Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#311

Post by mattmaroon » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:53 PM UTC

jmyeet wrote: post #258

The two execs fired were: - Kayvon Beykpour, Head of Consumer Product (3 years, 11 months) [1]; and - Bruce Falck, Revenue Product Lead (5 years at Twitter, 3 years and 11 months in this position) [2] Kinda weird that both people were just shy of serving 4 years in their current roles. When I see moves like this my immediate thought is always, it's to save or make money. For example, there could be an options pool in…

If the moves were made at 11 months I'd agree. It'd be really unusual if there was some large vest at the 4 year mark. Unless maybe they've recently been granted something for retention.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#312

Post by wutbrodo » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:54 PM UTC

deltarholamda wrote: post #302

lesstenseflow wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would firing someone who's on paternity leave be an issue at all? We're talking multi-millionaires who will get multi-million dollar severance. It's pretty hilarious to see the pearl clutching of techno-bourgeoisie over something like this, pretending other tech-lords are getting mistreated over some supposed breach of decorum. The mere fact that he gets to take parental leave puts him head and shoulders above mo…

Assuming that being fired while on paternity leave is even notable as a tragedy is a very 2022 thing. People can disagree on whether paternity leave is a good, bad, or indifferent thing, but it didn't even exist as a concept for most of humanity's existence in an official capacity. It went from being an idea, to a right, to something roughly comparable to "fired while undergoing chemotherapy" in a generation. It's od…

There's a very weird strain of culty utopian-maximalism in our culture right now. It'd bother me less if the entire last century wasn't filled with horror stories about what can happen if this sort of childishness festers too much.

I assume it's yet another consequence of social media's effect on culture: being as hysterical as possible has suddenly become heavily rewarded. The downstream effects on broader political culture (and culture in general) are utterly fascinating to me.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#313

Post by JasonFruit » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:54 PM UTC

SamBam wrote: post #266

ben_w wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, why would you think that? His wealth is mostly owning 20% of Tesla, plus some extra few billions from owning significant fractions of SpaceX, The Boring Company, and Neuralink. Presumably there’s some cash in there as well, but on his scale a hundred million is a rounding error.

It still confuses me that being part-owner of an old dot-com payment company, part-owner of a mid-sized car company (by number of cars sold), and part-owner of a (very good) rocket company make a person richer than anyone has ever been in the history of the planet, but that's probably because I just haven't looked into it enough.

Corrected for inflation, John D. Rockefeller is probably the richest American ever.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#314

Post by corrral » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

lesstenseflow wrote: post #267

minimaxir wrote: post #2

> I’m just now learning that Parag fired Kayvon while he was on paternity leave, which is truly awful. > Parag is on his way out too. Why is he firing his product leaders during his lame-duck period? https://twitter.com/CaseyNewton/status/1524790595968901122

Why would firing someone who's on paternity leave be an issue at all? We're talking multi-millionaires who will get multi-million dollar severance. It's pretty hilarious to see the pearl clutching of techno-bourgeoisie over something like this, pretending other tech-lords are getting mistreated over some supposed breach of decorum. The mere fact that he gets to take parental leave puts him head and shoulders above mo…

Seriously.

HN: "Firing a millionaire on paternity leave—and by "firing" I mean continuing to pay for the rest of their leave, plus probably a bunch of severance—is horrible!"

99% of the rest of the US: "WTF is paternity leave? Is that when your boss generously lets you use some of your annual leave for part of the week in which your kid is born?"

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#315

Post by marricks » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

Traster wrote: post #84

So there's two options right - the first is that Parag is for some reason making big strategic decisions about the direction of the company despite the fact that we all know he'll be gone if the deal closes. Or he's making big strategic changes at the behest of the acquirers before the deal closes. Neither of these things seem particularly kosher moves to make. The question is how to figure out which one it is. It wo…

Isn’t there usually some sort of removing of the skeletons from the closets before a deal closes? Yahoo revealed there massive data breach while their deal was closing and such.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#316

Post by paganel » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

ilamont wrote: post #262

kyledrake wrote: post #189

I've been using Twitter since it's main novelty was that it was a successful Ruby on Rails app, and honestly I've been trying to figure out where the exit is for my personal use of Twitter lately. If the acquisition goes through, Twitter won't make enough money to service it's debt, and the things they will do to fix that are pretty much guaranteed to lower the quality of the platform, which frankly has never worked…

> I also think the proposal to have Twitter allow all content that is "legal under US law" is a dangerous idea for the platform being a healthy community that most people actually want to participate in. This is key. If @dang suddenly threw up his hands and said "anything goes on HN within U.S. law" this wonderful virtual discussion forum would die and most of us would sign off forever. I say that as someone whose be…

That only works because HN is, mostly, politics-free.

I'm not a regular Twitter user but afaik that platform is pretty heavy on politics, more than that, it's pretty heavy when it comes to a certain political spectrum, the other side has been mostly de-platformed by now. I don't consider that as a healthy platform to comment on for the general public (even though, I agree, it might be ok for people who happen to share the same political opinions that have not been banned by the Twitter higher-ups).

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#317

Post by SamReidHughes » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

SamBam wrote: post #266

ben_w wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, why would you think that? His wealth is mostly owning 20% of Tesla, plus some extra few billions from owning significant fractions of SpaceX, The Boring Company, and Neuralink. Presumably there’s some cash in there as well, but on his scale a hundred million is a rounding error.

It still confuses me that being part-owner of an old dot-com payment company, part-owner of a mid-sized car company (by number of cars sold), and part-owner of a (very good) rocket company make a person richer than anyone has ever been in the history of the planet, but that's probably because I just haven't looked into it enough.

I'm really confused how you're confused. What is a better way to become the richest person than by owning and growing a series of hugely successful companies that provide products and services to people?

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#318

Post by Hallucinaut » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

rleahy22 wrote: post #264

travisgriggs wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This my feeling as well. Maybe I’m thinking too logically about all this: A) spend paternity leave enjoying your newborn, but in the second half gearing up and remotivating to go back to work, getting back to work and being let go with a “we didn’t want to dismiss you while you were gone, thanks for coming back, here’s the door” vs B) you’re on paternity leave and the company lets you go, but still your leave is fulf…

I feel like you're missing the part of scenario B where you have to take time away from your newborn to find a new job.

It's strictly better though in terms of being able to budget time in the conditions GP posted as the net "last pay day" remains the same.

Psychological effects notwithstanding

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#319

Post by lpv » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:56 PM UTC

lesstenseflow wrote: post #267

minimaxir wrote: post #2

> I’m just now learning that Parag fired Kayvon while he was on paternity leave, which is truly awful. > Parag is on his way out too. Why is he firing his product leaders during his lame-duck period? https://twitter.com/CaseyNewton/status/1524790595968901122

Why would firing someone who's on paternity leave be an issue at all? We're talking multi-millionaires who will get multi-million dollar severance. It's pretty hilarious to see the pearl clutching of techno-bourgeoisie over something like this, pretending other tech-lords are getting mistreated over some supposed breach of decorum. The mere fact that he gets to take parental leave puts him head and shoulders above mo…

I don't see the issue either. In a fancy job like this it seems much better to get fired now so he can calmly plan his next move, instead of them waiting for him to return and then firing him, which would just waste everyone's time.

Re: Twitter CEO fires two top executives, freezes hiring

#320

Post by travisgriggs » Thu, May 12, 2022, 6:57 PM UTC

rleahy22 wrote: post #264

travisgriggs wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This my feeling as well. Maybe I’m thinking too logically about all this: A) spend paternity leave enjoying your newborn, but in the second half gearing up and remotivating to go back to work, getting back to work and being let go with a “we didn’t want to dismiss you while you were gone, thanks for coming back, here’s the door” vs B) you’re on paternity leave and the company lets you go, but still your leave is fulf…

I feel like you're missing the part of scenario B where you have to take time away from your newborn to find a new job.

I feel like you’re missing the part where I said I was father of four. I failed to mention I recently helped my oldest with newborn twins (if you’re thinking 2 is twice is hard as one, you’re wrong, it’s more like 4x).

I’ve accrued some experience with newborns. It’s a very tired time at times. It’s a time of wonderment. Especially with your first, it’s surreal, after 2 weeks you can barely remember “what was life like before this again?” But despite its otherworldliness, it’s also a lot of downtime. It’s different than normal downtime, because you’re tied to this growing little life, but it’s there. And I did indicate that it is in the latter half where having this project to work on would be ideal. Guess that’s just me and apologies if that seems insensitive. It worked for me.