
'Stone-cold crazy' $1.7b golden parachute for ousted WeWork CEO Adam Neumann - burnte
https://www.businessinsider.com/experts-react-softbank-17-billion-wework-buyout-adam-neumann-2019-10
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mdorazio
This is completely insane. The only possible explanation I can think of is
that Neumann's shares were so ridiculously impossible to get back and he was
so stubborn about giving them up that SoftBank either paid this blood money or
choked on WeWork running out of cash in a month. Even if that did happen, how
negligent was SoftBank to get into this position in the first place?

This is why the general public, and now an increasing number of politicians,
are increasingly hating SV in general - the headlines are getting almost as
bad as the financial bailout ones in 2009.

~~~
SmellTheGlove
Particularly when We isn’t really a tech company and based in NYC, not SV.
It’s unfortunate to have it lumped in when it’s really not representative of
tech dysfunction. We have that, but it’s not this.

~~~
skinnymuch
I don’t know how many people will care if a company is based in NYC vs
SF/valley. It still feels in general like a SV thing if thinking of SV as its
ideas and echo chamber vs just region.

~~~
SmellTheGlove
I dunno, real estate grift seems more NYC than SV to me. I think ambiguity is
due to We marketing itself as a tech brand, but if we look at what really
happened here, it doesn’t seem SV beyond the CEOs caricature personality. Even
the growth at all costs companies like Uber are driving toward sustainable
unit economics.

I’m not one to defend the valley - I was an outsider for the first decade and
a half of my career before moving out here and into the fire. There’s a lot of
stupid shit that goes on in tech, but what We did is only create the
appearance of working from the same playbook.

Maybe on my latter point we really are saying the same thing - I could see how
an observer might relate the behaviors.

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anm89
This is obviously an absurd situation but I don't understand why people seem
personally offended by it.

This isn't public money. It's their money to lose and if they do it's they who
suffer the consequences.

It's their right to be stupid. As long as the do it on their and their non
public investor's dime.

~~~
katmannthree
>It's their right to be stupid. As long as the do it on their and their non
public investor's dime.

Perhaps, but from the outside it looks like at some point Adam decided that
instead of running a real company he was going to pump and dump We and run off
with as much cash as he and his wife could carry.

SoftBank's action here, while possibly a good strategic choice for them at
this point, looks from the outside to be rewarding antisocial behavior with
more money than the vast majority of us will ever earn in our lifetimes.
People aren't saying that SoftBank can't do it, they're just saying that it's
very unpleasant to watch.

~~~
anm89
Cool, so let them litigate if they so choose. A court can decide if the pump
and dump broke securities laws and penalize accordingly. It still doesn't
matter for any of the people acting personally offended.

It's absolute within softbank's right to act "antisocially" as long as no
specific laws were broken.

What, should we take them to thought crime court for improper antisocial
thought?

~~~
katmannthree
>It's absolute within softbank's right to act "antisocially" as long as no
specific laws were broken.

I'm not disagreeing with that. Just as it is likely his right to act in a
manner many find to be antisocial, it is my and everyone else's right to be
disgusted by Adam Neumann and to shame him online in whatever (legal) fashion
I feel like.

>It still doesn't matter for any of the people acting personally offended.

Since you seem to prefer concrete takes on things, consider that I'm not
judging Adam on some abstract moral basis. His actions on a broad scale
represent a set of behaviors that are at odds with a healthy society. He has
harmed softbank, but he has also harmed the employees at We. There are people
who left stable jobs to work for him who are now out of work, and many more
who will soon join them.

~~~
anm89
Yeah I think that's very fair. He has undoubtedly screwed a lot of people over
here. On the other hand many of them were just as greedy as Adam was with the
key exception that they did not position themselves in a winning matter. You
could debate this but I would argue most of them understood that this was the
game they were playing.

~~~
katmannthree
Absolutely, as far as people in his cohort go I don't think he's necessarily
any more unethical or selfish than the mean. In fact, given that SoftBank's
Vision Fund is backed by a nation with some fairly severe human rights issues,
one could even argue that from a utilitarian standpoint he has done good.

My issue with him is from my belief that a society filled with people who act
like he has is destined to far less long term success than one where people
are less self-serving.

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7532yahoogmail
On the one hand it's risk capital and this what happens to stupid investors
who with the CEO are greedy --- without creating real value like Buffet,
Intel, AMD, or other real companies. On the other hand this is why in the US
people like Sanders, Warren, and AOC get taken seriously: asshole corporate
people getting paid billions while workers are laid off and are taxed at
higher rates than rich people with tax accountants and offshore accounts.
WeWorks will lay off 2000 people, but as reported elsewhere, can't do that
just yet because they can't come up with severance pay.

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totaldude87
This is outright stupid and sets dangerous precedence and example.

dear SoftBank I know you have a lot of money to throw around but don't waste
it in this crap. Instead use this money to fund hundreds of companies that
actually help in the evolution of technology and science.

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sideshowmel
WeWork has always seemed like a Ponzi scheme to me. This reinforces my theory.

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quantified
Charismatic flim-flam is definitely a core competence.

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corodra
I love how everyone here is pretending that if they did a startup company and
got investment this big, they wouldn't put in safety measures for themselves.
Or even better, not sell their shares at last investment evaluation. Private
corps still have shares and he wasn't going to let go of voting rights without
a few shipping containers worth of money. You really want to pretend you
wouldn't do the same?

Stop hating the player because you'll get nowhere. Hate the game and the
bullshit religious devotion to these tech companies. Ya'll worship these twats
one way or another. From the Jobs, Musks, Bezos, Zuckerbergs, ya'll worshipped
them at one point. The Silicon Valley made the joke about this with the
pitches that were "Make the world a better place with..." Then you gasp in
surprise when you find out they're the same asshole as any other business
major.

These are all businesses. For profits. Not non-profits. There is zero
difference between a ceo/founder in SV compared to Rockefeller, Carnegie, JP
Morgan, or even Donald Trump. They are all the same money and power hungry
folks. Some just have better PR teams and self restraint than others. Better
wig makers too.

The only stone cold crazy thing going on is that people are surprised.

~~~
hos234
Have you heard of Theodore Roosevelt? The Rockefeller, Carnegie and Morgans
are just one side of a coin. And if you read enough history, society is
constantly flipping the coin.

~~~
corodra
Yea, the Bull Moose is one of my heroes. But I'm also not blind to reality.
The benefit he had in his days of trust bustin' was the fact the general
populace never worshiped the old business titans like the second coming of
Jesus. These days, people with open arms and open hearts say, "Yes! Please!
Exploit my data and ruin the market with monopolistic practices because you
said you love us and you _say_ nice things about the poor and _wanting_ to
save the planet." Then they cry foul when it's too fucking late.

The point to reading history is to learn from the past so the same mistakes
are not made again. Something people STILL don't understand. Nothing here
about WeWork or Amazon or Apple is new. New market, sure. New business
practices? Hell no. Exploit workers. Exploit consumers. Exploitative contract
verbiage. Exploit and lobby the government. Bullshit self-interest deals.
Nothing new at all. But even here on HN where it's supposed to be a bunch of
smart guys, they all jump like lions on the kill whenever someone mentions one
of these silicon valley asses are up to no good. They start reciting whatever
xyz fallacy they saw in an article to pretend like their dismissal holds
water. Take a look back into earlier this year on HN about WeWork. Some folks
were talking about how over valued the company was and it was a silly business
model to begin with due to their PR pushes. It wasn't going to hold. Oh no,
just a bunch of baby boomers, racists, and uneducated collegeless plebs who
don't understand how tech works. They don't know what they're talking about.
Let's throw confirmation bias into their face. Hell, the Theranos discussions
were even worse before they got exposed. All a bunch of misogynist racist
assholes if you questioned the validity of any claims made by Holmes. For a
group of people that claim to believe in science and evidence, it's a rather
emotionally driven community that uses pop-psychology, middle-school level
debate tactics and mass numbers to push weak agendas.

There's a part of me that just thinks, "Fuck it all. Let it burn." But I
figure if I go on these rants every now and then, someone else who doesn't
believe the hype machine, but feels alone in that, might get a sense of "Well,
I'm not completely alone in thinking this company/person is an asshole."

But what really makes me mad, no one here can rightfully claim that if they
were in that dude's position with WeWork, that they would do any different.
But oh, "How could this happen? Shame on them! Shame! Shame!" You're really
going to claim that you entered STEM if it had the same employment prospects
as a someone who majors in philosophy or art? Maybe they would have tried to
negotiate for an even $2b. I'll take that claim of doing something different
and shaming the guy for settling under $2b. But if you had the ability to
legally walk away with $1b+ from a company you are the founder of, and you
know it won't hold water for too long, you wouldn't take it? People illegally
walk away with far less money.

~~~
hos234
:) What can I tell ya - human nature! We all have weaknesses individually and
a different bunch when in groups.

The first time I saw a large cheque waved in front of me, I fell for it hook
line and sinker :) Having lived through the dotcom bust/2008 financial crash
and all kinds of other events, all I know is Learning takes time.

I had to fall and be miserable to learn. The second time around I didn't take
the cheque. I had to also learn financial independence gave me choices. And
lots of people don't have choices. All that creates conditions for the
contradictions we see. But things change. The world is not static. I also
learnt the hard way, naming/shaming/comparing/judging etc is not the most
effective in speeding up that Learning process. It creates more defensiveness
and counter reactions that drain energy further. There are better routes to
create understanding. Search for them and redirect that passion in your
comment into those routes.

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stuqqq
Donate money to charity please. Don’t give money to this scumbag.

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lostgame
Whatever you say, Stone Cold Steve Austin.

...not sure why I just said that, but I gotta stick by it. Whatever you say,
Stone Cold Steve Austin!

In reality, this is terrible.

