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

A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

centernetworks.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 124 posts

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#81

Post by elmomalmo »

xsmasher wrote: post #64
bad_user wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess I'm a flake - hey, what can I say; I get bored easily and feel the need to switch projects often, especially when the project enters maintenance mode. I also have a free advice to entrepreneurs - since I'm working remotely as I don't live in the US, I have to be much better / work much harder than US developers, just so I can take home barely the minimum U.S. salary in this industry. I also don't get any equi…

>I get bored easily and feel the need to switch projects often, especially when the project enters maintenance mode. Points for honesty, but I'm wary of any dev who says that. How do you know what maintainable code is if you never stick around for the maintenance?

In my experience, if you switch projects regularly you become increasingly dependent on your network of previous bosses and colleagues for future gigs. It's stands to reason that you will want to do the best job you can, produce the best code you can so that you have a better chance that you when you leave, you depart from colleagues that will be eager to work with you again in future.

Getting bored easily and professionalism are not mutually exclusive.

Edit: Grammar

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#82

Post by marcamillion »

robryan wrote: post #80
marcamillion wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps, but as far as I understand it...they are compensated at a pittance with the hope that after 3 - 5 years they can leave with a nice payout and move on to 'bigger' and better. I guess my point is, this is why you should be careful who you commit to slave for (e.g. a boss that expressly says that they expect you to work like a slave) because at the end of the day - if the business ever turns down you are just a…

What do you suggest then? They carry the employees even though it is no longer economically viable?

Not in the least. I think Jason did the fiscally prudent thing. He has a fiduciary responsibility to his shareholders to respond in the way he did. Very tough call, but no doubt the necessary call to make, if he wants to turn Mahalo into a going concern.

I suggest that he doesn't go around bragging about how he only wants 'winners' and he expects everybody to give 80 hour weeks and all that non-sense. Giving someone free food, and a 'free chef', doesn't make up for demanding 80-hour weeks no matter what they tell you.

I think he should just shut up, and set an example through deeds - because at the end of the day, 10% of the staff can (and should) get cut when revenue tanks. Acting like it won't happen and they will have a big payday if the company gets bought or goes public is disingenuous at best, and deceitful/fraudulent at worst.

That being said, I don't think he should discourage people from working that long - on the occasion when they have a deadline to hit or something.

But just be more responsible with the rhetoric, is all I am saying. These are people with families that are likely depending on their livelihood.

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#83

Post by marcamillion »

jasonmcalacanis wrote: post #60
staunch wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You like brutal honesty and you put yourself out there, so I think it's fair to ask you. Why don't you leave your role at Mahalo and do what you're the absolute best at? (TWiST, LAUNCH Conf, TC competitor)? Plenty of people can do a video eHow, but almost no one else could rival TC. It seems like a pride/ego/money thing from the outside. Is it something else?

Well, I really believe in the mission to build a site that helps people learn anything... and I believed in human-powered search before that (and still do to be honest). I've got the education bug, and I want to take the promise we all see in things like Lynda.com and Kahn Academy and scale it into a brand as big as Google or Wikipedia. LAUNCH, Angel investing and This Week in Startups are all fun, but they are not a…

Jason...some constructive feedback:

Perhaps you shouldn't try to be 'everything to everybody'. I might not be your demographic, but whenever I think of learning I never think of Mahalo.

I would say choose one vertical that you can conquer - from an education play - and conquer it. Then branch out horizontally.

You can't beat Lynda.com, Khan Academy and every other learning site at the same time. Take it one vertical at a time and come up with a unique value proposition.

Lynda.com was the first mainstream internet video portal to make programming/technical tutorial videos and charge for them.

People don't go to Khan for the quality of the videos (i.e. fancy production and cameras), it is because he has an interesting way of explaining complex topics - and he focuses on the content (not himself).

Those are not very easy to beat, because they have already achieved Product/Market fit.

Unfortunately, you guys are still struggling to find yours.

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#84

Post by praptak »

moultano wrote: post #75
sofakeekafos wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's being lionized on HN for making money, while he's polluting the written heritage of the human race. Not a chance I will take it elsewhere. He needs to be called out, to his face, as does anybody who thinks he deserves HN's respect.

Mostly I see people expressing sympathy for a guy who had a really bad day (and a newsworthy one.) And if you think mahalo is polluting the written history of the human race, then boy do I ever have some spam to show you. Mahalo may not be the best, but it certainly isn't the worst.

"And if you think mahalo is polluting the written history of the human race, then boy do I ever have some spam to show you."

GP's point: X are spammers and get undeserved respect on HN. Your response: there are worse spammers. Do the spammers also get undeserved respect?

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#85

Post by andrewvc »

jasonmcalacanis wrote: post #41

1. We're working with the folks impacted to place them at whatever company they would like to join. I'm personally reaching out to folks who might want these fine people. They will all wind up on their feet and be great additions to the vibrant startup scene in Los Angeles. 2. Mahalo is doing amazing videos with experts, but our (text) articles were created by passionate writers who are not necessarily experts. Googl…

Jason, we're currently looking to add a third engineer here at VOKLE in Santa Monica, the work's mostly Ruby / Rails, and we've been looking for someone experienced in that area, but given the quality of the Mahalo engineers I have met, I'm sure they'd have no problem getting up to speed.

I can be emailed at andrew@vokle.com for details.

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#86

Post by danteembermage »

suprgeek wrote: post #42
xutopia wrote: post #6

"Free advice for entitled Gen Y trophy kids: if you spend 12 months at a company over and over you look like a flake." http://twitter.com/#!/Jason/status/12621363849 Or maybe it makes you look like someone who thinks they have better opportunities elsewhere.

Free Advice for opinionated Entrepreneurs - when you have the right to fire anyone at any time; evaluate the person you are hiring on merit and "fit" for the role. Not based on number of past stints or time spent at each company; but mostly do not come off looking like huge hypocrites.

I think this glosses over an important point. Hiring or firing is expensive in opportunity cost (e.g. project delays, disruption to the work environment, morale) and so it makes sense to internalize that cost in a hiring decision. Suppose Person A will provide value Y per year, cost X per year, and turn over in one year costing Z. Person B produces value Y - K, costs X, but will stay for 3. If K < (Z - Z/3) all else equal you'd choose person B. Building a brand that you jump ship for better jobs ought to cost you something, even if that something is much less than the salary you gain not being a gold-watch girl.

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#87

Post by danssig »

rimantas wrote: post #72
jasonmcalacanis wrote: post #41

1. We're working with the folks impacted to place them at whatever company they would like to join. I'm personally reaching out to folks who might want these fine people. They will all wind up on their feet and be great additions to the vibrant startup scene in Los Angeles. 2. Mahalo is doing amazing videos with experts, but our (text) articles were created by passionate writers who are not necessarily experts. Googl…

> Video is the future, and we're going to be the largest > creator of educational videos this year. Oh no. I cannot wait for the video be the past. It may be the best way to teach some things (mainly involving physical activities or physical manipulation of some sort), but for programming topics it most often just waste of time and bandwidth. Why would I want to spend a minute watching someone to type a line of code…

I disagree. For me, I would like to see a world where you could press a button and get a transcript of any video for the times when I don't have the time to dedicate but I would also like the video for those times that I do.

The problem with just reading programming things is you're seeing the final product. If you watch the video there is a better chance that you'll see how the person got to that point.

The thing that always annoyed me about Haskell tutorials, for example, was people would put in all this beautiful code but I couldn't ever make it run. In a video they would probably ran it themselves and I would have been able to see the import statements they were using but not putting in the tutorial (this isn't a problem with Haskell literate programming afaik).

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#88

Post by tristanperry »

ericd wrote: post #79
moultano wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mostly I see people expressing sympathy for a guy who had a really bad day (and a newsworthy one.) And if you think mahalo is polluting the written history of the human race, then boy do I ever have some spam to show you. Mahalo may not be the best, but it certainly isn't the worst.

Borderline stuff may actually be worse than blatant crap, because the borderline stuff is harder to classify as crap.

Borderline stuff might be useful to some extent, to a minority of people. Blatant crap is - well - blatant crap with no use to anyone.

I accept your point about it being harder to classify, but I don't see how the SE's job being harder can equate to slightly useful content being worse than outright spam.

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#89

Post by tristanperry »

YooLi wrote: post #5
justinchen wrote: post #2

I think this only the beginning of the bad news due to this algo change. There are many legitimate businesses that have been seriously impacted by traffic drops and we'll probably see many more layoffs and budget cuts.

Out of curiosity, can you name some of the legitimate businesses that were affected? I thought the algo only targeted content farms and sites that regurgitated other peoples content.

http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4261944.htm http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4273051.htm http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4274857.htm http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4272916.htm

/\ For non-URLed discussion of dozens or possibly hundreds of legit sites which were hit.

Today's Wired article gives some more specific examples:

http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/03/google-spam-side-effe...

Re: A Week After Google Changes Algo, Mahalo Fires 10% of Staff

#90

Post by bootload »

S_A_P wrote: post #13

Could someone tell me more about this Jason Calacanis fellow. He seems to be a very polarizing figure on this site. Really all I know is that he seemed to have a falling out with Michael Arrington and alot of articles seem to mention him in a slightly negative light. Is there some reason for this, and no I'm not trying to troll.

"... Could someone tell me more about this Jason Calacanis fellow. ..."

If you listen to others explain who Calcanis is you'll get what people think he is. Instead listen to this interview (and read the show notes), on Stack Overflow podcast, "Podcast #56 Jeff Atwood" ~ http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/06/podcast-56/

He came across as smart, funny and determined. It's his determination that struck me the most.

Post reply on HN