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Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

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Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#61

Post by fvryan »

jessepickard wrote: post #13
blake8086 wrote: post #2

I have a deep interest in educational games. When I found out about Airy Labs, I applied and interviewed with them in August 2011. I got the impression the engineers were very smart, and very overworked. When we got to discussing numbers, Hsu was interested in a low five-figure salary. I sent him a few emails asking about things like revenue model. I was concerned that IAP corrupts the incentive structure around educ…

I'm a co-founder of a profitable 11-person educational gaming company called MindSnacks, so I have a pretty solid perspective on what works in this space. The key to making IAP work in an educational gaming company is keeping things really simple. We give away one lesson for free and then offer the remaining 49 for a one-time $5.00 fee. If you get greedy and try to squeeze payments out of your user at every turn, you…

love mindsnacks! glad to see japanese under dev

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#62

Post by michael_dorfman »

temphn wrote: post #23
rachelbythebay wrote: post #16

"Employees were warned against socializing or discussing their compensation with other members of the team." People working in the US really need to know about the National Labor Relations Act and what it means in terms of discussing salaries. Not having this kind of information out there is a bad thing for employees and lovely for conniving bosses.

Oh yeah, the NLRA. As opposed to just quitting and finding a better job? Getting the government (or unions) involved in variably makes a situation like this worse. Just walk away.

I think you are misunderstanding the point. The NLRA grants you the right to discuss your wages with your co-workers. Companies are not allowed to prohibit this, and more people should be made aware of their rights under the NLRA.

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#63

Post by derekp7 »

michael_dorfman wrote: post #62
temphn wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh yeah, the NLRA. As opposed to just quitting and finding a better job? Getting the government (or unions) involved in variably makes a situation like this worse. Just walk away.

I think you are misunderstanding the point. The NLRA grants you the right to discuss your wages with your co-workers. Companies are not allowed to prohibit this, and more people should be made aware of their rights under the NLRA.

So if you are making more than you colleague, and he finds out, then your boss has to spend a greater portion of the next pay increase funds to up his pay. Guess who's raise those funds come out of? It doesn't matter what is legal to do, sometimes it is still not a good idea to discuss compensation.

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#64

Post by ido »

nirvana wrote: post #46

TL;DR: I have had this experience. Don't try to reason with creepy management. Don't work somewhere that you're not being fairly compensated for (Even if its not cash, it needs to be fair.) They'll never change, and if you let them give you a raw deal, they'll never give you a fair one. I've worked in this situation. No way to know specifically what happened at Airy, but I worked for a company that was almost exactly…

    Another key- if they're in super fancy digs- temporary 
    or otherwise- its a big warning sign.
What's "super-fancy"? Seems most successful companies (albeit also many that aren't and just living off of investor money) have pretty nice offices.

E.g. would that raise a warning sign for you with google?

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#65

Post by Tautologistics »

derekp7 wrote: post #63
michael_dorfman wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are misunderstanding the point. The NLRA grants you the right to discuss your wages with your co-workers. Companies are not allowed to prohibit this, and more people should be made aware of their rights under the NLRA.

So if you are making more than you colleague, and he finds out, then your boss has to spend a greater portion of the next pay increase funds to up his pay. Guess who's raise those funds come out of? It doesn't matter what is legal to do, sometimes it is still not a good idea to discuss compensation.

Conversely, if you happened to be the one getting paid less, it would be to your benefit to discuss salary.

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#66

Post by michael_dorfman »

derekp7 wrote: post #63
michael_dorfman wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are misunderstanding the point. The NLRA grants you the right to discuss your wages with your co-workers. Companies are not allowed to prohibit this, and more people should be made aware of their rights under the NLRA.

So if you are making more than you colleague, and he finds out, then your boss has to spend a greater portion of the next pay increase funds to up his pay. Guess who's raise those funds come out of? It doesn't matter what is legal to do, sometimes it is still not a good idea to discuss compensation.

Whether or not it is a good idea to do so is not the point. The point is that it is against the law for the company to prohibit those discussion (as the company in the OP did). Companies that have policies in violation of labor laws are probably not the best places to be working.

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#67

Post by mjwalshe »

nirvana wrote: post #46

TL;DR: I have had this experience. Don't try to reason with creepy management. Don't work somewhere that you're not being fairly compensated for (Even if its not cash, it needs to be fair.) They'll never change, and if you let them give you a raw deal, they'll never give you a fair one. I've worked in this situation. No way to know specifically what happened at Airy, but I worked for a company that was almost exactly…

why did you not call the cops when you where being restrained?

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#68

Post by mjwalshe »

keypusher wrote: post #44
nknight wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps you could take your racist stereotypes elsewhere?

His parents were asian, and they ran the company. That's not racist.

Arguably corrupt though can they account for all the VC's money?

I remember working for a Company that took VC funding and they competed that they liked us as the senior management didn't go out and buy BMS the instant the money cleared.

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#69

Post by [deleted] »

jfarmer wrote: post #53
jfarmer wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internet-scale vigilantism has an awful side effect: it can never be entirely walked back. The damage has been done and the crowd is happy. They have their circus.

'A single article, quoting sources, and even giving the founder a chance to respond right in the article itself, is not "internet vigilantism".' Yes, it is. This isn't meticulously researched. This is not a 60 Minutes exposé. Did Anthony do any fact checking? Did he spend time researching the company and verifying these people's stories? No, he wrote an article in the Fox News style. Who needs fact-checking when you…

[deleted]

Re: Big Cuts at Airy Labs, Ex-Employees Blame Management

#70

Post by jt2190 »

ido wrote: post #64
nirvana wrote: post #46

TL;DR: I have had this experience. Don't try to reason with creepy management. Don't work somewhere that you're not being fairly compensated for (Even if its not cash, it needs to be fair.) They'll never change, and if you let them give you a raw deal, they'll never give you a fair one. I've worked in this situation. No way to know specifically what happened at Airy, but I worked for a company that was almost exactly…

Another key- if they're in super fancy digs- temporary or otherwise- its a big warning sign. What's "super-fancy"? Seems most successful companies (albeit also many that aren't and just living off of investor money) have pretty nice offices. E.g. would that raise a warning sign for you with google?

I wish I could remember the source... I'd heard a few years ago that an investment company had started a "corporate corruption index" and that "super-fancy new offices" was one of twenty or thirty indicators of corruption. Taken by itself it might not mean much, but taken together with the other items in the index it was a warning flag.
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