A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company • Hacker News Board

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#531

Post by throwaway894345 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:36 AM UTC

pinewurst wrote: post #466

throwaway894345 wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was recently laid off in tech and I flipped the "I'm looking for work" switch on linkedin and got literally dozens of messages from recruiters every day. I ultimately got a job that paid 10% better than my previous job, and I rushed the decision because I had only a small fraction of the severance that coinbase employees are receiving. Even with the "looking for work" switch toggled off, I get several messages from…

What buzzwords do you have in your profile that so attract recruiters? I’m not having anything like that happen to me.

DevOps and AWS are probably two big ones. I don’t even have a profile picture though. Not doing anything special to attract them.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#532

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:41 AM UTC

webkike wrote: post #527

muzika wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reality is thar vast majority of those who do not support the BLM movement are not at all racist. I believe that this movement has made our society more racist and divided than it was before.

Okay, so are black people supposed to just be fine with police killing them? I genuinely don’t understand at how you could arrive at that conclusion

[deleted]

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#533

Post by throwaway894345 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:42 AM UTC

davorak wrote: post #495

throwaway894345 wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re confusing “controversial” with “political”. Someone’s marriage may be controversial to someone, but talking about it isn’t political (at least not in the sense we’re discussing here). It becomes political when someone is arguing for or against gay marriage.

Seems like a reasonable interpretation in my experience. I have definitely seen people told not to talk about what you might call controversial because it is political. Don't talk about your abortion and how it made your life better or worse. Don't talk about your birth control. Don't talk about how you were explicitly told by an authority figure you were not worthy of a job because of your sex/gender. Easy for me to…

I’ve never heard anyone told not to talk about those things because they’re political, but I could believe they were told not to talk about them because they’re controversial.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#534

Post by anm89 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:45 AM UTC

webkike wrote: post #527

muzika wrote: post #426

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reality is thar vast majority of those who do not support the BLM movement are not at all racist. I believe that this movement has made our society more racist and divided than it was before.

Okay, so are black people supposed to just be fine with police killing them? I genuinely don’t understand at how you could arrive at that conclusion

Care to quote the part of the parent comment where he said anything remotely like that?

This is obnoxious, dishonest, bullying.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#535

Post by coolspot » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:46 AM UTC

paulcole wrote: post #455

Where are all these politically active workplaces that these HN commenters hate. I’d love to work at a place like that!

Whole FAANG for one.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#536

Post by nefitty » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:47 AM UTC

staticautomatic wrote: post #520

throwaway581029 wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Increasingly aggressive activism of this sort started ramping up at my employer a couple of years ago. Several outspoken activists started complaining and demanding all-company meetings, which were granted by HR and company leadership. In these mandatory meetings, which were attended by hundreds of employees, all sorts of contradictory accusations were lodged by the activists. For example, in the first meeting, one o…

An acquaintance of mine worked for a company that stocked tampons in the men’s restroom because someone lobbied for it despite the company having no female->male trans employees. My acquaintance, who is male->female trans, was baffled.

Doesn’t that just mean providing equal facilities? If you put hand sanitizer in one bathroom, you should try to provide it in all of them.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#537

Post by anm89 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:49 AM UTC

heavyset_go wrote: post #25

It's interesting to hear Coinbase management insist that they're apolitical when the company makes significant political contributions itself[1]. [1] https://www.fec.gov/data/receipts/individual-contributions/?...

They don't claim that.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#538

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 5:59 AM UTC

danaris wrote: post #78

devtul wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This idea of "everything is political" is why the discourse went to shit, now nobody can catch a break from politics, and if you had enough and don't want to take part then you instantly gets attacked for "supporting the status quo". I prefer to not be lectured on political issues by my orange juice brand. Their mission should be to sell high quality orange juice and make a profit.

Your life may not be political. My life may not be political. But the life of a black trans woman? That's political by its very nature, in today's climate. One party doesn't want her to be allowed to exist, the other does. Believing it's possible to be "apolitical" in any time of polarization is a privilege of those who benefit from the status quo.

[deleted]

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#539

Post by thih9 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 6:01 AM UTC

joecot wrote: post #315

codezero wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This assumes all roles at the company are equally able to exit the company in the midst of a global pandemic and find opportune work with the same growth opportunities, salary, and locality.

Maybe not, but are at least 5% able to do that?

What if these groups don’t overlap?

I.e. the “people who are able to exit” group may not overlap the 5% that would have resigned because they were already searching for something.

The GP’s (codezero) point above still seems valid to me because of that.

Re: A follow up to Coinbase being a mission focused company

#540

Post by anm89 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 6:09 AM UTC

CarelessExpert wrote: post #119

cltby wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bob grows chickens and Alice grows corn. They trade via barter. We'd probably agree this isn't political in any meaningful sense. One day, Alice has a clever idea: she can create a digital representation of money. Both Alice and Bob agree to accept these "tokens" in lieu of barter. Big mistake. CarelessExpert announces to Alice and Bob that their creation obligates them to join in bitter arguments about abortion, cli…

So do you normally spend a lot of your time online standing up straw men and knocking them down? Or is today a special case? My point, since apparently I need to clarify it, is that Coinbase claiming to have an "apolitical" workplace while a) operating in a business that's driven by libertarian and anarchist philosophy and b) spending time and money lobbying politicians in Washington in support of said values is, at…

You are the one with the strawman. The company never claimed to be apolitical. In fact they explicitly state they are.