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The Real History of TechCrunch

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Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#81

Post by gumby »

greglindahl wrote: post #80
jccalhoun wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Tesla was Musk's company until now. Apparently they actually reached a settlement with Eberhard to officially call Musk (and another two people) "founders" even though they actually weren't. https://www.cnet.com/news/tesla-motors-founders-now-there-ar...

Yes, it's often the case that "founder" is a label which a company might agree to add or subtract from various people. As an example, there are tons of startups where not everyone who was there on day 0 is called "founder".

Like Bill Joy: John Gilmore (first employee) was already on board when Joy joined the Sun team.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#82

Post by bojackstorkman »

Amezarak wrote: post #74
biztos wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been a lot of places, and I have some experience with sleep deprivation. One ought not assume too much. If you're regularly working 20-hour days, as opposed to the occasional all-nighter, then you're not doing anyone any favors -- not your company, not your friends/spouses/children, not yourself. But anyway I was alluding to the tendency to boast about how little one sleeps...

I wish companies understood this. Part of my boring non-startup job consists of occasional weeklong sprees of 20+ hours/day, staying on the jobsite the entire week, with no additional compensation. I'm definitely dead inside by the weekend, and noticeably affected after the first day. The logistics of what I do probably really does make it somewhat of a necessity, but I wish there was at least provisions for comp tim…

That sounds like wage theft.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#83

Post by ekanes »

greglindahl wrote: post #80
jccalhoun wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Tesla was Musk's company until now. Apparently they actually reached a settlement with Eberhard to officially call Musk (and another two people) "founders" even though they actually weren't. https://www.cnet.com/news/tesla-motors-founders-now-there-ar...

Yes, it's often the case that "founder" is a label which a company might agree to add or subtract from various people. As an example, there are tons of startups where not everyone who was there on day 0 is called "founder".

That is correct. Founder has to do with risk. If you are paid from the start, you're probably not a founder.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#84

Post by cocktailpeanuts »

birken wrote: post #43
cocktailpeanuts wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's say he really deserves the 10%. That doesn't make him a "cofounder". That only makes him a shareholder. If owning some shares in a company made you a cofounder, by that logic any angel investor or VC is a cofounder of ever single company they funded. And even if the law says you're technically a "cofounder", it's pathetic to call yourself that for a decade and use that false reputation for your personal gains i…

FWIW I never said anything about the guy deserving the title of co-founder or not. Arrington is claiming the guy had literally nothing to do with Techcrunch, which is directly at odds with the one piece of information we know: the guy owned 10% of Techcrunch. As for the co-founder title, my point is if you are investing in some business because an advisor is either a real co-founder or a fake co-founder of Techcrunch…

> And yes, it is pathetic if somebody is claiming a bunch of credit for something they didn't do. But it is also pathetic to give 10% of your business to somebody who did nothing (assuming the blog post is accurate)

This happens very frequently and that's why there are systems like vesting.

So you can't say it's "pathetic" to give away 10% to someone who didn't do any work. It's more of a system failure, or you suffering due to lack of experience or manipulation.

To give a specific example, there are tons of near-scam-artists who go around telling naive founders just out of college that they will introduce them to some investor, and in exchange they will get like 10% of the equity. Trust me this happens very frequently and not because the founders who fall for it are idiots, but because they're just inexperienced at that point in life. In this case, it should suck to be in that founder's shoes, but it's really harsh to call her/him pathetic because you have no idea what happened behind the scenes. But what clearly is pathetic is the older guy who know exactly what he's doing who is using his experience to scam the younger founder into believing that it's OK to give 10% of the company he hasn't even incorporated yet, all just for a single intro.

I'm not saying this is what happened in this case, but I'm just pointing out a founder giving away 10% (or even more) happens all the time, especially if you're not surrounded by the right people. This doesn't make them idiots, it's just that they were in an unfortunate situation. But someone who knows exactly what he's doing and is claiming to be what he isn't IS pathetic.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#85

Post by cocktailpeanuts »

vidarh wrote: post #45
telltruth wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TC is not just WordPress blog. There is a lot of leg work that happens to contact VCs, journalists, founders, conduct interviews, verify details etc. I bet 80% of the work that happens at TC is not-engineering. The fact that Arrington carried this entirely on his shoulder while Keith just stayed on sidelines is enough for him not getting credited for TC. However Keith claims on his LinkedIn profile that he advised Ar…

When techcrunch started it was just a WordPress blog. It quickly grew to much more than that, sure. > However Keith claims on his LinkedIn profile that he advised Arlington and helped him to be successful even initially he did not believed in TC. I've personally been present when Keith gave Mike advice about Techcrunch on more than one occasion (and I was only over about 1 week every 6 or so, so it'd be odd if I caug…

Most ethical people would never call themselves a "founder" if all they did was give advice and never did any real work. That's why we have a term called "advisor".

We're not even in legal territory here. It's about ethics. Can you see yourself calling yourself a "Techcrunch Co-founder" if you were in his shoes? If I were him, no matter how much advice I gave him I would NEVER call myself a founder if I didn't do any work AND the entire world knows that I never wrote a single post for a business whose only purpose was to blog.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#86

Post by greglindahl »

ekanes wrote: post #83
greglindahl wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's often the case that "founder" is a label which a company might agree to add or subtract from various people. As an example, there are tons of startups where not everyone who was there on day 0 is called "founder".

That is correct. Founder has to do with risk. If you are paid from the start, you're probably not a founder.

I know a lot of founders who got paid from the start. That's not the only way that there's risk.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#87

Post by erikb »

gumby wrote: post #60
erikb wrote: post #4

This is a very important lesson for Michael Arrington and many people reading this can learn from it without losing too much emotions or money themselves: Someone, who claims this to be a cofounder of your business even once, is not your friend! Don't support their claims, don't pity them. They try to exploit you. This kind of person is really good at keeping you emotionally hooked, and therefore even let you find ex…

Is the same true of Musk who was an A round investor in a company already founded by Eberhard and Tarpenning?

I would argue that without Musk's PR Tesla would be worth not 10% of what it's worth today. So yeah, he probably earned his seat at the time. I wasn't there though, so can't make a final judgement.

Btw putting in work to earn one's place is something completely different from letting someone else work and simply claim the success. At least from my perspective.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#88

Post by birken »

cocktailpeanuts wrote: post #84
birken wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW I never said anything about the guy deserving the title of co-founder or not. Arrington is claiming the guy had literally nothing to do with Techcrunch, which is directly at odds with the one piece of information we know: the guy owned 10% of Techcrunch. As for the co-founder title, my point is if you are investing in some business because an advisor is either a real co-founder or a fake co-founder of Techcrunch…

> And yes, it is pathetic if somebody is claiming a bunch of credit for something they didn't do. But it is also pathetic to give 10% of your business to somebody who did nothing (assuming the blog post is accurate) This happens very frequently and that's why there are systems like vesting. So you can't say it's "pathetic" to give away 10% to someone who didn't do any work. It's more of a system failure, or you suffe…

I feel pity for the older and more experienced founder who (allegedly) took advantage of the younger and naive one. But I also feel pity for the younger founder who was exploited and didn't know any better.

Maybe it is more pitiful than pathetic for the older and wiser businessman to (allegedly) take advantage of a younger and more naive person. But it is most certainly pathetic for somebody to give up 10% of their company for nothing, whether it is by being tricked or by being bullied or whatever.

That isn't a judgement on how common or uncommon this situation is, nor how intelligent either party is, nor on their value as a person. And perhaps we interpret the meaning of the word differently, but to me it means simply evoking pity.

The irony that this post itself might be interpreted as pathetic is not lost on me, but I think it is far more pedantic than pathetic so at least I have that going for me.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#89

Post by erikb »

ktamura wrote: post #7

>As a final note, I want to add that if anyone was a “cofounder” of TechCrunch it was Heather Harde. She joined in 2006 but she was in the trenches with the team until the very end, working 20 hour days, sacrificing her personal life and giving everything she had to make the company what it was. Heather never sells herself like Keith does, but she should. Unlike Keith, she helped build that company, and gave way more…

Sorry but no.

(a) If you did even 75% of what you just described you did more than many founders do.

(b) just because one is a founder one doesn't have magically more energy than other humans.

(c) just because one is a founder doesn't magically mean one earns a bigger share of the success. An early employee shares most of the cost (time spent, fears, real danger of having no money next month, possible conflicts with the law) but doesn't get that much of a share when getting rich. Idolizing this economically unreasonable situation doesn't make it better.

(d) I'd say the best enterpreneurs enjoy the thrill. So they actually go through a lot less negative stress than their employees.

Re: The Real History of TechCrunch

#90

Post by EGreg »

tptacek wrote: post #77
berberous wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While not one of the original co-founders, Musk has devoted enormous amounts of time, money and energy into Tesla since nearly the beginning, which I think makes him close enough to a co-founder. If you read Arrington’s post, he even says the same about Heather —- not technically a co-founder but one in practice given the amount of work she put in. The guy he is calling out is alleged to have put zero time or money i…

I had no idea until this thread that Elon Musk hadn't been with Tesla from the beginning. I presume reasonable people can disagree, but, no, I don't think leading someone's A round, even if you take an operational role at some point afterwards, makes you a "cofounder".

Agreed.

This is kind of like Warren Buffett taking over Berkshire Hathaway.

But now Musk is definitely the face and head of the company same as Buffett. That is what counts for most people after everything is said and done.

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