
John McAfee AMA - Garbage
https://www.reddit.com/r/netsec/comments/3hr9f0/i_am_john_mcafee_ama/
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jmkni
I thought this was good:

> OT, but do anyone know exactly what went wrong with McAfee after the founder
> left the company?

> It grew, it got big, like every company. When I started, there were 4 of us.
> Generating $10M/yr, we could have lived happily for our lives on that. VCs
> came and offered to make it bigger, we had to grow, we didn't have sales,
> marketing, etc. I gave it away, unless you were a government, corporation,
> etc. Once I went public, I had 1000 bosses, investors, FTC, SEC, all my time
> in meetings and interviews. I hired a programmer/day for over a year! I used
> to spend time taking apart viruses, not I was an accountant. Once a company
> gets big, it becomes slow, and cannot survive in its current form.

Nice cautionary tail there about ruining something good by trying to go too
big

~~~
derrickdirge
Going public is often the turning point where a 'Good Company' starts to
become a 'Bad Company'. It becomes no longer good enough to make a good
product.

~~~
yuhong
I didn't think it was that simple in case of McAfee or for that matter in most
cases however.

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orthoganol
When asked what someone can do to be successful in software:

> That;s a tough one. get out of the box no1. REALLY out of the box. Abandon
> every social norm, esp those closest to you. Then look at the world with
> objective eyes. Look what is the thing to do? Every entrepreneur I know (I
> know Steve Jobs, and he was out of the box) went out of the box. If you
> can't go work for someone else.

Yeah the older I get the more it becomes clear that there's inherent conflict
between following social norms (developing a cushy social life) and achieving
something big. Like with being a startup founder I think almost all have to go
through intense anti-social periods, admittedly I judge founders as being
average or worse if they don't seem to have some anti social or obsessive
streak to them.

Kobe is a cool example too, a guy who had a relatively bizarre social life for
an NBA player, with a manic obsession about work and improvement. I think he
even said "Friends come and go, but banners stay forever." Extreme, but hits
on a deeper truth about what all it takes to make it big.

~~~
eli
I mean this in the nicest possible way, but that kinda sounds like a
justification for being a workaholic.

~~~
prawn
Often, work pays off. The Lakers used to try and lock Kobe out of the gym to
stop him getting shots up at all hours before dawn. But he persisted and found
other ways in.

~~~
_RPM
Why would his team not want him to practice?

~~~
prawn
He would go in at 2am, 4am, etc and put up hundreds of shots. They changed the
locks. He would wedge open service doors, etc. Risk was burnout or injury from
sheer repetition.

They might've underestimated the sort of character he is. There are some great
stories out there about his training habits, the Lakers scouting him as a
rookie pre-draft, etc. Contentious character, but hard to deny his focus.

There is one great story of him calling in a trainer to work with him after
midnight. They take a break, the trainer understanding they were done for now
and going home. Trainer came back in the morning for team training and made
smalltalk with Kobe about hopefully he had had a good rest after their
workout. Kobe was confused. He'd been there all night training and hadn't gone
home.

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nnq
This is a gem of wisdom:

 _pair-programming between devs and hackers will allow for instant security
feed-back [...] It will be the only possible way to develop ironclad software.
Starting with the system architects, there need to be arcdhitectural hackers -
all the way through the coding process._

...and reading the other stuff too, he seems to still be knowing what he's
talking about!

~~~
butwhy
Yes he is very good at explaining good practice, such as precise instructions
on removing software:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKgf5PaBzyg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKgf5PaBzyg)

~~~
Someone1234
The dude is very likeable and I don't care about him doing illegal drugs (I'm
no moralist).

That being said, the accusations that he killed his next door neighbor in
Belize and then fled the country are disconcerting...

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee#Legal_issues](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McAfee#Legal_issues)

~~~
speeder
As someone that lives in a third world country, I think that everything John
said about the case (that it was about people wanting bribes) is true.

Also he said people hit him with a baseball bat after putting a helmet on his
head, I know even other techniques (a cop friend told me one of the things his
corrupt colleagues do is hit people with soap bars inside towels, it also
hurts a lot without leaving bruises if you know what you are doing).

~~~
rainer_muell
I don't think he said this had been done to him. He merely said that's a
common 'questioning' technique used in Belize.

~~~
drzaiusapelord
In another reply he claims they did it to his post-arrest.

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dr_zoidberg
What I liked the most is that they took the time to reply more than the top-
level question -- many AMAs I've seen* just answer the top level question and
move on to something else.

* disclaimer: I don't read so many AMAs, just the ones I find interesting.

~~~
raverbashing
Several AMAs lately have been a PR exercise (like showing up on a talk show)

~~~
jessriedel
I don't think there's a clean line between for-fun celebrity AMAs and PR
exercises. They blend smoothly into each other, and the real division is just
whether it trips your personal "authenticity" alarm.

~~~
nickysielicki
There's an easy well to tell, just look in the OP and see if they're plugging
something. John McAfee is not. Woody Harrelson was.

~~~
jessriedel
Everyone is plugging something all the time. Just because they're plugging
their general popularity rather than a particular movie does not make
something unassailably authentic.

------
mentos
It was wild to follow John McAfee a few years back when he was on the run in
Beliz. His podcast with Joe Rogan at the time was pretty entertaining and so
I'm not surprised to see they are looking to make a movie (not sure if this
was mentioned in the AMA, still making my way through it)

Scott Alexander & Larry Karaszewski To Script John McAfee Film For Warner Bros
[http://deadline.com/2013/07/scott-alexander-larry-
karaszewsk...](http://deadline.com/2013/07/scott-alexander-larry-karaszewski-
to-script-john-mcafee-film-for-warner-bros-551655/)

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paradisechris
Wow really enjoying the level of effort put into these responses

~~~
nathanvanfleet
Possibly drug fuelled..

~~~
_RPM
Regardless if that's true or not, how is that relevant?

~~~
slowmotiony
Relax, it was funny.

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ousta
this is the best AMA ever from the most fascinating crazy man in the IT world.

