What I loved about Paul Allen • Hacker News Board

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#21

Post by adventured » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:35 PM UTC

2_listerine_pls wrote: post #17

wwarner wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but not fair, to Gates OR to Allen. "After a few years all that passes. Bill and I have always been friends, even through the ups and downs" https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/may/02/paul-alle...

Just because the friendship remained, it doesn't make that particular event any better.

Had they gone through with it, it certainly would have been despicable. As it was, it was nothing more than a conversation that was hurtful to Allen. You can't indict someone for an action they didn't take, as though they did take it. It's entirely impossible to know if Gates would have gone through with that action.

Allen retained his full Microsoft stake and yielded tens of billions of dollars from the Microsoft that Gates, Ballmer and others proceeded to build up in the coming 15-20 years.

I suspect there are few here that haven't had insulting conversations about other people. Said negative, rude, belittling things that they later regretted. Hurled a very mean statement in the middle of a fight. Discussed leaving a spouse behind their back. So on and so forth.

It's not necessary to excuse the behavior of Gates, it was a crass mistake by a 27 year old. Allen retained his ownership, forgave Gates, and that's that.

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#22

Post by jnwatson » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:35 PM UTC

ProAm wrote: post #2

The only thing I ever think of when Gates speaks about Allen is how they tried to reduce his equity when he got sick. It's something that has stuck with me for 20+ years.

What struck me is that Allen was living with cancer for the last 36 years of his life.

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#23

Post by btian » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:37 PM UTC

ProAm wrote: post #2

The only thing I ever think of when Gates speaks about Allen is how they tried to reduce his equity when he got sick. It's something that has stuck with me for 20+ years.

Which is absolutely the right thing to do, especially if you have any external investor, or if you need external funding some day.

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#24

Post by jkuria » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:39 PM UTC

azhenley wrote: post #4

ProAm wrote: post #2

The only thing I ever think of when Gates speaks about Allen is how they tried to reduce his equity when he got sick. It's something that has stuck with me for 20+ years.

Is there a detailed account of this somewhere? I'd like to read more about it.

There is a detailed account in Allen's book "Idea Man":

https://www.amazon.com/Idea-Man-Memoir-Cofounder-Microsoft/d...

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#25

Post by projectramo » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:41 PM UTC

mobileexpert wrote: post #8

ProAm wrote: post #2

The only thing I ever think of when Gates speaks about Allen is how they tried to reduce his equity when he got sick. It's something that has stuck with me for 20+ years.

I don’t know the exact specifics, but the notion of co-founder vesting schedules exist today. This provides a simpler pre-agreed upon way to handle that kind of situation. If I recall correctly Micro-Soft wasn’t even a properly incorporated entity for the DOS deal making things like a founder needing to stop having an execution role for health reasons hard to deal with.

That's an interesting way of looking at it. I wonder if you're right in looking at it that way.

i.e. if one co-founder cannot work as much as the other, should there be a change in compensation?

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#26

Post by pgrote » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:42 PM UTC

gus_massa wrote: post #20

From the caption of the first photo: > Here we are in school. That’s Paul on the left, our friend Ric Weiland, and me on the right. In case you are wondering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ric_Weiland

Thank you for bringing this up. I had never heard of Ric Weiland.

Here is another article discussing how he distributed his wealth:

https://www.geekwire.com/2017/remarkable-life-legacy-ric-wei...

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#27

Post by ainiriand » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:46 PM UTC

ProAm wrote: post #2

The only thing I ever think of when Gates speaks about Allen is how they tried to reduce his equity when he got sick. It's something that has stuck with me for 20+ years.

That is the power of lawyers and contracts, that´s the power of the dark side.

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#28

Post by Insanity » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:49 PM UTC

jnwatson wrote: post #22

ProAm wrote: post #2

The only thing I ever think of when Gates speaks about Allen is how they tried to reduce his equity when he got sick. It's something that has stuck with me for 20+ years.

What struck me is that Allen was living with cancer for the last 36 years of his life.

Yeah that struck me as well. That must be quite horrible and lucky at the same time.

(lucky in the sense that, it could have ended much sooner, but it must be quite a horrible way to live. In my opinion)

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#29

Post by mabbo » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:52 PM UTC

I have perhaps one friend that I've known more than 15 years. Part of it is that I seem to be bad at keeping friends, and also because I spent a decade moving around a lot and just lost touch with people.

Paul Allen and Bill Gates were friends from early teenage years until the 60s, until death. Through so much change in the world, much of it instigated by them. Through becoming some of the richest, most powerful people on the planet and then turning into philanthropists together. Nearly half a century.

I literally cannot imagine the emotions Gates has to be going through as he writes this note. My heart goes out to him as much as Allen's family.

Re: What I loved about Paul Allen

#30

Post by saalweachter » Tue, Oct 16, 2018, 7:56 PM UTC

projectramo wrote: post #25

mobileexpert wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know the exact specifics, but the notion of co-founder vesting schedules exist today. This provides a simpler pre-agreed upon way to handle that kind of situation. If I recall correctly Micro-Soft wasn’t even a properly incorporated entity for the DOS deal making things like a founder needing to stop having an execution role for health reasons hard to deal with.

That's an interesting way of looking at it. I wonder if you're right in looking at it that way. i.e. if one co-founder cannot work as much as the other, should there be a change in compensation?

I think there's room for both compassion and contingency in compensation.

You can make sure that "your people" (operating from the mindset of corporate feudalism) are taken care of, that if they die prematurely from illness or accident their families are taken care of, and that if they are rendered simply unable to work they and their families are not worse off than in the worst case, without giving someone multi-digit ownership of the company.

It's something to consider when you start drawing up paperwork for your own startup, grisly as that may seem. What happens when one of your founders is struck by a bus a day, a month, a year, five years into the venture? How much of their vested and unvested founder-share goes to their heirs? Does it make a difference if their heirs are their children, their spouse, their siblings, or their favorite charity? Do you want to turn their founder-share from your super-voting shares to a share class with less voting power upon transfer [is that even legal? with vested or unvested shares?]? Does it make a difference if they are killed or merely incapacitated?

It's not a pleasant thing to think about, and it won't matter most of the time, but when it does...