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“Facebook turned me down” (2009)

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Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#51
post #34

It's interesting how neither of the founders fit any of the stereotypical valley founder profiles. They don't look like Mark Zuckerberg, they are older, Brian Acton barely used twitter, and his tech background is more traditional (C, C++, Perl, etc).

Any word on if either were married?

And if they were, I hope they were also smart enough to have prenups.

This brings up a question: Is it even possible to make a prenup that covers future windfills? E.g., a prenup that protects your wealth in a company that hasn't yet been founded.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#52

Turned me down in 07' after a handful of phone interviews, flying me across the country, and 8 hours of in person interviews with 3 separate departments... but not before I got their CTO so shitfaced drunk he botched a 2AM code push to production and helped convince Zuckerbergs little sister into riding a mechanical bull. I regret nothing. edit: Worth noting I was a 22 year old self taught programmer that hadn't expe…

They won't hire you but are begging to get more H1b workers...

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#53

NYTimes actually pointed out another curiously-related Tweet [0] from the other co-founder, Jan Koum: "totally agree with Vinod Khosla. people starting companies for a quick sale are a disgrace to the valley... 3:47 AM - 17 Jul 2012" [0] https://twitter.com/jankoum/statuses/225134737285578752 edit : I am not criticizing Jan at all and would gladly do the same given the same position.

Starting companies to sell them as soon as possible is not disgraceful. Haters gonna hate.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#54
post #9
post #2

Just goes to show, on paper, founders aren't always the most appealing employees.

I think in many cases great founders would make terrible employees. Imagine trying to tell Steve Jobs what to do.

Imagine trying to tell Steve Jobs what to do

Easy, do what you want.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#55
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any word on if either were married?

And if they were, I hope they were also smart enough to have prenups. This brings up a question: Is it even possible to make a prenup that covers future windfills? E.g., a prenup that protects your wealth in a company that hasn't yet been founded.

Of course you could just get married for life.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#56
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any word on if either were married?

And if they were, I hope they were also smart enough to have prenups. This brings up a question: Is it even possible to make a prenup that covers future windfills? E.g., a prenup that protects your wealth in a company that hasn't yet been founded.

By definition, a prenuptial agreement only covers entering into the marriage. Future assets, especially in community property states, usually have to be specifically disclaimed by the other party in the marriage before they can be considered separate property. For example: A prenup can't specify that a house bought after marriage is separate property, but the non-owning spouse can voluntarily sign away rights to that property as a recorded instrument. This is why some deeds say "John A. Doe, Grantee, a married man as his sole and separate property." (Some states allow for property purchased with separate assets to remain separate inside the marriage but the paper trail on this better be meticulous if a divorce ever happens.)

Editorializing: Why would a spouse be no less entitled to reap the rewards generated by the other spouse's start-up? A relationship, especially a marriage, is inherently two people acting as a unit, so just because one spouse didn't sling PHP and research lambdas all night doesn't mean that either spouse's contribution is more or less valuable. If my spouse accomplished something like this, I'd be thrilled at the success and genuinely looking forward to our life together with much less time and stress investment from both of us, since that means that I was also picking up a lot more of the "home life."

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#57

Turned me down in 07' after a handful of phone interviews, flying me across the country, and 8 hours of in person interviews with 3 separate departments... but not before I got their CTO so shitfaced drunk he botched a 2AM code push to production and helped convince Zuckerbergs little sister into riding a mechanical bull. I regret nothing. edit: Worth noting I was a 22 year old self taught programmer that hadn't expe…

> Turned me down in 07

Telling the story now is an interesting historical anecdote, but you probably didn't blog or tweet about it in 2007, right?

I can't quite understand why Brian Acton was so public about the companies that turned him down. Isn't this bad for him if he's in a job search? Doesn't this send out a negative message (assuming any employer bothered to look)?

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#58
post #6
post #2

Just goes to show, on paper, founders aren't always the most appealing employees.

Seems like he was pretty qualified on paper. Stanford grad and former VP of Engineering at Yahoo. With that in mind, maybe he just had a bad set of interviews. I think this would be more meaningful if we knew the position he was going for.

Some people are really bad interviewees. Forgivable because interviews are really bad at predicting fit and performance.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#59

Turned me down in 07' after a handful of phone interviews, flying me across the country, and 8 hours of in person interviews with 3 separate departments... but not before I got their CTO so shitfaced drunk he botched a 2AM code push to production and helped convince Zuckerbergs little sister into riding a mechanical bull. I regret nothing. edit: Worth noting I was a 22 year old self taught programmer that hadn't expe…

Where did you end up?

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#60
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if they were, I hope they were also smart enough to have prenups. This brings up a question: Is it even possible to make a prenup that covers future windfills? E.g., a prenup that protects your wealth in a company that hasn't yet been founded.

Of course you could just get married for life.

The tricky part of adhering to that doctrine is not the married part. It's the not getting married if it might not be for life part.
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