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Layoffs at Block

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Re: Layoffs at Block

#981

Post by socksy »

heathrow83829 wrote: post #963
KittenInABox wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like the idea that X doesn't owe you Y is fundamentally at odds with the fact that humans are a cooperative species and survive the best when they are cooperating. A choir can hold a note together because individuals can stop singing to breathe, safely covered by peers who will take their turn to breathe later. What is the point of organizing socially if not for the benefit of all society members? I know we ha…

that's not the job of a company. companies are suposed to be profit centered, their purpose is to make money. what you're talking about is the role of government. govt should be supporting policies like you are suggesting, by for example allowing for universal basic income or uniersal basic land or services, etc.

Why? This is asserted throughout this HN thread as an obvious truism, but it seems precipiced on some dramatic right wing free market concept of how the world works that I can't tell is coming from the libertarians of hacker news, or is some kind of USA concept.

Why should society let the concept of a company exist if it is actively detrimental to society at large, for the gain of a very few?

Re: Layoffs at Block

#982

Post by bluecheese452 »

groundzeros2015 wrote: post #339
mempko wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excuse me for making some pretty sharp statements. Twitter is objectively a worse product now. Musk is a deeply uncreative person who doesn't seem to actually like people and attracts people to him that are the same way. This shows in his truly uninspired products. Tesla is way behind the Chinese now. xAI is a copy cat. SpaceX seems to be taking old Soviet ideas. Musk I go on?

> Musk is a deeply uncreative person Do you have a portfolio or something you can share? Someone can have negative character traits and we don’t have to pretend they are no longer skilled.

Do you have a source for your post?

Re: Layoffs at Block

#983

Post by frankzinger »

jckahn wrote: post #838
skywhopper wrote: post #833

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, if AI were truly revolutionary, those developers would all be twice as productive. So why would you fire them?

Because productivity doesn't scale linearly with quantity of developers. There's a point where it plateaus or even descends as quantity of developers goes up.

The quantity of devs is not changing though. If AI really makes the existing devs more productive then the plateau should become higher.

Re: Layoffs at Block

#984

Post by frankzinger »

raincole wrote: post #840
skywhopper wrote: post #833

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, if AI were truly revolutionary, those developers would all be twice as productive. So why would you fire them?

Because Block is a mature company now and they don't need the extra productivity. It's not just better for Block but also for the whole society that these developers leave for more innovating companies. AI writes code. It doesn't fix organizational problems.

But there were no organisational problems according to Jack. Also do you really believe Block has reached peak productivity? Does any company ever reach it?

Re: Layoffs at Block

#985

Post by groundzeros2015 »

bluecheese452 wrote: post #982
groundzeros2015 wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Musk is a deeply uncreative person Do you have a portfolio or something you can share? Someone can have negative character traits and we don’t have to pretend they are no longer skilled.

Do you have a source for your post?

A source for what? Are we pretending Elon is not one of the most successful promoters of new ventures?

Re: Layoffs at Block

#986

Post by leoqa »

orphea wrote: post #976
leoqa wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m in big tech and use AI extensively, namely to do the same amount of output but in 1-2 hours a day. Been spending a ton of time on my side projects though.

Yep. I don't understand "Look at me! With AI I can do 10x work now". Like congrats, your prize is 10x work and new baseline expectations.

The higher velocity ends up bottlenecking on actual product decisions, deployments, testing etc. Before AI was generally blocked on the design approval, PR cycles, flaking tests etc. AI just helps me endure the pain of legacy code easier.

In my own personal projects I’m flying with AI. I know what I’m doing, I know how I would implement the code. Now I can just save the labor of typing the boilerplate.

Re: Layoffs at Block

#987

Post by Skunkleton »

abeppu wrote: post #643
Skunkleton wrote: post #552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience is that "asking staff for ideas" does not lead to successful products. Sometimes, sure, but in general it does not.

I've never seen a roadmap planning process that didn't involve some component of asking departments and teams what needs to be done. To the extent you have successful products, it's because you have product managers and engineers and data scientists and depending on the product, integration/forward deployed staff. These should be the people with a view to how the product needs to meet the needs of future customers, t…

This depends on your goals. If your goal is to drive efficiency into your processes, drive down tech debt, or fix pain points for customers of your existing products, sure. Most people at a your company with have thoughts, and lots of them will have good ideas.

If your goal is to pivot the company into new verticals, or to develop an entirely new product, then "asking staff for ideas" isn't a likely way to succeed.

Re: Layoffs at Block

#988

Post by 1123581321 »

rswail wrote: post #789
acjohnson55 wrote: post #746

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but the purpose of a company is not to employ people, it is to make money. The employment is a means to an end. If the money continues to flow without the people, that is better. I can imagine creating a system designed to allocate profits to a broader set of stakeholders, but that's not the system we have.

It's called a co-op.

You haven’t seen toxic work culture until you’ve seen a co-op reduce its size (or rather, tighten the circle of distributions.)

Re: Layoffs at Block

#989

Post by ezfe »

fireant wrote: post #970
ezfe wrote: post #568

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Voluntary severance/ERO is possible without a bad culture. I’ve seen it done, people love it.

Doesn't that make people with best opportunities (most skilled workers) leave and people with least opportunities (least skilled workers) stay? Personally if I was offered 6+ months of severance I just couldn't justify staying even in the best companies I've been at.

Yes but usually that’s fine because you structure it to happen over a timeframe that you (the company) chooses based on the person.

Re: Layoffs at Block

#990

Post by littlexsparkee »

geraneum wrote: post #696

If the cuts were not due to AI, what benefit does it provide to claim that it was? To be clear I’m not saying it was AI. I just wonder, why come out and say it like that? What’s the incentive vs. other reasons?

herd effect (doesn't stand out, everyone's using it), 'forward-thinking' i.e. preventing ostensible future problem rather than admitting fault of overhiring or bad mgmt/initiatives, juices stocks, keeps wages down and employees in line, if no ability or opportunity to expand (market saturated or bad biz outlook ahead) it gives cover to scale down labor force
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