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“Facebook turned me down” (2009)

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Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#61

Post by shutupalready »

techsupporter wrote: post #56
shutupalready wrote: post #51

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.

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…

> Why would a spouse be no less entitled to reap the rewards

OK, I'll bite. What if one of these situations:

1) What if the spouse was dead set against the start-up, and did everything possible to dissuade you, but you succeeded anyway.

2) What if you used your own money and assets from before the marriage to finance it? And what if those monies and assets were covered by the prenup; the company financed by those investments would or wouldn't be covered?

3) What if you founded the company when the marriage was in obvious decline and you both knew you'd eventually get divorced? What if you founded it when you were already separated?

4) Many companies with 2 founders don't have a 50:50 split. Why does the split with the spouse need to be 50:50 in the case of a company? Why shouldn't it be 60:40 or 90:10 assuming we accept the notion that the spouse must have been contributing something and is entitled.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#62

Post by throwwit »

Ologn wrote: post #5
hendzen wrote: post #4

"We only hire the best engineers"

He only had a BSCS from Stanford and had been a VP of Engineering at Yahoo leading over 300 engineers. Facebook turned him away, and as someone else mentioned here, Twitter. It kind of puts in perspective that blog post from yesterday that claimed companies in Silicon Valley can't find rock star ninja engineers ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7259845 ).

I've known quite a few programmers that really should have access to the types of resources these big companies command; but just end up in situations simply paying the bills.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#63

Post by curiousDog »

In this case, he was probably rejected more for fit/pay/cultural reasons but this should be a reminder for candidates to never be dejected when they're turned down by these companies. I have a friend who tried to kill himself because he failed the Google interview. Rejection by the "smartest" engineers at this companies is by no means an invalidation of your abilities. At the end of the day, none of them are solving the grand unified theory.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#64

Post by a_bonobo »

shutupalready wrote: post #57
chadillac wrote: post #15

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)?

You could see it as a badge of honor that Google or another large company, which purportedly hires only the best of the best, deemed you worthy of an interview. The mere fact that you have been considered for a position might raise your standing with potential employers [citation needed].

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#65

Post by a_bonobo »

rodgerd wrote: post #38
bduerst wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Too high of a risk for companies. Better to let the market sift out the successful founders than to payroll a hundred of them, hoping for a big win. Think of how many unsuccessful founder types that Facebook didn't hire too. Also if this guy was working for Facebook, odds are he would have ended up on messenger, and someone else would have filled the SMS market need for Whatsapp in India. Then Facebook would be acqui…

> Too high of a risk for companies. The problem with PARC and AT&T labs wasn't that having a bunch of really smart people doing interesting stuff failed to produce brilliant, world changing ideas, it was that the companies in question weren't always good at capitalising on them (arguably for the better, in the case of Unix).

> it was that the companies in question weren't always good at capitalising on them

There's lots of fun evidence for this - AT&T had an answering machine 1934 but shelved it for 60 years.

>AT&T firmly believed that the answering machine, and its magnetic tapes, would lead the public to abandon the telephone.

http://thinkofthat.net/2010/12/03/no-answer-how-and-why-att-...

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#68

Post by adoggman »

gscott wrote: post #52
chadillac wrote: post #15

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...

He didn't fit their needs. If he doesn't and H-1B workers do, they should get the job.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#69

Post by kkwok »

a_bonobo wrote: post #64
shutupalready wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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)?

You could see it as a badge of honor that Google or another large company, which purportedly hires only the best of the best, deemed you worthy of an interview. The mere fact that you have been considered for a position might raise your standing with potential employers [citation needed].

Doubt that was the reason for him. He was already very established engineering leader at yahoo.

Re: “Facebook turned me down” (2009)

#70

Post by kkwok »

Ologn wrote: post #5
hendzen wrote: post #4

"We only hire the best engineers"

He only had a BSCS from Stanford and had been a VP of Engineering at Yahoo leading over 300 engineers. Facebook turned him away, and as someone else mentioned here, Twitter. It kind of puts in perspective that blog post from yesterday that claimed companies in Silicon Valley can't find rock star ninja engineers ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7259845 ).

To be fair, we don't know what position he was interviewing for at Facebook.
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