Inside Palantir • Hacker News Board

Re: Inside Palantir

#41

Post by eloy » Fri, May 06, 2016, 9:51 PM UTC

CydeWeys wrote: post #5

> If you have information or tips, you can contact this reporter over an encrypted chat service such as Telegram, Signal, or WhatsApp, at 310-617-1302. You can also send an encrypted email to will.alden@buzzfeed.com, using the PGP key found here. This is the best "contact me if you have juicy insider info" slug that I have ever seen . He can take PGP-encrypted email! And this is on Buzzfeed!!!

If I had to make a choice to contact the author, I would go for Signal. You can make a lot less cryptographic mistakes by using it, and it doesn't backup all the conversations to Google Drive like WhatsApp or store them in the cloud like Telegram.

Re: Inside Palantir

#42

Post by melvinmt » Fri, May 06, 2016, 9:52 PM UTC

marmaduke wrote: post #14

How can they ask for such high prices?

Price discrimination at its finest.

> "If you can pay, you have to pay us. If you are a philanthropy stopping pedophiles, we will give you the same product you would get if you are wealthy special forces unit in a very wealthy country," Karp said.

> "If you're a hedge fund and you make a billion dollars and say you're not going to pay us, well, that's rapacious and we're not going to take your calls anymore."

http://www.cnbc.com/2014/03/19/free-advice-dont-go-public-sa...

Re: Inside Palantir

#43

Post by ethanbond » Fri, May 06, 2016, 9:55 PM UTC

jbob2000 wrote: post #24

nicklovescode wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ooAUeTlzdU here's a quick demo of one of their products edit: this is 2012, likely way out of date

Oh my god, what the hell is that thing! For all that money, they couldn't have hired a product management/design team?

Note the timestamp on the video... their products look sweet now.

Re: Inside Palantir

#44

Post by Lxr » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:00 PM UTC

> “One of the things we did well early on was to recognize and invest in the unique talents of each Palantirian”

I find it a bit weird how tech companies make up names for their employees now. Googler, Palantirian... does this make people work harder because they feel like they belong or something?

Re: Inside Palantir

#45

Post by l33tbro » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:00 PM UTC

Confusing company on many levels. On one hand such huge clients, top talent (until recently), and Thiel's famous success pre-requisite of having unique offering. But then ... they go and do really, really weird stuff like making recruitment videos shot on someone's Iphone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhMqPoCQ5Q8

I think for a long time they got away with seeming really cloudy and potentially mis-managed because of the secrecy that is inherent to what they do. But clients are now asking tough questions about what value they can actually bring to the table for crazy dollars, and things may becoming home to roost.

Re: Inside Palantir

#46

Post by untilHellbanned » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:00 PM UTC

Theranos, Zenefits, palantir, what's the next unicorn deflation? Is it Uber or Spotify with their Palantir-esque spend a $1/make $0.90 strategies or is it an another company with less-reported vulnerabilities?

Re: Inside Palantir

#47

Post by sharkweek » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:02 PM UTC

nicklovescode wrote: post #22

jbob2000 wrote: post #10

I want to see what Palantir actually produces. Like does Coca-Cola get a monthly report that says "Hey, you guys should bring back Cherry Cola in Montana for an expected 4% increase in sales" or what? What does $1mil/month actually get you ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ooAUeTlzdU here's a quick demo of one of their products edit: this is 2012, likely way out of date

Wow this is incredibly fascinating, how were they able to talk publicly about this...?

Re: Inside Palantir

#48

Post by DasIch » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:02 PM UTC

laxatives wrote: post #26

sharkweek wrote: post #13

Will Alden is shaping up to be one of the most connected journalists in startupland. First the Zenefits coverage, and now this, he's done a great job getting lots of great sources at some of the more interesting companies. Credit to BuzzFeed for building up a pretty solid news team.

Buzzfeed was also respnsible for outing tennis fixing in The Tennis Racket using statistical analysis of players' matches.

Buzzfeed is shaping up to be the one of the best sources for investigative journalism. Who would have thought?

Re: Inside Palantir

#49

Post by untilHellbanned » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:06 PM UTC

l33tbro wrote: post #45

Confusing company on many levels. On one hand such huge clients, top talent (until recently), and Thiel's famous success pre-requisite of having unique offering. But then ... they go and do really, really weird stuff like making recruitment videos shot on someone's Iphone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhMqPoCQ5Q8 I think for a long time they got away with seeming really cloudy and potentially mis-managed because o…

Seems like hardly fits the "competition is for losers" claim. Consulting firms are all about overpriced bullshit analysis. Seems like Palantir plays that game but sadly not even well.

Re: Inside Palantir

#50

Post by freyr » Fri, May 06, 2016, 10:07 PM UTC

ethanbond wrote: post #43

jbob2000 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh my god, what the hell is that thing! For all that money, they couldn't have hired a product management/design team?

Note the timestamp on the video... their products look sweet now.

> Ethan Bond

> Palantir, Product Designer; Starting June 2016, New York City, NY

I realize you're not technically a Palantir employee quite yet, but there's definitely the opportunity for bias here.