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Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

nytimes.com

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Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#131

Post by odorousrex »

floatrock wrote: post #47
ilovecaching wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you ever consider that Zuck has enough money, and that he really believes in making a product to connect people for the greater good and use ads to make it available to everyone?

As a person, maybe if I squint very very very hard. Legally, he has a duty to maximize value for his board and investors. And there hasn't been a business model that provides a free consumer web product without monetizing user data.

>Legally

Citation needed!!!

It is not illegal to have other goals than maximizing shareholder value.

For example, Costco. Publicly traded company but the employees are paid well, customers are well taken care of, and the CEO is rewarded for this. In the short-term, Costco could generate an enormous amount of value by automated, reducing wages, and finding cheaper supplies and lowering quality, selling their customer's membership information, etc.

But they don't. And there is nothing illegal about it.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#132

Post by avinium »

kjar wrote: post #122
mindgam3 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“if he felt like Facebook was bending things the wrong way he'd say so” I wish that were true, but this is a rather naive perspective. Facebook has a well documented history of requiring outgoing employees to sign non-disparagement clauses. For someone as high up as Chief Product Officer you’d better believe that they would have Chris sign something expressly forbidding any overt criticism of the company. Any severan…

A non-disparagement clause is so fucking bonkers. I read these things and would never sign something like that. It’s a blatant corporate attack on your freedom of speech and absolutely insulting as a human. You pay me. You do not control me!

You're not wrong.

But ethics can become a lot more flexible when someone's dangling a few million in stock options in front of your face.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#133

Post by mindgam3 »

keepper wrote: post #123
mindgam3 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“if he felt like Facebook was bending things the wrong way he'd say so” I wish that were true, but this is a rather naive perspective. Facebook has a well documented history of requiring outgoing employees to sign non-disparagement clauses. For someone as high up as Chief Product Officer you’d better believe that they would have Chris sign something expressly forbidding any overt criticism of the company. Any severan…

"Facebook has a well documented history of requiring outgoing employees to sign non-disparagement clauses." You're basically lying here. They don't. Actually, the last few high profile departures were pretty disparaging. Think Brian Acton's comments[1], as well as Palmer lucky[2]. You obviously are overplaying your knowledge of Facebook, and the rapport you hold with Chris Cox. I get it, its in fashion to shit on fac…

Brian Acton and Palmer Luckey are not even close to the level of "high profile departure" as Chris Cox.

Acton and Luckey both joined Facebook in 2014 as part of multibillion dollar acquisitions. They are like hired mercenaries and were never on the inside, or even close. Chris Cox joined in 2005, fresh out of college. He has been a true believer and one of Zuck's most trusted lieutenants since almost day one.

Of the people who worked there early, like pre 2008, I am not aware of a single one who is outspoken in criticism of Facebook.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#134

Post by rchaud »

debt wrote: post #86
refurb wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read "best" as "most talented", not "most moral".

Huh? I don't know what that means. Talented in fucking up the public perception of Facebook? Yeah they were good at that for sure.

"Talented" in terms of actually turning a social network (of which there were lots) into one of the most profitable companies in the world, let alone in 'tech'.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#135

Post by j-c-hewitt »

avinium wrote: post #132
kjar wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A non-disparagement clause is so fucking bonkers. I read these things and would never sign something like that. It’s a blatant corporate attack on your freedom of speech and absolutely insulting as a human. You pay me. You do not control me!

You're not wrong. But ethics can become a lot more flexible when someone's dangling a few million in stock options in front of your face.

Flip it around. If you are an employee partly compensated in stock, is it fair for a multi-billionaire who was one of your former bosses to flippantly trash talk the company in public after he cashes out, potentially damaging the value of your stock...? Wouldn't you want your employer to put some controls into place to prevent that kind of pointless harm to you?

You can still talk about literally anything else if you sign a non-disparagement clause or an NDA.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#136

Post by Jach »

kjar wrote: post #122
mindgam3 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“if he felt like Facebook was bending things the wrong way he'd say so” I wish that were true, but this is a rather naive perspective. Facebook has a well documented history of requiring outgoing employees to sign non-disparagement clauses. For someone as high up as Chief Product Officer you’d better believe that they would have Chris sign something expressly forbidding any overt criticism of the company. Any severan…

A non-disparagement clause is so fucking bonkers. I read these things and would never sign something like that. It’s a blatant corporate attack on your freedom of speech and absolutely insulting as a human. You pay me. You do not control me!

> You pay me. You do not control me!

That's why these things come with payment -- or for NDAs, a threat to make you pay them.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#137

Post by ignoramous »

keepper wrote: post #123
mindgam3 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“if he felt like Facebook was bending things the wrong way he'd say so” I wish that were true, but this is a rather naive perspective. Facebook has a well documented history of requiring outgoing employees to sign non-disparagement clauses. For someone as high up as Chief Product Officer you’d better believe that they would have Chris sign something expressly forbidding any overt criticism of the company. Any severan…

"Facebook has a well documented history of requiring outgoing employees to sign non-disparagement clauses." You're basically lying here. They don't. Actually, the last few high profile departures were pretty disparaging. Think Brian Acton's comments[1], as well as Palmer lucky[2]. You obviously are overplaying your knowledge of Facebook, and the rapport you hold with Chris Cox. I get it, its in fashion to shit on fac…

Acton 'lost' $850m in the process. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/26/whatsapp-co-founder-explains...

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#139

Post by wgerard »

anigbrowl wrote: post #124
NathanLands wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if Mark Zuckerberg ends up being "wrong" by your definition, why does that mean he lied? It's odd to assume negative intent or that you know what is going on inside other people's heads.

We've already had a look inside his head, because he joked with his friends about how naive the people giving their information to him were for trusting, and how they were dumb fucks that he looked forward to fucking in the ear. Sure, he might have changed since, but there's nothing wrong with rational speculation. Selfishness and greed are real phenomena in human relations so it would be as foolish to ignore such po…

> We've already had a look inside his head, because he joked with his friends about how naive the people giving their information to him were for trusting, and how they were dumb fucks that he looked forward to fucking in the ear.

You're reading a lot into a (admittedly stupid) quip/jab/whatever-you-want-to-call it by a 19 year old.

I don't even disagree with your fundamental assertion here, just that this is incredibly weak evidence.

Re: Facebook Loses Top Executives, Including Chris Cox

#140

Post by blahblahblah321 »

whalesalad wrote: post #109
mindgam3 wrote: post #61

I've known Chris Cox since freshman year of college and he was an informal advisor to my first startup. The NYT article referenced in hashberry's earlier comment includes a key quote: “For over a decade, I’ve been sharing the same message that Mark and I have always believed: Social media’s history is not yet written, and its effects are not neutral,” Mr. Cox said in a note to employees on Thursday. “As its builders…

I can't believe anyone was unable to see through the bullshit on FB from the very very beginning. Does ANYONE there now, or at any time in the past, have any real belief that what they're doing is connecting the world? It's a money making machine, plain and simple. (Money making machines are not bad, as long as there is never any dog and pony show about being some higher form of existence) I think that the people lea…

It's humorous to see someone call Facebook a money making machine from the start when even after its IPO the conventional wisdom was that it would struggle to make money: https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/22/a-look-back-in-ipo-faceboo...
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