Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

blog.dropbox.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

571–580 of 1001 posts

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#571

Post by mrkramer »

echoangle wrote: post #295
bhouston wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Drew Houston's total compensation for the year in 2023 was $1.5M That is insanely low for the CEO of a public company of Dropbox's size. But I suspect he owned a lot of shares in the company so when it went public, so he doesn't need salary, it is just a rounding error in terms of his wealth. EDIT: Yeah, he is worth $2B according to Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/profile/drew-houston/

I always wonder what gives these people the drive to continue. Maybe I’m lazy and lacking vision but if I were worth 2B, I don’t think I would go to the office every day just to get accused of mismanagement when I have to lay people off. I would take my yacht to the Caribbean and slack off.

People who have mission and vision of the future are entrepreneurs because they want to solve problems and help other people not because they want to become rich and sail with yacht.

Listen to Snapchat's founder and CEO Evan Spiegel[0] why he didn't sell to Facebook for $3 billion. He even didn't sell to Google which offered 10x more ($30bn) for Snapchat.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVu6M72XWUI

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#573

Post by azemetre »

flappyeagle wrote: post #530
azemetre wrote: post #509

Something weird I noticed about Dropbox: I cancelled my paid account two years ago. I had 5 terabytes of storage being used (mostly shitty concert vids and food pics). Everyday they email me telling me I’m over my limit. They always “threaten” to delete the data but it’s been two years since I cancelled. My Qs are: why are they hoarding my data for so long? Why would they want to do this? How cheap is storage for the…

You can just delete your data dude. No one is forcing you to keep it there. They’re generally not going to do something destructive because of unpaid bills. It’s nice of them

But why do I have to log into Dropbox to do this? I haven't logged into the site in 2 years and don't plan on it. I just find it odd that they keep threatening to delete my data but from where I'm standing it looks like they will keep my data indefinitely.

I'm not forcing them to do anything. I terminated my service and they're still keeping my data. Seems like shitty consumer rights that they'll just keep the data regardless of what I do.

That's what I'm trying to figure out, if others have similar stories.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#574

Post by lucianbr »

jrussino wrote: post #497
echoangle wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always wonder what gives these people the drive to continue. Maybe I’m lazy and lacking vision but if I were worth 2B, I don’t think I would go to the office every day just to get accused of mismanagement when I have to lay people off. I would take my yacht to the Caribbean and slack off.

I have a slightly different version of this. There are some other replies here to the effect of "people like to have a purpose in life". But surely "helping people share files" or whatever the Dropbox "mission" is can't be that inspiring, right? I mean, the point of starting a company like that is to make those billions. Maybe to do it successfully you need to delude yourself into thinking that mission is really impo…

The instinct to acquire resources does not have a limit. When homo sapiens evolved, such a limit would not have been a useful adaptation. There were no billionaires then.

Also it's nice to boss people around, probably for the same reason.

You and lots of people say would do something or other. I submit that it's different when you're actually in that position, as opposed to imagining it. Lots of us imagine we're going to go to the gym for years, and give up after a month or two.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#575

Post by s1artibartfast »

mulmen wrote: post #531
DrillShopper wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do those metrics count "number of people laid off" explicitly? We know they do implicitly because laying off people makes the company more profitable, but is there any penalty for killing jobs? If not, shouldn't there be?

The purpose of a corporation is to make money, not jobs.

to play devils advocate, there are different levels one can look at that. From the level of the companies and owners, the goal is to make money.

From the perspective of society there are tons of answers. A common answer is that companies provide goods and services that give consumers more value than they cost, thereby enriching the lives of consumers.

It seems like some people, especially those who take issue with layoffs, tend to think the social purpose of companies is to give jobs/money to workers. This leads to a lot of frustration for those people because the entire economic system is set up such that jobs are an optional byproduct of making goods, not the other way around.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#576

Post by sangnoir »

flappyeagle wrote: post #532
sangnoir wrote: post #515

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Often that person's leadership wasn't the problem, but even when it was, that doesn't necessarily mean that the company will be better-off without them How convenient (for them)! When the company is doing well, they get millions in bonuses because their irreplaceable leadership skills - which make them 2000x more valuable than the least paid worker - were instrumental to the organization's success. When the chips a…

Go start a company already — you’re on YC forums

I have started a company[1], but that's neither here nor there. I vehemently disagree with your insinuation that I couldn't challenge leadership culture had I not.

Founding a company doesn't make one infallible or irreplaceable. Though to be fair, it doesn't feel that way when it's your company though!

1. I will note that this is an incredibly low bar.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#577

Post by layer8 »

skwee357 wrote: post #36
yieldcrv wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how would you like the next CEO to handle it, for reference?

These words mean nothing really. I expect the next CEO to not use meaningless phrases. How does "taking responsibility" works in his case? What does it even mean other than PR fluff?

It means he’s saying people should be mad at him instead of at someone else. It seems to be working.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#578

Post by dixie_land »

wbl wrote: post #564
njtransit wrote: post #561

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A somewhat sensible take, but the issue isn’t just healthcare. A lot of your life is based off of long-term, fixed cost cash flow. E.g. you can’t pay less on your mortgage just because you got fired. Even with savings, getting laid off is highly disruptive, and, if done as part of a broader downturn in the market, you may never recover the required cash flow to enable your lifestyle.

Avoid lifestyle creep! I have to say I'm bad at this myself: somehow it all adds up, while each individual expense doesn't look so bad.

Exactly, I feel a lot of my coworkers fell under this trap: if you need cashflow for mortgage on your 4m mansion in (affluent neighborhood), you can't really afford it.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#579

Post by mock-possum »

kraig911 wrote: post #183

Dropbox my one critique is can you please make it affordable again. I just can't justify the cost as there are cheaper services out there. I don't care about PDF signing etc. I fear OneDrive/Google Drive are eating you lunch because it's a hard sell to be competitive against them price wise.

I stopped using them when they refused to work with valid windows paths - to wit, files and folders with emoji in their names.

Now I pay for google drive instead.

Re: Dropbox announces 20% global workforce reduction

#580

Post by GiorgioG »

wbl wrote: post #564
njtransit wrote: post #561

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A somewhat sensible take, but the issue isn’t just healthcare. A lot of your life is based off of long-term, fixed cost cash flow. E.g. you can’t pay less on your mortgage just because you got fired. Even with savings, getting laid off is highly disruptive, and, if done as part of a broader downturn in the market, you may never recover the required cash flow to enable your lifestyle.

Avoid lifestyle creep! I have to say I'm bad at this myself: somehow it all adds up, while each individual expense doesn't look so bad.

Can I avoid inflationcreep? How?
Post reply on HN