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We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

nautil.us

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Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#181

Post by auntienomen »

jerf wrote: post #166
mhneu wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. His long term incentives were aligned with letting the story run.

So, as I write this, there are what, 5 distinct possible negative motives for Murdoch? As the rationalists say, if you can explain anything, you can explain nothing. I'm not saying he did it for good reasons. I'm saying it's plain that nobody here knows why he did it , and lack of knowledge is lack of knowledge, not license to just fill in the blanks with whatever you like. (Our brains are very good at that, and the…

I don't consider my explanation to be a negative one. He didn't spike the story because he's not stupid.

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#182

Post by inetknght »

edanm wrote: post #131
kumarvvr wrote: post #26

The most amazing thing about this whole situation is that there were experts in the field who were shouting out about the impossibility of Holmes' claims right from the beginning. The media, though, never paid enough attention (or was possibly subverted by Theranos itself) to the naysayers. These incidents ought to remind us the exponentially important role media plays in our lives and how important it is that we com…

> The media, though, never paid enough attention (or was possibly subverted by Theranos itself) to the naysayers. This is not the most amazing thing, at all. I'm not surprised that "the media" with their limited access, didn't get the full story. Rather, I'm more surprised about the informed investors, who invested a lot of money, and had access or at least the ability to push for it. How did they invest so much mone…

> who cares what the public thought about Theranos - the public didn't lose money here.

I beg to differ. Straight from the article:

> Some patients were rushed to a hospital on the basis of erroneous readings, only to be sent home when their blood was properly analyzed by the hospital. Even worse, Theranos was using brutal intimidation tactics against its own employees to stop the truth from coming out.

I don't know about your location but American citizens pay quite a premium for hospital care. Imagine the potential for crippling debt all because of a test result which should have been known to produce false positives.

That's definitely the public losing money here.

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#183

Post by grigjd3 »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #119
laughinghan wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am under the impression that it is rare for journalists in America to be murdered for their stories, is that not the case? None of your examples are journalists being penalized for lack of due diligence or for being misleading. I think your instinct to protect journalists given their importance and the threats they face is a healthy and important one, and I share it, but I don’t think they’re above reproach. Ensuri…

Imagine if the phrase was "Software developers are not murdered for missing estimates in this country". I am pretty sure I would hit my estimates even in London. Yes Journalists need high standards of professional integrity and the legal air cover to maintain that. But really the ultimate defence is us - to reject the mountains of crap out there and seek out and subscribe to the worthwhile news sources. As ever, it's…

Why hold yourself responsible for your actions when you can just say everything is corrupt and imagine that is an excuse? ;)

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#184

Post by grigjd3 »

edanm wrote: post #131
kumarvvr wrote: post #26

The most amazing thing about this whole situation is that there were experts in the field who were shouting out about the impossibility of Holmes' claims right from the beginning. The media, though, never paid enough attention (or was possibly subverted by Theranos itself) to the naysayers. These incidents ought to remind us the exponentially important role media plays in our lives and how important it is that we com…

> The media, though, never paid enough attention (or was possibly subverted by Theranos itself) to the naysayers. This is not the most amazing thing, at all. I'm not surprised that "the media" with their limited access, didn't get the full story. Rather, I'm more surprised about the informed investors, who invested a lot of money, and had access or at least the ability to push for it. How did they invest so much mone…

It is cute that you think investors are informed.

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#185

Post by Bartweiss »

Torn wrote: post #113
timoth3y wrote: post #65

It's not unique to Theranos. It's all part of the perverse incentives involved with well-funded tech companies. There is no real incentive to call out fraud. As an investor or a partner you might pass on a deal, but to go public with your concerns means risking a possible lawsuit, raising the ire of the people who are already on the bandwagon, being excluded from future deals, and being dismissed as someone who is ou…

I have a strong suspicion another example will be Magic Leap. Note: not as an intentionally-misleading or lying case, but just as another extremely well-funded startup whose launch is likely to fall short of the hype. $2.3bn in funding adds an immense pressure for it to be successful and perceived as revolutionary.

Magic Leap could certainly fail, but I don't understand how they could be another Theranos.

Theranos had contracts-signed, money-spent deadlines for things they couldn't provide (the Walgreens deal), and was selling further investors by lying about having their product already in use by the government.

At least publicly, Magic Leap has promised virtually nothing. They said in December they'd ship something this year, but there's nothing binding in that. Even in the worst case - the tech is literally useless and they spent all the money - it'd be a bad investment rather than fraud and breach of contract.

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#186

Post by nojvek »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #119
laughinghan wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am under the impression that it is rare for journalists in America to be murdered for their stories, is that not the case? None of your examples are journalists being penalized for lack of due diligence or for being misleading. I think your instinct to protect journalists given their importance and the threats they face is a healthy and important one, and I share it, but I don’t think they’re above reproach. Ensuri…

Imagine if the phrase was "Software developers are not murdered for missing estimates in this country". I am pretty sure I would hit my estimates even in London. Yes Journalists need high standards of professional integrity and the legal air cover to maintain that. But really the ultimate defence is us - to reject the mountains of crap out there and seek out and subscribe to the worthwhile news sources. As ever, it's…

Can anyone give me a list of respectable independent media that I should be subscribing to?

The economist comes to mind. Any others HN recommends?

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#187

Post by cleong »

sametmax wrote: post #154
sytelus wrote: post #128

The book Bad Blood is amazing and extremely gripping. The question, however, why Holmes did this is still open. The critical point to remember is that Holmes never sold her shares and in fact she kept accumulating more. She didn't need IQ of 150 to figure out that going live with erroneous medical devices would get her slammed with lawsuits from patients. If she just wanted to dup investors to become rich, she could…

She probably believed in her project. You can't know if you are going to succeed when you try to achieve a revolutionary feat. But you have to act like you are sure you will. Imagine Jobs in an alternate universe, trying to get out the iPhone, but after years of failures and billions wasted, the world realize the product vision was unrealistic. Basically him being the same asshole, but hitting a wall many predicted.…

But in that alternate universe Apple would still have been a huge success, and the iPhone would have been another failed product like the Windows Phone. In addition to this pattern to success, Jobs was not a criminal. Theranos made VERY negligent statements such as the military using Theranos products(they did not).

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#188

Post by edanm »

inetknght wrote: post #182
edanm wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The media, though, never paid enough attention (or was possibly subverted by Theranos itself) to the naysayers. This is not the most amazing thing, at all. I'm not surprised that "the media" with their limited access, didn't get the full story. Rather, I'm more surprised about the informed investors, who invested a lot of money, and had access or at least the ability to push for it. How did they invest so much mone…

> who cares what the public thought about Theranos - the public didn't lose money here. I beg to differ. Straight from the article: > Some patients were rushed to a hospital on the basis of erroneous readings, only to be sent home when their blood was properly analyzed by the hospital. Even worse, Theranos was using brutal intimidation tactics against its own employees to stop the truth from coming out. I don't know…

You're right - I stand corrected. I wasn't aware they'd gotten quite that far in actually deploying their product and (supposedly) testing people.

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#189

Post by JTbane »

kumarvvr wrote: post #26

The most amazing thing about this whole situation is that there were experts in the field who were shouting out about the impossibility of Holmes' claims right from the beginning. The media, though, never paid enough attention (or was possibly subverted by Theranos itself) to the naysayers. These incidents ought to remind us the exponentially important role media plays in our lives and how important it is that we com…

FOMO is a hell of a drug.

Re: We Shouldn’t Be Surprised at the Theranos Fraud

#190

Post by busterarm »

aaron695 wrote: post #172
Kiro wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of "I remember" in this thread but where are the links?

Comment from the oldest HN article I could find - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6349808 NO one refuted it. The issue is not that smart people didn't know, it's so many people can't see the obvious. Assuming the comment is ordered correctly it's the masses with the problem. Valid concerns were raised, no one could defend them, but the comment was left at the bottom. HN, like the media has flaws that don't allow…

> Magic Leap will fail, who knows when though.

Been saying this since the beginning and just want to go on record with this again now in case this comes up 5 years from now like Theranos did.

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