly childish. It’s a nice goodbye letter from their well known and visible leader.
A braggadocios "goodbye letter" is worse than no letter at all.
The corporate speak regurgitation is icing on the cake.
The point of the ritual is to signal the world that all goes as planned, while giving away as few salient details as possible.
Sometimes it's better to say nothing at all than be thought a fool.
Yeah... what message do you think that would send.
The world is starting to realize that tech companies are causing a lot of societal damage that will take years, if not generations to repair.
People are also starting to get upset at large corporations for being tone death and having zero social contracts for the societies they reside in.
Public opinion is turning and GitHub/Microsoft are just getting caught in the crosshairs with public sentiment.
"plastic, formulaic, always-be-selling"
Huh?
OP is probably referring to this tired, cliched turn of phrase (among other examples in the blog).
-Phat Nat
You needn't use your real name, of course, but for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to. Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be a different kind of forum. https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme...
> for HN to be a community, users need some identity for other users to relate to
Apparently not! Using throwaways, people have upvoted me like crazy. Hundreds of points per month, for a person with no identity. If it kept going at the same pace, I would outrank some of the highest-point users within a year or two, all from using throwaway. Is that not community? And if it's not - isn't it better than community? Isn't upvoting someone you don't know, don't owe anything to, who you hold no preconceived ideas about, actually a more honest way to interact with a community?
When I get upvoted, I'm happy. Me being happy encourages me to post in a happy mood, so I create happier comments (on average). When I get downvoted or ignored (on my 'real' account), I get angry and depressed, and that makes for much less happy comments (and just a bad feeling all around). Using the throwaways not only makes me less angry and depressed, but it also enables creating content that people clearly approve of.
> Otherwise we may as well have no usernames and no community
There have been throwaways on this site for ages, in addition to known people. The community hasn't disappeared as far as I can tell. So it seems like you can, in fact, have it both ways. In addition, I've been a member of a lot of different communities. A lot of the time, the ones that banter on about how much of a close-knit community they are, enable some of the most toxic behavior. There are some great aspects to community, and some horrifying ones. Rather than trying to change the community to fit the standards we think it should have, perhaps we should encourage the behavior that metrics show have a more positive outcome. I could be crazy, but it seems like anything that inspires more upvotes (without the content being hateful, vitriolic, judgemental or divisive) seems like it's worth keeping.
Maybe I missed something, and there's some metrics-driven approach where you're pushing back on all throwaway behavior because its existence (regardless of content) leads to worse outcomes. Or maybe you just consider 'most' throwaways to post divisive content, and push back on all of them. Or maybe you just don't like the idea of throwaways, I dunno. All I know is this little experiment with throwaways has made me much happier on HN.
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
As for 'the community not disappearing' - this is a freerider argument. You're benefitting from the contributions of all the people who aren't behaving this way.
Also, there is no "freeriding" if the throwaways are actively producing positive content. You might as well call every single user a "freerider" - what are they contributing at all? Is your forum getting paid by someone based on an estimate of "real users" or something, and throwaways screw up your numbers? It really doesn't make sense.
The idea that a static username alone has an outsized positive effect on your community doesn't seem to be provable, in the face of accounts like mine. Maybe you're just making a general rule so you can eliminate the majority of accounts used for flaming or spam, I can't tell.
As I live longer, I realize some people take to corporate speak and corporate values like ducks to water.
It's actually their preferred mode of communication and existence.
Politicians play this game most clearly - they need to communicate allegiance to the rich, their political party and 'the people', which is an impossible ask (because the parties are not aligned and you please one by taking away from the other) but they do quite well by having invented a vocabulary that's interpreted differently by each group, plus they can outright lie, which's a last resort move they try to avoid.
Anyhoo :)