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Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

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Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#121

Post by newnewnew »

rollo_tommasi wrote: post #118
newnewnew wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The politically correct and their defenders engage in Crocodile Humor , the laughter of the powerful at the powerless[1]. It is an ugly thing to behold. "Many UR readers have had the priceless educational privilege of growing up behind the Iron Curtain. These readers will identify Professor DeLong’s tone at once: it is the tone of the Soviet humor magazine Krokodil[2]. I will take the liberty of Anglicizing, and call…

It is beyond ludicrous to suggest that a C-suite executive at a media company is "the powerless".

Who can get who fired is a flawed measure of power, but a good first approximation.

Which groups can say racist statements about which other groups and still keep their jobs? Also a good question for measuring relative power. We'll ask Anil Dash[1]

If your HR department toes the official feminist line, feminism has power. If someone can get you fired for making a dongle joke to your friend, that is power.

The myth that white males all hold positions of power is itself evidence of the power that cultural Marxists hold.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6361167

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#122

Post by gaadd33 »

kmeritt wrote: post #73
meritt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough but when top-level executives are being removed for their inappropriate behavior hopefully people will start to notice that "hey, maybe I shouldn't act this way!" and our industry can actually be respectable once again. This guy is a lawsuit waiting to happen with a very vivid history. No company is going to place themselves at risk hiring this guy again. There's plenty of other respectable talent out the…

A) "This guy is a lawsuit waiting to happen." Yep. As in... Either assign an intern to make my twitter updates for me or expect to get sued for wrongful termination and for me to finally set precedent about the limits of corporate policy with a goddamn federal lawsuit. B) "There's plenty of other respectable talent out there." No there isn't. There are plenty of people who read hacker news and know what's trending to…

Wrongful termination in an at-will state without violating any protected classes or protected speech? That would be an interesting precedent to set, how would you go about that?

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#123

Post by crapshoot101 »

untog wrote: post #27
samstave wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was the debacle at Disrupt?

You wouldn't have heard about it if you only read Hacker News - users systematically flagged any reference to it off the site. The 21st Century equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and saying "la la la la" Worth pointing out that the exact same thing has now happened to this thread.

That was incredibly depressing - the story gets flagged because its not newsworthy to someone.

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#124

Post by theorique »

andrew_gardener wrote: post #3
theorique wrote: post #2

That escalated quickly.

based on his history (links from inside article) it seems to have been building up over the years. Guess he finally crossed the line?

Yeah, I followed him for a while because he had some occasionally snarky and clever conservative quips [1]. (I like following and reading lots of smartass people all across the political spectrum)

I can remember reading quite a few and thinking "wow, this guy's gonna get called out one of these days". Guess it finally happened, and by someone with a big enough megaphone to really make it go viral.

[1] "Passion of Christ" tweet not among them. That was just foul.

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#125

Post by theorique »

fingerprinter wrote: post #11
Nate75Sanders wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most devs I've met will just endlessly put up with this shit. They'll also put up with: - long hours - far less than optimal physical workspaces - being left in the dark about what's going on in the company from a business perspective - all kinds of other crap We need more devs who will speak up or at least who will support the ones who do speak up. In far too many workplaces, it's still high school. Management is so…

I also wonder about the VCs or boards that hire them! I get the sense that they generally don't care if someone is a complete asshole so long as he gets results. But I am confounded when someone is a complete asshole and they don't get results. How does that person keep getting these jobs? :/

I don't know what this guy's like in real life, but if he acts relatively normal in a job interview, why would his social media habits come up?

In all my job interviews, no one has ever asked me whether I tweet out racist and sexist comments (spoiler: I don't).

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#126

Post by protomyth »

dragonwriter wrote: post #113
protomyth wrote: post #12

For Business Insider's sake, I hope he was not involved in any hiring decisions because there will be some lawsuits.

He was the CTO. It'd be pretty odd for a CxO not to be involved in any hiring decisions.

With how big a prick he is, someone might have kept him out of the hiring process.

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#127

Post by theorique »

hosay123 wrote: post #92
untog wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did you get the idea that "believing in anything" is the reason he got fired? It's quite simple (and already explained by rit). He posted numerous messages disparaging various groups - blacks, women, gays. He is responsible for hiring within the company. This places Business Insider in an utterly compromised position and in danger of lawsuits.

Been chewing on this since you made the comment, and I don't think I buy it. The "legal issues" angle is a dirty cop-out, and it ignores the issue at hand: he's being suppressed for holding an opinion. Right now I'm looking at the Twitter search results and being reminded why I hate people in general. Should expressing this opinion get me fired? Should I be prohibited from occupying a position of hiring people becaus…

Been chewing on this since you made the comment, and I don't think I buy it. The "legal issues" angle is a dirty cop-out, and it ignores the issue at hand: he's being suppressed for holding an opinion.

He's not being suppressed (and now fired) for holding an opinion. He was fired for publicly expressing views that were incompatible with his job as CTO.

He said in a public medium (Twitter), tagged with his professional title, that he believed superb female developers were as rare as unicorns. Any woman who had ever interviewed and been turned down for a dev position at Business Insider might have a legal case for unfair discrimination in hiring.

The other stuff (racism, sexism, etc) is one thing, but the example I mentioned above exposed his company to legal liability. That's not a responsible thing for a person in a decision-making and hiring position to do.

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#129

Post by fingerprinter »

theorique wrote: post #125
fingerprinter wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also wonder about the VCs or boards that hire them! I get the sense that they generally don't care if someone is a complete asshole so long as he gets results. But I am confounded when someone is a complete asshole and they don't get results. How does that person keep getting these jobs? :/

I don't know what this guy's like in real life, but if he acts relatively normal in a job interview, why would his social media habits come up? In all my job interviews, no one has ever asked me whether I tweet out racist and sexist comments (spoiler: I don't).

This is two days old now, so not sure you'll see it.

One should always expect that their internet information where their real name is listed will be seen. Most places are doing some sort of internet search for the person to see what public information, both good and bad, they can glean. This is the way of the world these days.

Re: Business Insider CTO Forced to Resign Following Twitter Firestorm

#130

Post by theorique »

fingerprinter wrote: post #129
theorique wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know what this guy's like in real life, but if he acts relatively normal in a job interview, why would his social media habits come up? In all my job interviews, no one has ever asked me whether I tweet out racist and sexist comments (spoiler: I don't).

This is two days old now, so not sure you'll see it. One should always expect that their internet information where their real name is listed will be seen. Most places are doing some sort of internet search for the person to see what public information, both good and bad, they can glean. This is the way of the world these days.

Agreed.

Depends on the policy of the company, of course, but the first thing I would do when I get a resume of a person for interviewing is to google their name. Do they have LinkedIn, github, Facebook, a personal web site?

There's good, neutral, and bad.

- good: OS contributions, intelligent blog on topic

- neutral: random hobbies, completely blank web presence

- bad: photos with illegal drugs, hostile blog, drive-by vicious blog comments, etc

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