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Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

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Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#221
post #201

"About a month in, our interim leader returned to Korea, and a woman was brought in who had worked at several video game companies. She used to know our CEO’s in college. She was kind, thoughtful, and attentive. I knew the company would eat her alive. After our boss departed, I took over a few of his duties. One of them was “viral marketer.” I was now creating ad campaigns on Facebook in an attempt to bring monthly a…

Wow... good find! "A real start up company is populated by a shark tank full of thieves, corrupt business people, unscrupulous investors, and fickle employees" WTF? So you're not a 'real start up' unless you've got a bunch of corrupt criminals running the show?

That must be a typo, I'm sure she meant "Jail"

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#222
post #47
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Landing page: > WrkRiot pulls signals from your resume and matches them to job posts. That's right, we do the searching for you. We'll be updating this section with videos, walk thru's and more. "walk thru's"? This website looks like garbage

Just look at the blog too. I'm not sure who thought that a blog post entitled "10 WAYS TO SURVIVE AT WORK WITHOUT SLEEP" would be a hit with job seekers. (Not to mention that 100% of their blog content -- 7 posts -- was posted 3 days ago)

10 WAYS TO SURVIVE AT WORK WITHOUT SLEEP: www.wrkriot.com/blog/2016/8/26/10-ways-to-survive-at-work-without-sleep

Guess employees are the target audience for this post.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#223
post #54

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.

> Plus we didn't have anyone matching any of the descriptions in this article. So you don't have a CEO whose headshot in the Team page is a bulldog? Or a Facebook page full of SpongeBob memes for that matter?

http://web.1for.one/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/1-2.jpg

There you go, don't think he could change this picture into a bulldog.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#224
Tess is one angry content writer:

3. Be realistic about what you can and can’t do in a day, due to your sleeplessness.

Take it easy when you’re sleepless. A lot of automobile accidents occur due to tiredness too, so if you can, try to stay off the road. If you’re hella alert for your commute, don’t chance it by doing something extra. Be responsible, idiot.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#225
post #47
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Landing page: > WrkRiot pulls signals from your resume and matches them to job posts. That's right, we do the searching for you. We'll be updating this section with videos, walk thru's and more. "walk thru's"? This website looks like garbage

Just look at the blog too. I'm not sure who thought that a blog post entitled "10 WAYS TO SURVIVE AT WORK WITHOUT SLEEP" would be a hit with job seekers. (Not to mention that 100% of their blog content -- 7 posts -- was posted 3 days ago)

All of their blog posts seem to have been posted on the same day...

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#226
post #185

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.

Disregarding everything else pointed out in this thread, there's also the part where the website for the older name of the company, 1for.one, still lists Penny Kim as the Marketing Director: http://web.1for.one/digital-press-kit/ And, just in case they now decide to remove that, I also saved it to the wayback machine, available here: https://web.archive.org/web/20160829104022/http://web.1for.o... So good try, scumbag…

[deleted]

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#227

The fake wire transfer receipt is fraud. That's a criminal offense. Have a talk with the local DA. California has a large prison system, with cell space available. I've never heard of a startup going that far.

+1 for pursuing the criminal angle, not because it would make it right for you, or be easy, but simply because it's the right thing to do.

That was 17 real crimes committed. Our society is better off when we collectively do our part to make sure that criminals like that face the justice system.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay people in regular ways through regular channels. Seriously, though, ADP delivers paystubs. If they were using ADP, they would have gotten paystubs.

When a company has just started, they may have not set this up. You can invoice the company. It's not a big deal. Again - of all flags - lack of pay stubs is the least of them if it's just a garage startup with 3-ish people. The actual exchange of money is 100x a stronger indicator of health than the presence of a stub.

This account had a dev team of 8 when she interviewed in May and 17 when she arrived in July, with an office in Santa Clara.

That is not "a garage startup with 3-ish people."

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay people in regular ways through regular channels. Seriously, though, ADP delivers paystubs. If they were using ADP, they would have gotten paystubs.

When a company has just started, they may have not set this up. You can invoice the company. It's not a big deal. Again - of all flags - lack of pay stubs is the least of them if it's just a garage startup with 3-ish people. The actual exchange of money is 100x a stronger indicator of health than the presence of a stub.

> You can invoice the company. It's not a big deal.

Nonononono. You're hired as an employee. There is a legal and ethical agreement for them to pay you at the intervals agreed upon in your contract. There are no ifs or buts about it, no invoicing them, no excuses for 'just started'. Payroll is NOT hard.

Re: Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup

#230
post #157

I've been burned repeatedly by startups recruiting me for one role which matches my experience/skillset, then after a month or so radically changing the role to one which I'd had no experience with. I get pivoting, I get needing to be flexible, but why would you hire someone skilled in networking operations and four weeks later decide that person need to design/develop your Windows application instead? I've always be…

> verify with the investors they claim to have backing from that they've actually invested in the company. I'm curious, how would you go about doing this?

If they are a US company, I'd start with Edgar: https://www.sec.gov/edgar/searchedgar/companysearch.html

For example, you can see the amount of money FullContact raised in 2015 here: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1523064/000152306415...

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