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Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

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Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#331

Post by danssig »

wpietri wrote: post #219

I am entirely in favor of this. Mainly because I'm four blocks away and am trying to hire engineers. Seriously, it's bullshit. It makes me mad not just for the people getting screwed, but for the whole industry. The whole point of giving somebody early equity is that it's a gamble. Sometimes it's worth nothing; sometimes tons. If companies start doing it in a heads-I-win-tails-you-lose fashion, then that really reduc…

>I am entirely in favor of this. Mainly because I'm four blocks away and am trying to hire engineers.

That should make you even madder than. If you're having trouble hiring engineers it is just because you're not paying enough. And thanks to this, the price just went up.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#332

Post by danssig »

rbanffy wrote: post #194
api wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll do a quick summary. Episode 1: (this is the one that most directly affected me) I was working on a very interesting but somewhat far-off technology. I did some tech talks about it, and put them on Google Video. Was approached by a guy who said he was a wealthy early-stage technology investor. He showed me a lot of stuff that indicated that this was the case, had a lot of real people vouching for him, etc. He mad…

In the drugs business someone who does what Zynga is trying to do now won't last long. Literally.

I wonder how much longer this sort of thing will need to keep going until others start following their lead.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#333

Post by epo »

samstave wrote: post #312
kamaal wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't surprising, not everybody in the game is for building something or for changing the world or for passion . Someone is here only for the money multiplication factor. Sales, advertising, marketing and your usual MBA subjects are all about that. That is, not to care about what you are selling, but to create an illusion which gives an opportunity to amplify that seed investment. That is the time to cash on and…

>not everybody in the game is for building something or for changing the world or for passion. You fucking suck. I am not clear if youare advocating these actions or not - but let me make it very clear to you; if you are a proponent of such behavior - lets make sure we never cross paths. This is NOT OK. People like this are CANCER. Sure - many instances of CEOs end up in the position of a Pincus - but it DOES NOT mak…

The guy is telling it how it is, you are behaving like an 11 year-old. The world is not a nice place, it gets less nice when money is involved, grow up.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#334

Post by rbanffy »

danssig wrote: post #332
rbanffy wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the drugs business someone who does what Zynga is trying to do now won't last long. Literally.

I wonder how much longer this sort of thing will need to keep going until others start following their lead.

Hopefully we can rely on courts of law to do their job.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#335

Post by danssig »

fragsworth wrote: post #16
cageface wrote: post #9

Is it just me or is tech particularly sleazy right now?

Looking at their products and how they treat their users I would have expected them to be sleazy in other ways too. I think it's just Zynga.

And Facebook... and Skype, etc.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#336

Post by danssig »

jccodez wrote: post #47
cageface wrote: post #9

Is it just me or is tech particularly sleazy right now?

Nothing new here: "Later, in 1982 when Allen had been diagnosed with cancer, Allen is reported to have said he overhead Gates and current chief executive Steve Ballmer discussing Allen's lack of recent contributions to the young company, and talking about how to dilute Allen's stock allocation."

People often forget what a scumbag company MS was. I would be shocked if they didn't have tons of such stories.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#337

Post by danssig »

skmurphy wrote: post #35
typicalrunt wrote: post #2

Company stock is basically ownership, and there's a dollar value attached to it. So is does Zynga's request run into the practice of extortion? It's another way of saying, give us your money or else something bad will happen.

CA law provides for at will employment but if the original option was not contingent on specific performance beyond what is needed to continue as an employee, and they are willing for the employee to continue working there provided they surrender their stock they may be in more of a gray area. It's in the nature of a targeted pay cut but it doesn't seem to involve a demotion or change in position, they are effectivel…

Wrong. They're saying "I know I gave you this, and put a lock in so you had to stay, but now it's worth more than I think you deserve so I'm going back on my agreement. Sorry you worked here so long for below market wages".

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#338

Post by danssig »

exit wrote: post #60

developers should blacklist companies like this. sort of an informal union. with the right personalities behind it we could do serious damage to the sleazy conniving wheeler-dealers who pull this shit.

Tech needs a real union. We've been exploited for quite some time and organizing is the only way to deal with it. If movie stars took the same approach as tech people, Tom Cruise would get $30k per movie and worthless stock options.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#339

Post by danssig »

kamaal wrote: post #298

This is probably one the hidden chess moves any start up can make once they've used you up like tissues(to use and throw). Of course once they have sufficient money and sales oriented CEO and senior executive staff, in the name of that's better for the company they can do anything they want. This is one of the things that scares me about working at a start up. Remember the early employee is spending his time and comp…

Simple solution: never make that compromise. A bird in the hand and all that.

Re: Zynga to employees: Give back our stock or you'll be fired

#340

Post by danssig »

timdellinger wrote: post #267

I know that no one ever gets credit for "I told you so", but last year I pegged the 4-year vesting schedule as risky, and wondered why we didn't see a lot more people being fired just to recapture their stock options: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1733107 To me the riskiest part is that you never know how a business is going to pivot, who might end up owning it, etc., so the idea that you'll still be working th…

Well, to be honest, I'm torn between my disgust at these scumbags and my lack of pity for people who were working at Zynga. I mean, the place never tried to hide the fact that they were a bunch of scumbags as far as I know. If you know their whole business depends on customers not understanding it, why wouldn't you expect them to treat you the same? They've already shown a clear contempt for people who aren't them. Do you honestly think they see you differently?
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