Major Investor Sues Theranos • Hacker News Board

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#81

Post by Fricken » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:15 AM UTC

alexqgb wrote: post #74

Fricken wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What Madoff did was illegal and malicious from the outset. Do you believe that when Holmes was handed the opportunity, at 19, to bring the Edison to market that she set out with the intent of defrauding investors? The only thing she's provably guilty of thus far is believing in her company a little more than is sensible and being preternaturally competent as a fundraiser. When Musk claims he can get people to Mars fo…

The fact that Madoff's intent was criminal from the outset and that Holmes' probably wasn't is irrelevant. The point is that it became criminal. And that's why she's in the firing line today.

At what point did she shift from being an optimistic entrepeneur to a criminal? Was it when she started getting magazine covers? Was it when Hwnry Kissinger joined the board of directors? She's still giving her company 110% in spite of everything that has transpired. Usually the correct time for a startup founder/CEO to call it quits is when they run out of capital, until then it's their job to try and make it work come hell or high water.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#82

Post by harry8 » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:19 AM UTC

M_Grey wrote: post #61

smegel wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "disingenuous" or "biased" or "unethical" Mainstream journalism will also do just fine.

Implying that once outside of the "mainstream" journalistic integrity suddenly improves? Nonsense.

Implying that staying inside the "mainstream" journalistic integrity suddenly improving is a false assumption.

I don't know that I agree with it, but it's a valid opinion to have that mainstream is no better than elsewhere.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#83

Post by nerfhammer » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:19 AM UTC

jfim wrote: post #60

nerfhammer wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've upgraded their paywall game, having a google referer doesn't help anymore.

It does, though once you've seen the paywall, no matter what the referrer is you'll get the paywall again. You need to open the "web" link in an incognito/private mode then click the WSJ link.

Ok, can confirm that works

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#84

Post by itestingstuff » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:21 AM UTC

dsacco wrote: post #2

This is the first article on this news, so I couldn't find a non-paywalled source. For those who don't subscribe to WSJ, the tl;dr is as follows: • SF-based hedge fund, Partner Fund Management LP, is suing "Theranos and its founder", alleging they lied to attract nearly $100M in funding. • Sources are an internal "fund document" and "people familiar with the matter." • The fund document was reviewed by WSJ and states…

I use this Chrome Extension to bypass the WSJ paywall: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bypass-wsj-other-s...

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#85

Post by itestingstuff » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:22 AM UTC

dreamcompiler wrote: post #7

ThrustVectoring wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, the "web" link is exactly for this. Paywalled sources get penalized in Google's search results, so most of the time searching for the article's title and clicking the Google search results link gets you the full article.

That used to work for me; it doesn't any more.

I use this Chrome Extension to bypass the WSJ paywall: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/bypass-wsj-other-s...

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#86

Post by spotman » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:27 AM UTC

Fricken wrote: post #72

astaroth360 wrote: post #51

Isn't her activity like the textbook definition of fraud? Not to mention the dude who she basically pushed into committing suicide. I hope she gets at least as much time as Madoff.

What Madoff did was illegal and malicious from the outset. Do you believe that when Holmes was handed the opportunity, at 19, to bring the Edison to market that she set out with the intent of defrauding investors? The only thing she's provably guilty of thus far is believing in her company a little more than is sensible and being preternaturally competent as a fundraiser. When Musk claims he can get people to Mars fo…

I agree with your sentiment, but another piece of the puzzle here should be considered:

Playing fast and loose with health care, that may be key to determining whether you have some life-threatening disease, is a big deal.

This is not like taking some VC money for the next social network, and having no chops to pull it off. Peoples lives could come into play.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#87

Post by flylib » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:30 AM UTC

if they can't do the proper due diligence then they shouldn't be investing other people's money

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#88

Post by chx » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:33 AM UTC

Fricken wrote: post #81

alexqgb wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that Madoff's intent was criminal from the outset and that Holmes' probably wasn't is irrelevant. The point is that it became criminal. And that's why she's in the firing line today.

At what point did she shift from being an optimistic entrepeneur to a criminal? Was it when she started getting magazine covers? Was it when Hwnry Kissinger joined the board of directors? She's still giving her company 110% in spite of everything that has transpired. Usually the correct time for a startup founder/CEO to call it quits is when they run out of capital, until then it's their job to try and make it work c…

When she lied about what Theranos has...?

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#89

Post by taytus » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:33 AM UTC

matt-attack wrote: post #62

julianpye wrote: post #6

One thing I find really weird is the choice of CEO photos in media reporting. If there is good news, they chose 'nice', attractive photos. If there is bad news, they look for worse ones. This is true for male and female founders. In this case, everything about this photo is an 'outtake', from hands, choice of framing, facial expression, eyes - it's a photo a photographer would not keep in their image selection.

> it's a photo a photographer would not keep in their image selection. Yep. And I wonder what David Paul Morris [1] thinks of having his work used in this manner. It doesn't reflect well upon him as a photographer that's for sure. [1] http://davidpaulmorris.com/

His work is not great either.

Re: Major Investor Sues Theranos

#90

Post by tlb » Tue, Oct 11, 2016, 1:33 AM UTC

maverick_iceman wrote: post #68

julianpye wrote: post #6

One thing I find really weird is the choice of CEO photos in media reporting. If there is good news, they chose 'nice', attractive photos. If there is bad news, they look for worse ones. This is true for male and female founders. In this case, everything about this photo is an 'outtake', from hands, choice of framing, facial expression, eyes - it's a photo a photographer would not keep in their image selection.

Generalization from a small sample?

Here's another sample from today. You could do accurate sentiment analysis entirely based on the CEO photos. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-10/coal-miner...

If you keep an eye out for it, you may notice the same pattern.