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Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

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Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#431

Post by ensignavenger »

highfrequency wrote: post #124

Directly contradicts Garry Tan's post saying that all forty founding engineers got seven figure payouts from the Google acquisition: https://x.com/garrytan/status/1947072583092052406 Even if the OP considers the full headline number of $2.4b to be the value of the company, and taking his "1% of fair" number as truth, seven figure payouts would imply all 40 founding engineers had >4% equity which is nonsensical.

It is possible that 7 figure number included the offer to join Google, and since this engineer didn't accept that offer, they would not have recieved the compensation for doing so. It sounds like Garry Yan was getting his information second hand, so it may not include all of the context.

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#432

Post by dfadsadsf »

ashdksnndck wrote: post #346
0x00000000 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

anything within 45 minutes of your office in palo alto (where you are mandated to show up 5 days a week). this will get you a 1300sqft piece of shit built in 1964 with asbestos and lead paint and lead pipes and a cracked foundation (also some dipshit realtor had them paint all the original wood beams and paneling inside gloss white and replace the original wood and slate floors with grey vinyl) from some baby boomer…

Redwood City is 20 mins from Palo Alto and has a lot of houses for $1-1.5M. $3M means you are paying extra for something optional. It’s not the minimum requirement. Lots of people are paying millions extra just to live up winding roads on a hill, where the commute is longer, and you need a geotechnical engineer to design your patio.

Redwood City has terrible schools (relatively) and many people consider excellent schools for their kids as hard requirement.

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#433

Post by gametorch »

anonym29 wrote: post #282
kstrauser wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are greatly exaggerating. One tangible advantage to living somewhere expensive with higher salaries is that anything you can buy online is effectively that much cheaper. An iPhone costs the same in Arkansas as in San Jose, so you'd end up working many more hours to buy one in AR than in CA, on average. Yes, housing is more expensive. A lot more. Everything else is way cheaper.

The trick is to rent cheap and live like a college student in SF/bay area while young, save aggressively, invest intelligently, then move somewhere comfortable but more affordable (CO's front range is lovely) for your 30s/40s.

I'm so so so glad I didn't spend my twenties working and saving.

I've lived a thousand lives, spent most of the time as true quality time with people I love, and I still have a few years left in this decade of my life.

And I'm still further ahead, financially speaking, than >99% of other people my age. (To those asking, I tripled down on life after getting a remote job.)

The one year I spent 9-5 in an office as a traditional SWE was by far the quickest and least eventful year of my life. Also probably the saddest.

I'm very glad I just said "no" and walked away and simply lived. It was absolutely worth the risk. I would never trade these years for the ability to buy a house in the Bay Area suburbs.

I probably will be able to do that anyways, if I want to, even though I don't.

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#434

Post by ponector »

mawadev wrote: post #71

I'm waking up personally to the unethical side of Software development as well. You can either do little and get paid pocket change or you can provide a ton of value for pocket change next to some promises lulling you in, where the value of your work exponentially increases, but you will see nothing of it and whatever you do: you are still a replaceable cell in excel to them and there will be ways where you get dragg…

Welcome to the real world. It is the case with pretty much every job, not only IT.

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#435

Post by [deleted] »

another_twist wrote: post #88
cleandreams wrote: post #82

My base salary was fine but the magic was in the stock. I got a payout on acquisition by a FAANG+ (as first employee). It was only 300K but I put 50K of that into Nvidia. Actually I invested all my payout from my startup stock into tech stocks. And I got a terrific golden handcuffs deal. After that I could afford to retire and I did.

Did you also post this recently in Blind ? If it is so you might want to fuzz the numbers a bit.

[deleted]

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#436

Post by dfadsadsf »

kome wrote: post #349

this is something that my feeble European brain will never understand: why people in American start-up keeps getting scammed with pseudo "private" equities, stock options, that are not on a market, and therefore cannot be priced? equities surrounded by very obscure (or no) legislation, that if you get fired or decided to leave you cannot keep. it just make no sense but americans loves them.

European salaries are laughably low even compared to low ball offers from US startups.

Essentially options for good (but not great) sr engineers are

1. Get 120k salary in Europe (on higher end)

2. 500k at FAANG in US (salary + RSU)

3. ~200k at startup in US + lottery tickets

Both option 2 and 3 strictly beat option 1 (especially after taxes) so European should get off the high horse and recognize reality that they are poor and exploited by companies and government.

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#437

Post by Retric »

AngryData wrote: post #418
Retric wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

3% of 3 million is 90k which sounds better than it actually is as you need to pay for health insurance. Plenty of people live in any city with less than that, but it is below the average income in many nice counties in the US.

90K is still 50% above the median income, not to mention the fact that you have twice as much as time available and using just a small amount of that can be used to cut costs significantly in other areas. It is more effectively a $150K income if we add in the median wage from the job you aren't doing.

Nationwide, the US median income for full-time workers is over 62k without considering benefits, but many areas are well above that.

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#438

Post by zeroonetwothree »

pjerem wrote: post #392
nkmnz wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lol no. Private health insurance in Germany is ~800-1000 for a 60 y.o. – public insurance might be cheaper, but you need to qualify for that when you move here by working as an employee when you're that old. Working permission will require you to work full time. So you'll end up working full time and pay ~600-1200 (based on your salary) in contributions.

I never said public healthcare is free for strangers. It’s rarely the case. Most of the time if you are not a citizen you need to either work or pay taxes. In fact even if you are a citizen, you may not be covered if you live abroad. It’s relatively easy to be covered as a stranger : in 99% of situations, if you just set up here seriously and not as a tourist, you’ll be covered. I count a 60yo who never contributed t…

I think you mean “immigrant” rather than “stranger”

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#439

Post by deanmoriarty »

gsibble wrote: post #101
mikestew wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google should have bought the company. They didnt. They basically bought the employees. They call it a "acquihire". That's just called "hiring". In order to "acquire-hire" employees of the target company, one must first "acquire" the company and the "hiring" part just comes along with the deal. In this case, Google skipped the "acquire" part.

The VCs all got paid their multiples. Google put a ton of money into the company which then repurchased select people's stock while leaving everyone else high and dry.

Do you know what are the mechanics that allowed the VCs to get repayed, but not the employees who did not take the Google offer? Is this an issue with liquidation preference, or was there something more shady going on that truly allowed VCs to make a “big” exit, while the employees owning common shares did not?

Re: Windsurf employee #2: I was given a payout of only 1% what my shares where worth

#440

Post by zeroonetwothree »

bluedevilzn wrote: post #339
nimos wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a tenancy in common 2 bedroom apartment not a house. Shared ownership of a 100+ year old building with "leased" parking 2 blocks away. Not exactly the home ownership dream.

That too for $1.5 million. 99% of Americans would picture a mansion when they think of a $1.5 million home.

Hey now, around 15% of the population live in CA or NY so I think your estimate is too high
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