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Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

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Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#121

Post by pyre »

hueving wrote: post #108
st3v3r wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They'll say something about being able to leave, but completely ignoring the situation being extremely stressful and scary. Victim blaming and a complete lack of empathy will ensue.

"victim blaming" is a loaded term to avoid any examination of the responsibility of the person who got screwed. When a drunk driver rolls their car and breaks both of their own legs, it is their responsibility for driving drunk, yet you don't find many people calling that "victim blaming" or "a lack of empathy". Anyone who uses that term tends to be appealing to emotion rather than proposing anything of substance.

> "victim blaming" is a loaded term to avoid any examination of the responsibility of the person who got screwed.

Are you claiming that "victim blaming" isn't a thing? There are plenty of people that want to shuttle blame/responsibility around, and will blame the victim for not making better choices, while absolving all others of guilt.

Take this incident as an example:

"Well, none of those employees are being forced to work there, so it's their own fault for not getting paid. They should have just chosen a more trust-worthy employer!"

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#122

Post by pyre »

jtfairbank wrote: post #110
pyre wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They might open themselves up to lawsuits. Even if they will win the lawsuits, that's a money/time sink to deal with.

Instead of getting into specifics, would simply listing them as "someone I would never work with again" suffice? If enough people do this then the specifics don't really matter... the warning sign is clear. This seems to avoid the defamation issue because it is a personal statement (about yourself / your thoughts) instead of a statement about them. They could still sue you for defamation, but hopefully you could get…

I'm not a lawyer, but I would assume that even that could be grounds for someone to file a lawsuit. I would like to believe that a judge wouldn't let that get very far, but if the person tried to claim material losses due to (e.g.) not being able to find work "due to your comments" then you might have to sit out a trial or settle.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#123

Post by keithnz »

programmer_guy wrote: post #41

Hey guys, just wanted to clear the air on some of the speculation: I'm actually with WrkRiot and can guarantee you we're not the company in question: I've got many weeks of paid on time pay stubs sitting right here. Plus we didn't have anyone matching any of the descriptions in this article. Interesting article though, it's really shitty some have bad experiences like this.

can you upload some photoshopped pay stubs? will go well with the photoshopped wire transfers. :)

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#124

Post by wrong_variable »

GuiA wrote: post #120
GuiA wrote: post #14

Welcome to the club. It's pretty much a rite of passage here to spend some time with a psychopath VC, a completely self absorbed CTO with a rich investor dad that fuels his fantasies, or an idiotic CEO with an ego problem, and to pay the price for it (just time if you're lucky, time+money if you're not). I've encountered this myself several times (down to the CEO using hire fast fire fast as a mantra), and judging fr…

Outside of the edit window for my comment, but wanted to add: the H1B situation sounds fishy as hell. 8 H1Bs costs a lot of money, which the company does not seem to abound with. It seems like something weird might be going on here - if the founders are willing to forge receipts and lie about the company, it might not be beyond them to hold on to passports or some such for "immigration reasons", which would then expl…

(speaking from a very informed position on this)

The biggest indicator I have seen when it comes to H1B1 is if the company is run by recent foreign immigrants.

I have seen 5 man team able to get hold of H1B1 - since they were that dedicated.

The process is not actually that hard if there is a will from the top for it.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#125

Post by [deleted] »

programmer_guy wrote: post #41

Hey guys, just wanted to clear the air on some of the speculation: I'm actually with WrkRiot and can guarantee you we're not the company in question: I've got many weeks of paid on time pay stubs sitting right here. Plus we didn't have anyone matching any of the descriptions in this article. Interesting article though, it's really shitty some have bad experiences like this.

[deleted]

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#126

Post by [deleted] »

programmer_guy wrote: post #41

Hey guys, just wanted to clear the air on some of the speculation: I'm actually with WrkRiot and can guarantee you we're not the company in question: I've got many weeks of paid on time pay stubs sitting right here. Plus we didn't have anyone matching any of the descriptions in this article. Interesting article though, it's really shitty some have bad experiences like this.

[deleted]

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#127

Post by whybroke »

programmer_guy wrote: post #41

Hey guys, just wanted to clear the air on some of the speculation: I'm actually with WrkRiot and can guarantee you we're not the company in question: I've got many weeks of paid on time pay stubs sitting right here. Plus we didn't have anyone matching any of the descriptions in this article. Interesting article though, it's really shitty some have bad experiences like this.

Too bad this was down-voted, it's by far the most revealing post in the thread. (and most entertaining too)

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#128

Post by jimmywanger »

jtfairbank wrote: post #112
jimmywanger wrote: post #6

"Sunshine is the best disinfectant." This might be counterproductive in some instances, but if something doesn't smell right, I'll try to blow it up and make all the dealings very public. I mean, there are no personal feelings involved. You are paying me to be a worker. No pay? No work.

Usually not a good idea. This opens you up to: defamation lawsuits, contract violations, and provides cause for firing which could hurt your own claims. Scumbag Startup: "We fired Screwed Employee for cause." Screwed Employee: "No you didn't! It was retaliation." Scumbag Startup: "Sure we did. Look at what he/she posted publicly after leaving the company. Screwed Employee behaved similarly around the office and was n…

Ah, you misunderstood.

When I said blow things up and make things public, I meant make all my communications with management and the company very out in the open, CC everybody.

That way, if they do fire you for cause, you have a paper trail, and you tend to keep a lid on their worst tendencies because then they have to justify their words/actions to their own employees.

No, you never escalate publicly, not to people outside the company. As long as everybody is CCed while the conversation is going on, they don't have a leg to stand on, since everything is factual.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#130

Post by Veen »

bambax wrote: post #109

> Jessica would ignore my best practices recommendations (...) and promote her “gonzo style” writings that were often filled with typos and grammatical errors. > I don’t when or how the money became an issue Typos happen.

So does proofreading.
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